Arakawa Shusaku, the artist who “decided not to die”, died on May 20th, 2010.

For those of you who haven`t heard of Arakawa,  he was an oddball artist in NY who proposed to “not die”.  His proposal for this was not some abstract art or installation, but a physical experience, through buildings which questioned the fundamental concept of artificial space.

Normally, we`d want our rooms to be flat, our stairs nice and easy, and nothing should make us trip.  We take it as a given, that things should move towards more comfortable, less difficult.  I think as designers, most of us never really questioned that, or failed to see progress in any other way.

But where has that led us?

This guy made an obstacle course out of elements that usually should be comfortable. For example, his Reversible Destiny Park has almost no horizontal areas, forcing the user to balance on difficult terrains throughout the visit.

…what a horrible sight.

But as ugly as it is, it is built true to his concept.  By navigating in a difficult physicial environment, it trains and tones the reflexes, thus keeping people fit and heathier, as opposed to an easy and smooth environment which weakens the people through neutral navigation. Thus, the concept of “never dying.”

This guy was onto something. Probably it was something that designers would be hesitant to touch(because, you know, its pretty damn ugly).