| 10年前，發生在20世紀末的921台灣大地震，搖撼了我們關於建築的思考。1999年9月21日凌晨，芮氏地震儀上規模7.3級的強震持續了102秒，又稱為921集集大地震的這個巨大災變，總共造成2,434人死亡、54人失縱、11,306人受傷、近11萬戶房屋全倒或半倒。誠如哲學家海德格在討論思考與住居的本質時所言，思考總是發生在突如其來的緊急狀態中，而住居則顯現了思考後的集置狀態。真正的思考，總是在事件之中，處在異變的時空經驗下，作為事件的思考。
經過日本阪神大地震、奧姆真理教恐怖主義行動與911事件之後，日本建築者隈研吾在他的文集《負建築》的序言中說：「大地震時的建築物極其脆弱的一面暴露無遺。」雖然隈研吾在文章中強調的是建築物私有性的不堪一擊，而並非專指建築本身的物理、材料或結構屬性，但是對於921大地震之後的台灣而言，不論是建築本身的物理、材料或結構屬性，建築與環境、歷史的關係，一直到台灣建築私有性的特殊狀態，全部都被捲入這個緊急事件之中，成為必須加以重新思考的根本問題。
對1992年畢業於南加州建築學院(SCI-ARC)的呂理煌來說，建築繁殖場可以說是面對這個緊急事件進行思考後的產物。
馬克思的名言「一切堅固的東西都消融在空氣中」在此變得極為諷刺，卻極為真實。將近11萬棟全倒或半倒的房屋裏，絕大多數都是水泥鋼筋的建築物，它們強硬的突出在台灣的山林、鄉間與都市的地表上，大多數是完全沒有個性的集合住宅，隸屬於勤勉工作的受薪階級傾注畢生積蓄，用貸款購置的房屋；或者是學校建築。
在台灣建築場域中重現了50年以上的西方現代主義建築思考，它所強調的大體積、多耗材、長時效的建築物，以及它背後具有政治經濟支撐力量的住房貸款與資本化買賣制度，完全漠視自然環境使用限度的意識形態，不連貫與分裂的時間歷史意識，不再理所當然。在建築繁殖場十年來的建造行動脈絡中，這些很少被質疑的建築前提，如今全數被置入括弧、被質疑。
西方現代性思考中的宏偉體系，一種不斷向上堆砌的空間思考，是否有可能另尋出路？如果建築不再刻意追求強力而牢固的建構，不再刻意追求象徵意義，不再刻意追求視覺表現，也不再刻意追求滿足私人佔有慾，建造的行動以及作為行動後果的建築，還有其他的可能嗎？
從建築繁殖場強調「創建行動」的角度來看，問題從來離不開從潛伏到繁殖的過程。這篇文章的主要目標，就是從「潛伏性的建築」這個角度，為建築繁殖場十年來的建築思考提供一個哲學性的對話觀點。
材料感的潛伏性：
分子化的差異與重複
建築繁殖場的母體使用鋼骨結構與金屬浪板屋頂，重複了台灣隨處可見的輕工業工廠建築形式。這種結構與材料，雖然很少為台灣一般的住宅建築所採用，但它卻涵構了台灣的代表性生產空間，也就是在1960年代以後的進出口貿易加工業經常使用的廠房結構。這種由金屬浪板屋頂搭建起來的鋼骨結構廠房，大多不起眼的散佈在都市、港口與道路邊緣，為第一世界國家代理其玩具、電子零件、雨傘、螺絲、工具、運動鞋、成衣，這種生產空間所具有的潛伏性來自於它的密集勞力與複製能力，以代理代工的過程，來生產某種不具有主體性的主體！就此而言，建築繁殖場的母體空間的基本特性就在於它相對於自然環境的潛伏姿態，相對於一般代理西方現代主義巨大堅固住宅與辦公室建築的潛伏性生產，呂理煌稱之為「易殖」(interbreeding)與「拓殖」(interfering)。
「易殖」面對的是既有的世界架構，期待在這已有的架構之上、之內，透過插枝、接枝與雜交的過程，形成雜化的新物種、新材料。就此而言，建築繁殖場的母體建築本身等於在台灣建築界既有的事務所與工作室結構中，在其代理的世界國家現代主義建築美學既有架構中，接枝了一個反現代主義、反生產貸款住辦空間、反對空間資本化的特異涵構廠房。促成了現代主義建築美學的某種化學變化。
這種材質與建造過程的化學變化，最明顯的就是表現在建築繁殖場一系列的松木構造行動中。特別是2004年第9屆威尼斯建築雙年展台灣館的涵構，雖然在入口處，表明了這個行動向義大利建築設計者史卡帕(Carlo Scarpa)的敬意，但是一旦群眾進入到普吉歐尼宮內部，就會對這個文藝復興以來被理性的幾何學所穿透的空間產生一種異樣的感覺。潛伏性取代了透明性，身體空間運動方位的流動性，取代了視覺穿透引發的理性透明感。觀者被邀請進入一個分子化的流變世界，具有自然溫暖度的松木木條，成了迎接肉身的多孔介面，這種材質既可以反射、反彈身體的運動重力，又能夠聚合成地板、扶手、坡道、牆面、木梯、高塔、座椅、躺椅，又可以自由轉折為過渡性的走道、高塔臨眺遠方的踏板、臨時停駐點的手靠、木桌、視覺螢幕的框架，具有象徵性的木叢、盆池等等。充分運用了潛伏在松木條取代水泥、取代鋼筋的作為基本建造元素的可能性。
另外一方面，松木條具有一種暫時性與容易破毀的性質，簡單的說，這是一種彈性建築、脆弱性的建築、負顯性的建築，它不斷以某種消極的方式凸顯空間的潛伏狀態。普吉歐尼宮搖身一變，不斷回應觀者身體的重力運動，成為空間探索的遊戲場，或者是古典中國園林建築所涵構的游移視點。觀者的身體不僅隨著地板舖設的變化而得以注意到在不同的停駐停留的可能性，同時，松木條也依據身體運動的感知模式，回過頭來塑造空間的情境，這個時候，松木條這個主要材質所構成的空間就形成了如同克莉絲蒂娃(Julia Kristeva)陰性母體的扣拉空間(Chora)，孕育著身體感其與視線交錯的複數可能性。有時候像是往寺廟參拜的坡道上行走，有時候像是爬在高塔上遠眺，有時候靠坐在或明或暗的環形空洞空間邊，有時候則躺靠在牆邊角落休憩；地板的上層有三座高塔貼近普吉歐尼宮的天花板，這促成了觀眾可以直接觸摸到這天花板，於是有人驚喜地發現，這是觀看了一輩子也不可能有的經驗─普吉歐尼宮的拱形下垂天花板居然是木構造，這種輕巧依附在原本石牆粉泥結構體上的天花板，由於松木高塔而變得可以觸及，猶如文藝復興的空間在松木條所涵構的潛伏空間中得到了歷史性的釋放，釋放出可視性之外的可觸性；地板的下層有七座如竹籔般的基座，觀眾不僅可以穿梭其間，還可以坐靠在衍生出座椅的這些木叢，對比上層所具有的明亮、穿透、交錯、向上延伸的視線，下層則明顯的帶有低矮、昏暗、朦朧、阻絕、休憩、向下收斂的視線。
