Download Distraction™ 2 - New

Everyone is talking about the new (has been, for some time now). The new this, the new that, how to become new, find the new, what will be the next new, what happened to the last new. Our civilization is helplessly in thrall to this subject. There are many other ways to describe what is important to us-we are also a society of the spectacle, we prefer simulacra to the real in an ecstasy of consumption, we have a soft spot for nostalgia and for science fiction-but we are, first and foremost, lovers of novelty. Everything else is conditioned by this fact. The regard for newness is so basic and universal that to even notice it, much less question it, seems extraordinary.

We believe that newer is better. Not because it is a fact in each individual case, but because it is an inevitability in general. This belief originated during the industrial revolution, when we first started to figure that history progresses rather than accumulates. Since then, we have come to take 'progress' for granted; nowadays new equals improved. The economic importance of this formula cannot be overstated. The magic words 'new and improved' power consumption, continuously creating new markets, the lifeblood of capitalism. The mechanisms of built-in-obsolescence, artificially drawn out development schedules (which phase in changes in smaller increments over the longest possible time to ensure a continuous supply of new-and-improved products), and contrived categories, (which turned the station wagon into the new and improved minivan and then the SUV) have become positively epistemic.

Yet, ours is also a critical society, and this colors our view of the new. By entailing 'improved,' new becomes less a statement of fact than a judgement, setting up newness as a value. And it is only that value which matters: the new thing is questioned only about its provenance, rather than its efficacy. Particularly in the cultural sphere, where the only currency is currency, the critical bias-towards-the-new creates an atmosphere in which the new is privileged, the not-really-new-after-all is held in contempt, and the not-even-presented-as-new is completely ignored. When you've got a hammer everything looks like a nail.

Yet, it doesn't take much of a step back to recognize that 'new' and 'good' are not automatically the same. The association of the new only with progress is a cultural artifact, not a logical inevitability. New stuff can be bad, too. Or bad stuff can be new. And, most importantly, good stuff need not be only new, or even the latest. In fact, the best stuff tends to survive-long enough to become not-new, if not long enough to become a monument. Clearly, the more likely place to find bona fide excellence would be in the chronologically superior regions of the timeline, and the passage of time alone should not necessarily erode objective worth. But objectivity has never been a feature of the media-driven culture machine, which is the main arbiter of such (chrono-inflected) value.

As a cultural medium in its own right, architecture has not been immune to the blandishments of newness. The objective survival of goodness has always been one of architecture's achievements, but a bias for the new is now reflected throughout field, most particularly in its academic corners. Ironically, this bias has become ingrained through the presumption of a historical perspective which treats the progression of discoveries, inventions and re-discoveries as the only important chain of influence. In this version of history, 'first' beats out 'best' every time. When first is not available, then best is reframed to be first in some way, so that the importance of the best stuff is not explained in terms of its goodness but its originary priority. This originary status is picked up by theory as proof against (political) repression, since it provides the only logical assurance of the non-conventional.

Design, or at least critical design, which is architecture's entry in the culture-fashion stakes, is also dependent on the logic and imprimatur of the new. In design's case its identity-and value, which, in the signature design realm is the same thing-is entirely bound up in being seen as the next big thing. Rather than strive towards the epitome of any tradition or established practice, the best design is expected only to break new ground, where it may remain safe from critique as long as it can avoid attributions of ancestry.