Critical Interpretative Layers/

Επίπεδα Κριτικής Ανάλυσης

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5rPbGs1_-0

Manuel de Landa, Capitals and Metropolises.

How should we conceptualize cities?. Where in the continuum between individuals and societies should they be located? This class tackles this question by examining social entities smaller than cities (communities, organizations) as well as larger ones (provinces, nation states). It also introduces a basic typology of urban centers. Cities from ancient times have engaged in two quite different types of activities, one characterized by centralized decision-making, the other by multiple decisions made in a decentralized way. Those functions we associate with the government of cities are of the first type, while those related to trade are of the second type. Some urban centers tend to be dominated by one or another of these types of activities, becoming either the capital or organizing center of a hierarchy of towns, on one hand, or a gateway to foreign markets linked into a transnational network, on the other.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-zWRBGD7ck
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnEj8OL62_I

Manuel de Landa, The Biology of Cities 1 & 2

Urban centers have many different relations with organic entities. First and foremost, towns and cities have always been parasitic on their surrounding countryside for food. As cities develop and outgrow this primary supply zone they reach out to other areas. Some do it through trade, others through colonialism and conquest. Besides food, cities prior to this century also depended on rural areas for their supply of human beings. Not until the 19th. century did urban centers become net producers of people. Before that death rates were always higher than birth rates (at least for the majority of citizens) and most towns depended on a constant stream of rural migrants to grow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etfRE5-YlXs

Geoffry West, Life from Cells to Cities: Are They Sustainable?

a cross-disciplinary and collaborativeproject that examines current environmentalissues and the potential to effect significantchange through critical dialogue and innovative practices.Geoffrey West is the distinguished professor and former president of the Santa Fe Institute. He presents "Growth, Innovation, and the Accelerating Pace of Life from Cells to Cities: Are They Sustainable?"

Contemporary Architectural & Urban Thinking/ Σύγχρονη Αρχιτεκτονική κ' Αστική Σκέψη

http://vimeo.com/43952360

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzlEOp-twlk

OMA, Megalopoli(tic)s

OMA partner Reinier de Graaf gave a lecture at the Berlage Institute about Megalopoli(tic)s.

De Graaf started by arguing that thinking big is compulsory when thinking about 'the green cause'. One needs to think in a global context, like Buckminster Fuller did with his Spaceship Earth and Doxiades' global Ecumenopolis city (1967). By showing different mappings of urban growth, De Graaf showed that the Ecumenoplis is, in fact, not that far way. These developments take place, not in the old Western metropolitan areas, but in the megacities of the South and (Far-)East.

To understand this growth, De Graaf looked at the rise of global economic liberalization. It is generally assumed that this started in the West with the simultaneous election of Margaret Thatcher in the UK and Ronald Reagan in the US. De Graaf argued that it started in China with the coming to power of Deng Xiaoping and the introduction of the ‘Open Door Policy’. De Graaf maintained that economic development is inextricably linked to urbanization, questioning if urbanization is a consequence of economic development or a means to economic development.

The problems that accompany rapid urban growth were historically addressed by (Western) thinkers writing about urbanization, but when Asia became the main setting for urbanization, these Western thinkers ceased thinking and writing about the topic. The visions of tomorrow’s city, are now being seized by consultancy firms. ‘Master plans’ are now created by technology giants like Siemens and home products companies like IKEA.

De Graaf closed his lecture by arguing that the prominence of cities is detrimental to the state of a nation; ‘third world’ cities like Sao Paolo and Mexico City have a GDP as comparable to ‘first world’ countries, such as Sweden and Australia. But these cities still have less political power than their respective nations. While the city (polis) was the birth place of politics, the Megalopolis calls for Megalopolitics…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_JwAamoAeU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSQWS9WcCQs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKvY6iRirJs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvstRTw2aaU&list=PLBED11C5C0A40BC19

Κωνσταντίνος Δοξιάδης

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD3ybaRN-y8

Charles Waldheim, Landscape Urbanism

How 21st century urban planners are challenged by the need to organize not just people but space itself and hence defines a new architectural discourse: landscape urbanism.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-OocuYhclQ

Eduardo Rico, "Relational Urbanism: Models, Cities and Systemic Utopias"

The lecture will describe the practices of Relational Urbanism, where concepts linked to the cybernetics and system theory form the basis of a renewed critical perspective framing associative and digital techniques, moving beyond the false promises of the parameter and the performative design. The turf which Relational Urbanism claims as its own is that of envisaging new regimes of urbanism which derive their raison d???etre from a spatial design rooted in the material and temporal specificities of the territory and where the metabolic nature of the environment is critically balanced with concepts of social and environmental justice, in short, a laboratory for a new critical territorialism.

Eduardo Rico studied civil engineering in Spain and graduated from the AA's Landscape Urbanism program. He is currently a AA Landscape Urbanism Studio Master and has acted as consultant and performed research in the fields of infrastructure and landscape in Spain and the UK. Currently he is involved in the development of infrastructural strategies for large-scale urban projects within the Arup engineering team as well as being part of the collective GroundLab.

Pictorias References / Εικονογραφία

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