然而，潛伏性的建築所要處理的顯然不只是視線的問題，在2004年威尼斯建築雙年展普吉歐尼宮台灣館的「繁殖場」作品中，松木的味道，身體重力與姿態改變造成木料反響的聲音，空間材質上的可觸摸、可親近，都塑造出一個讓人可以放鬆、遊玩，讓陌生人之間可以相互邂逅、視線相互接觸、身體放鬆的倚靠在同一個變化多端如莫比斯環的平台之上，空間感性上的潛伏性自此得到高度的釋放，而這種釋放卻不是透過強烈的感官刺激。繁殖場涵構出的是如子宮空間般的潛伏性與生產性，身體感知與空間材質對話的基礎行動可能性，成為建築涵構的主題。
這樣的建築思考，延續到2005年台灣台南海安路的「非間帶－開放實境」、2006年德國魯爾區的D計劃「開放實境」中，展現其潛伏性的空間介入力量。前者跨越了一整條街，奪回了市民的街道權，這條街在15年前鏟除了原址的舊市集與房舍，在行政官僚體系的扭曲規畫下，進行了一個荒謬而失敗的都市地下街計畫。「繁殖場」以松木條重構了整條街的空間質感，吸引市民在一條長龍形空中步道中，重新找到駐足點，可以從不同角度與高度觀賞頭上的都市天空，也可以俯視腳下川流不息的汽車與機車，甚至干擾並吸引了早已不再停留的車陣裡的駕駛人目光，使得整條街的靈魂被喚醒，搭配著一連串的社區與藝術展演活動，成功地由讓松木繁殖的空間轉為拓殖的游憩之所，街道的潛伏性得到了解放，流變出一條龍形市民區間帶。
在2005年的海安路造街計畫中，繁殖場的「非間帶－開放實境」除了空間介入與拓殖外，還提出了松木以外的另一種材質：白色塑膠桶。在921台灣集集大地震中，某些建築物的支柱曾經被發現有沙拉油的鐵桶充裝水泥，填塞其間。相較而言，塑膠桶更形脆弱、具有彈性而容易產生化學變化。在台灣的日常生活空間中，白色半透明的塑膠桶與路邊麵攤的臨時招牌與照明、與水的儲存和農林漁牧業的使用具有歷史上的普遍聯結性，其他藍黑暗色類型的塑膠桶則與充當肥料的餿水相聯結。另一方面，在60、70年代的代工工廠裡，塑膠桶卻扮演了台灣與全球聯通的角色，它承裝著流質物料、污染性油料、甚至化學強酸，在各地林立的工廠角落中，扮演轉換出代工產品附加價值的要角，打造了台灣進入80年代以後世界經濟體系的管道。「繁殖場」在「非間帶─開放實境」作品中抽取出這個曾是台灣邁入世界體系的空間要素，加上內部燈光裝置，在街道與市民的身上轉化出材質自身的涵構語言。
2008年在台灣總統府與台中國立美術館前的「果凍迷宮」(Jello-Maze)，進一步將這些白色塑膠桶轉換為材料分子，用碎形構造的方式，打開了一種台灣式的迷宮建築形式。它不似歐洲的花園式、宮廷式迷宮建築，也不企圖創造聳立入雲、絕地通天的巴別塔，而是在晚間有溫度、有自身發光裝置的半透明迷宮。這個迷宮突顯出某種歡鬧中的幽靜，某種在溫暖的光線中與他者邂逅的可能性，因此，庫伯力克「鬼店」中讓人欲逃無路的悠深迷宮，或者佛羅倫斯波波里花園樹木參天讓人暈眩的樹牆迷宮，都不具有「果凍迷宮」所具有低視線阻隔、半透明多孔與環境視線引導的曲線變化，最重要的是，「果凍迷宮」裝置在都市與市民空間中，成為某種大型的迷宮遊戲裝置，讓市民與兒童建立與夜間發橘光的塑膠桶──這個潛伏性質材──的親近感，釋放出工業與經濟價值以外的材質感受，而事實上，對於這種材質的感受，早已在台灣物件歷史的發展中，潛存在人民的身體記憶深處。
場所感的潛伏性：
殖民現代化的碎片轉置
除卻日本之外，如果現代化對東亞大多數的國家而言，意味著殖民式的現代化模式，那麼，台灣自身純粹的建築空間可以說從來就不曾存在，而是潛伏在台灣受17世紀西班牙、荷蘭、20世紀日本、美國殖民現代化過程的碎片之間，也潛伏在其與18世紀至今中國文化母體本身的不穩定關係中。我們說台灣建築空間的潛伏性，就在於它歷經一連串的歷史變遷，至今仍未曾真正歸屬於市民。
這種時間上的「未曾」或「尚未」，從理念上來說，似乎本來就包含在現代性的批判計劃之中，但是從空間的構築與規畫來說，卻凸顯了台灣建築的過去，經常是一種外來殖民者、政治管理者所進行的現代化建築規劃，而發展自以市民價值為基礎的空間，只能說是相當晚近的事。其中更難以切割的一個歷史轉折，也就是土地與房屋商品化的巨大轉折，所謂的「市民價值」受到商品價值的封包，至此，過去殖民歷史上的「未曾」與「尚未」，再一次被扭轉到關於商品化的物質想像，一般市民住宅的規畫者、設計者，或所謂的現代建築師在此登場，成為馬克思所說的：「商品價值的實現是驚險的跳躍」這句話裏自負的馴獸師。
就此而言，空間的潛伏性在當下指涉的是尚未被殖民、意識形態與資本主義商品化所馴化的野性空間狀態，然而，就台灣不連貫的歷史變化而言，空間的潛伏性無疑的只能展現在某些破碎化的空間經驗裡。對於這些破碎的空間經驗進行野性的實驗轉化，猶如在一個龐大、不正常而無止境自我增生的有機體之間，進行某種良性病毒或空間抗體的繁殖培養，這項工作必須在既有的殖民空間、意識形態空間與商品化空間的內部或外部，導入病毒抗體，令其做異質性的增生、拓殖。因此，潛伏性的建築在這裏發揮的是特洛伊式的木馬力量。
這是一種空間的部署。哲學家傅柯在討論「異質空間」的時候，顯然注意到了殖民地空間、治理性空間、人類學化的空間、死亡空間、生命政治空間、規訓與懲罰的空間和現代都會交通轉換空間，但他也注意到了作為物質性力量的鏡像空間與抽象力量的語詞空間。但是如今倒反過來，如果我們從第三世界國家空間與建築被殖民的經驗作為出發點，對於「異質空間」的思考，就必須進行雙重化的批判工作：一方面是對歐洲現代性式空間規劃話語的批判；另一方面則是透過物質性的涵構批判國族主義或異國情調的空間話語。「繁殖場」的空間部署，作為某一種東亞當代的「異質空間」思考，似乎正是以某種唯物論的方式進行著上述的雙重批判。這種批判，用非常物質性的語言來說，就是對於混凝土式的現代主義建築美學的批判。
921台灣集集大地震，11萬棟全倒與半倒的房屋，正代表了這種從柯布西耶建築美學發展出來的混凝土式現代主義在台灣的巨大失敗。然而，透過所謂的後現代美學席捲而來的商品化貸款住屋，並沒有真正去除它骨子裏的混凝土式現代主義。建造者與居住者不相關，商品住屋與其建地的歷史不相關，居住者成為買賣者，也成為抽象化的使用者。空間的存在成為完全幾何學化、物化的存在，現象學式的場所精神論在此顯得無關痛癢、反諷、更具有某種可能被商品化的危險。
