Notes on the Society of the Brand

Spectacular cities of our time

“…In his thesis the commodity, in being separated from the activity by which it is produced, is no longer something that enters into the sphere of experience in fulfilling particular needs or desires, but has itself become the constituent of the world of experience, reorganizing the urban milieu and everyday discourse (Debord, 1967;Brenkman, 1979). To many contemporary critics, the spectacle has indeed triumphed in recent decades with the advent of the 'experience economy' amidst neoliberal capitalist globalization (Best and Kellner, 1998;Foster, 2008;Gotham and Krier, 2008;Krupar and Al, 2012;). In tandem with accelerating commodification of the built environment is the rapid expansion of the scope of 'the spectacular.'…”

“…No longer confined to familiar iconic architecture and celebratory built forms, it now encompasses a widening network of 'other' spaces ranging from sites of dissonance and conflicts to types of invented heritage. Increasingly, cities around the world are driven to rebrand themselves by tapping into their cultural and experiential potentials, promulgating novel use of visual symbolisms and creation of affective 'atmospheres' that aim to establish emotional connections between consumers and the environment (Klingmann, 2007;Krupar and Al, 2012;Lee, this issue). While these phenomena suggest the arrival of a new stage of 'spectacular urbanism' with new forms of seduction and domination, these sites and sights also provide impetus for alternative practices, with social actors seeking to transform the meanings of urban space and conjure imaginaries of the city that may or may not align with dominant neoliberal urban agendas.…”

“…After all, as mentioned earlier, many forms of 'counter-practices' inspired by the SI have too quickly been coopted as part of neoliberal corporate strategies for further commodification of the environment and ongoing calibration of consumerist subjectivities. If the spectacle indeed defines the conditions of possibility for change and resistance, then perhaps more work is required to elucidate how it functions as a 'governing arrangement,' which involves different components that regulate our everyday social relations and organize urban knowledge (Krupar, 2012). This also suggests, to follow Allen Pred, that we need to explore the 'social fact-ness' of the spectacle; that as a technology of power and as pedagogy, how it comes to achieve legitimacy through popular consent rather than through coercion (ala Foucault), and to inculcate a particular way of seeing the world and reorganize the power relations among the state, the economy and culture (Pred, 1995;Krupar, 2012).…”

Bem-vindo ao mundo das marcas: da magia e liminaridade dos lugares de compras na cidade contemporânea

“…Embora a equiparação das cidades a produtos, que podem ser transacionados e geridos de acordo com os princípios das marcas tenha os seus detratores (KAVARATZIS & ASHWORTH, 2005;KAVARATZIS, 2009;KRUPAR & AL, 2014;VANOLO, 2019), a verdade é que os planos de branding que mercantilizam a cidade têm-se amplamente difundido, em cidades com distintos posicionamentos da hierarquia urbana, e inseridas em contextos geográficos e culturais muito diferentes. KAVARATZIS e ASHWORTH (2005), apenas para citar duas referências maiores neste campo, não têm dúvidas que as cidades podem ser vistas como "produtos" especiais que, salvaguardadas as especificidades, podem ser geridas como as marcas.…”

Hyper-realism and loose-reality: the limitations of digital realism and alternative principles in landscape design visualization

“…While once apparent, this correlation is increasingly difficult to distinguish, as realism in both discursive and commercial practice reflects the larger assimilation of design culture into society (Krupar and Al 2012). In this society of spectacle, design subcultures (including those of architecture and landscape architecture) are commodified and absorbed into the global branding of personal and national aspirations.…”