On Mike Davis' text ' Sand, Fear, and Money in Dubai'

Dubai…now where do I start? Like mentioned in my previous blog, I am not a fan, at all. Gigantism is the word that pretty much sums it up for me. Having said Las Vegas is probably one of the last honest places on earth, Dubai is exactly the opposite, it is probably one of the least honest places to be. As Hickey said, in Vegas it is all ‘about stakes, not status’, in Dubai it is the other way around. No one cares about the stakes as it is anticipated that everyone has, excuse my French, shit loads of money anyway. It is all about status and social hierarchy. John Doe is not going to play in the same room as Sheik Such-and-such because this would offend him as he is superior to the ordinary people. There are no hidden doors to exclusive rooms in Vegas according to Hickey, well, I suppose in Dubai they are everywhere, just not hidden, but with a big fat sign on them probably saying something like: 'Ordinary, poor people stay out, we do not want you here, you are not worth it. Go do something else, somewhere else; oh and please do not touch the golden door knob it might get dirty'. I mean seriously, you can buy bars of solid gold at the airport. Sure, you totally need to be able to buy one at the airport shopping centre. Who does not know the feeling when stepping out of a plane desperate to buy a gold bar as soon as possible because, apparently, they do not sell them on planes. Davis' description of Dubai being a

 

                                                                 'vast gated community'

is very accurate I think.

I like how Mike Davis describes the possibility to fulfil childhood fantasies by staying at the Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea hotel to feel like Captain Nemo and then presumably takes the mickey out of it (or does he not?) by saying that the structure is situated under water and is protected against

                                         ‘terrorist submarines as well as missiles and aircraft’.

I mean, it most definitely is true and not a joke, it is Dubai afterall, but it just sounds really ridiculous to protect a hotel from hostile submarines. Although, given its war zone adjecent location, Dubai probably does have reason to fear attacks and for being quite paranoid. If you have done something incredibly bad, let’s say…fund terrorists for example, you might have the feeling that you better want to look over your shoulder twice. According to Davis

‘all roads lead to Dubai when it comes to [terrorist] money’ and it is the ‘financial hub for Islamic militant groups’.

Looking at the history of Dubai, which is currently the second largest building site in the world according to Davis’ text, it actually started out as a rather small fishing and pearl diving town before oil was found and it changed dramatically. Davis describes Dubai as an

                                         ‘enchanted forest of six hundred skyscrapers’

with a

                                   ‘new Tower of Babel’ an ‘impossible half-mile high’.

For me this is a kind of ‘Hadidopolis’ (I am referring to my previous blog on the interview of Zaha Hadid by Jonathan Meades) come true, just not designed by Zaha. But it is the same ‘no looking back, do whatever you want as long as it is bigger than everything else or stands out in another way’ kind of architecture. I totally agree with Mike Davis that Dubai consists of

                                    ‘over-the-top. Monumental architecture’

that does have a bitter aftertaste, not only because it can in some way be seen as a

                                                ‘reminiscent of Albert Speer’

and his architecture. Back than it was all about big, bold and eternal buildings as well, trying to showcast nothing else then power. I think the Sheik too thrives after eternal life through these buildings. He wants to be

                                                  ‘number one in the world’.

And as

‘Architectural gigantism has always been a perverse symptom of economies in speculative overdrive’

it is no wonder that Dubai has become a paradise of consumption and is one of the best examples of

                                                            ‘hypercapitalism’.

Davis describes this forest of buildings as an

                                         ‘eerie chimera of all kinds of fantasies’.

He is referring to the replicas of famous buildings like the Eiffel Tower or the Pyramids of Giza. They are actually planning a replica of the Taj Mahal…four-times its original size. Yeah, I mean the original one is a bit small afterall…SERIOUSLY????I know Vegas has replicas of the Eiffel Tower etc. too, but they are actually smaller than the original and they were not built to make them better or more famous than the original just by making them insanely huge. I t was just a fun thing to attract people when they are able to go from ‘Paris’ to ‘Venice’ by foot in 20 minutes. All these huge buildings have been built over the last 50+ years, after the first ever concrete building was built in 1956. And just for the record: this happened before this country even abolished slavery (well officially at least), which happened 7 years later. This brings me to the next thing that really winds me up about this place: Human Rights. They are pretty much non-existent. In Dubai

                                       ‘trade unions and most strikes are illegal’

and would be dealt with by riot police.  To me this is really shocking and alarming. According to Davis, the

‘building boom is carried on the shoulders of an army of poorly paid Pakistanis and Indians’.