但「繁殖場」的空間部署，為什麼採用金屬浪板、鋼架與木架、松木條與塑膠桶和白熾燈泡這些材質呢？這些材質與空間的潛伏性究竟有什麼關係？
首先，我們可以說，這些材質在空間的塑造上都具有變異的彈性，也都具有身體的親和性。換句話說，如果我們想要從身體的親和性重新挖掘出潛伏性的空間，就必須運用於身體親近而具有變異彈性的材質。
其次，繁殖場進行涵構工作的主要工作者也就等於研究者本身，這些具有學生身分的研究者，在氣質上摒除了後現代主義式的藝術品味，同時也對台灣習慣了混凝土式的建築現代主義抱持激烈的質疑態度，他們的態度比較接近某種科學實驗室的成員，企圖找出潛伏性的空間，加以繁殖，而這種找尋過程中，他們發現，最重要的介面，仍舊是空間建造者與使用者的身體，這種身體的實作與物質性的想像，使得他們在批判思考中設定的一個限度：絕不進行如摩天大樓式的直觀巨構建築，所謂建築，永遠與身體感的延伸與空間氛圍的對話做為基礎，建築是一種治療，透過土地、木頭、金屬、塑膠、光與電這幾種基本的物質條件，企圖把壓抑的空間與身體當中潛伏的力量具體釋放出來。
第三，從現代化的殖民經驗來看，繁殖場的工作方式包含了亞洲特有的師生關係及其倫理力量，這樣一種團隊組成的方式，本身即包含有自我批判、自我教育的特質，它並不是一種單純的殖民、意識形態推廣或商品化隔離斷裂的規劃營建方式，而必須同時考量施作者身體經驗介入的可能性與不確定性，換句話說，某種隱而不顯的身體感在這裏成為潛伏性空間的確切指標，如果沒有透過師生關係的對話和倫理力量，潛伏性空間能將成為另一個空洞的名詞，然而，施作者在規劃的涵構上進行一種研究性的參與，其必要性必然來自於具有個別差異的身體感，於是，潛伏性的空間成為聆聽差異化的身體感的一種空間，它尚未被實現，也等待被實現，它必須要從每一個施作者個別的生命經驗、身體感與想像出發，在師生倫理關係的張力與協調中，進行一種永遠難以完成、卻永遠必須繼續開展的空間涵構行動。
第四，而老師之所以為老師，有如拉力賽中的領航員，他必須在一個瞬間經驗中辨識地形地物，指出出口的可能方向，他是製圖師，他的施作平面與學生不同但有所交疊，他展現的是在想像的現實之間的製圖術，一種在潛伏性空間中尋找出口、尋找逃逸路線的繪圖術。就此而言，繁殖場面對潛伏性空間的方式並不是對可能的構造物預備了一張精密而不再改動的藍圖，而是準備了關於繪圖術的各種基本元素，或者構造物的基本輪廓，一直要等到身體感與潛伏性的空間力量遭遇之後，一個在圖表與現實之間的行動在瞬間被採行，空間的生產於是得到一個暫時性的完成。實際上，這裏所謂的完成只有充實的程度之別，從外表來看，永遠有其他的行動可能繼續被採行，永遠未完成。
時間感的潛伏性：
歷史終結後的建築
時延
資本主義式的住宅建築不允許未經編碼的建築語言，這種詳細編碼的工作，就當代的情況而言，顯然可以具有看似豐富的歷史向度。因此，我們在台灣可以看到西班牙與荷蘭殖民時期的木造與磚造建築，可以看到具有漢人特色的閩式建築，可以看到日本殖民時期的新古典主義建築，可以看到國民黨政府時期的混凝土式現代建築。從一種自然的建築時延來看，這些不同的建築編碼雖然斷裂，但是仍保存有某種自身的完整度。然而，從黑格爾到丹托的「歷史終結論」來看，80年代之後，當台灣走向高度資本主義化的社會，台灣建築本身的歷史就進入了終結狀態。所謂的終結狀態，主要指的是建築語彙本身的概念化、抽象化與去歷史化，在台灣的脈絡而言，這種抽象化與去歷史化的自由，其實主要是被限定在住宅的商品化與建築的資本主義化的範圍之內。換句話說，對於台灣過去建築歷史語彙的編碼與再現，主要是由資本主義的自由市場所操作、所完成。
台灣當代的房地產市場可以說充分表現了這種歷史終結的狀態。某種商品化的國際主義以及廣告口號化的美國、歐洲與日本意象，象徵著現代主義的巨大成就，以符號化的方式依附在建築體、建築外觀與建築論述中。最明顯代表的就是台北的101大樓，撇開它直觀性的、摩天大樓式的巨大結構體不說，某種中國式的「竹節」的造形意象，透過設計師自由的賦予，充分展現了現代主義之後，自由運用歷史編碼的市場精神。如此的巨大、在直觀中具有力量、體系化、自由、超越歷史，難道我們不應該讚賞它在歷史中的連續性與堅實性嗎？
從直觀的、物理的角度來說，摩天大樓似乎是一種真實不墜的當代建築成就。然而，如果我們從921事件的經驗來看，如此強大的建築面對道德、倫理與宗教力量，卻顯得如此脆弱。資本主義商品化的邏輯創造了完美的幻見，當101大樓不斷在尋求新的買主的時候，它就跟台灣一般房地產市場的資本邏輯一樣，抽離了土地，抽離了歷史，抽離了使用者的生命經驗與生活世界，它們的堅實存在，只限定在資本流動的抽象世界裏。因此，這些商品化的住宅與摩天大樓實際上不過是商品消費邏輯下的斷片，它的時間性來自於固定的建築語彙編碼，但不論從建築設計者、使用者與市場買賣者的角度來看，這些建築完全沒有歷史的延續性與堅實性，它們只是在滿足建築師與消費者的慾望吧。
如何逃逸出資本主義無所不包的建築編碼語彙呢？如果建築可以重新回到潛伏性的空間，潛伏在地表，潛伏在牆面，潛伏在角落，那麼，它也可以用另外一種方式突破時間的框架，回過頭來，潛伏在歷史建築的時間內部，潛伏在現代建築的瞬間皮層，潛伏在未完成的涵構狀態中，也潛伏在與施作者當下的身體感相互連結、與社區的空間史對話、與市民的時間想像相互激盪的涵構狀態裏。呂理煌說：「我們想像這裏是曾經在時間深海中的城市遺址。」這就是建築繁殖場在時間的潛伏性上所進行的工作原則。
首先，潛伏到歷史建築的時間內部去。繁殖場在面對2004年建築雙年展台灣館的普吉歐尼宮的歷史空間，以及2006年德國魯爾美術館的「D計劃──開放實境」時，它並沒有理所當然的接受這個歷史空間的歷史性。而是反過來企圖在這兩個文藝復興史與現代工業史空間裏，置入某種異樣的時間要素，在潛伏在這個歷史空間裏的時間性得到釋放。這也就是拋除形式思維，運用某種現象學式的當下身體感，涵構出可以游走、可以停駐、可以逗留、可以相互觀視、可以躲藏起來的變化空間，於是，觀賞者在空間的參與上不再是有距離的、歷史性的觀看，而是進入身體參與的當下時間。當代建築中最難以獲得的恰好就是這個身體參與的當下時間。在歷史建築的時間內部，這種當下的時間感具有一種事件性，讓參與者回到身體感受與空間的直接對話與直接關係裏。再進一步說，這個潛伏性的工作對於施作者與其製圖者來講都是一個挑戰。
