my quest to find the many needle-like maps hidden among the hay-stack-like streets of Rome

Thinking of interesting maps of rome, I remembered a map I had seen before in my wanders through the Jewish Ghetto around studio.  Down one of the alley ways is a spray painted map of Rome.  The maps was composed of a general figure-ground of Rome, with many of the smaller streets filled into make larger blocks.  The Tiber to the west and Aurelian Walls around the east and south aere painted red.  Taking a closer look today, I realized that besides telling how many steps from the Aurelian Walls I was (2445 steps west, check map 12 in the gallery), this was only one of twenty-one maps scattered throughout the city, each marked by a red cross.  Filled with a sense of intrigue and determination, I set off on a mission to find and document all of these maps.  Each map was carefully placed among one of Rome’s many side streets, which made many a challenge to find.  The maps had various distances to the walls and each showed a path to the closet point on the surrounding walls.

In a sense, it reminded me of an fire escape map – in case of emergency, head to the nearest Aurelian Wall.  As a collective, the maps begin to create a sort of phantom-like presence of the walls, never directly experienced, but always beaconed to.  Though the walls were called out on the map, the count of steps give a sense of scale that we experience rather than project on a 2D surface.  Instead of giving meters or feet, giving a measure of steps makes the distance seem more real and recognizable.  By marking the different maps, projections out to the walls are made and slowly connect the boundaries of the city into an image not only seen, but sensed by the steps-to-be.  Though the locations are scattered and a little hard to find, they made the discovery of them more exciting and by chance.

And honestly, who doesn’t like a treasure hunt?

Where two places meet, an edge forms and a unique place of diversity and vitality is created.  Caught in the flux between the sea and the mountain, an edge stands to divide land from water, salt from rock, horizontal from vertical.  The beautiful offspring of two fertile ecosystems, a costal edge has even greater potential for life than its creators.  Rather that 1+1=1, this edge equals three – one part mountain, one part sea, and another part unique just to the edge.  Here, growth of all types are abundant – plants and trees, wildlife and fish, humans and settlements.  What was once a marsh, rich in natural life from air, sea, and land, the new town in Terracina is still pregnant with activity and growth.  Be it a jellyfish in search of fish or a tourist tracking down a beach chair, the edge between the mountain and the sea attracts and provides for all sorts of life.  Too far in either direction and the environment becomes harsh – mountains too high and seas too deep to support the pulse that keeps costal diversity alive.  Whether its a city, a marsh, or an olive tree, the evidence of edge vitality is clear.

Grains of sand belittling the greatness beyond, rocks crumbling at the feet of water, green consuming the cracks left by constant flux.  Salt-infused air caries the energetic pulse, seducing nature to come bed in the bounty on the edge of two worlds.  Man, infatuated with the coasts fertility, rushes to capture the potential birthed by nature’s love affair with land and sea.

Interaction betwen floors and views as well as horizontal emphasis make the MAXXI and Castelvecchio Calvisio seem very similar, despite different materials.

When thinking of big buildings, most minds look up.  Many small cities are low and grow out, while big buildings are tall and grow upwards.   Program doesn’t change that much from the city to a large building, like with Le Corbusier’s Unite D’Habitation in Marseilles.  Corbu translated the typical horizontal street layout into a vertical stack, complete with its own set of necessities often found in a small city – a storefront level, residences, open spaces, streets, and service areas that maintain the systems of the building.

Unite D'Habitation by Le Corbusier

Yet not all buildings grow upwards.  For example, the MAXXI, designed by Zaha Hadid is very large, but is actually shorter than some of its neighbors.  The main circulation corridors aren’t tall stacks of stairs, but rather long, twisting hallways that facilitate horizontal movement through the museum exhibits.  Comparing Castelvecchio Calvisio to the MAXXI, the stair-lined alleyways of the small town look strikingly similar to the directional exhibit spaces of the museum.  Like the inwardly-looking city blocks, the museum paths looking at each other, creating interesting interactions between floors and spaces.  Castelvecchio Calvisio can even be considered one large building, already defined by the surrounding walls of stone, and connected by long, narrow corridors and overhead passageways.

