Invisible Cities:

1
Invisible Cities

• Concept City, Remote Cities, Nature and Music

2
Outline

• Italo Calvino The Invisible Cities
• Your Views?
• Patterns of the Invisible Cities
• Other Kinds of Invisible Cities
• The Music Garden
• Conclusion?

3
Italo Calvino

• One of the world's foremost postmodern authors
• Calvino is listed alongside Philip Johnson's ATT
  building, Disneyland, Monthey Python, Max
  Headroom, and Donald Bartheleme as the most
  prominent 'icons' of postmodernism (Pilz)

4
Structure of Invisible Cities
5
Different Kinds

• Cities and memory.
• Cities and desire.
• Cities and signs.
• Thin cities.
• Trading cities
• Cities and eyes.
• Cities and names.
• Cities and the dead
• Cities and the sky.
• Continuous cities.
• Hidden cities.

6
Outline of our Reading

• Marco Polos talk to Kubla Khan
• 1.
• The invisible will not perish
• Description of cities with gestures and language
  the emperors responses
• 2.
• The past is always ahead of us elsewhere is a
  negative mirror
• From gestures to words and back to gesture the
  use of silence
• 3.
• Cities are made of desires and fears.

7
Outline of our Reading
Your views?

• 1. Cities and memory. 1. Diomira past
  happiness
• Cities and memory. 2. Isidora past desire
• Cities and memory. 3. Zaira past connections
  
• Cities and memory. 4. Zora described point by
  point, unmoved till it disappears
• 2. Cities and memory. 5. Maurilla a postcard
  city
• 1. Cities and desire. 1. Dorothea 2 ways of
  describing a city
• Cities and desire. 2. Anastasia describing the
  city vs. full experience
• Cities and desire. 3. Despina -- 2 perception
  of a city
• 2. Cities and desire. 4. Fedora -- with a mental
  city which turns into a museum
• 1, Cities and signs. 1. Tamara arbitrary
  signs
• Cities and signs. 2. Zirma The city is
  redundant, so is our memory, because they are
  repetitive.
• 2 Cities and signs. 3. Zoe a city which is a
  mixture of functions.
• 1. Thin cities. 1. Isaura a city of wells ?
  two religions (??? Venice?)
• 2. Thin cities. 2. Zenobia a city of
  platforms, balcony and ladders not happy or
  unhappy, but one generating desires.
• 2. Trading cities. 1. Euphemia where
  merchants meet to buy and sell, but also to tell
  stories.

8
Patterns of the Invisible Cities

• City, memory and the past
• Desires are memories. Cities contain our
  desires.
• Polo p. 28 we know more about our past as we
  move ahead.
• A citys past pp. 10-11
• The Concept City vs. the Lived City
• Dorothea p. 9 Also city vs. desert
• Anastasia p. 12 describing a city and desiring
  in it
• City and Desires
• Two perspectives. P.17 Cities are formed by
  their opposites and desires.

9
Patterns of the Invisible Cities

• Human constructions
• Religion
• Buildings Isidora p. 8
• Human Languages
• Signs arbitrary (Are there any which are not
  signs?)
• Gestures and Signs

10
Invisible Cities II Distant Cities

• Diomira p. 1 ? City and Memory Byzantium
  underneath Istanbul
• Isidora ? City and Arts Carpentry at ?? (a town
  in a mountain)
• Anastasia p. 12? City and Desire/Arts Kite
  Festival at Lahore
• City and Signs/Postcards

11
Kite Festival at Lahore

• Basant, the festival that marks the start of
  spring
• Kite with string coated by hand in a doughy
  substance which is impregnated with pulverised
  glass (http//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asi
  a/2750193.stm )

12
The Music Garden

• What do you think?
• General Design
• Efforts Arts, Business and Politics
• Music, Nature and Urban Space

13
Bach Garden Plan

• Suite1 I Prelude II Allemande III
  -Courante, IV Sarabande, V - Menuet I , VI -
  Gigue

Bk 5
14
Toronto Music Garden

• From Bostons City Hall Plaza to Torontos Harbor
  Front

15
Prelude An undulating river scape with curves
and bends.

Response to the environment Bk 3
16
Allemande A forest grove of wandering trails.

Original plan Bk 7 adjusted in the new plan Bk
14
17
Courante A swirling path through a wildflower
meadow.

Bk 11
18
Sarabande A conifer grove in the shape of an arc

19
Sarabande a poet's corner

• the garden's centerpiece is a huge stone that
  acts as a stage for readings, and holds a small
  pool with water that reflects the sky.

Bk 13
20
Menuette A formal flower parterre.

• Gigue Giant grass steps that dance you down to
  the outside world.

Bk 8 12
21
Efforts Arts, Business and Politics

22
Efforts Arts, Business and Politics

• Different concerns of the Boston government
  noise, money (to privatize the space to increase
  more economic interest), tourism, security
• To gain financial support to massage the
  corporate power.

Bks 10 6
23
Music, Nature and Urban Space

• Mas intention to create a space for music
  without walls. ? what about traffic? (e.g. Bk
  16)

24
Music, Nature and Urban Space

• Julie Messervy To shape nature in simple forms
  (Bk 2)
• The films Bk 9, 15

25
Minuette formal dance

• Hand-crafted with ornamental steel, a circular
  pavilion is designed to shelter small musical
  ensembles or dance groups.

26
Music and Nature The Gigue

• or "jog" is an English dance, whose jaunty,
  rollicking music is interpreted here as a series
  of giant grass steps that offer views onto the
  harbor.

27
Conclusion?

• A city can be variously defined, imagined,
  desired for, and connected to the past.
• Concept City does not just belong to the city
  planners. We also have our concepts in the use
  of signs, memories and through our desires and
  efforts in construction.

28
Reference

• Pilz, Kerstin.  Reconceptualising thought and
  space labyrinths and cities in Calvino's
  fictions. Italica, Summer 2003 v80 i2 p229(15)
• http//www.juliemoirmesservy.com/pro.htm
• Toronto Music Garden Photo Gallery---Inspired by
  Bach Yo Yo Ma http//www.nakayoshi.org/musicgard
  en/
• Loraine Hunter http//www.garden-time.com/magazine
  /03september/article_gotw.php