DEALING WITH DEATH: THE EXTENSION

Jesse Verdoes

In the search for the effects of our shifted attitude towards death on the architectural discourse, it is established that the change is triggered by spatial and social factors. Next to the fact that the modernization and specialization of cities leads to a separation between territories of the living and the dead, the medicalization of society and the urge to keep people alive results in our view on death as a failure of life. The negative connotation of death leads to a society that rather hides its existence. Taking this into account, it seems that we deal with our contemporary cities the same as with our bodies. In an effort to keep the city alive it has become an assembly of fragments. It transformed into a body that has most in common with one that moved beyond death: a post-human body. The city of today cannot be seen as a unified body, but more as a fragmented, extended and ever-becoming one. The cemetery in this situation has become an autonomous fragment, an indifferent piece of architecture. The very indifference towards anything living results in the incredibly static architecture of The Continuous Monument: an architecture that alludes to the insignificance of life due to the non-existence of death. As its contrary, the denial of death in the Reversible Destiny Lofts leads to a highly dynamic structure, functioning as an extension of the body. an architecture that alludes to the insignificance of life due to the non-existence of death. As its contrary, the denial of death in the Reversible Destiny Lofts leads to a highly dynamic structure, functioning as an extension of the body. an architecture that alludes to the insignificance of life due to the non-existence of death. As its contrary, the denial of death in the Reversible Destiny Lofts leads to a highly dynamic structure, functioning as an extension of the body.

The focus on continuation at both the urban and architectural scale results in the extension of the human body, transforming it into a body that denies death. As death, being an inherent part of all life, can never be fully denied, it occurs that the crux of dealing with death in modern society lies in the notion of extension: being part of the daily life but at a distance.