Thoughts about "Hoarders"

Many years ago, one of my posts was about people with compulsive behavior keeping lots of staff inside and around their homes. I'm not a psychologist and I saw this from the point of view of a morphologist, just the occupation of the architectural space.

We had a client, back in 2012, owner of an important house, who used to fill up the rooms with vintage objects, up to the ceiling. She had some illegal constructions and upon comparison with the inspector's pictures, we discovered the owner was relocating stuff and even windows and doors. 

I was surprised, being this my first experience with hoarders. I offered her to buy a nice vintage jar, and she reluctantly sold it to me while warning me "be careful, that's the way you begin to pick up". 
She made the effort to have her legalization plans prepared soon, but she decided not to submit them. After a few meetings with the City inspector, the planner and the City attorney, and due to the inaction on her side, she was arrested and put in jail. Until her brother came back from Europe and got everything done: plans got approved, a contractor was hired to fix the house, which was deeply cleaned, and she was sent to hospital. I don't know what happened then, but I promised the brother to keep the original plans of the house.
Now, trashing old plans I had in a closet, I couldn't get rid of this house blue prints (they are genuinely blue), out of respect for my compromise.

Back in 2018, we had another experience, more serious this time, and the contractor taught me the word: "hoarder". He cleaned part of the house to allow us to take the overall dimensions.

All the time I was wondering how they could live in these conditions where all type of objects, clothes, toys, food etc etc was piled up everywhere.

The lady homeowner had psychological problems, but the husband, after many years of living under the circumstances, seemed to be submissive and in full acceptance of the unhealthy environment.

The son, had a separate clean room and bathroom for himself, like a bubble in a sea of trash.

In my experience, the family accepts the situation and everyone tries to create an independent personal space in the house. This is the best thing they could do.

There's currently a series on Netflix called "Hoarders" which captured my full attention. Not that I like the style of "Big Brother" show, I would have preferred a documentary instead of a sort of short performed novels about the disease.

What is stated is that 19M people in the USA suffer from hoarding disorders. And they are showing some extreme examples.

It seems to be a common factor, which is the lack of interest of the son/daughter in a long period of years. They go away from home, being incapable of dealing with their parent/s disorder and when they come back (they are brought back in the "show") they are repentant they have not seen or realized what was going on inside the house in question. Or with the person in question.

It feels weird to me that a son or daughter does not know how the parent is living this way for so long years, but not all families are the same.

Grievances and tears are abundant and worst of all -in my opinion- is the participation of a licensed psychologist who admonishes the hoarder, in the effort of making him/her realize of his/her bad doings, and what is more, she gives a public diagnostic of the psychological health of the hoarder. 

Which doctor would publicly state the patient's diagnostic openly to the world???? "It's a mental illness!" That is stunning, at least in my mind. And of course I am not criticizing her experience and wish to help, it's just I would have preferred more privacy for the addicted.

Of course, she appears to be a counselor and they are not her patients. And I'm assuming the family is being paid to show all the procedures for the extreme cleaning up in a very short period of time, let's say three days, before Code Enforcement shows up. And this is never enough.

An interesting "legality," is that the cleaners must not take the junk away unless the owner gives them permission. Which is very difficult because what is junk for some, is precious to others. If the hoarder does not allow the removal of objects/ trash, then it could be considered a robbery.

A case that has made me sad, so far, is Patricia's, a lady from Indiana, whose house is deeply full of trash accumulated along 30 years, infected by rats, dogs and human feces, the house is collapsing due to the extra vertical loads and all its component materials are biohazardous given the feces and rotten organics have been absorbed by walls, flooring, foundation. The house is unsafe and worth demolition, but at the end we learn Patricia comes back and her son in law (or so relative) is making some improvements in the house to leave it "somehow" habitable. Because that's the main point, is the hoarder able to live back in the house? Is he /she able to get his/her pets back?

Can he or she be treated or is it a sort of dementia? And it is clear that the whole close family needs therapy.

Coming back to Code Enforcement, they shouldn't let the hoarding reach such a critical point because setting aside the decrease of the property(ies) value, it's absolutely unsafe and contaminating. It seems to me they do not notify the family, but just the homeowner, who cannot understand what is wrong.
In the cases I personally know, not a single social worker was sent to the property. It was all related to the building, to the construction. I see it as a weak point.

