Richard Desjardins

Concentration Studies Urbanism

Anne-Catrin Schultz
01/16/17
Reading Response: The City as Wave-Trough in the Image-Flood

The city is a place where citizens come together to mingle, shop, and work. Vilm Flusser in his
essay The City as Wave-Trough in the Image-Flood describes the city as a flection in a field. He strongly
believes that a city should not be described as a geographical place instead, it should be viewed as a
network of interlocking wires merging public and private lives. Flusser claims that the city is a dance of
masks (321) where people hide their true identity behind a mask. Cities should be built upon on the
human connection and be a place where citizens can form relationships through nets of dialogue.
Originally there were three spheres in the city; public, private, and theoretical. Having these three
separate spaces have no become a point of historical reference. Due to cable television and cars the
three spaces of the city start to interact and fuse into one another. Flusser believes that the city really no
longer contains distinct private and public spaces, and the theoretical space is so thoroughly integrated
into both that it is no longer recognizable because it has changed so much (342). Private spaces like the
interior of cars start to push into the public realm allowing the public to view into the cars and get a
glimpse of others private lives. Yet, we become irritated when someone takes away our private space,
our political engagement, and our belief in the Holy (324). Citizens allow the spaces to merge together
however, the become annoyed when they are taken away.
Due to the spaces merging and since dwellers are irritated with it the notorious Self shows itself
not as a kernel but as a shell (324). Flusser claims citizens put on these masks and show themselves
off as something they arent. The city has become less humane. They have put forth these masks and the
dwellers chose which front to be. In some cases, in urban centers nowadays people wear a variety of
masks throughout the day. Flusser claims we, however, insist upon out identity, even though when we
have misplaced or lost the medicine bag that refers to it (325). Urban dwellers have become
encapsulated by the mask that they wear and since they have worn it for so long they lose sight of who
they really are as a person.
To start a new image of humanity Flusser believes we must imagine a net of relations among
human beings, a intersubjective field of relation (325). The net is where information flows such as
feelings, intentions, and knowledge. Where the treads of the net knot themselves together is a human
subject. Where there is a dense populations of knots in the net a wave-trough is created in which Flusser
relates to the city. Flusser uses Cologne as an example of this intersubjective field of relation. However,
in his mind Cologne reveals itself . . . in which these relationships are collected into masks in order to

actualize their inherent possibilities (327). The houses, squares, and the cathedral are seen as a
surface phenomena because it is a failed net due to the existence of the materialized masks.
New urbanism solves all. Phil Gochenour, the translator, states all communities, all cities, are
formed more by the relationships within them than the physical space they occupy (322). In a city plan
using Flussers net, masks appear through dialogue, not through the purchases of materialized objects.
He believes that identity and difference would give rise to one another (327). People using one another
and the media to enlighten themselves is the future Flusser sees. Dwellers must stop recognizing
themselves as someone they arent. Humans need to step out of the historical dialectic and not take up
the roles of the masks given to them however, create their own through the dialogue net.

Questions:
How do designers help dwellers create their own mask?
Why does Flusser use Politics as the term for New Urbanism?

Works Cited
Flusser, Vilm. 2005. The City as Wave-Trough in the Image-Flood. Translated by Phil Gochenour. Vol.
31. 2 vols. The University of Chicago Press.