Kentleşmiş çevrede fırsattan istifade mekansal üretimler
Snatch space productions in urban environment
Yazar: CANAN EDA ÖZGENER
Danışman: YRD. DOÇ. DR. SAİT ALİ KÖKNAR
İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi / Fen Bilimleri Enstitüsü / Mimarlık Ana Bilim Dalı / Mimari Tasarım Bilim Dalı
Derece: Yüksek Lisans, 2015
Konu: Mimarlık = Architecture

Özet:
Araştırmalara göre büyük bir bölümü şehirlerde yaşayan insanlar için kentleşmiş
çevre, artık içine doğup gündelik hayatlarını idame ettirdikleri doğal ortamlarıdır.
Sıradan insan bu çevreye fırlatılmış gibidir. Bu çevre hakkında çok fazla söz sahibi
olduklarını söylemek mümkün değildir; fiziksel çevre üzerinde görünür söz sahibi
olmak güç gerektirir, politiktir. Gündelik hayat içerisindeki eylemler için mekanlar
yukarıdan inme bir tavırla otorite tarafından tanımlanmış ve kullanıma sunulmuştur.
Oysa sıradan kent sakinleri; tanıdık endişeler içerisinde gündelik hayatlarını
sürdürürken; yoğun, katı ve tanımlı kentleşmiş çevrelerini ihtiyaçları doğrultusunda
ve belli bir mimari bilinç ile değiştirir ve dönüştürür. Dolayısı ile hem otoritenin
sunduğu mekan aynı kalamaz, hem de sıradan fiziksel çevresi hakkında söz sahibi
konumuna gelir.
Sıradan bunu yaparken, aslında ona tanımlı bir çevre sunma niyetindeki kentsel
çevrenin bileşenlerini, bireysel çıkarlarını güderek işine gelen bir mekan oluşturmak
üzere kullanır ve bu bireysel tavır zamanla tanınırlık, bilinirlik kazanarak diğer
sakinlerin de kullanımı ile iyice sağlamlaşır, hatta kimi zaman otoritenin de dikkatini
çekerek kendine yasal sınırlar katar. Mekanın dönüşümü bu yolla gerçekleşir.
Bu üretimlerin kentsel çevreyi bir malzeme olarak kullanması ve onu köşe, aralık,
yüzey, boşluk, girinti, çıkıntı, oyuk, eğim, çukur, yükselti, akış, hareket, kalabalık,
gürültü gibi temel fiziksel bileşenlerine indirgemesi; tasarlanıp sunulmuş ve
kullanıcısına mesafeli duran bir ürün olan kenti; daha çok boş araziler, kullanılmayan
alanlar, terk edilmiş endüstriyel bölgeler, işlevlendirilmemiş kentsel boşlukları
tanımlamak için kullanılan terrain vague kavramına yakın bir zemine çevirmesi ile
önem kazanır. Kentleşmiş çevre denilen tanımlarla yüklü, katı ortam; sıradan
sakininin bir çeşit çıkarcılık ile örülü içgüdüsel mimari bilincinden türeyen potansiyel
ile kendiliğinden, anlık, değişken, kurnaz, esnek ve yaratıcı mekansal üretimlere
sahne olur, bu üretimlerle beraber kendisi de değişir ve dönüşür.
Çalışmada bildiğimiz anlamda bir tasarım süreci içermeyen bu mekanların
üretiminde yer alan fırsattan istifade süreci; hareket ve biçimden istifade olarak iki
ana başlığa indirgenerek otoetnografik bir tavır ile toplanan numuneler üzerinden
bahsedilen mimari bilincin bir çeşit ters okumasını yapma niyetiyle fotoğraf ve
çizimlerle incelenecektir.

Abstract:
According to the recent researches, a high percent of the population now live in
cities which present itself with an urban environment. A typical citizen is born into
this environment; in which they don't have an actual control or right to speak about
their physical surrounding which are composed of the spaces proposed by authority
in a dominating manner.
The ordinary citizen sustain the daily life which in character is unpredictable, vague
and ambigious; in this environment. This uncertainty of the daily life is the very
reason why the predefined spaces with their borders and definitions offered by the
authorities cannot fully adjust with the actions of the citizens; these borders and the
definitons constantly get disintegrated by the interests of daily life, intervention by
the user is an unavoidable feature of the designed spaces; in this case for the city
too.
Hence the citizens keep interfering and reshaping their urban environment; in order
to create spaces of their own interest. To do this; the citizens generate spatial and
constructional solutions regarding their concerns without a notable education or
accumulation on the field of architecture or design. They actualize the possibilities
and potentials by the virtue of their conscious that has an architectural essence in it,
which this study aims to capture and demonstrate.
