工厂引领了一场改变人类生活和全球环境的革命,巨大的工厂让人心生敬畏。大概 20多年前,我曾到北京的重型机器厂参观,走进其中一个 30多m高,可同时容纳 200多工人作业的巨大炼钢车间。车间内不同高度的天梯交错连接着不同的作业区,空中吊车悬挂在顶部的轨道上,通过牵引电力磁铁把废钢或生铁投送到电弧炉、平炉、转炉等炼钢炉里进行提纯与氧化还原,融化形成 1 550~1 700 ℃的钢水,再到模具里铸成钢锭。车间轰隆的噪声和炙热的生产场景让人既惊叹又目眩。
现代生活是建立在 18世纪以来工厂在生产、效率和科技方面进步的基础之上的,从城市建设到生活所需,几乎都来自工厂的生产制造,支撑着我们享受工业文明的成果。工厂塑造了我们所生活的现代世界,是从农业文明到工业文明转变的标志。与农业文明类似的是,工业文明也是人与自然相互关系的一种表达方式。
20世纪中叶,随着科技与产业模式的发展,西方国家开始工业转型,很多标志性的大型工厂停产关闭,人们对工厂及工业世界的怀旧之情却在增长,被称为“烟囱怀旧”。那时有学者提出“后工业社会理论”“后工业社会的来临”等概念已为工业遗产的专业性探讨提供了较成熟的社会学环境。对工业遗产审美的认知可以追溯到启蒙运动时期,当时很多画作中描绘出对古希腊、古罗马建筑废墟的赞美,同期的古典花园中也出现营造“废墟”景观的风气。对“废墟”的审美传统或许有助于对工业遗产的审美塑造,以废弃工厂为主题展示生产机器的摄影作品,如废弃的水塔、冷却塔和鼓风炉等大型工业设备的摄影展,明显挑战了传统的美学范畴。摄影记录赋予冰冷的机器以美学价值,向观众传递一种“新的观看方式”,这种审美方式逐步延伸到后工业遗产景观更新的开放空间中。
已经冷却下来不再运转、不再作为生产资料进行生产的巨型工厂设备,被整合到自然公园的场景中,成为了一种景观,这与参观炼钢车间的感受是完全不同的。大部分居民少有机会体验到巨大工业机器运转时的大生产过程,缺少对工厂详细的了解,很难想象蒸汽轰鸣,超高温环境下热火朝天、荡气回肠的工业生产场景。这种由“炙热”的生产机器转为“冷却”的后工业遗产景观,作为一种与众不同的标识物,如何在更新过程中维系它作为遗产的风貌并保留其原真性,让参观者能够更切身地感受到工厂改变世界的价值,以诉说昔日的荣耀?这是后工业遗产转变为文化景观的宏大愿景中重要的议题与挑战。
不仅是大型工业设备,任何类型废弃工厂的更新都需要对城市作出新的贡献。那些令人瞩目的后工业更新改造项目,记录着人们不断改造环境、改善生活的智慧与努力,无论这些遗存的改造过程有多么复杂,它们都是对过去时间的最好标记。后工业遗产的景观更新通过将自然融入,让工业遗产充满了新的自然生机,重新定义了作为景观的价值,但也有逐渐标签化的趋势。如何在景观更新中赋予工业遗产新的能量与情感?让它仍旧能转化为一种与城市和社会融合的新方式,继续它塑造现代生活的使命。期待有更多元方式、更丰富类型的新突破,通过对工业遗产更深刻的体验与记忆沉淀,赋予它独特的审美趣味,似有剪裁,又不着痕迹。
主编:郑曦教授
2020年6月23日
Factories have led a revolution that have substantially changed human life and the global environment, especially the huge ones that are awe-inspiring. I once visited a Beijing-based heavy machinery factory about 20 years ago. I walked into one of huge steel-making workshops, which is more than 30 meters tall and could accommodate more than 200 workers. In the workshop, the overpass with different heights were interlaced with different operating areas. The aerial crane hanging on the top track delivered scrap steel or pig iron into the steel-making furnaces, including electric arc furnace, flat furnace, and converter, through traction power magnets, for the purpose of purification, oxidation and reduction. Those materials melted into steel water, the temperature of which was 1,550-1,700 ℃ and then were molded into steel ingots in molds. The roaring noise and production scenes in full swing in the workshop were both amazing and dazzling.
Modern life is built based on the factory's improvement in terms of production, efficiency, science and technology since the 18th century. From urban construction to life necessities, they all come from the factory's production and manufacturing, which enable us to enjoy the achievements of industrial civilization. Factories shape the modern world in which we live and symbolize the transformation from agricultural civilization to industrial civilization. Similar to agricultural civilization, industrial civilization also embodies the relationship between man and nature.
With the development of technology and industrial models in the mid-20th century, western countries began their industrial transformation. Many iconic large factories shut down but people's nostalgia for factories and the industrial world never stops but grows subtly, which is known as “chimney nostalgia”. At that time, the concept of “post-industrial society theory” and “the coming of post-industrial society” proposed by some scholars have provided a more mature sociological environment for the professional discussion of industrial heritage. The aesthetic perception of industrial heritage could be traced back to the Enlightenment period when many paintings expressed the appreciation of the glory of the ruins of ancient Greek and Roman architectures. It is in the same period that the classical garden also appeared a tendency to create a “ruin” landscape. The aesthetic tradition of “ruin” extends to the industrial heritage. The aesthetic tradition of “ruins” may help to shape the perception toward the industrial heritage. The photographic exhibition of production machines, such as abandoned water towers, cooling towers and wind stoves, is themed by these abandoned factories. It clearly challenges the traditional aesthetic category. The photographic record gives icy machine the aesthetic value and conveys a “new way of viewing” to the audience. Such aesthetic way gradually extended to the landscape renewal of post-industrial heritage.
Giant factory equipment, which had been shut down and was no longer used for production as a production material, is integrated into the scene of the nature park and becomes a landscape. This is actually different from the experience of visiting the steel-making workshop completely. Most residents hardly have a chance to experience the magnificent production process when these huge industrial machines were running. With rare understandings on factories, residents could hardly imagine the roaring steam and the bustle industrial production scene in the very high temperature environment. As the postindustrial heritage landscape transformed from a “hot” production machine to a “cooling” landscape as well as a distinctive marker, how can it maintain its characters as a heritage, preserve its authenticity in the process of renewal and make visitors better feel the value of the factory that changes the world and recollects the glory of the past? This is an important issue and challenge in the grand vision of the post-industrial heritage transformation into a cultural landscape.
Besides the large industrial equipment, any type of abandoned factory renewal needs to contribute to the city. Those stunning and impressive post-industrial renovation projects witness people's efforts and wisdom of transforming the environment and improving the life quality continuously. No matter how complex the process of transforming these remains is, they are the best representatives that mark the past. Through integrating the nature, the landscape renewal of the post-industrial heritage enables the industrial heritage to gain new natural vitality, redefining the value of landscape. However, the tendency of labeling also appears. We need to consider how to endow new energy and emotion to the industrial heritage in the landscape renewal to make it transform into a new way of integrating with cities and society and continue its mission of shaping modern life. We expect more diversified and richer breakthroughs. More profound experience and memory of the industrial heritage could give it unique aesthetic interest that could appreciate the effect in the graceful switch.