Now, in my blog about Alain Badiou’s text, I said that I am fine with capitalism as long as it does not get too extreme, and asked the question what too extreme was. Well, Dubai is a pretty good example of the too extreme.

Human Rights Watch accused the Emirates of

                                           ‘building prosperity on ‘forced labour’

in 2003. The workers are being

                                      ‘superexploited’ and are generally ‘invisible’

to the visitors. They are hidden. Just like the gruesome instigators who built up a

                      ‘sinister sex trade’ on ‘kidnapping, slavery and sadistic violence’,

all hidden behind a glamorous façade. There is probably no one buying teddy bears for these hookers.

This brings me back to the comparison of Vegas and Dubai. Remember what I talked about in my blog about Vegas and that Dave Hickey said that nearly everyone wakes up happy in Las Vegas? Well here is what one of the labourers from Dubai told the New York Times:

‘I wish the rich people would realize who is building these towers. I wish they could come and see how sad this life is’.

To me Vegas and Dubai are not the same nor even similar. One is a place where people go to have fun and let themselves go. Everyone is the same and is having a good time. The other place is judging everyone and everything and all the glamour is just the façade for a very ugly truth.

                                                      ‘Speer meets Disney’

is probably the best description I have ever seen about Dubai, well done Mr Davis!



 

 

 

On Dave Hickey's 'A home in the neon'

Vegas baby!!! A loud voice screamed in my head and movie snippets from ‘Hangover‘ in my mind’s eye made me giggle before I even started to read the text as I knew it would be about ‘Sin City’, the ‘entertainment capital of the world’, the ‘capital of second chances’, in one word: Vegas! Now, I might seem overly excited but to be honest before I read the text I thought of Las Vegas as fake, a pool of sins and lost souls and most of all, I thought it was actually just a tiny city with nothing else then casinos and hotels. I did not realise that it is in fact the 31^st-most populous city in the USA. I was not thinking about the people who live there all year, who have a house, two kids, a dog and a white picket fence. I though Las Vegas was one big street with neon signs stuck above each other to each side of it. I must say, I was clearly wrong.
It does not happen very often that a text can change my mind on something by 180 Degrees. But this has happened for some reason. I do not exactly know if it was his style of writing that convinced me or also that I read the text about Dubai (see my next blog), which is said to be the eastern equivalent to Vegas, right after reading this one, and I despise Dubai from the bottom of my heart and therefore funnily enough tried to defend Las Vegas against this juxtaposition.
I love the story-like atmosphere of the Hickey text. One can clearly sense that it is his very personal view on the city. He shares his memories of his childhood when he would go to Las Vegas with his dad and his jazz musician friends, especially Shelton, who was able to get

                                                             ‘steady gigs’

much to the envy of his father. One of the main aspects of Las Vegas according to Dave Hickey is that everybody is the same. You can walk the streets in your

                                                          ‘choice of apparel’

without getting the ‘What-the-hell-are-you-wearing-look. Vegas has a

                                                    ‘flat-line social hierarchy’,

it just does not matter if you are a professor, rock star or Aunt Sue from Minnesota. Everyone is sitting at the same tables, playing the same games, getting the same odds. I would say, Las Vegas is probably one of the last honest places on earth. What you see is what you get. I like that. He also notes that it is one of the few places on earth were the

‘vast majority of the population arises every morning absolutely delighted to have escaped Hometown, America and the necessity of chatting with Mom over the back fence.’

I think he has definitely a point there. Where else does a majority of people wake up each morning, happy to start the new day? Las Vegas seems to be some kind of magical playground for adults. It is like back when we were kids and got to go to one of these huge barn-like places with mountains of toys, games and well, other children. We spent the whole day playing on every playground equipment there was until we found the one that we stuck to and just did not want to leave when it was time to go home. Mum and Dad would sit somewhere else, talking to some other Mums and Dads. We were kind of on our own, and we loved it! Vegas is somewhat alike. Hordes of people inside an artificially lit room with games in it. You would try them all out until you get stuck to one of them and beg your friends for ‘5 more minutes and just one last try’ before they drag you out.

I also agree with Hickey that Vegas is probably the only place where a group of grown, heterosexual men would have some kind of a sleep over party by sharing a room, no one feels weird about this ( it is like in football when it is totally acceptable for a guy to slap another guys butt...it is like in games everything is allowed). Everyone is just there to have a good time, to let yourself go, be a grown up child for a couple of nights before real life grabs you with its cold fingers and drags you back to your 9 to 5 desk job.

