Introduction

Definitions

snippet |ˈsnipit|
noun
a small piece or brief extract : snippets of information about the war.

tape |tāp|
noun
a narrow strip of material, typically used to hold or fasten something : a roll of tape | a dirty apron fastened with thin tapes.
• [often with adj. ] long narrow flexible material with magnetic properties, used for recording sound, pictures, or computer data.
• a cassette or reel containing such material.
• a recording on such a cassette or reel.
• (also adhesive tape) a strip of paper or plastic coated with adhesive, used to stick things together.
• a strip of material stretched across the finish line of a race, to be broken by the winner.
• a strip of white material at the top of a tennis net.
• a strip of material used to mark off an area.
• a tape measure.

verb [ trans. ]
1 record (sound or pictures) on audio or videotape : it is not known who taped the conversation.
2 fasten or attach (something) with adhesive tape.
3 ( tape something off) seal or mark off an area or thing with tape.

*Source: Apple Dictionary

In Hip-Hop DJ culture, before the age of mp3's and online media, snippettapes were used as promotional tools for forthcoming LP Records. Generally these music cassettes were only two times three minutes long, playing short track extracts. Snippettapes are related to mixtapes, DJ-mixed compilations mending tracks generally from different artists into a coherent continuous mix.



Occiliating between three cultures

I am a student of architecture at the ETH Zurich, Switzerland. When graduating from Gymnasium in 2004 I did two documentary Films about sustainable construction in Switzerland, one commissioned as a promotional film for Minergie, a state-owned company that promotes and certifies low energy houses. I started with my studies in 2005 with a pervailing interest in sustainability - widened from a technical viewpoint to a plurality of factors informed by a better understanding of cultural, sociological, philosophical and historical perspectives. I currently study a semester abroad at the TU Delft, Netherlands to better understand part of my cultural background (my grandmother was born and raised in Apeldoorn, Netherlands). After five rigidly guided semesters at the ETH Zurich, the loose rythm and freedom in Delft leaves room to critically develop a personal stance in architectural thinking.

My second year architectural design professor put the perspective of present-day architecture students into words: "The social agenda of the modernist avant-garde architects and urbanists was about a minimum living standard for a rapidly growing urban population resulting from industrialization in the western world. You as the future genereation are at an even more interesting point in history: There is an unprecedented number of persons that need a minimum living standard all over the world, but global ressources are extremely limited. The most interesting question thus is: How will we deal with this?" It is in Brazil I found a segment of this fascinating yet simultaneously paralyzing task. I first visited Brazil last year and attended an urban reseach workshop with the ETH Zurich at the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism of the University of Sao Paolo (FAU USP) in August. I was particularly struck by the political dimension of the discussions amogst the students, something almost entirely lacking in Switzerland. Modernism as a social project is persisting in Brazil where the postmodernistic critique was replaced by intellectual and artistic resistance due to the military regime from 1964 to 1985. It might be therefore that architects in Brazil until today are - more so than in Europe - somewhat peripheral figures in the design of the cities. A second reason I see for a prevailing modernist ideology in Brazil is the pure necessity for amelioration of the the precarious spatial and especially hygienic conditions resulting from rapid and uncontrolled growth of urban fabric in metropolitan areas.

Jorge Oseki, a professor at the FAU-USP who died in July 2008 described stated that "Brazilian architects are married to nobody, that is why they only talk to themselves". Oseki was very critical of the architectural practice in São Paolo, he saw Brazilian architectures impotency due to the limitation as an autonomous art and the lacking engagement with the economically and politically powerful, leaving the development of the city in the hands of engeneers, real estate developers and informal settlers. A fellow student from São Paolo, Luís Pompeo, studied and worked for one and a half years in the Netherlands. He was fascinated how Dutch architecture scene managed to successfully take advantage of the flourishing economy in the past two decades and achieve international reputation through it. At this point it is interesting to speculate that the architectural culture in Brazil might have been preserved in all its radicality exactly through its isolation and resistance. A radicality that is architectonically articulated in elaborated constructions with wide spans. This brazilian "elaborated lightness" again has influenced quite a few renowned swiss architects in their practice devoid from any political content.

I like complexity and contradiction in the relationship between ethics, politics, social and economic demands within the field of architecture.

Three weeks ago I got back from my second visit to São Paolo where I participated in a workshop organized by a group of ambitioned students from the TU Delft. (www.urbandetectives.com) Our group of fifteen dutch and eight brazilian students tried to approach informal processes in the city from different angles and - like detectives on a case - looking for indices revealing the complexity of these processes. In the spirit of the present day ephemerity substituted by the digital age this Blog is a collection of snippets. Like an Architecture Jockey, at this point still digging in the crates of the urban environment, I am randomly looking for these rare pieces that need to be dusted off, spicy tunes with multivalent political messages. Today, precisely one year after the total burndown of the Architecture Faculty of the TU Delft and in midst of the financial market crisis, everybody at the TU is emphasizing the opportunity for repositioning such a loss and such a crisis provides. If we have indeed arrived at a threshold moment, anecdotes and critical observations are my contribution to the discussion over priorities in architectural and urbanistic production.

The decks are empty, the needels sharp. Let's Record!