Thinking City: Adam Chodzko, Liverpool Biennial

Funny, when things seem to come together.

The way life can connect seemingly disparate things. Giving the impression of a greater meaning, I think that this is sometime referred to as synchronicity. A recent experience of this phenomenon involves my current (paid) job, a novel, the current social-economic situation and a performance lecture.

That lecture by Adam Chodzko took place in an abandoned above ground reservoir in Toxteth.  Now Liverpool gets its water from elsewhere it stands as an monument to Victorian engineering and bravado.

So where once were tonnes of water stands Chodzko and his seemingly modest presentation. Though the reverberation of his voice throughout the space lends his voice a certain booming gravitas

Fitting as Adam is talking about some huge subjects, literary. One of the things under discussion are super container ships. Modern leviathans that cross oceans and seas, making sure that you and I have things like iPods, Lego and training shoes.

This is where the first ‘connection’ comes into play. I have recently read Simon Ings novel ‘Dead Water’ a multi-layered narrative, which features a character Eric Moyes who creates these shipping lines and uses them to hide a terrible secret.

Both Ings and Chodzko touch on the strangeness of these sea born giants which despite their size are as invisible as air. How these thing follow a unique idea of fluid dynamics, operating to the imagined pressures of commerce.

The creation of a constant flow of things and stuff which threatens to overwhelm us and fill the spaces we inhabit. Which brings me to the third ‘connection’ recently I have found myself employed (by a company known for tiny pens, that’s not IKEA) this puts me rather neatly at the end point of this epic voyage of stuff.

One of many who facilitate the ‘last mile’ of that journey. Helping everyone fill their homes with stuff, in the lecture Chodzko speculates that this collection of stuff will lead to the instigation of people creating and dealing with smaller and smaller spaces. He provides this by showing us his prototype living space created from a IKEA wardrobe.

All this may just be preparation for a future, a future that will take place on the giant super-boats. These will become the cities of a flooded world, a world flooded with water and stuff. Once aboard this floated cities we will be surrounded by all of our stuff that we would arrive at some kind of nirvana.

A capitalistic equilibrium, a utopia on the ocean waves.

When where on our never-ending cruise, what will happen to the mega-docks that where once home to these behemoths? Well Chodzko suggests that the ultimate role for these docks, such as the proposed Liverpool 2 superdock is as massive earth-works, as land art. Their destiny is to become supersized monuments to entropy like Robert Smithson’s ‘Spiral Jetty’ or even oversized versions of J.G Ballard’s empty swimming pools.

The archaeology of this future is to be built through commerce, we are building it.