Machines over Los Angeles River
Prof. Dr. Marc Angélil • Studio V-IX • Los Angeles River
Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich • Fall 2018
Collaboration with Benjamin Han
Operating at the intersection of architecture, infrastructure, and landscape, the five Machines crosses the Los Angeles River - a water control channel in concrete erected after major floods by the Army Corps of Engineering from the late 1930s. The infrastructure demonstrates the potential for revitalization which is open for interpretation. The greater site of Los Angeles River is a superimposition of construct with different levels permanence which varies from the Jefferson grid to the bare infrastructure of the La river to the more temporary houses.
The Machines are architecture defined as self-contained autonomous characters which witness and documents changes of city in various forms. The Machines are given a repeated program and a dormant program ,and the succession of these events constitute the memory of the city. Each Machine produces an artifacts which are the imprints of the changes. In the distanced future, the machines are set to be rediscovered and or reinstate to the original program which they perform.
Los Angeles, CA
34.169939, -118.632400
Glass Recycling
34.171697, -118.630126
Weather Station
34.172851, -118.628560
Photographic Archive
34.173809, -118.627467
Electrical Transformer
34.174928, -118.625300
Religious Printing
document
“[A] concrete or symbolic indication, preserved or recorded, for reconstructing or for proving a phenomenon, whether physical or mental.“ - Suzanne Briet
The document is an object and an artifact. Document and documentation have always existed as celebrations, proofs of our existence and livelihood, but at the same time they reflect our anxieties to preserve and maintain an understanding of things. Especially in times of turbulence and change, we find security in knowing that documents are kept.
Axonometric Projection
Machinery Section
Mask of Medusa