Panoptic

The installation is an instrument for observation, a device through which the ocular perception of the prison is altered. The project explores the notion of panoptics, a term derived from the philosophical and architectural concept of the panopticon, first conceived by Jeremy Bentham during the Age of Enlightenment, a spatial paradigm through which society can be observed and controlled. The project investigates the correlation between voyeurism and architectural space and how panoptic-based architecture can influence our pathological state and consciousness. Michel Foucault’s mechanism of panopticism, takes the concept further as a symbol for modern disciplinary society:

“The Panopticon is an ideal architectural figure of modern disciplinary power. The Panopticon creates a consciousness of permanent visibility as a form of power, where no bars, chains, and heavy locks are necessary for domination any more.” — Excerpt from Discipline & Punish; The Birth of the Prison, Michel Foucault

The disused prison is situated within the former incarcerated island of West Berlin, concealed behind the high Altbau facades of Kantstraße. The prison is hidden both physically and psychologically, away from the public consciousness. Passing the threshold from the familiar realm of the current to this secluded place, dilapidated, dormant and frozen in time, one is engulfed by the prison’s spirit. In the manner of inmates, the processional sequences of Höfe lead to the final grand courtyard where the installation is revealed. Pendant in mid-air, held tort between the high red brick planes of the prison, Panoptic demarcates the state of arrival. The installation establishes a vantage point from which the viewer observes an abstracted and constantly evolving image of the courtyard’s facade, peering into the prison cells.