Return of the Amphibious 屿: Conservation by Restoration
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Return of the Amphibious 屿: Conservation by Restoration
Gary Kwek Rong Fu
Thesis Supervisor: Dr. Johannes Widodo
Cluster: Conservation and Heritage
屿 (yu) is a borrowed Chinese geographical term (also seen in Zheng He’s Mao Kun map), that refers to a specific typology of island, which has no counterpart in the English language. It not only speaks of terrain that disappears at high tide and temporarily emerges at low tide, but also the cultural activities and spiritual fascination Man has projected onto this phenomenon of impermanence. The Malay Archipelago contains many of such small fragments and islets whose ‘amphibious’ quality as an island has been lost through reclamation and gentrification which accompanied the arrival of western ‘modernity’.
The thesis is sited at the southern islands of Singapore, which lost a large part of its vernacular culture after the 1970s reclamation and relocation of islanders and serves as the motivation behind the exploration of ‘屿’. The architecture thesis speculates a conservation of the amphibious through restoration. The focus are as follows:
- Restoring the amphibious quality of reclaimed land through rising sea level
- Restoring the gentrified past islanders to return to the newly built neo-vernacular village
- Restoring the vernacular context of the Kusu pilgrimage
The architectural intervention is the building of a neo-vernacular village where people can continue to define what is ‘vernacular’ and reconnect with our amphibious heritage, a critical identity of our forefathers. Through craft and constructing the village, they will be able to understand the spirituality that was projected from the terrain.