Lecture & 'Borat'

This week , I'm gonna write about the linkage between the lecture and 'Borat' , the movie that we watched in the class. The lecture is about simulation , what is real and what is simulated. The boundary of these two words is presently vanishing , people can't figure out what is real and what is not. First , when I watch the movie , I can't understand how these two things , simulation and Borat , are related. But when I watch it further , there is one seen , the weather guy scene , he is talking with empty screen different from the on air one , that's the map and moving graphic on. Borat can't understand what that weather guy is doing because he is looking at the different view from the audience. The audience see the representation of the geography , map , with the simulation of the weather on it. That's all I can see at the first time. When I rethink about it , I found that the movie itself is the simulation of the real situation that can be happen or can't be. In this case , I think it is hardly happen but the film maker try to make us get into it and make us believe that it's happened. The way they make this film , not intently frame our perception for a beautiful scene , makes the audience easily believe that it's happened and blurs the boundary between the truth and fiction. The last thing , in my opinion , I do not like this film , it's not my taste, but at least it makes me realize something , the world is the big scene of endless drama.

Representation of representation

From last week lecture , we discussed about the representation of representation. The quote , "Everytimes people say word , they have image in their head and construct it to be more real." I agree with this quote and have some questions. Why these words represent those things? Is there any relationship , or people just make them up. Where is it from and who control it to be this way? In my opinion , people made a lots of things up , even their language, to communicate and represent something. Further development , the complexity in linguistics field increases , so people use these language , or words , to represent other words. This becomes representation of representation in my opinion. Another question pops up , from the beginning , people made all these things up until repeat the process again , so what is the true word to represent word? May be it's no right answer , I still don't know.

From previous discussion , the representation of representation also relates to the architecture , modern architecture. S.R. Crown Hall , at IIT by Mies van der Rohe, is one of modern architecture that use the representation of the real structure , as the concept of modernism, by the attached elements outside the building. The concept of modernism "All lines of the structure make building stand up" is represented by the structural ornamentation , so this quote , for me , is not really true because all lines is the representation of the structure inside , They don't take the load , the real function of it.

I will end this journal with the quote "Everything is nothing" . Nothing is the truth , they are all construct by human. Do not believe in everything people say.

Manufactured Landscape 2

From last journal , I wrote somethings about Manufactured Landscape , and this week we are assigned to write about what is Non-manufactured landscape , but what I thought is changed from this week lecture. This ,Why Manufactured and Non-manufactured landscape? ,becomes the topic I'm interested in and will write about. Another topic is 'Is our perception framed by political statement?'.

'Why manufactured and non-manufactured landscape?'

First , I thought that manufactured landscape is the landscape that created from any result of manufacture processes and non-manufactured landscape is somethings opposite, but after the last lecture , I found that there are some factors that frame our perception of the nature. Therefore , what I think about manufactured landscape may be wrong , and the following question is 'why we have to follow the definition of something from others and call it as others call?'. This question make the boundary between manufactured and non-manufactured landscape in my thinking disappear because the definition of nature is not the same , so it effects to the definition of the landscape that I mentioned that they are related to each other. It can be different , it can be the same , or it can be anything. Until now , I just can't create my own definition of manufactured and non-manufactured landscape regardless of the framed 'nature' that I was forced to understand.

'Is our perception framed by political statement?'

From the lecture , there is the linkage between political status and the establishment of national park , the framed definition of nature. Nature in government's definition seems to be pure , without human or any artificial things but the real thing is 'not see it doesn't mean it's not there'. This idea controls the way we perceive the world and judge what is nature , what is not and what it should be. As we are designer , the way we perceive nature and use it in our design is important. Just copy , do what others do , or just using the natural material to create the natural sense in the space can make the space meaningless if there is not the strong and real meaning of nature from the designer behind , so the way we perceive the world effects on our design.

Khao Yai National park

MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPE

Manufactured landscape is the documentary film about working of photographer , Edward Burtynsky. In my opinion , its name sounds interesting for me because this name compounds of two words that seem to be opposite, manufacture and landscape. Manufacture is the word about industrial process or producing something by machine , opposite to landscape that seems to be about nature. From the film , two quote I am interested in are :

'landscape from industry' and

'aesthetic or environmental crisis'

'Landscape from industry' is my first focus topic because this film is all about taking photos of landscape from industrial process , recycle process , employees , industrial waste and environmental effect. I think that these photos show the way industry form the new definition of landscape. This kind of landscape is not necessary to be created from nature. It can be indoor or outdoor. It can be created by humans or objects. It can be systematic or unpredictable. It can be good or bad. It can even be construction or destruction. The process of creating manufactured landscape is various and the result is also various.

'Aesthetic or environmental crisis' is my second topic. The photos of manufactured landscape are all beautiful , but I think at the same time , it can warn us about the environmental crisis that we are facing. It makes me think about the way we spend natural resource , the way we do with industrial waste and recycling system , the way our lifestyle change because of industry. There are a lot of warning behind the beautiful picture. I think Burtynsk's photos are more than the photos , more than the art project , they are something that can reflect our surrounding situation and also ourselves.

reference :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufactured_Landscapes

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/edward_burtynsky_on_manufactured_landscapes.html