NOTES: 
All pictures are screen shots from the "Hoarders" show on Netflix.
On episode 5, another doctor is presented: psychiatrist Melva Green, who has shown a lot of support and compassion. And she helps the hoarders (two of them) to get to the root of their problem which -apparently- is a consequence of their poverty in childhood. 

My selected screen shots from The Cabinet of Dr Caligari

¨The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (German: Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari) is a 1920 German silent horror film directed by Robert Wiene from a screenplay by Hans Janowitz and Carl Mayer. It is one of the most influential films of the German Expressionist movement and, according to Roger Ebert, is "the first true horror film".[1] The film used stylized sets, with abstract, jagged buildings painted on canvas backdrops and flats. To add to this strange style, the actors used an unrealistic technique that exhibited "jerky" and dance-like movements.[1] This film is cited as having introduced the twist ending in cinema.[2] The premiere of a digitally restored version of the film took place at the 64th Berlin International Film Festival in February 2014.[3] This restoration had its U.S. premiere at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival "Silent Autumn" event at the Castro Theatre on September 20, 2014.¨

Excerpt from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cabinet_of_Dr._Caligari

Architectural photography of ¨Delicatessen¨

I don´t like French movies too much, but Delicatessen (1991) is one of my favorites. I´ve watched it three times, and now, I´ve been focused on the architectural photography that somehow reminded me the post michael wolf frames abstract views of parisian rooftops at Designboom, where the Parisian roofs are shown as abstract pictures, out of context.

These scenes look like paintings, some of them Surrealist, other Expressionist.

I am sharing today some screen shots from my computer, being in my humble opinion, the greenest, the best ones.

The man in his paper disguise is astonishing, a piece of art hanging from the staircase. Let´s say a beautiful paper sculpture.

The scene is reinforced by the snails and the water flooding the room. A dynamic scene with organic components.

The tunnels

The rooftops 

A rooftop like a Surrealist painting at the end of the movie

Some Surrealist images of Nostalghia, directed by Andrei Tarkovsky

The birds flying from the Virgin's womb

Many architects are fans of Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky, because of the lighting, the water and surrealism in his movies, regardless the plot. A favorite one is Stalker, though I liked Nostalghia best, which seems to be his most personal movie, about his feelings at his exile in Italy.

For those who want to read more about the film,  here's an interesting review in Slant Magazine, and I have to warn you, the author confuses the name "Gorchakov" with "Gorbachov" in the last paragraphs, there's nothing to do with the former president:

http://www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/nostalghia

The images here are screen shots from my computer. 

The beautiful chiaroscuro

The mirrors

The abandoned

The indoor water reflexes, the interiors

From an architectural point of view, what I enjoy most, is the intertwined spaces, the interior and exterior, the buildings have no roof, and when they have it, the rain pours down leaving the floor as a lagoon, the vines grow inside/outside and we have a few hints of where the characters are, as they are -sometimes- shown against the bright exterior light.

The indoor water reflexes, the interiors

The indoor water reflexes, the interiors. Tarkovsky barely uses color in this movie. 

The free standing door is opened to go through "one space to the other" or "one room to the other".

The picture above shows exactly this confusion of spaces. The door has only its frame, but there is no division between rooms, it's a big space that could be virtually divided by columns and some furniture. But see, the lunatic is using the door to pass through, curiously, there's no water behind the door, but a basin that is part of the group of basins that are meant to keep the rain water, of course, an impossible task.

The beautiful streets in Italy, the old, the decayed.

The young girl amidst the old and the decayed. The vines grow outside/inside

The lonely streets

The wardrobe, a displaced element in the street where Gorchakov sees himself in the reflex of the lunatic. 

The church without roof. Always this idea of interior-exterior

People in the public building's staircase, like floating in the air. It reminds me of Rene Magritte's painting, "Golconda." 

Gorchakov's house in Russia is superimposed to the open church in Italy. The mixed feelings of the exile, the memories, that include the dog. The reflex of the Gothic windows on the water, as an impossible effect, given they are so far.

The adoration of the Virgin who gives " pregnancy." 

From "Man with a movie camera" 1929

I'm not a fan of silent movies, but what can I say about "Man with a movie camera" ? That's great, absolutely great. This is an experimental, documentary film from 1929, directed by Russian director Dziga Vertov, edited by his wife Elizaveta Svilova. The film depicts the everyday life of these Union Soviet cities: Odessa, Kharkiv and Kiev.  