第二，潛伏在現代建築的瞬間皮層上。2005年台南海安路「非間帶－開放實境」計劃，基本上，是以手作的方式，在失敗的都市計劃之後所產生的一條柏油馬路旁進行的涵構。這種柏油馬路在台灣代表了現代化的時間狀態──讓人車瞬間通過的一條皮層，但這種瞬間其實在開發的過程中衝垮了社區的交流時間。然而，如果要重新挖掘出社區的交流時間，就必須涵構出容許這種交流時間與交流行為的潛在空間。如果說921台灣大地震所引發的時間失落感、時間的創傷必然要透過另類的建築行為得到撫慰，那麼，繁殖場在海安路工作的時間過程，也就等於他們跟社區民眾對話的時間，也就等於他們引發社區民眾停留在街道上，重新談論失去的街道、重新占領失去的街道的行動時間。現代都市的瞬間皮層所具有的潛伏時間性，至此重新被揭露開來。
第三，節慶、遊戲與休憩的夢幻時間感。繁殖場所進行的潛伏性的時間涵構，很容易就可以從2008年總統府廣場與國立美術館廣場中涵構出的節慶時間、遊戲時間與休憩時間，看出街道的快速穿越相對而言是多麼的具有暴力性質。這些快速不容駐留的道路可說是橫向的摩天大樓，已經成為現代都市無法逃脫的時間命運。但是，繁殖場的遊戲場與迷宮建築，卻特別在晚間為市民與兒童找到了潛汱性的、非消費性的、身體與空間探索性的玩樂空間。
結論：潛伏於未建成的涵構
作為結論，我們可以用「潛伏在未建成的涵構狀態中」來總括繁殖場的建築行為與建築哲學。
前文已經說過，某種「未曾說出」、「尚未說完」的時間結構，潛伏在繁殖場所使用的涵構材質、所進行的空間化行為中。這裏所謂的未完成或未建成，不同於日本建築者磯崎新那些未完成的建築計畫、不可能的建築草圖。而是關於台灣現代主義混凝土建築的時間性批判。表面上看起來，混凝土非常的堅固、持久、具有高度的完成感。實際上，在台灣歷史的脈絡中卻代表了去歷史化的建築材料。其建築行為由於商品化而充滿了歷史的斷裂性，而缺乏延續性，當大地震與水災發生時，人們被擠壓在鋼筋水泥的空隙間，龐然巨大的集合住宅整幢傾倒時，鋼筋混凝土的脆弱性與其因為商品化而掩蓋建築倫理性的本質，才得以彰顯。
災變之後，建築不可能不回歸大地。用海德格的語言來說，人文世界必須直接面對大地，在與大地的爭執之中，開展其世界結構。在這個開展過程中，事物之所以成為事物，建築之所以成為建築，總是從某種世界結構的想像中得到具體的落實。然而，在符碼化與商品化的資本主義世界中，所有世界結構的想像都失去了回歸大地與大地進行嶄新的爭執的動力，這便是繁殖場回到材質、空間、身體、行為、時間、歷史的潛伏性中，尋找那潛伏在未完成涵構狀態中的未來建築，尋找那潛伏在未來時序中，某種事件性的負建築與弱建築，它潛伏在周遭自然環境中，也潛伏在市民的歷史、市民的身體、市民的空間與市民的輕巧生命力量當中。
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Ten years ago, the September 21 Taiwan Earthquake in the end of 20th century has given a violent shake to our thinking of architecture. It happened on the midnight of September 21 1999, which registered in Richter magnitude scale as 7 points 3. During 102 seconds, the violent shake made 2,434 persons death, 54 persons missing, 11,306 persons wounded and nearly 110,000 buildings collapsed or half toppled. As Heidegger said in discussing the essence of thinking and dwelling, thinking is always an Ereignis, an Event, in a sudden crisis and dwelling is a Gestell, a Framing, after an eventual thinking. Thus, the real thinking is constantly situated in a deviated spatial-temporal structure in need of eventual thinking. After the events of Japanese Aum Doomsday Cult terrorism, Hanshin Earthquake in Japan and the September 11, 2001, Japanese architect Kengo Kuma stated in his preface of his book Defeated Architecture (2004), “Earthquake has revealed the weak side of the buildings.” Though the weakness that Kengo Kuma mentioned is mainly about the private ownership of architecture, it is still a strong formulation effective for the architecture of Taiwan. For no matter the physical, material or structural attributions, the relations among architecture, environment and history, or the extreme private ownership of Taiwanese buildings, everything