the bicameral business mind
location:
university of wisconsin - milwaukee
course:
mono-poly dollar, graduate elective studio
instructor:
lindsey krug
date:
december 2023
playlist:
corporate introspection | analytique drawing
the truth is relative | nine square drawing
the sunglasses and the mirror
a fable
The Sunglasses and The Mirror emanate from the Earth as amorphic crude oil, awaiting full actualization.
Placed in polished steel drums, the oil for the Sunglasses leaves no trace behind.
Placed in lackluster steel drums, the oil for the Mirror leaves in its wake chaos and destruction.
The Sunglasses and The Mirror hurry through the rest of the preparation process.
​
Awaiting embodiment, The Sunglasses and The Mirror have plenty of time to dream.
The Sunglasses dream of a bright future.
The Mirror dreams of exorbitant treasures, no matter the cost.
The Sunglasses’ and The Mirror’s dreams form their unique recipes for incarnation.
​
The Sunglasses’ and The Mirror’s dreams are combined with the raw materials in a factory.
Along a pristine conveyor belt, the ingredients for The Sunglasses slowly alchemize with the help of many happy workers.
Along a faulty conveyor belt, the ingredients for The Mirror slowly alchemize despite neglect and abandonment.
The Sunglasses and The Mirror have manifested their desired form.
​
But what is their desired life?
Stowed in an immaculate trailer, The Sunglasses are efficiently transported towards their destiny by a state-of-the-art computer system.
Stowed in a somber trailer, The Mirror is tumultuously transported towards its destiny by a warring truck driver and artificial intelligence.
The Sunglasses’ and The Mirror’s odysseys conclude at the Dollar General.
​
The Sunglasses and The Mirror grow curious about their new surroundings.
From their shelf, The Sunglasses can see a tidy aisle being tended by cheerful employees.
From their shelf, The Mirror can see an aisle more like an obstacle course with a single employee sitting amidst the chaos, dejected.
The Sunglasses and The Mirror dream of what exists beyond their shelf.
Customers flock to see The Sunglasses and The Mirror.
When worn, The Sunglasses show the customer a vision of community, belonging, and equity.
When used, The Mirror shows the customer a vision of isolation, control, and exploitation.
The clarity of these visions is fleeting, though, and The Sunglasses and The Mirror are ready to be purchased.
The Sunglasses rest on one side of the cash register and The Mirror on the other.
Within the lenses of the Sunglasses lies the promise of recognition and success.
Within the lens of the Mirror lies the promise of emptiness and dissociation.
The transaction concludes, and the Sunglasses and the Mirror venture out into the unknown.
Yearning for validation and belonging, the Sunglasses and The Mirror are excited to find a home.
The home of The Sunglasses is large and filled with discordant noise, flashing lights, and gluttony.
The home of the Mirror is large, too, but barren within. An empty promise.
Disillusioned, The Sunglasses and Mirror concede defeat.
Laid to rest in their graves, The Sunglasses and The Mirror find themselves at the precipice of rebirth.
Buried in a polished steel dumpster, The Sunglasses envision a new life of “more” – success, accumulation, power, recognition.
Buried in a landfill, the Mirror envisions a new life of real fulfillment.
The Sunglasses and The Mirror wonder aloud...
Beware staring at the sun rather than looking in the mirror.
The cornerstone of this semester-long exploration was the role that propaganda plays in our experience of the Dollar General. This investigation began with the purchase of a hand mirror and sunglasses from the store, and together these two lenses provided the perfect vehicle for research into this topic. Throughout the semester, these two lenses, the sunglasses representing the Dollar General’s rosy, propaganda-laden messaging and the mirror reflecting the not-so-rosy repercussions, were used to better understand the breadth and depth of the impact of this advertising.
corporate camera obscura | ceramic container
If the problem is propaganda, what then is the solution? The intersection of overconsumption and propaganda in the context of Mass Culture has been a staple in public discourse for some time now, but what role might we as architects have in disrupting this endless cycle? Using a speculative approach, this proposal aims to be a solution, emanating from one driving question:
“What if retail surveillance could be used to facilitate critical corporate introspection?”
existing surveillance condition:
dome camera
panoramic camera
existing surveillance condition diagram
This new store prototype utilizes a reciprocal surveillance feedback loop between customers and corporate as a methodology for corporate introspection. The Corporate Loop incorporates mirrored walls strategically placed to allow the lone employee working the skeleton crew to surveil the entire store from their location in the proposed addition atop the existing store. The Customer Loop introduces transparent apertures into the carefully constructed mirror system in order to provide customers the ability to see the clandestine inner mechanisms of the Dollar General store and the reality of the labor conditions that are behind their shopping experience. This proposal creates forced transparency between consumer and Corporate, providing customers with greater autonomy and consciousness in their consumption. It also allows Dollar General Corporate a new way to shape public perception of their business. By allowing customers to peer through apertures into spaces that would typically be private as provided by the Customer Loop, the Dollar General has the opportunity to transform their public image and relationship to their target markets.
The design facilitates a new level of propaganda: Dollar General can use this new experience as an opportunity to shape public perception of how they run their business. The subversive nature of this solution benefits customers and employees as the forced transparency requires that Dollar General Corporate be considerate of the scene they are creating for their public to witness.
consumer surveillance loop
corporate surveillance loop