TWO MAKE A CHANGE 

TEXTO PRESENTACION ESCRITO 2014

 

EL OMNIPRESENTE PETRÓLEO.

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Sudamérica, año 2040. Después de una breve ducha, gracias a la energía de los paneles solares y a las virtudes de su termo, el señor Discman trabaja por la mañana desde su laboratorio ubicado aun costado de su invernadero hidropónico. A trabajado en su hogar desde hace 10 años. Las posibilidades que entrega la digitalización de la bio-tecnología a permitido genere diálogos transcontinentales en instantes. Por la tarde, coge su bicicleta y va en busca de su única hija, que estudia Canto de Pájaros en el conservatorio de la ciudad. Aprovecha de comprar unas prendas confeccionadas con fibras naturales y va en busca de sus zapatos que estaban en reparación. Al volver, toma un velero que une el centro de la ciudad con la comunidad en la que habita. Al llegar a las alturas de su casa, comparte una taza de café en la terraza ajardinada de su edificio con el resto de sus vecinos, con quien también comparte el uso de otros espacios e instalaciones. Para cenar prepara verduras del huerto urbano ubicado a pocos kilómetros de su barrio. Por la noche desde su habitación escucha el viento de los arboles y uno que otro transporte publico eléctrico.

El señor Discman, descansa en su Eco-Biblioteca pensado en realizar ese único viaje, que lleva planeando todo el año a las profundidades de la Antártida.
Las acciones de nuestro presente son nuestro futuro.

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THE UBIQUITOUS OIL.

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South America, 2040. After a brief shower, thanks to the energy of the solar panels and the virtues of his thermos flask, Mr. Discman works in the morning from his laboratory located next to his hydroponic greenhouse. He has been working in his home for 10 years. The possibilities provided by the digitalization of bio-technology have allowed to generate transcontinental dialogues in moments. In the afternoon, he takes his bicycle and goes in search of his only daughter, who is studying bird song at the city's conservatory. She takes advantage of buying some clothes made of natural fibers and goes in search of her shoes that were under repair. When he returns, he takes a sailboat that links the city centre with the community where he lives. When he reaches the heights of his house, he shares a cup of coffee on the garden terrace of his building with the rest of his neighbours, with whom he also shares the use of other spaces and facilities. For dinner he prepares vegetables from the urban garden located a few kilometers from his neighborhood. At night from his room he listens to the wind from the trees and to some electric public transport.

Mr. Discman, rests in his Eco-Library thought of making that unique trip, which he has been planning all year round to the depths of Antarctica.

The actions of our present are our future.

 

Vandana Shiva, Indian scientist, philosopher and writer comments on the purpose of oil "We eat oil, wear oil and even think oil. Yes, we eat oil because the food we eat is produced by the pesticides and fertilizers that come from oil. We can also consume kiwis imported from Australia every day thanks to the fuel that moves the planes and ships that transport them. Yes, we wear oil because synthetic fabrics come mostly from oil, as do the dyes that dye them, the buttons that fasten them. And yes, we think oil because nowadays it is almost impossible to think of an activity that we develop in industrial societies that does not depend on oil, that does not need or has needed oil at some point in its production process or realization.

 

Throughout the last decades, man has based his development on oil, from the most basic things such as food to the latest technologies such as a telephone or a mouse. The human being wears clothes made of petroleum derivatives, polyester and nylon, washes himself with detergents made from it, eats fruits and vegetables fertilized with this fuel, has fun with sets of plastics derived from black gold, decorates his houses with this material turned into paint, varnishes, furniture, insulation and even synthetic flowers, and of course, the locomotion is based on oil from the first screw that was part of the car, to the fuel that fed it.

 

Cities are a source of equity, in the words of Annie Leonard (director of the History of Things project), a space of equality and opportunity or at least a space that provides a proxemic that allows for diverse dialogues at the scale of needs. This landscape, built as an artificial space, provides health, cleanliness and a territory of geo-social relationship that allows to lower, for example, the incidences of mortality.