The film has no plot, it's just a record of places, people, situations, objects, even graphic design, the habitat and life of progressive crowded cities, filmed by a man who goes everywhere with a big camera that cant' be hidden. And somebody is recording him for the movie.

As the images have double exposure, one doubts if they are really to be trusted, but the overall impression is that of a progressive country where Communism doesn't show up; everybody is happy, working, enjoying the beach, the games, smiles everywhere.

This is one of the few images of the Communist built environment

An upside down view of a building, think about it! A shot from 1929

What's even more, the film that has not a continuation in scenes, it shows images that are pretty out of the standard in those years: a woman giving birth to a child, half naked women, and lots of surrealist shots.

Needless to say, the camera is everywhere, taking people in surprise and in the most weird places: up in towers, in scaffoldings, in train tracks (let's say in a hole between the tracks), the cameraman is trying to achieve his balance on the doors of a convertible car. It's impossible to avoid smiling while watching the absurd situations. And in the meantime, we enjoy the old cities.

What is interesting is the effort to show a connection between the theatre, the literature and cinema, non existing at that time.

Finally, the camera has a life of its own. It shows up at the theatre, "walking,"  greeting everybody, bowing itself, that's a funny sequence.

Then the airplanes, remember it was between wars, and the faces of emotioned people, at the theatre, of course, watching this " must see" movie.

For further reading:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_with_a_Movie_Camera

COUNTER TOURISM: An interview with Phil Smith

Phil Smith

Phil Smith is an academic, writer and performer, who lives in South Devon, UK. For twenty years he worked predominantly as a playwright in experimental, physical, community and music theatres, during which time over one hundred of his plays received professional productions. In 1997 his work took a sharp turn towards working in non-theatre sites and this led to his interest in walking as both an art in itself and as a means to making art and performance and everyday political interventions in public spaces.  

I have the pleasure to interview Phil Smith again, this time advancing on from his theory and practice of Mythogeography – the art of ‘walking sideways’ – as an opportunity to  learn about Counter Tourism, the subject of Phil’s new project that includes micro-movies, online presence, and two new publications: a pocketbook and a handbook for everyday tourists.

MM Which are the basic differences between Mythogeography’s walks and the ones for Counter Tourism?

PS They are inspired by the same ideas – those that come from the ‘drift’ or dérive – but where Mythogeography’s walks (or at least their intentions) are unbounded, Counter Tourism takes the boundings and prescriptions of heritage tourism as its object. Where Counter Tourism’s visits step to the side or go off at tangents, they do so in order to later loop back to the discourse of heritage tourism, in order to destabilize or re-frame or vivify that discourse.

MM If we don’t feel nostalgia is that a problem? How does Counter Tourism work in a country which we don’t know anything about?

PS In a way, such a visit, knowing nothing, is already Counter Touristic. For heritage sites are very often presented on the basis of invisible, unspoken but mutually understood narratives. For example, in English country houses the lives of the uniformed staff are often remembered and re-presented, but the non-uniformed staff  (labourers, gardeners) are not. The recognition of uniformed servants is regarded as a democratic innovation, but it contains its own discrimination. So, actually preserving one’s lack of knowledge or feeling might be a good tactic – you will very quickly begin to feel the meaning-making machines get to work on you and that sensation might illuminate the nature of the site and the nature of ideological production in it.

MM Considering the attendance of British people to the trips of Counter Tourism, what do you propose for a different culture, in other words is there a pattern to follow or you’d change the strategy in another country?

PS When as a member of Wrights & Sites I was part of publishing ‘An Exeter Mis-Guide’ we assumed that the book would be mostly used in the city it as written about, yet it has been used in many different countries – France, USA, India, Australia, and so on – as a tool for exploration. Rather than me trying to anticipate how Counter Tourism might be adapted for different countries I would rather leave that to people to discover in their own improvised visits. At one point I write “if the guards are armed” – there are no armed guards at UK heritage sites, so I am signaling my awareness that conditions for visits will vary from country to country and region to region.

MM Your research panel members come from a wide range of working backgrounds. What’s your experience working with both professional artists and also people with a background not related to arts and architecture?

PS Well, the whole basis of Mythogeography is the idea of multiplicity so it was a joy to have so many insights and perspectives. What the panel members brought were insights and attitudes that disrupted many of my assumptions. Sometimes they de-composed what I was thinking and doing, at other times their ideas and mine were synthesized or fell into mutual orbits. It worked differently with different people, but almost always adding to the multiplicity. 

