Open-up The Potential Contents in Public Space Through The Diagrammatic Way

Shan Shan Jiang

The purpose of the study is to investigate the potential contents within the public space through the diagrammatic way. There are mainly two kinds of figures to describe a space, which presents the interior conditions and the interior movement. Diagram these figures within a space aims to uncover inherent potential movement that previously hidden in its interiority in order to collect the forward-looking thoughts to improve our space. In this research, the interior conditions focus on the objects, the functional division as well as the sound within a space; the interior movement is from the repeated recordation of people movement within a space in every equal interval between a period of time.

The figures are collected from the 5 public sites, including the pure space (the atrium in Buchanan Galleries), the pure object (the banquette in Victoria Shopping Centre), as well as the assemblage of space and objects (refectory in Reid Building, the Basement Floor in GoMA and the Central Station Hall). The initial process is separation and partition of figures. In general, the figures within a space are divided into metaphorical figures and rhetorical figures. As suggested by Eisenman (2004, p.163), a trace represents and records the action inherent in a former or future reality. Recording the traces within a space becomes important. As the traces are not the simulation of reality, they are related to reveal the potential contents in a space.

From studying the people movement patterns, the result indicates its internal relationship with the space layout. Analysis the integrations between people movement and the inserted objects in space becomes the effort to discern the intertwined of diagrams. In this sense, the effort is to determine the heterogeneous mobile situation that occurs and could occur in the public space. Thus, the diagram I as a series of diagrams shows a way to decompose the entwined diagram. The diagram II as the further thinking to determine the heterogeneous movement occur with in the space. It is a model as an assemblage of differences (the various of imcomplete cubes), throughout where I hoped each one would find at least one way to recombine the model – because, in the end, a real community is somewhere you can find your place. In addition, there are some visuals to illustrate some combination ideas.

Eisenman (1999, pp.32-33) argues that a diagrammatic mechanism is needed that will allow for both preservation and erasure and that can simultaneously open up repression to the possibility of generating alternative architectural figures which contain these traces. In another word, in such a diagram, both the specific object and its interiority can be written onto the surface of diagram that has the infinite possibility of inscribing impermanent marks and permanent traces. Then, Hendrix (2006, p.175) support that the interiority of the architecture is prior to its differentiation in signification, as the revealing of the repressed furfural suggests the interiority of architecture as being always already present in absence, as the unconscious. The interiority in space prior to differentiation, which is the already ‘written’. Thus, the absence is in presence. The traces within a space signifies an action is in process. A trace is not a simulation of present, but represents the potential content inherent in the interiority, it is the key to reveal the potential and possible contents that inherent in the space structure. Discovering interiority of space invites to diagram the exist space, as well as separate and partition the collected figures. Making a new diagram is for revealing the potential content, which requires the decomposition of analysed figures. At last, to build the space in other sites becomes the processes of differentiation. Thus, the aim to open up the potential content through analysing the exist

The study suggests a not-presence is a prior condition of presence in space, a space through repetition of difference exists in many sites. The diagram II is a structure of differences, the form indicated the absence, that is, the potential content is in its presence. Through an open-ended modification, the model becomes a place of invention. It demonstrates the repetition of difference. There are visuals to illustrate some ideas about how the incomplete cubes are combined to the different places.