was involved into this emergent event and became a problematic that has to be rethink over. For Taiwanese architect Li H. LU, graduated from SCI-ARC in 1992, the Interbreeding Field organized by him in the pedagogical notion of “Making in Action,” is the aftermath of the emergent status after the September 21 Earthquake. It is ironic here to cite the Marxist phrase “All that is solid melts into air,” but how truly it is! In the nearly 110,000 buildings collapsed or half toppled, the majority of them were constructed by reinforced concrete and functioned as the collective residences or buildings of school, as the case of Sichuan Earthquake 2008. They looked very strong and got a cheap price to establish all over the territories of mountains, forests, villages and cities, belonging either to the hard-working salary classes who invested all their savings or granted a loan in these houses or to the government that built these school for the working classes' children. Through the reinforced concrete, the Taiwanese architectural field has represented the western modernist thinking of architecture after the period of Japanese colonization in 1895-1945. This way of architectural thinking insisted the architecture of gigantic volume, multiple building materials, long-term duration and its background of economic-political power sustaining by the institution of residence loaning and free market trading of capitalizing buildings. After Earthquake, people do not take this kind of architectural modernism for granted and start to question the ideology of neglecting the limitation of usage of natural environments and the broken consciousness of local spatial history. During the 10 years action of building, Interbreeding Field has put these propositions into brackets which seldom being questioned before in Taiwan architecture. The grandiose systematic thinking of western modernism often puts the emphasis on a way of upwards building. But is there any different possible way of escaping? If the architecture does not intentionally search for a reinforced, strengthened structure, for symbolic meanings, for visual expressions and for satisfying the desire of private ownership, the action of “Making,” building and its production will have any alternatives? In the perspective of Interbreeding Field, the problematic cannot be detached from the process of latency and interbreeding. The aim of this article is focused on the notion of “Latent Architecture” and elaborates the philosophical significance of this notion from the praxis experience of Interbreeding Field in this decade.
