story213.xml
Title
story213.xml
Source
born-digital
Media Type
story
Date Entered
2002-03-11
911DA Story: Story
The following essay was written Sept. 12, 2001 at the
request of an OP-ED editor at Newsday, a NYC-LI newspaper.
The editor decided not to use it - I believe she had asked
several people, and used the first one she got back.
However, the story has traveled quite a bit, particularly
among artists, both here and abroad.
-----------------------------------------------------------
We had a studio in the World Trade Center. On the 92nd floor of Tower 1. Until yesterday.
Our art/architecture collaborative Ocean Earth, had been granted this space by the
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council through their World Views program. It was an exhilirating
place to work, to watch a thunderstorm, to look out on the waters we sought to utilize as
sources of alternative energy. To replace our reliance on BIG OIL. To alter the
ecological, economic, political and social consequences of our reliance on BIG OIL.
I had watched the World Trade Center being built. As a young architecture student, I
visited the big hole in the ground which was to become the WTC. A huge hole crisscrossed
by the tubes of PATH trains They hung in the air like artifacts of a Flash Gordon movie.
Later my mother worked in the building, and I'd meet her for lunch. We'd look out the
windows, watching airplanes pass below us. Later it became a place of transit for me as a
commuter from my home in New Jersey, the first hints of New York City I'd see from the
train, the place I'd arrive, and the last place in New York on my journey home. I'd watch
the changes in the mall on the ground floor, waxing nostalgic for the bank, the Japanese
sushi vendor, the other transient elements of what seemed like a permanent place.
Tuesday morning I left my daughter's apartment on the Lower East Side at 8 AM, whispering
goodbye to her as she slept. Later she arose, and looking out her window, saw the first
plane strike Tower 1. She called my wife: "Mom, a plane just hit the World Trade Center!"
"Don't watch it - it's going to be horrible!" my wife replied.
Our studio in the WTC required us to obtain special photo ID cards. For security.
I remarked to my colleague: "This is stupid. It just feeds an atmosphere of hysteria.
It makes as much sense as airport security. It won't stop anyone who is determined to
plant a bomb, it actually encourages them to try."
Why did the buildings collapse so rapidly? What can we learn from this? What lessons
does it have for current architectural practice? Steel is very sensitive to heat.
In most skyscrapers, the steel skeleton in encased in concrete, to protect it in case of
fire. The World Trade Center, with its' steel structure on the outside of the building,
would have been immune to fire of ordinary proportions. In the event of an inferno,
however, the steel will weaken, twist, and collapse under the weight above it. This is
apparently what happened. This collapse then progresses like a house of cards.
It is a consequence of the arrogance of scale - as we stretch ourselves heavenward, we have
created a condition in which we are literally placed on a slender support, vulnerable to
small pertubations.
This morning, the day after, I asked myself what I can do. Dressing, I pulled out my
tee shirt with Dr. Martin Luther King's picture on it. I need to assert the spirit of
Dr. King. I need to shout it to the world, to place it on my chest. I wish our President
would speak of the need for reconciliation, not retribution. We don't need more innocent
victims.
Today, Ocean Earth, in the shows "Policy Models" at the Rockford Art Museum in Illinois and
"Sea Change" in Spacex Gallery in Exeter, England offers a vision of a world not dependant
on petroleum and free of the conflicts and hostilities attending our reliance upon it. Had our
proposals for the Persian Gulf and other locales producing the raw materials for energy been
adopted, the hostility evident in this act would have been defused, replacing the need
for conflict with the need for cooperation.
George Chaikin, September 12, 2001
Plexus 1.618
Assistant Professor of Art
Lehman College, CUNY
Associate Professor Adjunct
Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture
The Cooper Union
request of an OP-ED editor at Newsday, a NYC-LI newspaper.
The editor decided not to use it - I believe she had asked
several people, and used the first one she got back.
However, the story has traveled quite a bit, particularly
among artists, both here and abroad.
-----------------------------------------------------------
We had a studio in the World Trade Center. On the 92nd floor of Tower 1. Until yesterday.
Our art/architecture collaborative Ocean Earth, had been granted this space by the
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council through their World Views program. It was an exhilirating
place to work, to watch a thunderstorm, to look out on the waters we sought to utilize as
sources of alternative energy. To replace our reliance on BIG OIL. To alter the
ecological, economic, political and social consequences of our reliance on BIG OIL.
I had watched the World Trade Center being built. As a young architecture student, I
visited the big hole in the ground which was to become the WTC. A huge hole crisscrossed
by the tubes of PATH trains They hung in the air like artifacts of a Flash Gordon movie.
Later my mother worked in the building, and I'd meet her for lunch. We'd look out the
windows, watching airplanes pass below us. Later it became a place of transit for me as a
commuter from my home in New Jersey, the first hints of New York City I'd see from the
train, the place I'd arrive, and the last place in New York on my journey home. I'd watch
the changes in the mall on the ground floor, waxing nostalgic for the bank, the Japanese
sushi vendor, the other transient elements of what seemed like a permanent place.
Tuesday morning I left my daughter's apartment on the Lower East Side at 8 AM, whispering
goodbye to her as she slept. Later she arose, and looking out her window, saw the first
plane strike Tower 1. She called my wife: "Mom, a plane just hit the World Trade Center!"
"Don't watch it - it's going to be horrible!" my wife replied.
Our studio in the WTC required us to obtain special photo ID cards. For security.
I remarked to my colleague: "This is stupid. It just feeds an atmosphere of hysteria.
It makes as much sense as airport security. It won't stop anyone who is determined to
plant a bomb, it actually encourages them to try."
Why did the buildings collapse so rapidly? What can we learn from this? What lessons
does it have for current architectural practice? Steel is very sensitive to heat.
In most skyscrapers, the steel skeleton in encased in concrete, to protect it in case of
fire. The World Trade Center, with its' steel structure on the outside of the building,
would have been immune to fire of ordinary proportions. In the event of an inferno,
however, the steel will weaken, twist, and collapse under the weight above it. This is
apparently what happened. This collapse then progresses like a house of cards.
It is a consequence of the arrogance of scale - as we stretch ourselves heavenward, we have
created a condition in which we are literally placed on a slender support, vulnerable to
small pertubations.
This morning, the day after, I asked myself what I can do. Dressing, I pulled out my
tee shirt with Dr. Martin Luther King's picture on it. I need to assert the spirit of
Dr. King. I need to shout it to the world, to place it on my chest. I wish our President
would speak of the need for reconciliation, not retribution. We don't need more innocent
victims.
Today, Ocean Earth, in the shows "Policy Models" at the Rockford Art Museum in Illinois and
"Sea Change" in Spacex Gallery in Exeter, England offers a vision of a world not dependant
on petroleum and free of the conflicts and hostilities attending our reliance upon it. Had our
proposals for the Persian Gulf and other locales producing the raw materials for energy been
adopted, the hostility evident in this act would have been defused, replacing the need
for conflict with the need for cooperation.
George Chaikin, September 12, 2001
Plexus 1.618
Assistant Professor of Art
Lehman College, CUNY
Associate Professor Adjunct
Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture
The Cooper Union
Collection
Citation
“story213.xml,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed January 16, 2025, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/16978.