 

If we think about and observe our cities today, we can realize that the dependence on oil is total, almost 90% of our urban life is sustained by oil. We are routinely engaged in using detergents, glues, nylon, turning on the television, throwing away papers, fuel, taking the car, painting our apartments, watering the garden, living at home. Many of our daily lives are thought out and supported by black gold. Yet the city as a space of relationship has existed without oil. Let us not forget that to bring water to the city, it was necessary to build atmospheric infrastructures1 (aqueducts) that coexisted with geography and thus with cities.

 

The dependence on oil in this urbanized life has increased the speed and with it the need to consume. Under this parameter, the massification, the production in quantity, installs the geographic amnesia, the libertarian individualism and in consequence the abandonment to the natural life.

 

For decades we have observed that economic increases in a country translate into urban growth of expansion, both vertically and horizontally. Acceleration is seen in cities, the size of Rome, that are built in a month or skyscrapers erected in a week. London, Paris, New York, Sao Paulo, Mexico City, today Dubai show us that acceleration is concrete and amnesiac. At the same time we can observe countries like Nigeria that are lagging behind and living without water or with the most precarious infrastructure to be able to sustain themselves.

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It is said that a country that grows economically becomes more competitive globally, builds communication infrastructure, but clearly forgets the consequences this brings for future generations.

 

At present, there are concrete realities working towards non-dependence on oil. We can observe agricultural communities, artisan fishermen, independent settlements with non-renewable energy, groups that live off the fog, indigenous communities, are real examples, few, but valuable in a society that is concretely sustained by oil.

 

We believe that citizens can adopt a paradigm shift. That if we join the next 7 billion people we will be by 2025, more than half of whom already live in cities, and make them aware of the processes involved in consumption, we could reduce our ecological footprint in pursuit of cooling our planet.

 

Oil is becoming scarce, and this is serious for modern society, given the enormous degree of dependence on industrial activities and transport. That is why we believe in a City without Oil, that it is necessary to think our daily life without the black gold, since in a not very distant time we will have to live without this product, to give way to the production of our own energy and food or we will simply disappear leaving a damaged territory.

 

Our cities should change their dependence on oil to the generation of clean energy, thus allowing the production of food in nearby neighborhoods, self-sustainable houses, clean transportation, an eco-social economy, a policy that subsidizes participatory and non-individualistic thinking, and countless energy sustainable daily lives.

 

1 "Atmospheric Infrastructures". Research carried out by the author of the text. Its advances were presented at the Latin American Meeting of Architecture Students (E.L.E.A), Brasilia 2010.

 

In order to understand and thus relate the themes that will be conjugated around oil, it is necessary to observe this millennial oil under the gaze of extraction, production and consumption and in parallel to understand this product in its conceptual sense, this means under the logic of the acceleration of time and space. This parameter allows us to link ourselves directly to the making of the city.

 

We understand that urbanism, architecture and design are a fundamental part of producing change, but we also understand that it is not vast with this, but it is in the concrete, fluid and open relationship with biology, ecology, economy, politics, social networks. It is through this interaction that ethical change can be real.

 

The TWO project, seeks to establish a transdisciplinary relationship, a platform for coexistence, a space for retroactive expansion, an exchange station that allows the construction of a pristine and systemic gaze, which existed but was abandoned.

 

Our goal is to think about and visualize the future of our cities without oil. Raising research, projects and works that inform and can serve as a trigger for a change of life.

TWO is a project by linkage, this means that it sustains its work in collaboration with the other, in the contribution of one more, since we know that alone we will not be able to reach the goal.

 

TWO is a project by bio-mimesis, since we observe and study nature in order to build our cities.

TWO is a bio-technological project, since it fuses biological logic with technical logic.

TWO is part of the Ecological Paradigm.

TWO is a project that believes in DECREASE. This means that it bets on building smaller and more efficient cities than big and clumsy ones.

TWO believes in the doing-thinking.

TWO is an environmentalist and atmospheric project.

TWO simultaneously promotes locality and globality.

TWO is situated between artisan development and technological advances.

TWO is a Science and Fiction project.

TWO is a project promoted by the office of Estacion Espacial Arquitectos.

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Sebastian Contreras Rodriguez

Architect / Researcher

Master degree Architecture

Diploma Urban Planning and Management

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