So why then, is Castelvecchio Calvisio a small city and Unite D’Habitation a big building?  Perhaps it is because the original intent behind the places, a town evolving from individually planned houses that then merges over time into a bigger unit, with the label of ‘city’ becoming merely a continued tradition.  Maybe the issue is context – without other big buildings around, the whole (the city) is considered made up of separate units (blocks) rather than as a complete unit in of itself.  If Unite D’Habitation was sitting on the hill by itself, perhaps it would be considered a small city.  Therefore, the difference between a small city and a big building is in the way the built environment is thought of.  Does it participate in a bigger social context?  Are there other units similar in size?  Has it always had a single identity or was it once considered by its parts?  Physically, the city and the building might be the same, but the context and history can change its label.

The Breakup: A conversation between walls

Once there was a couple, a proud set of columns named Mark McAngel and his partner, the beautiful backdrop, Maggie Marble.  They were destined to be together forever since they were first created, but a recent earthquake shook the foundations of their relationships and Mark has been having second thoughts about the whole “together for eternity” thing…

Mark: Listen…things have come up.  That last earthquake made me realize that we really aren’t meant for each other.  We’ve grown too far apart and I think its time we split.

Maggie: No…no, we’re not that far apart.  We can fix this, I’m sure.  If I hold you tight enough we’re good as new!

Mark: I don’t think this will last Maggie.  I need my space now.  I want to stand alone, be free.  I’m tired of being stuck to you.

Maggie: But we were made for each other!  I…I won’t let go.  I’ll just hold on tighter, maybe then we can become one again.  If I just hold onto these straps, you won’t go anywhere.  See?  Still together, forever right?  Just like we were meant to be?

Mark: You’re way to clingy Maggie.

A building rarely has an easy time meeting ground.   And why shouldn’t it?  The ground is supposed to be a place of stability, a place to lay foundation and form structure.  But looking at ground over time, the land is constantly in flux.  Evidence of the dynamic is seen where the western fork of Rome’s trident axis, Via di Ripetta, meets the twisting river-front road, Lungotevere Marzio.  Where originally a slope made its way down to the riverbank has been radically change, trading stability in the moment for projected stability in the future.  With the construction of the retention wall and a new bridge where the intersection meets the tiber came a drastic elevation change that twisted a warped the topography, swallowing surrounding buildings in a constructed landscape.  At the southern curve of the intersection, a pink apartment building has made interesting changes to its own sense of ground, altering the floor planes to take advantage of the altered surroundings.  To better utilize the storefront along Via di Ripetta, the ground floor of the building from its main entrance above steps up, allowing a double height space.  Under the small courtyard in front, lies a parking lot, sunk down further than the stores next to it so that the courtyard can complete its slope toward the midpoint of the intersection.  The space between the high ground floor and the surrounding ground has windows, allowing daylight to penetrate below, while glass block does the same following both the sidewalk along Lungotevere Marzio and scattered within the courtyard.  The slope thus provides opportunity for new spaces – the walls wrapping around the new fill to create the parking lot and higher, brighter stores along the lower road.

I feel overwhelmed.
I walk more, and know that I’m walking.
I look up and look out and know that I’m looking.
I experience a scale of magnificence.
I become belittled.
I gain scale of time.
I seem insignificant, my lifespan seems insignificant.
I lose sense of time.
I wonder where my layer of time will go.
I appear pale to the color of the buildings, the people, the culture, the food.
I appear tan to the color of the tourists, the picture-collectors.
I taste multiple bests of everything.
I feel connected to the alleys, the windowsill, the bench, the tree, the fountain.
I feel disconnected from the car, the camera, the fence, the tourist, the local.
I feel small next to the building, the church, the street, the view, and much more.
I feel big next to the cat, the cobblestone, and very little else.
I see, I think too much.
I touch, I think too little.

I am a student.
I am overwhelmed.