Paysage

The project’s core aim is to capture the ephemeral and fragmented nature of contemporary existence. As an exploration of the “liquid” and “transitional” qualities of the modern world, as described by sociologists such as Zygmunt Bauman and Richard Sennett, Paysage addresses the short-term memory and spontaneous reactions that define contemporary life. It examines how the constant flux of emergencies, societal shifts, and collective hysteria shape our experience of space, identity, and culture. These unstable, temporary structures—both physical and ideological—serve as metaphors for a rapidly changing world, where the boundaries between the permanent and the transient have become increasingly blurred.

Central to the project is the question: What does identity mean in this shifting context? As globalization and neoliberalism continue to influence urbanism, architecture, and cultural production, the project seeks to uncover the characteristics that define identity in an age of constant transformation. Neoliberalism has propagated a homogenized, ubiquitous urban landscape characterized by the same chain stores found in every city, identical suburban layouts that are navigable only by car, and the rapid circulation of trends, materials, and imagery—elements that define the built environment everywhere, yet remain elusive in terms of their origins, their future, and their collective cost. This confusion, inherent to neoliberalism, is a defining feature of the era: we no longer know where things come from, where they go, or how long they will last, but we are encouraged to accept them as ‘progress,’ as long as they appear ‘smart’ or profitable.

The project also engages with the question of cultural appropriation, sustainability, and the commodification of symbols. In a society that has formally declared an emancipation from religious authority, what is worshipped in its place? What simulacrum has taken the place of the divine in a world dominated by liberal ideologies and global capitalism? Paysage juxtaposes the veneration of abstract ideologies with the worship of the material, revealing how contemporary landscapes are shaped not only by economic imperatives but also by the ideological structures that underlie them. Symbols of power, authority, and progress, once sacred, have become hollowed out and commodified within a system that prioritizes consumption over meaning.