ANDREW CHUN-AN WEI
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Off the Beaten Path
TwoFold
Analog Series
Champaign Boutique Hotel
Ward’s Island Terminal
Marco Polo House
Meditation Pavilion (Built)
Architecture Writing
PKX to JFK (aviation spaces)
Art Work
Jia De I
Jia De II
Millennial
Untitled
Summer
33,000
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Common Room
Analog Studio
Prof. Mark Raymond
, Soumya Dasgupta
Mar, 2021
Analog Studio
Prof. Mark Raymond
, Soumya Dasgupta
Mar, 2021
As part of the Analog Studio series of work, students created a series of drawings to enhance our awareness of spatiality, architectural sensibility, and personal history. The six drawings included a one word title prompt, sequentially portrait, assembly, personal room, common room, urban, and landscape.
I have always been fascinated with airplanes. My family used to tell me that after a long-haul Toronto to Taipei flight, 5-year-old me would re-enact everything the flight attendants announced in the air. This fascination with airplanes goes beyond the excitement of flying or the intricate engineering that enables it: it is the satisfying repetition inside the cabin space; it is the carefully contained space for each individual; it is the fabrics and patterns along the seats and walls that connect the plane to the airline and its home nation. Since I have never been intrigued by fighter jets, I believe I have been fascinated by the indescribable spatial quality of the commercial airliner cabin space itself since I was young. It was not until last year when I discovered Marc Auge’s theory on non-places was I able to put my long fascination with airplanes into words and further theorise it.
Marc Auge’s theorises non-places as spaces that have no significant historic or anthropogenetic value. While places evoke history, non-placesare hyper-focused on the present, where the most important spatial quality is often efficiency and technological modernity. I believe that air transit spaces, both the airport and the airplane cabin generally fall under the category of non-places. The generic polished floors and the large curtain walls in the airport as well as the rigidly aligned seats in the airplane do not point to historic significance and are often indistinguishable. However, an important aspect I interpret as a method of place-making in a non-place such as an airplane cabin is branding. I am interested in how the airline’s branding and its associations to nationality become the sole indicator of identity for the cabin space. In my drawing, I have chosen to depict the maple leaf rondelle of Air Canada, one of the two main airlines I fly with (the other being EVA Air, but their branding approach is not as explicitly national).
The drawing consists of two mediums – the digital drawings and the analogous brush stroke. The digital is intentionally used to depict generic and premanufactured elements in the common room of the cabin space. This includes the seats, airline branding elements, as well as flight attendants. The flight attendants are digitally collaged figures and do not have a face. This choice was to indicate that flight attendants in the cabin space are often seen as a representative of the airline’s brand identity instead of individuals. The corporate identity maintains an overpowering effect, eclipsing spatial elements such as walls, furniture such as seats, and further onto humans such as flight attendants. To further emphasise corporate identity as the main characteristic in the cabin space, the Air Canada maple leaf rondelle is the only element in the drawing that is coloured.
Another aspect that the digital portion brings out is how individual identity is expressed in a non-place such as a cabin. This is most evident through cabin class distinction. Individual identity is first inherently expressed through the financial capability of affording an expensive high-class seat and then expressed in physical space through enhanced levels of privacy and spatial areas. The higher the cabin class, the more financially capable the flyer, and the more privacy and spatial area is dedicated to them in this non-place.
The final element depicted with the digital is the collaged objects – “debris”. These belongings, in a more personal way (compared to cabin class differences) again showcase how people express individual identity in a non-place such as a cabin. People express individuality quite literally by leaving their mark. There is also differentiation in the debris that people litter the non-place in. In economy class, where comfort is lackluster and individual space is compressed, most belongings are dedicated to improving comfort, such as pillows, or for entertainment, such as ipads and earphones to pass the time. In business class, where there is extended comfort, passengers can remain productive and work on their laptops. First class objects reflect a more luxurious and pleasurable experience and is in parallel to how airlines market first class seats. Debris more densely populates the back of the plane, reflecting general cabin occupancy in flights and sales.
Finally, the analogous brush stroke are indications of human activity. Most of the stroke acts as an ambiguous backdrop to the debris, while figures are shown at aisles at the back of the plane as well as areas where cabin classes are separated. This is to reflect the involuntary but inevitable social situation on long-haul flights, where passengers in economy line up to use the lavatories. The absence of figures at the front of the plane indicates the lesser number of passengers as well as dedicated lavatories in higher class cabins. The figures do not have clear facial detail to reflect Auge’s theory onnon-places, where people occupying non-places are cloaked with anonymity. The figural depictions of the passengers are more ambiguous and gestural compared to the more detailed, digitally-placed flight attendants. This is to reflect the fact that we often have a pre-conceived image of flight attendants (dressed neatly in their airline uniforms with a plastered smile), while the appearance of travellers are much more varied.
