MAP OFFICE

Where the Map is the Territory

Robin Peckham

The old saying used to warn that the map is not the territory. But the guerrilla architectartist-urbanists at Hong Kong-based MAP Office (Gutierrez + Portefaix) insist that the map (or the MAP)most definitely is the territory, and this exuberant book proves it.

An incredibly complex, 360-page book, jam-packed with essays, interviews and over 500color illustrations, photos, drawings, collages and more, summarizes two decades in MAP Office’s evolution from architectural research to artistic intervention and cinematic theorization. It’s a work of genius from working geniuses, mixing politics, installation art, humor, science fiction, multi-cultural initiatives and just plain visionary thinking. The group has rejected everything about Modernist ideology, from the idea of the pristine space or the iconic shape to the quaint thought that form might follow function. Architecture has been let out of the bag, and it’s running wild.

The text of this book, structured around six clusters of work, shows off a repertoire of tactics, notions, strategies, installations, sculpture and provocations accumulated through exhibitions, competitions, and festivals (including the Venice Biennale). They start in Hong Kong, migrate to the Pearl River Delta, expand to China as a whole, and then explode into Istanbul, Palestine, Thailand, New Orleans and virtual space. Is it architecture or is it art? The answer is yes.

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