On complexism

Abstract

Abstract This article responds to Philip Galanter’s essay ‘Complexism and the role of evolutionary art’ to explore complexism in relation to postmodern and generative architecture. Galanter poses complexism as a new theoretical mode that can supercede the divides of modernism/postmodernism and the two cultures (sciences/arts and humanities). The author, rather than promoting complexism, examines it as if from afar, positioning it as our most recent scientifically informed paradigm. She asserts that, in many ways, complexism functions as an ideology permeating realms of cultural and intellectual production. Examples range from contemporary advertising to economic theory, political and economic protests such as the Occupy Movement, to the rhetorical and computational strategies in generative architecture. The author demonstrates that postmodernism in architecture was always theoretically tied to complex systems theory. Further, she connects the vagaries of application and extrapolation of complexity theory, across realms of current-day cultural production, to the definitional vagueness of some of complexism’s key terms (system, selforganization, emergence). Finally, she argues that two collateral effects of complexism are: (1) the promotion of dependence on environmentally damaging computational devices and (2) the socio-economic and environmental expulsions occurring in the global economy, as recently argued by sociologist Saskia Sassen.