Latency of Materials: Molecular repetition and difference
The matrix of Interbreeding Field is constructed in the steel structure and metal wave plates. And this form of building has repeated the omnipresence of Taiwanese light industry's factory architecture. This type of structure and materials, though not adopted by the majority of residence houses, represented chiefly the construction of productive space during 1960s, which was a period of import/export trading and processing industries in the economic history of Taiwan. The factory buildings constructed by steel structure and metal wave plates, for their structures and roofs, were spread on the marginal regions of metropolitans and harbors. They worked as agencies for processing the toys, umbrellas, electric components, shoes, screws, ready-made clothes and tools of the first world states. These productive spaces were divergent from familial scale to factory scale and therefore their installations were more latent than realized. Their latencies came from the works of productions being always labor-intensive and reproductive which deprived the subjectivity of the working subjects in the process of agency. In this sense, the fundamental characteristic of the matrix space (1999-2002) of Interbreeding Field is its lurking gesture in relative with its natural environment. In contrast to the general western modernist gigantic and solid residences and bureaus, for Li H. LU, the mode of production of Interbreeding Field are interbreeding and interfering in modernizing spaces instead of keeping the mode of agency and reproduction. ‘Interbreeding' means the active confrontations of the given world structure and experimenting different ways of transplanting, crossbreeding and hybridizing the new hybrids and materials of architecture. In this way, the matrix of Interbreeding Field has transplanted an anti-modernist, anti-loaned-building, anti-spatial-capitalizing interweaved place into the given modernist architectural atelier, residence and agent factories. It is an action of promoting the ‘chemical change' in modernist architectural aesthetics and refuting the formal post-modernism at the same time. The ‘chemical change' in respect of materials and building process is firstly expressed in the series interweaving action of redwood pine. We would consider specifically the redwood pine interweaving and overlapping of Taiwan Pavilion of the 9th Venice Architecture Biennale in 2004. When the audience entered into the interior of Palazzo delle Prigioni that constructed by the Renaissance rationale of perspective geometry, passed by the dedication to Italian architect Carlo Scarpa presented in the entrance, they would feel the metamorphoses in the spatial-temporal structure of this building. LU and Interbreeding Field chose latency in place of transparency; that is to say, they chose the motivations of bodily orientation and motility as their building focuses in place of visual representations and transparency of rational design. The audience was invited to a molecular syncopation of becoming-architecture that the natural modulated, warming, flexible redwood pine becoming a porous interface of the flesh. As a gravity-reflective and weight-flexible material, the redwood pine became an interface of different assemblages: wood flooring, armrests, sloping path, wallboards, wood ladders, towers, seat, deck chairs, passages, footrests, handrails, tables, frameworks for screens, symbolic bamboo bushes and ponds, etc.. It is an extreme actualization of the latency of the redwood pine in place of reinforced concrete as the element of building. In the second place, the temporality of redwood pine is characteristic of maturing, temporal and vulnerable. So to speak, it is a flexible, weak and negative architecture which continuously transforming the spatial latency in a way of “becoming-place.” Palazzo delle Prigioni was transformed into a playground for spatial interrogation, an auto-responding field of the gravity movement of the audience, a reformulated Chinese garden pregnant of multiple visual syncopations. The body of audience was guided by the becoming of redwood pine to change its focuses and to notify the possible pause points. In the same time, the redwood pine was used in molding the atmosphere of the place according to the model of different bodily motility. In this way, redwood pine became a matrix as ‘chora' formulated in Kristeva's thought which being pregnant with the overlapping space among multiple bodily affects and regards. Sometimes the audience seemed walk upwards on a sloping path to a temple; sometimes they seemed climb upon a tower and look far away; sometimes they seemed repose besides a pond or a bamboo bush for meditations; sometimes they seemed lean against the wall on a corner or a handrail to have a pause. There were three redwood pine towers stretching upwards to the arching and the vaults which supporting the audience to touch the arching and vaults with their fingers. It would have been a Bachelardian surprise when they found the arching and vaults were timber structure corresponding with the timber towers and the whole redwood pine interweaving. And such a liberation of renaissance architectural historicity, through Interbreeding Field's overlapping the two heterogeneous spatial constructions, made the place tangible out of its visible dimension. Below and above the wood flooring, there were two contrast spaces too: the one below was a basement like bamboo bushes filled with atmosphere of obscurity, gloomy, separation, solitude; the other above was a garden or a playground stretching vertically and horizontally implied with transparent, bright, chiasmatic regards. However, the issue what latent architecture would like to deal with was not only of the look or the regard. Taiwan Pavilion in 2004 has also presented a moebius platform of the fragrance of redwood pine, of the sounds resonant of the different weights pressed on the redwood pine, of the affinity and the tangibility that created an atmosphere for the audience to encounter with each other, of looking tenderly with the strangers, of leaning one's body against the place with the other. Thus it would liberate the latency of spatial sensibility, not through high tensional stimulus in bodily perceptions, but through the revealing of the possibilities of actions and existences. Revealing the power of latency of interbreeding and interfering in space, Interbreeding Field extended its thinking to Tainan city street reformulation work “Non Side Zoom: Open Reality” in Taiwan, 2005 and “Project D: Open Reality” for “ENTRY 2006, Talking Cities” in German heavy industry district Zeche Zollverein Essen 2006. The former has traversed a street that was depopulated by a false urbanized project destroying its traditional market there. “Non-Side Zoom: Open Reality” recaptured the citizen's right and latent power of the street by building a sidewalk, a pavement, a footbridge, a pedestrian bridge with redwood pine. As contrast with the asphalt road, its tar concrete and its speedy traffic, the redwood pine has provoked the citizens to stop, to pause and to talk with each other when they strolling on the platform. Plastic barrel was the new material adopted in “Non-Side Zoom: Open Reality,” Comparatively speaking, the 20 liter plastic barrel is more hard, artificial but a container with more historical sense. In the daily living space of Taiwanese, the white plastic barrel might be the signboard of a stall when there is a light bulb inside; it might be the container of water and many different materials for works; and it might be the recycling container for hogwash. In another way, in the agent factories of 60s and 70s, the plastic barrel played the role of supporter and container of the pollutants, even strong acid and strong base that would be transformed into the values of the products in the process of import/export trading. The plastic barrels paved the paths for Taiwan entering into the global economic system but not without some environmental prices. Interbreeding Field extracted this spatial element as a singular architectural language and contextualized it on the street of Tainan with the citizens of the 21th century. In the context of “Jello-Maze” in the square of presidential palace and the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts in 2008. Li H. LU and Interbreeding Field transformed these plastic barrels into molecular element of building. The plastic barrels became the fractals that constructed a labyrinth in Taiwanese fashion. The labyrinth was not similar to the European garden or royal court labyrinth, was not resemble the vertically stretching Babel, but was one with multiple warm and bright monads each with a light bulb inside like thousands of fractals. They were organized as some spatial rhetoric invitations for the encountering of strangers in cities. The separation was not enclosed and was just for distinguishing the different paths. The audience would see each other in a corner suddenly appeared before their eyes because the walls of the labyrinth were low enough to create this possibility. Children and adults would like to play in this labyrinth, to find each other contingently but not to find something intellectually. Finally, it became a micro paradise with semi-transparent orange light and the atmosphere of the memories of childhood.