This exact essence is thought to be the origin of the dicipline; like the primitive in
nature when there was not a single building around, the citizen of today also tries to
take opportunities of their physical environment; they make ways, they take
shelter.For instance like sitting on a rock when tired; citizens use doorsteps, handrails
to sit; use a park as a tribune of a stadium. They find, make and compose a
space for their intentions. The only difference is the setting; the basic instinct of the
protagonist seems to stay the same.
Consequently; this dense, solid and predefined setting that goes by the name of "the
city" acts as a terrain vague for the ordinary citizen. It is possible to find numberless
possibilities in any given definition. Terrain vague; although as a concept that is
usually associated with the form of absence, obsolete and undefined spaces; in this
way can be experienced through the over-defined setting of the city.
The citizen makes this possible by using the city as a material; how handy they are
beats the urban entities' definitions, resulting in space productions which may be
called as "snatch spaces" based upon their instant, cunning and quirky character.
The resident sees a potential, realizes it and makes a production.
By this way the city turns into a kind of physical fund, resource and opportunity for
its residents. In this materialisation process; citizen degrades the urban environment
into its very basic physical features like corners, gaps, surfaces, voids, slopes,
heights and motion, flow, crowd, noise and so on. After this cognitive operation
these basic features are taken to be used in establishing an alternative space for the
proposed one.Besides the creativity and the cunning it requires and highlights; this kind of space
production is the ordinary's way of having a say in shaping the city, which makes it
quintessentially a political action. The ordinary informally takes their right to the city
and its resources.
Though the goal is not making a spatial statement; but just making use of an
opportunity; spatially speaking, this action takes the given meanings off the
predefined spaces, turns them into something else. Competency in shaping the
surrounding also brings significant dominance in its wake and this can be seen as a
victory for the weak over the powerful, and it might be considered as the only
possible one.
Residents keep operating on this environment and by doing this they also change
the character of the notion of consumption. This process also resembles with the
notions of language and talking; in which users create a saying with the help of the
language and by changing the order of the words expression changes too. The
citizens change the product, just by the way they are using it; in this case this
product is the city.
Urban skaters that are common features of the urban environment also adopt the
same manner; they take the urban entities far from their definiton; and just by using
them in their own interests they simultaneously add value to our urban lives.
Skateboarding might be seen as a critical activity which is also in direct relation to
architecture and urban space. It suggest that the city is not just a place as it is
proposed to be; but in this case it can be a pleasure-ground. Just like the samples in
this study it is also an offer to to see the city with a different point of view.
The notion of "gecekondu" in İstanbul also might be seen as a product of the same
instinct; using the convenient spaces, lacunaes in law and as a result generating an
informal space by using these vacancies and also the waste that is generated by the
city itself.
The recent occupy movements also represent this manner; they include snatch
space productions in their process; using an urban environment by giving it different
definitions; changing the way it is proposed.
Productions as settled as "gecekondu" and as extraordinary as occupy movements
will not be included in the study with samples; because of the aim of focusing on the
spatial productions of the ordinary.
This familiar and daily samples included in the study demonstrates how the ordinary
become entitled to receive a right to speak on their physical surrounding; namely the
city, which is filled with definitions, borders and regulations that aim to give a kind of
order to actions through spaces.
In the study the spatial process of using an opportunity of the urban environment will
be examined through urban samples that were collected with an autoethnographic
manner, meaning collected from the routes, surroundings of the researcher's daily
life. This manner was used as a form of self-reflection; with the aim of connecting a
more personal story to a wider cultural, political and social meaning and
understanding.
Samples collected will be documented by photographs and afterwards will be
examined through architectural diagrams in able to catch the essence of the
forementioned architectural essence of the ordinary. The aim is to read this
undesigned snatch spaces backwards with a spatial concern in order to highlight the
production process of the ordinary citizen in predefined urban environment.
While the mentioned interventions of the ordinary to the predefined environment
points out its deficiencies, bugs, defects and failures such as complicated routes,insufficient spaces and excessive restrictions; this kind of productions also bring out
the uncalculated potentials of a given shape. The ordinary citizen sees the potential
and vacancies in this given, urban environment; takes the advantage and turns it
into a living, running, active space to use for commercial or social purposes.
From this aspect these actions and the resulting spatial productions might provide
an insight for the discipline which in spite of appearance stands somewhat far away
from the user; in this case the ordinary citizen with ordinary worries.