DESIGN BY USE –
The Transformation of Tallinn Culture and Sports Arena Linnahall and Its Surroundings
Abstract
The paper discusses the use of public space in Tallinn. The base of the survey is the hypothesis according to which spaces that lack strict maintenance are preferred by users when compared to well-kept, “beautiful” public spaces. It is not stated though, that initial design is unnecessary – the site benefits from organisation to a certain degree but the main characteristic in focus is the process of change. The survey looks at space as an “open work”.
The study is based on a public place in central Tallinn – the surroundings of the capital’s former premier concert hall Linnahall – that has previously had a different appearance and use, but is now strongly discredited in public opinion, but nevertheless actively used. The survey takes a look at the constituents that interact in the place-making process: location, history, restrictions, reputation, number of people, number and type of occurring activities, etc. in order to illustrate the correlation between the “openness” of the site and people’s preferences in choosing an environment for activities. When a spatial situation is unfinished it can host a relatively higher variety of activities than a rigid spatial composition that needs constant “life support”.
The design process never ends with the drawings or the construction. The process is carried on by users who shape the space through their interactions and reflections upon it, therefore – through design by use. The now deteriorating Linnahall arena has lost a great deal of its former statue, but serves as an important part of the urban “ecosystem”.
INTRO: READING THE URBAN LANDSCAPE
There is a combination of reasons why the use of urban places has been chosen to be under focus in this study. It is the facts that urban public space situations are simultaneously noticed and contacted by a high number of actors and therefore under constant attention but are, at the same time, due to their high load of usage, under constant pressure and numerous restrictions. These two characteristics emphasize the need and possibility to study the interrelations of a place’s spatial and emotional qualities.
The paper takes to study these interrelations at a specific location in Tallinn, basing it on the fundamentals of Umberto Eco’s open work concept. The main thesis claims, that public space, likely to whichever output of any other field of art, is an unfinished product of the creative process that the author can never really finish, for it is constantly re-interpreted by the observer-reader-user[1]. The exact fashion of interpretation cannot be fixed by the author.
The aim of the study is to use a case study to show that places that are more “open” than others (due to their elements, maintenance and overall atmosphere), places where there is space for adjustments, are used more variedly and creatively than those with strictly pre-established functions.
People are programmed with a trait of having the need to reorganize their surroundings. The concept of affordance describes the processes between the actor, the environment and the act of use. It was first discussed by psychologist James J. Gibson in his article “The Theory of Affordances”[2], where the concept was introduced. According to the affordance theory, the use of objects or spaces is determined by the traits of both the objects themselves and the user. Therefore, there is always an endless number of ways to use something, e.g. a bench is most likely to be used for sitting on, but also for sleeping under, eating off, stepped on as stairs etc. Affordances are described as action possibilities, that are all constantly present but are recognised differently by individuals. By Gibson, the environment and the actor are inseparable, one cannot exist without the other[3]. The case study is carried out, keeping in mind both of these constituents, the place is studied together with its users. The synergy of the two is the phenomenon under attention.
These relationships are illustrated by comparing places with texts, drawing attention to the parallels between the reading of text and the “reading” of public space. The surroundings of Linnahall are used for the illustration. The variety in use is brought out at this strategically important and perspective, but “left over” location in central Tallinn.
LINNAHALL: ARCHITECTURAL MASTERPIECE OR OVERSCALED IDEOLOGICAL TOOL?
The Linnahall arena was built for the 1980 Moscow Olympic Games. Tallinn was one of the many candidates for holding the Olympic Sailing Regatta, the other choices being Leningrad (St. Petersburg), Riga, Sotchi and Odessa. Many facts – political, financial and organisational – spoke for choosing Tallinn. The decision was made in 1974 and by that time Tallinn had already long ago started preparing for the event.
A good number of the city’s most influential landmark buildings date from the Games. The main arena was the Tallinn Olympic Yachting Centre at Pirita. Also the Tallinn TV tower, Central Post Office, Tallinn Airport, hotel Olümpia and other objects where built to accommodate the guests. The Linnahall arena, officially the V. I. Lenin Palace of Culture and Sport, was the building that caused the most discussion. A special permit was needed to start the building: „each planned object had to be so-called defended in Moscow. It was most difficult to push through the building of Linnahall“[4]. The arena was repeatedly crossed off the list, but finally got the approval. It was doubted wheter a new building was needed simply for watching the Games, but its actual function as the opening grounds for the Regatta was a reason good enough. All the new buildings where planned and built at maximum speed, especially Linnahall. The grand opening of the building was moved forward at the last minute: it was initially planned to be syncronised with the 40th anniversary of the Estonian SSR, but as the Olympic Charter forbids to hold political events during the Olympics, the date had to be moved a whole month forward. This demanded great changes in the chedules and resulted in a very low building quality (the roofs have not been waterproof from the beginning). It is remembered that the carpeting at the buffet was still being glued while the opening speeches where given at the main hall[5].
Regardless of the quality, the building is among one of the best pieces of Estonian architecture. It achieved the „Interart-83“ biennal Grand Prix (the country’s only building with a prize of this importance) and also the USSR National Prize in 1984[6]. Its authors, architects Raine Karp and Riina Altmäe have not only managed to create a great architectural piece but have also mastered the demands of the difficult site. Looking at it from the sea, it is almost unnoticeable. It looks as if it is simply resting on the shoreline, at the former location of unorganised houses of small enterprises[7]. The building was the first brakethrough towards the shore of the Tallinn bay[8] (Image 1).