The overall elevational view of the cabin space is to emphasise the aspect of repetition of the airplane cabin. It attempts to combine the perspectival experience of the space and the plan view we see when selecting seats on a website. The choice to show the front elevational view instead of a view of seat backs, which we experience mostly during a flight is intentional. It showcases repitition in the generic non-place airplane cabin, while also allowing me to depict how passengers occupy the space and place-make in their own way. This drawing is thus my attempt at mediating between non-place and place, generic and individual, clean and messy, standardised and organic, and the digital and the analog.
I have always been fascinated with airplanes. My family used to tell me that after a long-haul Toronto to Taipei flight, 5-year-old me would re-enact everything the flight attendants announced in the air. This fascination with airplanes goes beyond the excitement of flying or the intricate engineering that enables it: it is the satisfying repetition inside the cabin space; it is the carefully contained space for each individual; it is the fabrics and patterns along the seats and walls that connect the plane to the airline and its home nation. Since I have never been intrigued by fighter jets, I believe I have been fascinated by the indescribable spatial quality of the commercial airliner cabin space itself since I was young. It was not until last year when I discovered Marc Auge’s theory on non-places was I able to put my long fascination with airplanes into words and further theorise it.
Marc Auge’s theorises non-places as spaces that have no significant historic or anthropogenetic value. While places evoke history, non-placesare hyper-focused on the present, where the most important spatial quality is often efficiency and technological modernity. I believe that air transit spaces, both the airport and the airplane cabin generally fall under the category of non-places. The generic polished floors and the large curtain walls in the airport as well as the rigidly aligned seats in the airplane do not point to historic significance and are often indistinguishable. However, an important aspect I interpret as a method of place-making in a non-place such as an airplane cabin is branding. I am interested in how the airline’s branding and its associations to nationality become the sole indicator of identity for the cabin space. In my drawing, I have chosen to depict the maple leaf rondelle of Air Canada, one of the two main airlines I fly with (the other being EVA Air, but their branding approach is not as explicitly national).
The drawing consists of two mediums – the digital drawings and the analogous brush stroke. The digital is intentionally used to depict generic and premanufactured elements in the common room of the cabin space. This includes the seats, airline branding elements, as well as flight attendants. The flight attendants are digitally collaged figures and do not have a face. This choice was to indicate that flight attendants in the cabin space are often seen as a representative of the airline’s brand identity instead of individuals. The corporate identity maintains an overpowering effect, eclipsing spatial elements such as walls, furniture such as seats, and further onto humans such as flight attendants. To further emphasise corporate identity as the main characteristic in the cabin space, the Air Canada maple leaf rondelle is the only element in the drawing that is coloured.
Another aspect that the digital portion brings out is how individual identity is expressed in a non-place such as a cabin. This is most evident through cabin class distinction. Individual identity is first inherently expressed through the financial capability of affording an expensive high-class seat and then expressed in physical space through enhanced levels of privacy and spatial areas. The higher the cabin class, the more financially capable the flyer, and the more privacy and spatial area is dedicated to them in this non-place.
The final element depicted with the digital is the collaged objects – “debris”. These belongings, in a more personal way (compared to cabin class differences) again showcase how people express individual identity in a non-place such as a cabin. People express individuality quite literally by leaving their mark. There is also differentiation in the debris that people litter the non-place in. In economy class, where comfort is lackluster and individual space is compressed, most belongings are dedicated to improving comfort, such as pillows, or for entertainment, such as ipads and earphones to pass the time. In business class, where there is extended comfort, passengers can remain productive and work on their laptops. First class objects reflect a more luxurious and pleasurable experience and is in parallel to how airlines market first class seats. Debris more densely populates the back of the plane, reflecting general cabin occupancy in flights and sales.
Finally, the analogous brush stroke are indications of human activity. Most of the stroke acts as an ambiguous backdrop to the debris, while figures are shown at aisles at the back of the plane as well as areas where cabin classes are separated. This is to reflect the involuntary but inevitable social situation on long-haul flights, where passengers in economy line up to use the lavatories. The absence of figures at the front of the plane indicates the lesser number of passengers as well as dedicated lavatories in higher class cabins. The figures do not have clear facial detail to reflect Auge’s theory onnon-places, where people occupying non-places are cloaked with anonymity. The figural depictions of the passengers are more ambiguous and gestural compared to the more detailed, digitally-placed flight attendants. This is to reflect the fact that we often have a pre-conceived image of flight attendants (dressed neatly in their airline uniforms with a plastered smile), while the appearance of travellers are much more varied.
The overall elevational view of the cabin space is to emphasise the aspect of repetition of the airplane cabin. It attempts to combine the perspectival experience of the space and the plan view we see when selecting seats on a website. The choice to show the front elevational view instead of a view of seat backs, which we experience mostly during a flight is intentional. It showcases repitition in the generic non-place airplane cabin, while also allowing me to depict how passengers occupy the space and place-make in their own way. This drawing is thus my attempt at mediating between non-place and place, generic and individual, clean and messy, standardised and organic, and the digital and the analog.