Now, apparently there are only two rules in Vegas:

                             ´1) Post the odds, and 2) Treat everybody the same’.

As Hickey describes in his text especially Easterners have a problem with this as they are just not used to the absent of a hierarchy. What brings me back to Dubai but I will elaborate on that more in my next blog. Just so much: Hickey says they are desperately searching for the

                                                               ‘secret Vegas’,

the exclusive Vegas, the hidden door that would get them to the room where only their kind would play. But this does not exist according to Hickey.

                                            ‘Vegas is about stakes, not status’.

But this apparently

                                               ‘offends their sense of order’.

Well, it certainly does not offend mine, and I think it is great.
Oh and I LOVED the story about the teddy bear; it actually made me laugh so much. The legendary Herr Teddy being bought by some lad for a hooker who would then bring it back the next morning for cash and then the next night this ‘game’ would repeat (I just feel for the poor teddy who never finds a nice place to live).  Well there you go, ‘Sin City’ can still live up to its name. I bet the groups of men do not only come here for the gambling. But then, what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas (except for STDs guys, that’s following you home, just saying)…

On the text 'The First Great Female Architect' by Jonathan Meades (on Zaha Hadid)

'You know, it's those buildings that always look like a UFO has landed in the neighbourhood.' This is how I describe Zaha Hadids' work to my non architecture friends whenever there is a moment that I  talk about buildings, architecture and other interesting things that go on in my life. As you can probably sense from that statement, I am not a big fan of Zahas' work. Although I must admit that I admire her and think she deserves to be, and is, a famous architect, not a 'starchitect' (what a horrible word indeed), but I will come back to that later. First of all, I don't actually know what to make of the Meades's text. On one hand I find it quite amusing in what way he is articulating his views on Zaha, on the other hand I find it somewhat strange that he attacks her by saying that she cannot express herself and then writes a text himself in which he uses phrases like 'verruca-like jargon'. For me the text was very hard to read and I caught myself reading every other paragraph twice and then realised I did not memorise what I just read. I think he tries too hard to sound eloquent which makes it annoying. I also think that he very clearly had prejudice against her from the beginning, he had a preconceived opinion and in fact tells us very little about her views on things, either because she really did not say anything and was failing to express her thoughts or because he did not want to understand her and just took those sentences and gestures of Zaha that suited his arguments. I'd say it was probably the latter. In that sense it is not written particularly well but I do agree with a lot of things he says (this is, if I understood him right).
My impression on Zahas' buildings associates well with Meades' description of the factory-like atmosphere in her office. I read somewhere that no one actually speaks to each other and I can only assume how it must be to work for her in this cold Zaha world. Just like her buildings do not communicate with their surrounding in the sense that they are often completely misplaced. I think of them as cold and despressing objects to work/live in. He mentioned that Zaha has

                                             ' style all right, but not a style' .

Now having said that I do not particularly like Zahas' work , I still disagree with Meades on this point. Although her buildings are all different in a way, her style is distinctive to me. It always looks futuristic and sort of left in the sun for too long, hence the structure melted. Zahas' buildings lack corners in general, everything is rounded,everything! (I mean seriously, is she affraid of the devil or something? Because as we all know since Goethes' 'Faust' the devil can only enter through corners...)
In the text Meades asks the question why Zaha still does not have any buildings in London although her office is situated there. I think it has nothing to do with the fact that she is a woman but because she does not care the slightest about history and context. And this is just simply impossible in a city like London (fortunately!!!). How can someone just be so ignorant? She clearly has an attitude there. I absolutely loved how Meades talks about her view on this and how he describes

                                        'Hadidopolis' (I love this, ha! Genius!)

and how a whole city with her buidlings would be less disturbing than a single one in an

'already established environment where the clash of idioms is potentially deafening'. 

I agree with that, although I think it would be a very unaccommodating,cold,weird place to live in. He then says that

'no matter what she says, each of her buildings is sensitive to ist context. Being sensitive does not mean being passive. It is not a question of taking a cue from the immediate surroundings, but of making an appropriate intervention that changes those surroundings, which creates a new place and better space.'