MM Why do you include popular songs and some informal disguises, like hats? Is it a kind of postdramatic theatre?

PS There is an inspiration for Counter Tourism in postdramatic theatre – yes, definitely. The performance walks from which Counter Tourism developed might be characterized in the way that that Hans-Thies Lehmann characterizes the postdramatic: ‘disintegration, dismantling and deconstruction’ , ‘de-hierarchization of theatrical means’ , and an ‘experience of simultaneity’  sited on a plane of synchronicity and myth: ‘not a story read from... beginning to end, but a thing held full in-view the whole time... a landscape’. Songs and disguises are for using sparingly – there is a danger that Counter Touristic visits can flip over into showing off and exhibitionism. But in one of the films - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gM7FZkd1Qaw – I do sing, but I think I’m probably trying everybody’s patience with this moment of self-indulgence! So hats and songs maybe, but very sparingly!

MM Does everybody participate in the performances or maybe you found reluctant ones among professionals?

PS When a visit is explicitly a performance – like a mis-guided tour – then almost everyone will be prepared, if asked, to take some active role or part – modeling ghosts or holding a rope for me to ‘dangle’ from. I never set out to make people feel uncomfortable or self-conscious, I always aim to make people feel comfortable and secure and then challenge them to step a little way out of their comfort zone for the purposes of the collective event. Using the Counter Tourism tactics people can choose how performance-like or how discreet they want to be.

MM I was surprised to see that in GeoQuest video old people are participating, also kids and adults. Is there any different approach for the eldest?

PS Well, these were older people in ‘sheltered housing’ so the visit of the GeoQuest there had to be to them in their homes rather than taking them to the site – so we took rocks and sand to them rather than them visiting the cliffs and beaches. But no, apart from being sensitive to our impact – the arrival of three men in strange costumes could be disturbing for very elderly people if too noisy and boisterous – we treated older people in the same way and with the same intentions as everyone else.

MM You say there are variations and re assemblages of what tourists see based on their own experiences of life. Is it valid to manipulate them to find the multiplicity of points of view?

PS I hope that Counter Tourism is an offer rather than a manipulation. It requires the tourist to make a leap that only they can make – one can offer the different viewpoints, but if a visitor wants to stick to a homogenized narrative of the site then they will be able to ‘pull the shutters down’.

MM In GeoQuest video, people are making sound with stones, while the leader is playing a song related to geology, also in another scene, people are using pink glasses. Is it part of the exorcism of familiar forms of heritage?

PS Yes, I think “exorcism” is a very good word to use – heritage (in this case a geological one) is often seen as a view through “rosy coloured spectacles” (a nostalgic’ overly sunny view of the past that confirms our own prejudices) and using the glasses forefronts and challenges that tendency and then seeks to bend it to a new kind of impact. The fundamental tactical-principle of counter-tourism is to exorcize or hollow-out existing ways of visiting sites and then re-animate those ways in exorbitant and excessive ways (either as spectral versions or highly coloured, comic or emotional versions of themselves).

MM On the other hand you show the importance of signs on the monuments’ walls - what’s the purpose of it, wouldn’t it reinforce the idea of heritage?

PS I try to encourage people to ‘over-interpret’ the signs – rather than as simple narratives of the heritage we can (half-seriously) read them as esoteric crypto-messages or discover double meanings or you tell ourselves tales about how they unintentionally reveal the secrets of the site.

MM Is it allowed to take pictures, if they are a static representation of reality, not in the spirit of Counter Tourism?

PS O yes, even without a stills camera or a video camera we see through those lenses and frames all the time – just as many urban nineteenth century people might have seen the landscape as if framed like a painting. So I suggest that we use those internal frames knowingly – and photography can help – as well as being a means to disseminate counter-touristic ironies and opportunities to others.

MM Based on the film of ‘Mythogeography’ at the Royal William Victualling Yard, are mythogeography’s walks exclusively for students?

