Representational Space

Representational Space

By Sky Hirschkron

Representational space is the part of sociologist Henri Lefebvre’s spatial triad associated with the simultaneous experience of physical space and formation of social meaning. As phrased in English by translator Donald Nicholson-Smith from Lefebvre’s original French, this space “[embodies] complex symbolisms” and relates “to the clandestine or underground side of social life, as also to art” (33). This concept is closely related to spatial practice, or the ensuring of cohesion regarding the relations between social forces and spaces, and representations of spaces, which are related to production of spaces and maintaining the appearance of order (ibid).

Offering space for individuated thought within ideationally homogenous systems of production, representational space is space as it is experienced, in which an individual’s idealization of space circumvents its visceral impression. In scholar Hannah Anderson’s words, it is what “the imagination seeks to change and appropriate,” and thus lacks cohesion and is open to the intrusion of social movements. The concept itself offers appropriation in a variety of disciplines, including historical analysis, the planning of social movements, and its representation in recorded media.

For historians, tracking changes representational space over time reveals shifting relationships between social consensus and its built physical correlative. It offers counterpoint to geographical change, which upholds contested divisions as truth, and imbues shifts in physical layout with multi-dimensional meaning. In “Sarajevo Lost in Transition?” Nermina Zagora and Dina Samic identify multiple architectural “typologies” embodying Lefebvre’s representational space throughout the late history of Sarajevo. While the Ottoman period in Sarajevo was typified, in Zagora and Samic’s view, by a variety of typologies, including business centers, schools, marketplaces and hotels, the authors nonetheless identify religious buildings with reference to Islamic architecture as “the most emblematic and recurrent public architectural typologies in the time,” owing to the significance and coexistence of multiple ethnic and religious groups (161). Zagora posit that during the 20th century, this religious epoch was “replaced by the faith in Slavic brotherhood, unity and self-management,” giving way to representational spaces typified by social and cultural centers (164). Here, representational space operates independently from spatial production, incorporating communal ideas at the expense of spatial hierarchies.

Notwithstanding its power as a tool for characterizing the past, representational space may also act to outline the future. Jana Carp examines this dimension in her essay, “Ground-Truthing' Representations of Social Space,” by emphasizing the political implications of Lefebvre’s conceptual triad. In opposition to the authority bestowed by physical places, Carp insists, “it is people who sustain and transform places through their productive interrelationship with space,” and this is the lesson that representational space has to impart (132). For Carp, representational space carries an “unusually deep sense of meaning” and applies to “both collective places/experience and private places/experience” (135). Carp applies this concept to a committee restoring an urban stream. What held the committee together, in Carp’s view, was “steady commitment” and a belief in “even marginal improvement” (140). This unified front towards progress relates to representational space as it “[levels] the playing field in terms of space” so socially constructed spatial hierarchies are broken down (ibid). While Zagora and Samic suggest a shift in historiographical method, Carp uses representational space as a theoretical baseline to inspire direct social action.

Representational space manifests in cinema in two fundamental ways. The first involves its part in a larger spatial structure, wherein spatial practice and representations of space play equally large roles. Within this structure, representational space functions primarily as a site of transformation. This can be witnessed in Joanna Hogg’s Exhibition' , ''in which a couple comprised of visual artist H and performance artist D finds its relational footing in the architecture of their prized house. As the house becomes an inadequate conduit for love, D becomes nakedly attached to the house, while H acts out inversely, absconding into the surrounding treacherous city streets. The lived space of the house, throughout the course of the film, gives way to inevitable, radical change within the confines of the romantic partnership.

In the second mode, representational space is shown divested of the structure of spatial production, while the viewer infers rather than grasps possible outcomes. Here, representational space characterizes a contested present. This is witnessed in Sergei Losnitza’s Maidan, a chronicle of mounting protests in Maidan square in Kiev, Ukraine. While the house of Exhibition oversees a complete relational transfiguration, Maidan, in contrast, focuses solely on fragmented, fiery expressions of social unrest, removed from concrete realization.

References

Anderson, Hannah. "Chicago's Critical Mass and the Transportation of Daily Life." The Inversion of Space and Spectacle. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Dec. 2014. .

Carp, Jana. "'Ground-Truthing' Representations of Social Space: Using Lefebvre's Conceptual Triad." Journal of Planning Education and Research 28 (2008): 129-42.

Lefebvre, Henri. "Plan of the Present Work." The Production of Space. Trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 1991. 1-53.

Zagora, Nermina, and Dina Samic. "Sarajevo Lost in Transition? Ideologies and Their Representational Spaces." International Journal of Architectural Research 8.1 (2014): 159-70.