Now, I do not agree with Meades on this last bit. I honestly do not see how the majority of her buildings create either new places nor better spaces.
I think the main thing about Zaha, the thing that makes her famous, is that she wants to show off at all cost. No one would notice her work if it was not this displaced in its environment. But sometimes this is just what gets you famous in the end: just scream the loudest so everyone notices you.
As I said in the beginning, I do think she deserves to be famous and to some extend I do admire her because I really give her credit for standing by her design when others changed theirs according to a specific style that was popular during the time (like Leon Krier who Meades mentions in his text), and for being an inspiration for all female architects out there. Meades is right, there are not that many female architects around, particularly famous ones. But she does have a name and I have seen some of her work in an exhibition from when she was still a student at the AA and I must admit, being a student myself, it looks increadible. As much as I do not like her style, she does have one and as we all know: There is no accounting for taste.

 

On Alain Badiou's 'This crisis is the spectacle:Where is the real?'

Crisis, crisis, the crisis is everywhere!!! Not a single day without hearing this word, it seems not even hiding in a cave in a forgotten forest would free you from getting it rubbed in. You cannot flee from it, you cannot hide and you got to have an opinion on it-and it better be a clever one even if you don't have a clue about what's going on. To be honest, just like Alain Badiou also mentioned in his text,I don't have a clue and I tried to pretend I do, trust me, but I don't. All I know is, banks go bust because they don't seem to know how to do their bloody job but don't get punished, instead managers get bonuses. I actually looked up the definition of it in the dictonary because I always thought you get these when you have done well, silly me, but it turned out I wasn't actually stupid as the definition of bonus (payment) is as follows:

' sum of money added to a person’s wages as a reward for good performance'

Right. Well done you banker. Have you lost a Billion Pounds? Never mind, there you go, have your bonus payment of 250,000 and go on a nice holiday to recover from all the stress.
Badiou talks about this as well and I totally agree with him that it is absurd that governments all over the world save the banks with amounts of money we cannot even picture in our heads whereas the general public has to not only endure this but also pay for it with higher taxes. But as soon as the subject of education and building or improving schools and universities comes up, the government says 'Sorry folks, we'd love to but there is just no money for it.'
I like how Badiou is describing everything like a scene from a disaster movie and how he is talking about how very low loans have become a sort of 'designer drug'. Overall I like his style of writing and do agree with a lot of things he says, although I do not share his love of the Marxist way of life. I do agree with him that capitalism can, and in fact does, trigger greed but I also think that it is the motor of our economy. Much like an old car, the motor inside might constantly make problems but without it the car would not be able to run at all. I do not think the basic principle of capitalism is such a bad thing at all. For example: Mr X comes up with an idea and starts to produce it on a small scale. He pays, let's say, 20 Pounds for all the parts and for whatever equpiment he needs to produce it. He then sells it for 25 Pounds and 'Ta-da!' he made 5 Pounds profit. For me that is totally acceptable as long as it does not get too extreme. But that's the crux. At what point does it get too extreme? Who determines what too extreme is? For me it becomes a problem when something it is getting mass produced in some far away country to keep production costs at a minimum and the John Doe who has set up his small buisiness has so much success with his idea that he hires managers and CEOs. Or in other words: When the person who has once started to produce whatever his idea was, is no longer managing, controling and working for his own firm anymore. When there are managers who do everything for him and the owner as a private person is no longer taking a personal risk. This actually brings me back to the bankers and the crisis and how Bardiou says that capitalism is

'devastating in its becoming' and 'irrational in its essence'. 

Fair enough. But is capitalism to blame for this crisis? In fact, are bankers even capitalists? Now this might seem strange but if you look up the basic meaning of capitalism and what a capitalist is, you will find that it is someone who is the owner of the means of production, in other words, someone who has machines. These machines are powered by the workers who are employed by the owner of the machines and who produce an added value. The owner, or capitalist, is responsible for his employees and machines and is taking risks with his personal assets. If something goes wrong he would lose everything, so he is carrying the responsibility and risk. Moreover the workers would not have any work without his ideas and machines. I think it would be fair enough to say that it is fine that he gets the profit. Furthermore he would probably invest part of this profit in his buisiness to enhance it. Let's now take a look at the finance world: the bankers, the banks etc., can we still say that they are responsible for themselves? Are they taking a personal risk while speculating with crazy amounts of money? I dare to say: No, they do not! If a bank goes bust not an individual person is liable, not an individual person is taking the risk, it is always a bunch of them. None of them is liable with their personal assets. That is the difference.
So I do agree with Badiou that banks should be nationalised or at least be controlled in some way, but I do not think that abandoning capitalism would help.