Saša Mächtig: Back to the Future
As we watch our analog reality slowly giving way to its digital evil twin, many elements that were a regular part of our routine are turning into relics which wouldn’t be out of place in an archaeological museum, though you might call it cultural archaeology. The best example is the humble kiosk in its many iterations, from basic and boxy to design classics like the K67 model designed in 1966 by the Slovenian designer Saša Mächtig. The latter was originally a mass produced product that spread out all over the world, from Yugoslavia all the way to Japan. Unlike AK 47, this one kills only your mood if they don’t stock your favourite bubblegum.
There were many different purposes. From the usual newsstand to a DJ cabin at the Times Square, it can adapt to a changing world without losing its own core value. The original prototype is allegedly preserved at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. You can still run into these around town but hardly as much as before. Not just because with online news and podcasts they lost a part of the original ubiquity and purpose. When something that’s created as a meeting point transforms into a museum exhibit, you know the social pendulum is swinging in the wrong direction.
Millenials might be the last generation preferring newspapers to newsletters. In Vienna you can see them in old-fashioned holders. But that’s a phenomenon of its own, along with melange as the trademark drink of their renowned cafe culture. I usually pick up a magazine I read at the same kiosk that got into the headlines due to proposals to have it relocated to clear the way for a bar terrace behind it . This resulted in a petition you can sign to help the owner keep it, which many people did. It’s some sort of a referendum on our right to public spaces in the era of liberal capitalism.
There is an increasing number of them standing on the sidewalk, locked up. An empty, shabby shoebox that’s lost its purpose and attracts dust instead of customers. This wasn’t we wanted but it’s what we ended up with. The public chooses the web instead of print. If you want to praise it as environmental awareness trust me, that’s not the case. That would require proper education about it and paying fines if you don’t properly recycle. Instead, we recycle our trash by throwing it into the river and few give a damn though that’s improving too. Now they throw it around cemeteries, where it piles up behind tombstones. The dead don’t mind your shit.
In the Herzegovinian town of Stolac, the late architect Emir Buzaljko wrote about a kiosk that, besides selling papers and snacks, also worked as a meeting point and an improvised post office where you could pick up stuff. The owner was beloved among locals, a shoulder you could cry or laugh on. It even witnessed local peace protests before the outbreak of war in the 1990s. It took a particularly harsh toll on this town that’s since become synonymous for all kinds of tensions, though there’s still some unspoilt beauty at its core. The old newsstand embodies this spirit, a forest hidden by the trees of petty politics. It’s a metaphoric agora deserted of reason.
Printed media used to be synonymous with sophistication and cultural literacy. It’s increasingly hard to find something worth your money when so much of it moved to the digital platform in order to survive. This brought about a change where you have to pay a subscription if you want to avoid perpetual irritation by ads and distraction triggers. Magazines like The New Yorker still have an appeal but Instagram reduced it to cartoons with witty lines it’s globally known for. Within this mountain of information, junk, quick pleasures and fake news, Saša Mächtig’s creation stands as the one constant presence only a trained eye can recognize and admire. The face behind its windows might be changing, yet the frame stays the same.
Yugoslavian product design was on a steady rise in the 1960s, transforming everything from households to hotels, fashion and visual arts. After the official emancipation from Moscow, a new aesthetic that suggested optimism and prosperity. It’s mirrored in countless things at fleamarkets where you can buy them for a tuppence since vendors don’t know their true value. There are some exceptions, fortunately: Bernardi armchairs are again in demand, with a matching pricetag. You can even buy the K67. It would make for a nice wine cooler, but way too big for my living room.
There are other works Mächtig designed, many of them also hidden in plain sight of bypassers, like telephone booths. Though, how many of us think about that when you’re using one of those? Better still, when is the last time you used it? They’re either gone or standing uselessly in various stages of decomposition. Sometimes they find a new life in shape of street libraries or a blank canvas for street art which injects them with a new life and purpose. Born in 1941, this Slovenian visionary inspires young designers to think outside the box though he built his career on one.
The amount of content on social media has turned all of us into opinion makers assuming authority on every issue in the incessant rat race for the next influencer crown. The internet is full of niches that sooner or later find their target audience in desperate need for advice about the hottest new nail polish. Back in the analogue time, sources of information weren’t so overwhelming and intrusive. If you wanted to hear someone with an opinion, you’d buy a magazine or watch tv. If you wanted to talk nail polish with your friend from Shanghai, you’d use your a landline. I can imagine quite a few people reading this don’t have it anymore. Me neither.
There’s a gas station not very far away that’s stocked as good as a grocery store. Exactly what you need when you get a craving but there’s no sweets in the house. Kiosks are a different experience, not least because you’re unlikely to end up on a shopping bonanza when all you really wanted is a bag of chips. I look at the window and the clerk inside, almost like watching a 3D tv screen. Curiously, it’s usually a woman. These days, if I do buy a paper, I automatically switch to the back for the crossword puzzle and the book reviews. Almost like a psychological trick. After fighting your way through natural disasters, wars, economic crises and human misery in general, finally there you are, trying to find that four-letter word for love.
After our little petition started raising eyebrows even in the city council, it became a matter of discussion. Some people were in favour of the move, since she could simply open up shop elsewhere. Others strongly opposed the idea. Here we buy cigarettes, nurse our addiction to sudoku or simply look for the new sports section. Whichever way you look at this, it’s hard to be impartial. Especially since more and more public space is in the grip of private investors. They don’t care for our community, urbanism or context, but we have to. The battle is never done so it can’t be completely lost. That’s where you find the strength to look up when you feel like looking down.
It would be nice though to replace this with a shiny red K67. Most of those I saw were either red or bright orange. A curvy glass tangerine full of treats. You would look for comic books and the lady inside would always know in advance which one you prefer before you ever asked for it. Was it Batman or Dylan Dog? Ah, the new one arrived. The dopamine rush you’d feel was almost as big as when I got my first computer. Later it would be your first cigarettes and worst of all, condoms. That’s why the Saša Mächtig’s kiosk is important. It’s much more than that. Like your youth: easy to lose yet hard to regret. Enjoy it while it lasts because there’s no way back.
