The Affective City: Cartography of Machinic Urban Assemblages

Abstract

While the city is generally perceived -within complexity theory and dynamic systems theory as a changing field of dense interactions that occur in a range of spatial and temporal scales, we are unable to perceive it or describe it in these terms. The main goal of our work is to redefine space - ontologically and epistemologically- in order to reveal the invisible system of its interactions. Thus, the city is represented via a connectionist model, by means of the representation of the interconnections of its various parts. The project theorizes the city as a multiplicity, a structure of spaces of possibilities while at the same time trying to establish a liaison between the city's properties, tendencies and capacities. While properties are actual and can be observed, tendencies and capacities lie in the virtual level and become actual once exercised. Their intensive cartographies map zones of varying degrees regarding the density and intensity of information that is available pointing them as the city's islands of affordances. In this framework, Hecate becomes the city's virtual map, an interactive mechanism able to decipher, map and connect the superimposed layers of significance informing the city's layout and behavior, in real time. Visualized as a network of richly interconnected nodes of varying intensities, each representing information flows between the system and the city, Hecate is introduced as a visual thinking tool to perceive them in real time.