Linear soundings : 26 fragments of the linear discourse

Abstract

This text is a follow-up study for a work that focused on squares that was published by the author as Piazza Pulita [Roma, Officina Edizione, 1983]. The purpose of both works is to comment on the production of sense of linear features of the environment. The multidimensional character of these features, which includes economic, sociological, political, psychological and aesthetic, or even exclusively, technical components, make it necessary to approach them heterogeneously. That is, a set of observations that must be used that imply multiple points of view: a plurality of pertinence. For heuristic purposes, these observations are organized from two points of view: -- A roughly chronological point of view according to which the evolution of lines is seen as a means of social organization and cultural expression. -- An experimental point of view that at temps to express the effects of linear features of primarily the built environment. The effects focused on are generally space and time effects. It is the very principle of this research upon the discourses of linearity (and of the text which represents it) that its figures cannot be classified: organized, hierarchized, arranged with a view to an end (a settlement): there are no first figures, no last figures. To let it be understood that there was no question here of a history of line (of a line story) and to discourage the temptation of uniform meaning, it was necessary to choose an absolute insignificant order. Hence, we have subjugated the series of figures (inevitable as any series is, since the text is by its very nature obliged progress) to to a pair of arbitrary factors: that of nomination and that of alphabet. Each of these arbitrary factors is, nonetheless, tempered: one by semantic necessity (among all the nouns in the dictionary, a figure can usually receive only two or three), the other by the age-old convention which decides the number of letters in our alphabet. Hence, we have avoided the wiles of pure chance, which might, indeed, have produced logical sequences; for we must not underestimate the power of chance to engender monsters; the monster in this case, would have emerged from a certain order of figures, a "philosophy of line" where we must look for no more than its affirmation. An approach towards the line rests on simple questions: What is it? What is its nature? Why does it exist? The focus of this research is to perceive explicitly the collective image of lines through its urbanistic production as well as its mode of production representation. An approach to the theme of linearity rather than to the actual street, channel or skyscraper, allows distance in analysis and constructive analogies. To learn means, here, to compare. When one compares an apple and a grapefruit, one learns about fruit. When one compares an apple and a bowling ball, one learns about symbol. When one compares an apple and a car, one learns about object. When one compares different phenomena that share a single characteristic, we learn about this common feature. We describe this world of similarities on the basis of paleological thought, where the line i s a street, the line is an elevator, the line is transportation, the line is time, the line is architecture. These-stories will teach us about the line as a phenomenon. THE SPEED AT WHICH LIFE IS LIVED IN THE PRESENT HISTORICAL POINT HAS CREATED A PERCEPTION OF THE LINEAR ENVIRONMENT, THAT IS PARTIAL AND LIMITED ONLY TO WHAT IS SEEN AT A GIVEN INSTANT. LINES ARE BEING INCREASINGLY EXPERIENCED NOT AS FEATURES OF STRUCTURES, NOT AS PARTS OF A WHOLE, BUT FOR THEIR OWN SAKE AND AS IF FROZEN IN A SINGLE MOMENT IN TIME. IN OTHER WORDS, BOTH APPROACHES LEAD TO THE SAME POINT: LINEARITY IS SUPPORT TO DISAGGREGATION OF SPACE BECAUSE OF THE USE OF ITS POTENTIAL EXTENSIVITY.