The Responsive Environment: Design, Aesthetics, and the Human in the 1970s PDF
Preview The Responsive Environment: Design, Aesthetics, and the Human in the 1970s
The Responsive Environment Busbea_i-xxvi_01-286_TEXT_F.indd 1 11/18/19 12:15 PM This page intentionally left blank THE RESPONSIVE ENVIRONMENT DESIGN, AESTHETICS, AND THE HUMAN IN THE 1970s Larry D. Busbea University of Minnesota Press Minneapolis London Busbea_i-xxvi_01-286_TEXT_F.indd 3 11/18/19 12:15 PM This book is supported by a grant from the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts. Publication of this book has been aided by a grant from MM the Millard Meiss Publication Fund of the College Art Association. A portion of chapter 1 was published as “McLuhan’s Environment: The End (and The Beginnings) of Architecture,” Aggregate, December 11, 2015. A different version of chapter 4 was previously published as “Soft Control Material: Environment and Design c. 1970,” Journal of Design History 30, no. 2 (May 2017): 139–5 6; copyright 2016 Oxford University Press. Different versions of portions of chapter 6 were published in Repositioning Paolo Soleri: The City Is Nature (Scottsdale, Ariz.: Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, 2017), in conjunction with the exhibition of the same name, and “Paolo Soleri and the Aesthetics of Irreversibility,” Journal of Architecture 19, no. 6 (December 2013): 781– 808. Copyright 2020 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Published by the University of Minnesota Press 111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290 Minneapolis, MN 55401- 2520 http://www.upress.umn.edu Printed in Canada on acid- free paper The University of Minnesota is an equal- opportunity educator and employer. 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Busbea, Larry D., author. Title: The responsive environment : design, aesthetics, and the human in the 1970s / Larry D. Busbea. Description: Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2019017203 (print) | ISBN 978-1-5179-0709-9 (hc) | ISBN 978-1-5179-0710-5 (pb) Subjects: LCSH: Environment (Aesthetics) | Design—Human factors. | Design—History—20th century. | BISAC: DESIGN / History & Criticism. | ARCHITECTURE / History / Contemporary (1945–). | ART / History / Contemporary (1945–). Classification: LCC BH301.E58 B87 2019 (print) | DDC 111/.85—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019017203 Busbea_i-xxvi_01-286_TEXT_F.indd 4 11/18/19 12:15 PM To my little pattern watchers, Kase and Ramona Busbea_i-xxvi_01-286_TEXT_F.indd 5 11/18/19 12:15 PM This page intentionally left blank Contents Preface and Acknowledgments ix Introduction xiii 1 Invisible Environments 1 2 Pattern Watchers 45 3 Responsive Environments 89 4 Soft Control Material 141 5 Cybertecture 167 6 Arcoconsciousness 209 Conclusion 235 Notes 241 Index 279 Busbea_i-xxvi_01-286_TEXT_F.indd 7 11/18/19 12:15 PM This page intentionally left blank Preface and Acknowledgments This is a book about changing conceptions of human– environment inter- action and the ways in which these came to be technically and aes- thetically modified during the 1970s. My approach is not based on the determinative influence of a particular class of technologies or any stable object. This is not a history of computers in design, “smart” technologies, or even “responsive environments” so much as it is an attempt to track the epistemological and sensible shifts that precipitated or were precipitated by new models of the human subject as a contingent, porous, extended, and attenuated entity. That this capacious brief might be adequately addressed by the metho- dological resources of art history is a proposition that I test here but cer- tainly do not resolve. My frequent forays into anthropology, biology, psychology, and various other scientific and humanistic subdisciplines are overreaches. These are not made out of a hubristic belief that I might ac- tually master these fields (specialist readers will recognize my limitations immediately); rather, they are inspired by my research subjects, who un- derstood these same disciplinary distinctions as modern contrivances that would give way to environment in due course. If I did feel emboldened, though, it was only because of the tremendous support I enjoyed while preparing this material over the past few years. This support arrived in very concrete financial and professional forms, and in much more personal ways. I received travel funding from the University of Arizona’s School of Fine Arts Faculty Professional Development En- dowment. The UA Provost’s Office provided a subvention to underwrite reproduction costs. The book has also received the support of the Millard Meiss Publication Fund administered by the College Art Association. The Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts supported this research in its initial stages, and in the form of a publication grant at its conclusion. The foundation not only provided necessary funding for the work but was also present in more existential ways, as many of the proj- ects and individuals I discuss here were funded by the same organization some fifty years ago, and they shared a belief in its mission of placing art, architecture, and design at the center of social discourse. One of these individuals was Edward T. Hall, who was involved with the foundation on several occasions when he was posted at the Illinois ix Busbea_i-xxvi_01-286_TEXT_F.indd 9 11/18/19 12:15 PM
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