Latency of Place: Colonial modernization and its fragments
If the modernization of architecture for the majority countries of East Asia, excluding Japan, means their colonial modernization, the pure Taiwanese place has never been established before. It is latent in the colonial history of Taiwan among Spanish and Dutch in the 17th century, Japan and United States in the 20th century, and finally latent in the ambiguous, unstable relation with its Chinese cultural matrix. When we discuss on the issue of latency of architecture in Taiwan, we are talking about the destination of place of citizens of the Third World during the history of globalization. This spatial-temporal experience of ‘never been,' ‘not yet,' which being characteristic of the critical project of European modernity, now becomes a unbearably painful sarcasm of the architecture and ‘project' of the colonizer. And after the end of colonization, there is a more powerful capitalist market that dominating the territories and residences. In the structure of commodities communication, houses and buildings become more abstract than in the period of colonization so as to jump into the gigantic flow of capital. Modernist and post-modernist aesthetics are suitable with this flow of capital as its aesthetic ideology. As Marx said, “the realization of commodity values is a thrilling jump,” the modernist and post-modernist architects in Taiwan are sometimes the arrogant trainers of the lions of commodity values. However, spatial latency means the ‘other space' that is a brute being without being tamed by colonization, capitalism and aesthetics. In this way, Taiwan only owns her spatial latency in some ‘not yet' built fragmented spaces. When Interbreeding Field experiments in such fragmented spaces, it is just like experimenting in the intervals of a gigantic organism that has nourished itself in some abnormal way. For cultivating new possibility and transformation interior or exterior, it is necessary to put some antibody into it and make it heterogeneously growing up and interbreeding first with its environment. The latent architecture here become an origin of ‘other space.' Latent architecture is a possible building of escape and revolt in the given socio-historical dispositif of space. When philosopher Foucault discussing the ‘autre espace,' he has taken notice of the colonized houses, spaces of surveillance, spaces of hospital and death and the spaces of transportations among modern metropolitans, but he has also paid attention to the material power of specular space and the power of abstraction of discourse space. In the context of spatial colonization experience of the Third World, the Foucaudian ‘auter espace' should be a task of double critique: on the one hand, it is a critique towards European modernity about the discursive project of space; on the other hand, it must be a materializing contextualized critique in a de-nationalist or de-exotic spatial building. As a spatial dispositif, Interbreeding Field practices an East-Asia way of thinking of ‘other space' and exercises a materialist double critique as mentioned above. In a very concrete way to speak, this critique aims at the critique of modernist architectural aesthetics of reinforced concrete. But why this spatial dispositif uses metal wave plates, steel structure, redwood pine, plastic barrels and light bulbs as its materials in the spaces? What is the relation between these materials and the latency of place? Firstly, these metal wave plates, redwood pine and plastic barrels have a variant flexibility in common and their intimacy with our body is quite evident. That is to say, if we would like to rediscover latent place out of bodily intimacy, we have to adopt materials of variant and of flexible that corresponding the motility of our body. Secondly, the measure of place originates in builders' and user's sensibility and handcraft. The different roles of the workers, the researchers and the designers are in majority overlapping in Interbreeding Field, which keeping resist the aesthetics of modernism or post-modernism, therefore they use their own body in dialogue with the place in building as the molding measure. The living corporeal measure makes a finitude of their critical architectural thinking: never separate with handwork to invent a intuitively gigantic construction like skyscraper. The architecture for them is always extended with handcraft, handmade, handwork, sensation in becoming, atmosphere, anti-history and anti-memories. Thus Li H. LU prefers the word ‘Building' than ‘Architecture' to emphasize something of liberation and of therapy during the process of dialogues with the materials of territory, woods, metals, plastics, lights and electricity. It is a liberation of latent energy in body and space being repressed or suppressed in history. Thirdly, the methodology of practice of Interbreeding Field implies a specifically Asian character of ethical aesthetics that between master and his pupils in a school that living and learning as a group. This kind of group consists of an intensive exchange of opinions on-site during its practice, then the exchange extends to the domain of self-critique and self-educative characteristics of modernity. It is a critique on base of continuously practice working on some issues waiting for interrogating in the future. Thus the quality of knowledge here presupposes practice personally and alternatively distinguished from the method of capitalism and colonization. The action of building pays attentions to the uncertainty and different possibility coming from the worker's experience on-site, and this implicit experience has to be worked out simultaneously and divergently through the critical and dialogical relations between master and his pupils. In other words, the project of latent architecture constantly includes all kinds of modulations in the laborers' participant and on-site research. And the teacher or master of Interbreeding Field is just as the navigator in a rallycross or a cartographer in a virtual plane that facing with the Becoming of the place.
