Prologue
My birth and my youth were very significant. But, since the loss of my memory a little of it remained; alternately persecuted with pale pictures of my own history. The sum of seamless thoughts, a bricolage of disconnected imagery defined Me and my Being. Memories would come and fade, especially the ones of my childhood ( for instance, I remember the endless dining table that gathered all of us in the room and held us together, the oversized opened door with cold and metal handle, it`s scratched surface, and framed cold winter view, and most of all, I remember my mother with a warm expression, her`s exceptional attention and sense of order towards the world). Partly nostalgic, partly haunted by images from my long lost home, my I; incomplete and fragmented, felt the existence of life before this one.
A Life Beyond Time. In a World Beyond Space.
I was at the crossroads of my thoughts. Determined to go on without looking back, completely distraught with my inner condition, I left. It was inevitable that this would happen. Contradictory feelings, though surprisingly clear, defined my world. Perhaps, this was my last look outwards. Surrounded by faceless repetitions that were lost in my mind, and with a simple glimpse into the abyss of endless forms, I continued. Streets, squares, and bridges; all were lost in the depths of the contemporary. Once symbols, now only blurred shadows. Remains of the forgotten age. Those places, that have lost the idea of quality, were self-sufficient. Their transparencies, so obvious, showed it`s true colors; Truthful, False and Contradictory. Kafkaesque.
Generic, a true adjective.
I was alone, but I did not feel poor. Like the greatest thinkers, sometimes I got flashes of awareness and insight. About the world around me. Life itself. Disappointment came when reflection in my mirror showed a face painted with wrinkles. Forgotten, unwanted and in an oblivious state. No! This was not my dream nor my desire. But this is what has happened. Thought I didn`t know it yet, I have ceased to be. Rejected. Discarded. Completely unaware, and to escape this affliction, I secretly searched for a Mirage that (falsely) promised salvation. Perhaps a place from my youth; A house made of other houses. In a state of amplified awareness, my mind triggered, constantly evaded comprehension of that what was envisaged. The presence of its spaces and their qualities, like a metaphor of the contemporary, rested in the back of my psyche.
To think was disturbing. To remember was difficult. To find It, impossible.
...
Untitled House
And then I saw It. Out of the blue. Dark and yet full of life. It would be a mistake, not to reach this far, far away, into this house freed from meaning. From the laws of perspective. I knew it was standing there for some time because the weeds had overgrown it. The road to it, full of underbrush and wild herbs. Completely abandoned, the rain leaked along its facade.
Destined Architecture.
There were stories about this house. That there were no hallways, and that rooms were molded into an endless enfilade. That the number of doors was greatly multiplied, but none of them were locked. Also, I heard that it was constantly empty, that did not suit anyone's taste and that once there lived an enigmatic individual.
A misfit. A rebel.
In a slow awakening of consciousness, totally alone, dehydrated and in a state of delirium, I noticed the room and saw the door; heavy and metallic. Actually I was surrounded by many of them. In that plural of elements, I could not make out their number. Their meaning. Like an old gothic cathedral, walls were covered with a patina, but instead of stone, they were made out of concrete; it`s print shell varied, reflecting the tactility of a wooden template. It`s texture; rough and brute; represented its most honest state. Room after room, function after function. Apparent stability deceived me. Expelled me. Kitchen, bathtub, and work desk; first room; all covered with moss. Out of sync. Floor with slope; seemingly unstable. Doors were tight and heavy; timeless.
Have I been here before?
As all things are twisted, reality around shaped me. Changed me. The house I was in faced its own interior. Inverse. As I walked, a slow disintegration occurred. Walls became thinner, slopes bigger...The door at the end (or the beginning, because everything was a matter of relativity), were eaten by the lack of light and increased humidity.
Down has become the new vertical...
Where it began and where it ended? This house, with undefinable scale; its in-between state was its true face; existed only as a Concept, I presumed. The entry to the site, so diabolical; its path, descending. New collective; so they called It. Almost without form or function. Without hallways. Someone would say, with no cause and effect relationship, where form and function co-existed.
Alchemy of the Real.
I was convinced that the Size, which made this House, was a relative term. Through its breakthroughs and inconsistencies, discontinuities; the House thrived. No matter its borders were visible; It, a House, actually had no beginning and no end. Perhaps my name was Asterion*, and I have finally arrived home waiting to meet my maker, but suddenly it was of no importance at all. There was no meaning inside this massive walls. It's empty body, a shell that captivated it, stood only for its loss. The places that accommodated were absurd just as my inner world was; its connections ridiculous. Then, subconsciously I realized the truth; a house was a void; in the constant state of becoming; a symbol.
* The name Asterion was taken from a short story "The House of Asterion" by J. L. Borges