Amazon vs Amazon: A Spheres Reflection
Thought and photo reflection on the newly opened Amazon Spheres in Seattle, WA.
Monday January 29th, 2018 marked the grand opening of The Amazon Spheres downtown Seattle. The Spheres embody a telling commentary of Amazon the company versus Amazon the jungle.
Let’s begin with some notable facts about Amazon the company. Chris Wells wrote an article for Business Insider that summarizes key facts that reveal how big Amazon the company has become. In the article he notes the following:
An analysis by Slice Intelligence released in February (2017) found that 43% of all US online retail sales were done through Amazon in 2016.
One in every four US adults have Amazon Prime.
Amazon delivers 1.6 million packages a day.
He goes on to state:
The sum total of those investments in infrastructure and supply chain management have made Amazon by far the most valuable retailer in the United States. Amazon’s $356 billion valuation is so big, it’s larger than Wal-Mart, Target, Best Buy, Macy’s, Kohl’s, JCPenney, and Sears combined. With the recent acquisition of Whole Foods, there are no signs the retailer has any plans of slowing down.
Now let’s contemplate the Amazon jungle. According to Wikipedia, the Amazon rainforest is a 2,100,000 square mile jungle that covers much of the Amazon basin in South America. One in ten known species in the world lives in the Amazon rainforest. This constitutes the largest collection of living plants and animal species in the world.
To get a feel of what the Amazon jungle is actually like, I turn to Werner Herzog. In the documentary Burden of Dreams, Herzog stated this about the Amazon Jungle while filming Fitzcarraldo on location:
Kinski always says it’s full of erotic elements. I don’t see it so much erotic. I see it more full of obscenity. It’s just — Nature here is vile and base. I wouldn’t see anything erotical here. I would see fornication and asphyxiation and choking and fighting for survival and… growing and… just rotting away. Of course, there’s a lot of misery. But it is the same misery that is all around us. The trees here are in misery, and the birds are in misery. I don’t think they — they sing. They just screech in pain. It’s an unfinished country. It’s still prehistorical. The only thing that is lacking is — is the dinosaurs here. It’s like a curse weighing on an entire landscape. And whoever… goes too deep into this has his share of this curse. So we are cursed with what we are doing here. It’s a land that God, if he exists has — has created in anger. It’s the only land where — where creation is unfinished yet. Taking a close look at — at what’s around us there — there is some sort of a harmony. It is the harmony of… overwhelming and collective murder.
This description is almost the complete opposite from the jungle as presented in the Amazon Spheres. In a recent Seattle Times article Matt Day stated:
…the Spheres feel like a mature, if unusually well-manicured, jungle.
I decided to visit the Spheres to see and document just how Amazon the Spheres actually are. On Sunday February 4th, 2018 I spent some time taking photos outside the Spheres and found Matt Day to be correct. It is a difficult task at this point in time for a member of the general public to gain entrance. Looking through the glass exterior it was clear to see a variety of exotic plants on display. And it was not just the inside that was well-manicured. While I was observing the triumph of the Spheres an employee was busy buffing the outside sidewalks surrounding them.
Here is the problem. The jungle by its very nature is not a well-manicured place. The Spheres are Amazon the company displaying a sense of dominance over the Amazon jungle. According to the Spheres website there are more than 40,000 plants from the cloud forest regions of over 30 countries. The Spheres are display globes that hold a jungle that has been curated and tamed. This is a far cry from the Amazon jungle Herzog described. Misery and murder are no where in sight.
What are we to make of this global display of dominance over natures most wild frontier? Are we safer, less miserable or more free of the burden of survival? Or are we growing dependent on an illusion? Can this possibly last for all time? Or are our survival skills atrophying?
It cannot be denied that the Amazon Spheres are an incredible site to behold. The attention to detail and planning that went into making this spectacle a reality deserve to be acknowledged and respected. We all long for a relief from misery and the removal of the fear of survival. Amazon has made life much more convenient for many people and thus reducing misery and increasing the ability to not experience the urgency of survival.
In conclusion, I find my feelings about the Amazon Sphere’s deeply resonating with Herzog’s statement on how he feels about the Amazon Jungle:
But when I say this, I say this all full of admiration for the jungle. It is not that I hate it, I love it. I love it very much. But I love it against my better judgment.
Note: All photography by the author. Photos taken with an SX-70 Polaroid Land Camera Sonar OneStep using expired Impossible Project Skins Edition Film. Do not use the photos without express permission. All rights reserved.
