Caitlin Walsh
ARCH-4980.1 | Chris Perry, Assistant Professor
CULTURAL REACTIVATION
Tamarack [art] Lodge
CAITLIN WALSH
In the foothills of the Catskills, a small Jewish community started a summer retreat for the Jewish New Yorkers. It grew, hitting its peak in the fifties and sixties, and was known as the Borscht Belt. At this time there were resorts, hotels, bungalow colonies, and boarding houses all over the region. Each summer the area transformed into an entertainment culture. In the eighties, it declined, and the region suffered. The local community, not having this temporary community coming and going, cleared out. This left an abundance of vacant buildings still to this day, including: 7 resorts, 49 casinos, 97 hotels, 265 houses, and 942 bungalows.
My site is the abandoned resort, Tamarack Lodge. The buildings have a unique character to them, reminiscent of another time. The location is very rural, with a local community that is focused on preserving the natural and existing.
At the beginning of the year my postwar research into art and architecture, their relationship, and the culture driving them, led to research of the trends of the time, including chance, time, temporality, and consumerism. Today, the trends are focused around the new technologies emerging.
I am introducing a technological artist’s community to the region, reappropriating the resort site and transforming the existing structures to the new program. I am creating an infrastructural framework spanning the site that will help to restructure existing buildings, distribute electrical, HVAC, and lighting across the site, and create new spaces. Two octagonal existing buildings become anchors for the site, with the framework latching on and spreading off from them. These will become work labs for the artists. The main space also includes a lobby area, exhibition space, a lecture hall, offices, and residences. The framework also creates a canopy over an outdoor theater and plaza area with informal seating.
My final project is reactivating the abandoned structures of yesterday using technology of today into space fit for the artists of tomorrow.