The architects’ task was to connect the sea with the centre of Tallinn, yet not to cover up the view from the bay towards the historical panorama. Another problem was faced by the existence of the site’s surrounding neighbours: the military concrete factory and the old fish market then used for repairing ships. There was a railway line crossing the axis of the planned building, it was unthinkable that people where to start crossing the tracks before reaching the arena[9].
Image 1: A 1980’s aerial view on the arena and its surroundings. Author: unknown. Source: The Museum of Estonian Architecture.
The solution was found in a flat form dug into the ground, coming to act as a link between the city and the sea. The building has no façades, its roof is a public promenade functioning as a bridge over the industrial railway tracks. The surroundings of the arena never got to serve as public space – there are only two extensive parking lots decorated by rows of trees. The large areas on both of its sides remained industrial.
The building’s walkable terraces where not the only surprise for the users. After climbing the entrance stairs, the guests enter the foyer on the 1st floor level. The attention is instantly drawn to the fact that the whole interior is open: the main concert hall can be viewed descending towards the stage down below as a spacious amphitheatre. The strict symmetry of the layout and the wide interior space both clearly refer to the superiority of the vast “Homeland”. A look on the building today reveals but a distant memory of its former position. The deteriorating steps, dripping roofs, crackled concrete and graffiti-covered walls no longer justify its titles. Is it a lost case or a contemporary urban landscape with simply slightly shifted values?
1. SPACE, DESIGNER, USER
About the open work
The main conjoining anchor of the paper is studying public space as an unfinished, ongoing, “open” work. In order to avoid confusion in concepts, it is important to specify the grounds of the theory. Eco explains the dynamics between “the open” and “the finished” as follows: our usual reception of a work of art is of an end product of an artist’s work that carries a fixed sequence of communicative effects[10]. In his discussion, the author always leaves a part of his work to be finished by the observer (listener, user) or by chance. Connecting the very same phenomenon with the ways of public space is immanent: as a story read from a book is never identical for each individual, are places never interpreted similarly. The organiser of a space has given it certain features, but understanding and using the space is individual for everyone, depending on the “reader’s” cultural background, growing environment, preferences, beliefs, attitude[11].
One of the reasons for drawing parallels between text (it is text towards which the main attention is drawn in Eco’s works) and public space is text’s ability to embrace. In addition to what text really says, it includes always also the not-said[12]. This property requires active cooperation from the reader, the space left for interpretation needs to be filled with meaning. This is a clear illustration for the open work concept: every text in its final form is translated slightly differently by each reader and here it is the not-said that becomes determinate next to what is said.
This work therefore claims, that arrangements, where spatial situations are unfinished, are natural and of high quality: they consider the user. The study concentrates on the users of space, but does not directly concern them. The survey does not use questionnaires or collect emotions and opinions, but gathers and analyzes the reasons for the opinions, looking at space itself, namely: unfinished spatial situations.
OF TEXT
The function of a text is to communicate, to transmit. Text is understood by those who are familiar with the system (signifier) in which the information (signified) is transmitted. Derrida criticises the dialectic way of thinking that is peculiar to western cultures, where even text is strongly separated into speech and writing. He says that one cannot be preferred over the other and no opposition of the two is possible[13]. One is simultaneously added to the other and replaces it without being neither opposed, nor equivalent[14].
“To be with the ones I love and think of something else: it is only then, when I get my best ideas, only then I produce what is needed in my work. The same is with text: it gives the greatest pleasure when it can have you listen to it from a distance; when I repeatedly have to raise my eyes and think of something else”[15]. Eco names the phenomenon as blanks[16] in the text that the author designates to be filled by the reader. This is where the embracing character of the text emerges: the author writes and the reader reads more from the text than is actually written.
OF READING
The reading of space as text by the user as the reader is taken as the basis of this study. By Eco the author always has to impose the model of his possible reader and compose the text according to reader’s encyclopaedia. It is as well the text itself that gives explicit information about the sort of readers they presuppose[17], many texts make evident their Model Readers by implicitly presupposing their competence. Similarly can the properties of spaces presuppose certain types of users. Yet, in the case of an open work, it might not always be the author who selects the specific (“correct”) type of reader from amongst the others. An open text has too many possibilities for varied interpretation.
The story of a narrative text reaches the reader through text itself, the system in which the story is transmitted, and also through the reader’s property to follow. The blanks are filled with events and the story is equipped with illustrations that are based on the reader’s previous experiences[18]. The setting of the story always looks like a place we have been to, or a suitable combination of characteristics of various familiar places.
Text is a relatively comfortable parallel when describing space. Like the reader’s background is the ground for assembling a story, are places made by people themselves, by filling space with meaning[19]. Whether a place seems nice or not, is worth stopping at or not, is friendly or hostile, your own or a “stranger”, depends on the judger’s encyclopaedia, or in other words, the beliefs, preferences and opinions accumulated during previous experiences. Individuals experience different associations in connection with moments, people, thoughts and feelings, sounds and smells, nuances and tones met at one same place. The very same physical form of a space is read differently. Eco describes the reader’s importance both in “The Open Work” (1989) and “The Role of the Reader” (1984). Both studies determine the reader as the meaning-maker in the communication process, and not the text, for the preconditions written into the text are equal for everyone.