Latency of Temporality: After the end of architecture
In the perspective of Danto's ‘the end of art,' Taiwan's architecture was end when it went into a high capitalist society in 80s. For the ‘end' here, we mean a conceptualized, abstracted and ahistoricalized consciousness of architecture and buildings that after the highly coded languages of all sorts of architecture crossing history and the borders of states. In the context of local architectural history, there are timber structure and red bricks buildings in the period of Spanish and Dutch, the san-ho-yuan pattern, or the three winged pattern and the szu-ho-yuan or four winged pattern of Minnan and Pro-China architecture, the red bricks facades, European engraved stones arches and columns, and over-ornate chisel patterns of the Baroque facades in Japanese colonization period, and finally the reinforced concrete modern buildings in KMT government period after 1945. Though these patterns and codes disrupted with each other from an architectural chronicle point, they had their own context in different periods. But now the capitalist free market makes all the historical codes being librated from history that totally going into a market that ‘anything goes.' The present market of Taiwanese real property has fully represented this state of ‘end of architecture.' The best symbol is Taipei 101 skyscraper. It has a intuitively gigantic structure and the symbolic cultural sign of bamboo node that was given freely by architect and designer. It is an achievement of high modernism or postmodernism. And should we celebrate this systematic, powerful, free, ahistorical building of its solidness and the duration it will have in the history ‘not yet' coming? In a physical and intuitive viewpoint, the skyscraper is certainly a real achievement of modern architecture. But if we remember the experience of the September 11 terrorist event, the strong twin towers became so vulnerable buildings in confrontation with the power of morality, ethics, political violence and religion. The logic of capitalist commodity has created a perfect fantasy of the real. When the 101 skyscraper kept find the new buyer, its existence is similar to the other real property in Taiwan that dominated by the logic of commodity. It has separated with land, separated with history, separated with the lived experience of the dweller and its solidity and duration are limited in the abstract world of the circulation of the capital. How can we escape from the omnipresence of capitalist architectural coded language? If architecture can interrogate into the latent spaces, to the bottoms of the land, to the surface of the wall, to the dormant corner, then it can break through the frame of time and conceal itself inside the historical building, cover itself up the skin of modern building, hide itself in the unbuilt context, lurk itself in the builders' bodily sensation and incubate itself in the dialogue with spatial history of community. Professor Li H. LU said in reflection of the temporal dimension of Interbreeding Field, “we imagine that here is a city relics that sunk into a deep ocean of time.” This is the working hypothesis in the aspect of latency of temporality. We can elaborate it as follow. Firstly, LU and Interbreeding Field are lurking and interfering into the temporality of historical building's interior. While they faced with Taiwan Pavilion of the 9th Venice Architecture Biennale in 2004, Palazzo delle Prigioni, it did not take the Renaissance rationale of Progioni for granted; the same attitude was the case “Project D: Open Reality” for “ENTRY 2006, Talking Cities” in German Ruhe district Zeche Zollverein 2006. On the contrary, they tried to put some heterogeneous element of temporality into the historical spaces in phenomenological ways to the extent that the latent places could be experienced. The body of audience could walk on, lean on, climb upwards, hide into and repose on the redwood pine playground. They could have the regards without distance or history that create a body of present and an anti-memory sensation. In this way, a place of event, of happening would be possible. Secondly, LU and Interbreeding Field are lurking and interfering on the instant surface skin of modern architecture and create a ‘becoming-place.' Taking ‘Non Side Zoom: Open Reality' in Tainan 2005 as an example, this project was realized in handmade method by LU and the team members of Interbreeding Field. They brought a very warm, soft and slow redwood pine pedestrian way overlapping on an asphalt road that had been a site of a fail urbanized project. This road represented the temporality of modernization and the speediness flowing of the capitals surfing on it. It is a road anti-memorial and ahistorical but for nothing creating on the site. All the automobiles and scooters passed instantly and the pedestrian did not stay or stop for a while because it was just an enclosed transportation channel for them. The redwood pine pedestrian bridge and watchtower have created a heterogeneous temporal platform for playing, for communicating and for meditating. There is a latent temporality hiding in a traumatized community here. If the sense of loss has to be comforted by transformative action of building, the working temporality of Interbreeding Field in Tainan has provoked the people of community to gather, to stay, to speak to each other on the street again. The latent temporality of modern city was revealed its otherness. Thirdly, Interbreeding Field has invented the temporality of dreaming, playing, celebration and reposing in 'Jello-Maze' in the square of presidential palace and the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts in 2008. In contrast with the horizontal speediness of highways and asphalt roads, the vertical solidness of skyscraper and collective reinforced concrete residences, these playgrounds and labyrinths were buildings for the children and citizens in their non-consumptive dreaming and leisure time.
Conclusion: Latency in the unbuilt context
Building on a reverie ‘never being' and ‘not yet' for LU and Interbreeding Field is not working on the unbilt, unfinished, blueprints but a series of handcraft critique of Taiwanese modernized reinforced concrete architecture. Originating in the trauma experience of uncertainty and ruins of living houses, the vulnerability of redwood pine and plastic barrels are materials of becoming-building for a new place-thinking that more brute, contextual, historical but anti-memorial. After the catastrophe, all architecture cannot help but regress to the ground. But after all, in Heideggerian words, the architecture and human world must confront with the earth and ground to establish the things and the structure of world. The latency of architecture exists in this confrontation and the reveries. The materials, place and temporality are interfaces between the earth and the world. LU and Interbreeding search for the latent dynamics of confrontation in the materials, spaces and temporality. They have found the vulnerability instead of solidity, the flexibility instead of hardness, the participating ethics instead of individual aesthetics, the action instead of blueprint, the handmade and body instead of digital machine and geometry, and finally the latency instead of architectural buildings complete fineness.
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