Death And Exactistion

Once we were. Once we were not.

The human being is born, a human being dies. The death of a human being begins with the union of two cells. Life moves toward death. Human being goes through from nihilism to existence; from life to death. Death is mysterious, for now. Uncertainty can be deadly for human beings and can lead someone to denial. A human being never intends to abandon this known world. Death is rottenness, taking apart into pieces, is something that you like to do but cannot. Death is not seeing your loved ones anymore. Everyone wants to be remembered; however, death is already oblivion sooner or later. Human being goes towards some solutions to fight against the idea of death. Some want to leave his mark in history, some hang onto working, some instills their hopes to a child who is a part of themselves for their lives, some shelter under the wings of God. Someone who has a religious faith never regards death as an end but their souls are immortal. The familiarity of people with death generally occurs in a living thing. It is like writing on the gravestone of Duchamp: “Besides, it’s always the others who die” This is the same as the hero of Gilgamesh who is concerned about this matter with the death of his friend and the epic can be regarded the first informative text on this issue in terms of the history of thought. Even today human being is still afraid of death, in the struggle for not dying and seeking for immortality. Scientific developments point out that people are very close to finding out immortality. Technology turned the world into a small planet. In modern times, the speed of everything has increased day by day, nobody has time to feel. Human is, gradually, interested in imaginary one rather than a sincere one, interested in form rather than content. In order to ease touching and maximize, many machines and implementations which are developed cause quite the opposite of what is expected indeed. Human is getting lonely day by day and he is not a social being anymore. The human stopped getting touch with a human, human stopped getting touch with the world. Although distances are getting shorter, people are isolated from everything even to their existence.

Today in the world, two people die each second. Since time passes and because of awareness of life can end at any moment, death is a great fear source for humanity for ages. Enduring the existence of death along with struggling to live is a hard mission. A crisis is represented by two symbols: Danger and Opportunity. Yalom, an existentialist psychotherapist who regards the danger of death is like looking at the sun, burning. But once people show courage, they change and improve many perspectives and lead his life to self-fulfillment and being a whole (2008).

If death means not living and nullity; the concept of nullity is non-present or the failure of existing. While the word ‘ex-act-ist-ion’ which is mentioned in the heading of this text implies the process of self-actualization, it has a positive meaning by oneself because of its associations. Exactistion affirms death which is regarded as negative like nihilism, disappearing by pointing out that existence exists itself. As in Heidegger’s ‘Dasein’, who questions the meaning of existence or self-being-existence is an ‘exactist’ in this text.

Human is what he has done. Death is the possibility of exactistion. A human can learn dying and while dying they can learn living as the way of Süreya who said “keep the change”. Exactist can fight against death with art. The work of art is beyond time. It challenges to the death. The art of architecture can be considered as the design of emptiness in a null space and also the entities within whom are not ever-existed.

The concept of nullity is hard to comprehend. Mortal-architect confronts with death, if he succeeds to love it, he can be one on the way-human-architect. While one on the way-human-architect shapes the world in which he exists on the way to death, he thinks realistic, that’s if he carries out all that he has done by keeping in his mind, he can be ‘exactist-architect’. Exactist-architect makes life meaningful by the places he has designed.

If Peter Zumhtor or Tadao Ando is considered as the exactist-architect, Kim Ki-duk can also be considered as an exactist-director.

The Therme Vals’s being curative and cleansing is not only because of pure water itself, but also a form of existence of the building. What makes it valuable is the enthusiasm concerning existentialism which humans arose inside him. Zumthor is the designer of the chapel of Bruder Klaus Field which leads to thinking about the meaning of existence.

We feel Benesse House Museum poetically which belongs to Ando and in Water Temple, immortality is represented to one; Ford Horse Farm takes the fear of death away.

A monastery that floats in the space behind the gate is seen on the signboard of the movie ‘Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, Spring’ which is centered on the circle of life-death-life. This gate which is in the intersection of soil and water does not cover anything structurally. It is an absolute threshold, a stimulus. The tree which is inside water also keeps its journey. The structure behind the door is built on a platform in the lake. Wind and structure constantly switch; it is fixed in the frozen lake in winter, it dissolves when water gets warm in spring and gets moved again. It seems as if the design has not been completed. It is constantly accessible to the experience. The place, by becoming free, changes into the place of self-being-existence (Mortaş, 2012). 

How happy is the one who is ‘exactist’ without dying?