* From Banham to Joburg

Reyner Banham is definitely one of the most influential architectural/urban theorist for me. The book on 4 ecologies of LA is particularly brilliant.

The starting point is to see the city as systems, for him, ecologies. He sees how landscape (nature) sets the datum for the city, and how artificial interventions (man-made) interpret and explore that landscape. From the urban systems, architecture is not singular incidents but a part of that ecology. It’s quite simple really.

What is important is this way of thinking ‘city as ecologies’ makes situations and mechanisms of the city ‘mappable’ and identifiable. Seemingly dispersed incidents start to connect visually, physically or conceptually. This method is particularly significant in its time. In 1971, Paris still taught beaux-arts and London AA students were drawings timetables for revolutions. Koolhaas’ AA graduation project ‘Exodus’ was made the year after (1972). Exodus was one of the few architectural projects at the time which wanted to address architecture and the world through design and scenario. Banham’s take on LA was comparatively way more advanced and liberated from European’s old schools. Above all, the entry of ‘ecology’ is the entry of urban discourse in architecture discipline. Banham’s 4 ecologies were ‘still’ the guidelines when I researched in LA in 1998 with Stan Allen (now dean in Princeton). I guess after Banham there have not been better didactic methods in understanding urban systems of LA.

I think about cities in systems, ie. ecologies. But when it goes with Joburg, suddenly one lacks nature to set the datum. In Joburg, my datum is mining belt, Apartheid and architectural/urban theoretical backbones of Apartheid’s spatial organizations (garden city, modernist functional zoning etc). This is evident in my thesis at the Berlage Institute.

It is very interesting to compare Cape Town to Joburg in ecological terms. Cape Town’s racial, social and economic divides have not changed as visibly/physically as in Joburg. My assumption is that nature (sea and Table Mt) sets too strong of a datum for Cape Town’s urbanization to mutate substantially. Whereas in Joburg, datum is artificial; rules can be bent and re-interpreted. It’s very interesting.

So in the way, from this way of reading the ecologies of these 2 cities, I am assuming this: Joburg has more potential to overcome spatial apartheid than Cape Town. And the next hypothesis is: so if Joburg’s datum is Apartheid’s design tactics (garden city, zoning etc), in order to undermine spatial apartheid, these datum’s have to be intervened or destroyed. This hypothesis is in my Joburg text to you. This is a thesis, which can take at least 4 years to pursue, and for a city, definitely will take more than decade(s) to overcome. I hope for an open Joburg, but if the enemy is not identified, it will be hard to propose the right strategy, especially for a city of such a scale.

Now think again, who will be able to make a difference in such a big scale? Politicians. Not architects. Those who have the instruments do not have the knowledge and courage; those who have the vision do not have the power. What’s new? If architectural proposals are too implicit and indirect, maybe other medium could be more expressive and efficient. This is why architects have to be public intellectuals. Being ‘public’ is as important as being ‘intellectual’. The days of making nice little projects in one’s little studio is over. Architects have to have public voices especially when the scale of problem is urban.