The House As SKIN

Abstract

Archigram's mini-environmentsThis paper investigates J. G. Ballard's vision of the house, tracing its origin to the ideas expressed by the British architectural avant-gardes of the fifties and sixties; these regarded inhabited spaces as psycho-physical membranes, bio-architectural constructs functioning as extensions of the body. The philosophical sources of Ballard's early fiction are also investigated to show the impact of Existentialism on his concept of dwelling, both via early Pop Art and directly through Sartre's and Heidegger's works. One of the aims is to disclose the importance for Ballard of Archigram's fantasies of bio-technological responsive houses but also to interrogate the imbrications in his fiction of such fantasies with contemporary theoretical ideas of dwelling (McLuhan, Banham), authenticity, and the estranging chaos and unhomeliness of the world (Heidegger). The article discusses specific examples of Ballard's unhomely, post-human habitations, from psychotropic houses to the neo-gothic technological tower-block, showing how they are imbued with contemporary architectural and philosophical theories. A special emphasis is placed on the uncanny and -so I argue here -gendered spaces of High-Rise.

The flâneuse and the City as uncanny home in Lawrence Durrell’s <i>The Alexandria quartet</i>

“…His imagination maps the city as a maternal space-place whose residents he describes as mere flora symbiotically fused with the city, or as he says 'part of city' (Durrell 1957:13). Laura Colombino (2012) in her article on the work of J.G. Ballard talks about the concept of the house as skin; for my purposes, this could be amended to the city as skin, where Alexandria can be seen to assume the role of an uncanny and abject womb-like home.…”