Autocriticism: Architect-neurosis

Abstract

Autocriticism challenges normative boundaries and meanings of ‘self’. This thesis reviews primitive self-perspectives that verge on singularity between environment and self, suggesting a certain reciprocity between self-ideation and community-realizations. The theoretical construction is narrativized in script one: “two poets on the meaning of autocriticism”. The dialogue incorporates frameworks of psychoanalysis and contemporaneity in literary criticism. Within it, two poets contextualize criticism “-in house, today”, effectively reversing the plane of projections and introjections. The phenomena of criticism becoming no-criticism is demonstrated “-in house” for the reviewers of this M. Arch thesis, in the second script: “two analysts on architect-neurosis”. As a set, the two scripts foreground three “viewings” of ‘self’ that each actualize its own art of subjectivity: Designer’s Block on Kirkland street, Resident’s Safe over Cambridge-Somerville, and Students’ Sandbox for Blackstone Steam Plant. Individually, the projects cultivate different forms of community-realization at respective sites, but collectively, they produce a patterned body that reflects the voyeur’s understanding of the relative environment.