The Presence of Absence
I
decided to name my blog post “The Presence of absence” because while reading “The
Emergent Rules”, Charles Jencks makes this statement “….these erosions relate
also to that feeling of loss which is a recurring theme within postmodernism:
the ‘presence of the absence’.” At first I had trouble grasping this concept of
the union of this Dualism, You can’t have absence without first having presence
this is true, but to have both seemed like having your cake and eating it to. (Another
unintentional rhymes btw) Here is our cake people (Detroit) Detroit was once the
fourth-largest city in the US, but because of its social and economic decline,
there are places where the architecture serves as relics of the city’s “former
urban glory” These buildings embody the presence of absence because what makes
this architecture so compelling is the discomforting yet stunning wasteland
that is these depopulated cities. When seeing these now desolate, imperfect,
old buildings you sense that this was once a thriving place, a place with
buildings that were beautiful and occupied, a presence. So when looking at
these photos you will see the existence of the nonexistent, the presence of
what is now absent, life. Luckily Detroit is still doing things, even if it
just helping me grasp concepts of postmodern architecture.
Most of this reading was confusing and I look forward to
class tomorrow so we can expand on Jencks in hopes of me grasping the full
article here. I always leave class with a better understanding of what I read
so my next blog will be a fuller, more complete post!
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