[CC]P

site
center 2005
practice
wonderland
urbi/suburbi

research

[C - center]
City centers are contemporary forms of open-program system where public space is partly publicly partly privately owned. Private ownership is manifested through a mode of restriction (capsules), which regulates participants’ behaviour through the mechanisms of representation of power. Space is apparently open, yet the private ownership with private regulations (security services, surveillance systems – cameras and alarms, restrictions of movement, staying and expression…) reduces the public to a flux of functionally defined individuals – users of city infrastructure and/or consumption. City centre redefines the city from a space of free movement and expression into a space of controlled functional behaviour.

[C - city]
Shopping centers are a contemporary form of closed-program system (capsule) where public space is privately owned. Private ownership implies a special regulatory framework which regulates participants’ behaviour in a carefully defined direction, the direction of instant consumption. Space is a hybrid; though a flux of people gives to it the appearance of a public space, the private ownership with private regulations (security services, surveillance systems – cameras and alarms, restrictions of movement, staying and expression…) reduces the public to a flux of functionally defined individuals – consumers. Shopping center redefines the city from a space of free movement and expression into a space of controlled functional behaviour.