What is Architecture by Michael Southard

Architecture is old. Old. Like beer making and prostitution old. It is something that has been with us since there was an us. Shelter, dwelling, place making, and architecture were all fused together then – in the old days. Architecture was an unexplainable expression of the people who created it. Now, in the aughties, architecture is not so easily swept under a socio-cultural-politico-economic-anthropological-materialist rug.

Metaphorically speaking.

Something has gotten in between it. Context and structures have drifted apart creating roaming zombies in the place of dwelling. Cosmological order has been attacked by the march of reason, industrialism, Taylorism, and globalization. It is a complicated story involving the suburbs of Levittown, urban renewal, white flight, deindustrialization, Bretton Woods institutions, advances in communication, international travel, nation states, wars, power, and lots of beer and prostitution. Something has happened to architecture. Right?

Is it a case of longing for bygone days that never existed? Was architecture really all that simple way back when? Was the human species any more simple? Yes. No. Both. Contradiction is inherently human and highlights the complexity of the world in which we find ourselves. Talking about architecture is complicated and riddled with contradiction. If trying to dissect it in a straightforward fashion you will be frustrated with inconsistencies. Better to avoid the black and white of what architecture is and embrace a strange narrative that parallels the strangeness of being alive.

Darkness is the proto-genesis of my architecture narrative. In the womb it was dark, warm, and safe. And, inside of the womb, I was inside of me. Also dark, warm, and safe. I was born into a world of enclosure, an echo of the body and the womb. For there to be an inside, a static stable world, there must be an external. A world of light, wind, and flux. This is the beginning of architecture. A world of inborn sensual stimuli. This is the filter by which archetypes arise and go on to inform our emotional impressions of our physical world.

From here, it is all beer and prostitutes.

Overflow by Katelyn Clontz

Heading for the Land of Peace by Fredessa Hamilton

Knowing we’re sitting here on
The eve of his passing
doesn’t help -
doesn’t hurt anymore

Either. Two by two we
drop exhausted. You and
her one night, me and you

Another. It hurts to leave,
it hurts to stay.
Of course you’ll fight not to go.
And you taught us well – our wells so deep -

We won’t stop. But don’t
you always want to see what’s next?
Adventure. A New Deal.

This has been long – there is
nothing like “ready” here.
No, no signal, no sign that says
it’s OK to go. Oh, but
Adventure – A pioneer
Headed for the Land of
Peace. And Love, Daddy.

We Ought to Look Back by Alan Blair

As the close of the decade neared, I felt fairly certain that when the cultural output of the 00’s was totaled and rated it would pale in comparison to my beloved 1990’s. “Things were better in my day! You damned kids and your fancy Facespace and etexts! Who took my Gold Bond Medicated Powder?!“ etc., etc. But when it came time to look back and assess the past ten years of music, film and television, the results were irrefutable: the 00’s was a fantastic decade for the popular arts in America. Moreover, technology made creating and finding that art easier than it’s ever been. Like the 90’s, I feel certain that I’ll continue to mine the depths of the 00’s for the things that I missed my first time around.

In the interest of brevity and in a not-so-subtle nod to a particular popular technology of the new decade, the raves listed below are no more than 140 characters in length. All titles are listed alphabetically so that I can cowardly avoid ranking them. And in the interests of variety and fairness to the other competitors, a certain band has bowed out of the running. Let’s light this candle.

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