Literary Space

The Book as Model

The process of designing the Center for Divided Families was accompanied by continual exploration into alternative ways of visualizing this project, which resulted in, among other things, the creation of books and sectional studies and culminated in the modified accordion book shown below. This creation blurs the boundaries between book and model, between literary space and architectural space, and between two- and three-dimensional modes of representation. By flipping through the book, there is a subtle revealing of the main concepts of the project, and a tangible revealing of the spatial narrative. This book/model also began to embody the spirit of the project. In Confucianist belief, upon death the soul is transferred to wooden tablets and stored in wooden boxes, examples of which can be seen at the Jongmyo Shrine in Seoul, South Korea. This is a ritual dating back centuries, and the practice of ancestral worship still occurs in South Korea to this day.   Similarly, this book emphasizes that the Center for Divided Families could be even more significant for the descendants of those divided.