Cityscape in the Era of Information and Communication Technologies

Abstract

The urban structure of a city and its architecture are the spatial manifestation of the culture of its inhabitants. Historic urban spaces provide a basis for observation and drawing conclusions regarding the past social, economic, cultural relations. An evolutionary order of creating new typologies of space and construction technologies is emerging from the research on the history of architecture in response to the demand and new functions. The ornament and aesthetics following the cultural changes of society are subject to evolutionary changes. The urban structure of a city and its architecture are the spatial manifestation of the culture of its inhabitants. Historic urban spaces provide a basis for observation and drawing conclusions regarding the past social, economic, cultural relations. An evolutionary order of creating new typologies of space and construction technologies is emerging from the research on the history of architecture in response to the demand and new functions. The ornament and aesthetics following the cultural changes of society are subject to evolutionary changes. The motivation to take up the topic is the desire of referring the relations between the community and the built environment, so perfectly studied and described in many historical examples, to the present day conditions. Interest in issues of directionality and purpose in designing architecture of the ``here and now'', realized in practice when working with the architect Renzo Piano, prompted the author to search for sources of contemporary concepts of spatial design. This common source is the basic factor shaping the contemporary culture—a wide access to information. The main goal of this work is, therefore, to determine the influence of the contemporary media (means of mass communications) on the trends shaping the architectural space. This influence can be seen on many levels: from changes in settlement preferences, due to changes in the formula of employment, to the question of the mass media promoting trends in stylistics, triggering the need for mass customization of working and living space. It is important to emphasize the applicative value of the research and cited solutions verified with the experience of the author, acquired while working in architectural offices in Germany, Australia, Scotland and Poland. An important experience that has shaped the views of the author on the discussed topics was the collaboration with the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London (AA) and participation in the Springer International Publishing AG 2018 A. Bonenberg, Cityscape in the Era of Information and Communication Technologies, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69542-61 1 seminar on social media at Harvard University in Cambridge, USA. At each of the mentioned stages of work, it proved important to take into consideration the changes to which the community is subject through the new media. The teaching positions at Politecnico di Milano and Poznan Univesity of Technology gave the author the opportunity to research and study the subject in the didactic process. Information technology plays an important role among the contemporary mass media. Building of an information society is one of the objectives of a social policy in Poland and the European Union. A historical report ``Europe and the Global Information Society—Recommendations to the European Council'' elaborated in 1994 by the Bangemanns Commission, pointed directions and proposed rules for the organization of the European information society. It describes the opportunities arising from the possibilities of economic development while warning against omissions in this sphere. Omissions and lack of computerization will result in underdevelopment and marginalization of some regions of the country, and its residents can face a technological exclusion, disastrous on a common, competitive job market: The first countries to enter the information society will gain the most benefit. They will set the agenda for all those, who will follow in their footsteps. Poland entered the nineties as a pre-information society. In the strategy of the country development, on the basis of the material produced during the works of the First Congress of Polish Information Technology in Poznan in 1994, it was determined that one of the main factors of economic development should be precisely computerization. Cultural transformation caused by the universal access to media using the latest information and communication technologies are not without effect on the architectural space and built environment. According to leading sociologists, urban planners and architects, technological and social changes involve spatial changes. They will cover planning at the regional level, city level as well as architectural design, to the designs of interior furnishings. The thematic selection allowed to expose trends which, according to the author, have the most important impact on the image of the contemporary spatial reality subject to the influence of media. It was important to synthesize the issues to be able to see a coherent logic of the projects implemented today in the field of architecture and urbanism. From the ancient times, the public spaces in cities served to exchange information—they were designed to promote the flow of information process and the need for social interaction was one of the factors shaping the spatial planning of the urban structures. An important issue raised in the paper is the impact of media coverage on the clarity of the functional structure in the city scale in conjunction with the risk of generating a space devoid of identity. Reflections on the media, architecture and their relationship to space are initiated by the author by defining the meaning that she desires to associate to these notions. This is a difficult task because of the ambiguity of the semantic scope of the The Commission deliberating under the supervision of Martin Bangemann, the commissioner of the European Union in the years 1993–1999, responsible for the development of telecommunications and information technology—the main promoter of the concept of ``information society'' in Europe. 2