Anthony Vidler The Architectural Uncanny Essays

The second part considers the architectural process and how this relates to the use of architectural fantasy in animation film. In this chapter Suzanne Buchan describes some examples of animation film's particular "bending" or manipulation of architectural space and contrast this to our experience of space in architectural set design in live-action cinema.

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In his book Hollow Land: Israel’s Architecture of Occupation, architect Eyal Weizman references Palestinian refugee camps as uncanny spaces that “each side considers haunted” (227).

It has also become common within the global movement of humanitarian journalism to invoke a language of spectrality and refer to refugees as “ghosts” and refugee camps as “ghostly,” “haunting,” and “eerie.” The narrative framing of refugee camps, as well as the belief in their haunting, points to the spaces of Palestinian refugee camps as particular sources of uncanny anxiety.

Currently, the world contains an estimated 5 million Palestinian refugees, with around 1 million of this number living in Gaza and the West Bank.

Politically, refugees occupy a threshold space of multiple legal dimensions.

There are many examples that unpack the intersections of architecture and the uncanny.

One of the most recent and politically charged can be found in the Palestinian refugee camps, particularly those within the Palestinian territories of Gaza and the West Bank.Throughout the history of film, we have seen a change in the ways in which architecture is used, portrayed and represented in film: from the scale models of the 1920s, through to actual sets, rendered backdrops, and now to complete green screen filming.This term we will view films with a focus on the creation of the set, and the varying impacts of these sets in the end result of the film.Invoking Freud’s definition allows us to unpack this anxiety as the result of the uncanny architecture of the Palestinian refugee camp, both in terms of the “homely and unhomely,” as well as its deconstruction of political, legal, and territorial boundaries.The presence of Palestinian refugees is a deeply charged issue for Palestinians and Israelis, as well as for the neighboring Arab nations.The Architectural Uncanny was explored in the mid 1990s as a series of essays that focused on the Post Modern in architecture.Post Modernism, in its way of reflecting on the images of the past, sometimes in a very theatrical way, can be seen as a parallel of sorts with the creation of sets for film - that may use the past, present or create a future, in somewhat a similar theatrical fashion.The author then investigates how the space takes an active role in determining the narrative.The final part of the essay considers Anthony Vidler's concept of the architectural uncanny.Much Post Modern Architecture left the viewer with an odd feeling experience - one that was not based in "reality".Different means of portraying film sets, can create the same phenomenon.