COOPED ANALYSIS
The dance Cooped by Jamar Roberts is an expression of liberation in darkness and in being unseen. The piece begins by not allowing the viewer to feel grounded. What is up or down is confused as Jamar’s torso seems to either float or hang in a liminal purple space, keeping from establishing a sense of gravity. This allows Jamar to move with freedom within this space, body exposed in profile and every motion visible. However, as the dance progresses, the light dims and the background becomes a textured blackness in which his body disappears. The perspective continues to switch as floor and walls are introduced and hidden throughout the several sections, or acts, of the dance. As he dances within the spaces, his body fills up the entire screen, the light barely illuminates the contours of his body. What is him and what is blackness become indistinguishable. His movements are elusive, glimpses of them seen when he passes across the dim light. However, in this textured blackness his dance becomes more energetic, he gestures with his hands as his arms move back and forth across the screen, uncaring of his audience.
PHOTOGRAPHY OF HUDSON YARDS
Hudson Yards claims to be a space for everyone as an area of public and culture, with the Vessel in particular proclaiming that it was built for anyone to come and climb. However, the spatial design gives away the space’s true intentions. Hudson Yards turns away from the city and looks onto itself. Access is restricted, the site raised upon a plinth that breaks from the city grid. It refuses to integrate itself into its context, ignoring the immediate community to create its own internal one. And within this community, the people are heavily surveilled. The buildings monitor themselves, each other, and the public space of Hudson Yards. Within the public space, there are security cameras, all hidden to varying degrees. They surround the open space, watching people as they enter the shops, peruse The Vessel, and participate in the various pop ups. In addition to the cameras, there are several kinds of voyeuristic employees roaming the open area. There are K9 units, traffic guards, security guards, and concierges observing the those within the public space. Lastly, there is the Vessel designed to look out and to look in, giving people vantage points to watch and surveil others while other surveil them.
SURVEILLANCE
POWER
For my proposal, the design reacts to the surveillance of Hudson yards to elude the visual surveillance controlled by Hudson Yards management. A series of overhanging structures provide both shade while blocking the sight of the surveillance cameras on site. Another series of reflective angled surfaces are deployed in these areas to reflect light back at the security cameras. Additionally the landscaping creates large berms that block both the cameras' and guards' views in the areas further away from the reflective overhangs. People entering the site are able to know if they are in the sight of cameras or security guards through the materiality of the ground, with a dark slate denoting a completely elusive path, a white stone denoting guard visibility, and white slate denoting exposure to cameras. Under these overhangs is a multitude of blocks that can be used as seating or as stands for marketplaces with the space becoming activated by the people throughout the day.
Site Plan
GROUND PLAN
SITE SECTION
DETAILED SECTION
Shop displays have been taken over, replaced with programming for libraries, magazine racks, classes, a kitchen, a gallery for local artists, an area to record podcasts, and a printing press to create zines. These spaces are now able to give back to the community and to actually host public programming, and promote the dissemination of information that is controlled and created by the local populace as opposed to the recording and keeping of visual information in security cameras to be used by the Hudson Yard management as a control tactic.
OVERALL PERSPECTIVE
LIBRARY PERSPECTIVE