PS Not at all! I wanted to make a film of this walk and I wanted to take my students on the walk as part of their course – so I was ‘killing two birds with one stone’ – my walks are almost always open to the general public and I have no idea who will turn up – often my subject matter is adult but my means are playful, so children can often get involved in those means – for example, in my recent ‘Spaces’ walk in Weymouth I referenced the murders of a local serial killer and dragged around a bath (he drowned his victims) – the children loved the way that the water in the bath bounced around as I dragged it over the cobblestones (something I had drawn everyone’s attention to as a useful means – the break up and reforming of the site’s reflection - to re-interpreting the site).

MM In the overall context of Counter-Tourism, what was the significance of your “water walk?”

PS Water Walk was a mis-guided tour around an area of industrial heritage and former quayside in Exeter during which we tried out some innovative ideas for a tour that came to have a bearing on the devising of Counter Tourism – myself and the other guide began by explaining that we were going to relinquish most of the roles of guides, we told the audience all the history we were not going to tell them about on the tour, we enacted all the pointing we would not be doing and we took off our guides’ jackets – we then led the tour mostly in silence enacting various secular rituals using water (crucial to the former industrial processes of tanning, cloth manufacture, driving the water mills, and so on) – we ‘exorcised’ the tour and then resurrected its tactics in excessive ways. The responses of participants were qualitatively different from other tours – not only did they describe the multiple meanings of the sites appearing, but they became self-consciously aware of how they were constructing a multiplicitous heritage-consciousness while in the act of actually constructing it in their own minds - this quality I came to attribute to this tour’s accessing of ‘chorastic’ qualities in the site - a space somewhere between being and becoming, temporarily resistant to obligations of exchange and commerce, a temporary evasion of identities and hierarchy, a potential space of transformation, a transitory space that a particular kind of performance might be able to provoke and sustain for a while. From this walk I took the idea of the double movement (exorcism and excess) to which Counter Tourism subjects the ordinary tactics of a tourist visit, the idea that the guide should step back and let the participants be the driving force, and that the driving aim should be access to the ‘chora’ of a site rather than the performance intervention in it.

MM Is it helpful for your objectives to see the landscape indirectly, for example through the many reflections on the water, or through lenses, or to imagine the landscape through the sky?

PS Yes – frames and mirrors – I am always using them and advocate them – they allow us to become aware of the internalized frames, mirrors and representations that we use and make.

MM In Counter Tourism, can the human body have a direct approach to Nature? I was just imagining myself laying on the grass, listening to the sounds of Nature and in this way recreate the landscape….

PS Why not? Yes, sometimes there is a moment to drop all the clever tactics and go for a direct sensual immersion – but without any romantic illusions – there will be all the same ideological framings at play even in this sensual act as in, say, an intellectual inquiry.

MM This question was inspired by thinking of the movie directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, “Stalker” ; I suppose you find some relations between Stalker and Counter Tourism?

PS To some extent, yes, because ‘Stalker’ is about a kind of pilgrimage which is partly ordeal – and both those qualities can be introduced into the touristic visit with subversive or disruptive effects. And, of course, pilgrimage and tourism have always been close. I like to use anachronisms knowingly – to disrupt ideas of ‘progress’ and ‘modernity’.   

MM What do you suggest for those tourists in the shopping malls who are missing the “counter tourism” or even the conventional tourism?

PS I would say – do the counter tourism in the malls. One of my tactics    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGAQTJAKSAA  is to walk a mall or supermarket as a zombie, treating the mall as the museum of a post-apocalyptic society. In the Handbook I move on to discuss how all spaces are heritage spaces – but some have a gate and a ticket office and some do not.

MM Where is Counter Tourism going?

PS I hope that it will be seized upon as a pleasure by as many everyday tourists as possible – firstly as a means for enjoyment, but one that will change the nature of heritage from a looking backwards (whether serious and analytical or nostalgic and chauvinistic) to what others have called ‘anticipatory history’ – a use of the past for making the best futures.

MM Thank you so much Phil!

Above, three shots from the video Mythogeography at the Royal William Victualling Yard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGdBtWmbc4A&feature=player_embedded#!

To buy Phil Smith’s  books on Counter Tourism and Mythogeography go to: http://www.triarchypress.com/pages/Counter-Tourism-Pocketbook.htm , http://www.triarchypress.com/pages/Counter-Tourism-Handbook.htm 

and http://www.triarchypress.com/pages/Mythogeography_Guide_to_Walking_Sideways.htm For more about Counter Tourism check out www.countertourism.net and for 31 micro films on counter-touristic tactics click on the links at 

http://countertourism.blogspot.co.uk/p/tactics.html