ARCHIPORN

Being a famous porn actor, I’m definitely the most qualified person to write this article. I’m an actor, in the sense that I work in one of the most pornographic cities in the world. I’m famous, because I believe I’m the most fashionable architect in the slums of Shanghai.
Keep in mind that I consider the correlation to pornography to be a compliment, I never liked educated and intellectual people, and I always felt comfortable in the vulgar superficiality that dominates this city.

Shanghai is a very young city, basically devoid of any historical or cultural depth. Furthermore, shortly after it was founded, it was sterilized by the cultural revolution that carefully removed all traces of the few traditions that did exist. This was done by burning books and ousting the few intellectuals that roamed its streets. What a shame, you might say, but it doesn’t end here. The whore who was just born is already infamous, as to top it all off has chosen as her role model the most barbaric culture in the world: the American one. This is where I am. Any person with a minimum amount of spiritual dignity would probably steer clear of such a monstrosity. But being a first rate pervert, I have been wallowing in the spiritual sewer of the world like a strange fish on a scavenger hunt for the past seven years.

Maybe I made a big mistake, but I remember, seven years ago, fleeing from a place where the biggest lie of the century was being told: we considered depth to be the ultimate meaning of life. People didn’t realize that there was no need to hide their most precious assets in a spiritual cave and they were convinced that superficiality meant stupidity. This mentality also manifested itself in architecture, where everything was done slowly, profoundly, and in a hierarchical and indecipherable manner. I sought to find a playground where there were no misleading traditions and memories, where everything was projected into the future and thus certainly superficial, ignorant, spectacular, fast, interactive, updated, creative, in other words: pornographic.

For now, as you might guess, it’s just a town full of peasants living in scandalous architecture. But I see great potential for aesthetics (not culture!) of the future. Here, I’m learning to not feel guilty for refusing to go into details, eating fast food, being constantly on the move, only writing short texts on my mobile, living in a simultaneity of stimuli with no focus on anything as the old masters in Europe had previously taught me to do. Thus, architecture becomes an ephemeral object, a temporary show or an installation, normally destroyed within a few months or years.

For now, I am surrounded by obscene architecture that is genuinely without shame, senseless copies of historical stereotypes from the West, overlapping elements and references from the most unexpected places. In short, their way of life is transposed into design.

Of course so far, this demurral of depth has only left us in the domain of the insignificant. Reinventing the superficial is not easy and often results solely in pure stupidity; but when I see people moving in masses so naively, led by a revolutionary instinct towards the collective and without regard for personal creativity, I’m sure they are the true prophets, those who will guide us towards an amazing future.