At the heart of postmodernism has been the need to house all possible cultures and identities, and acknowledge the importance of context in creating meaning. The only answer to these needs was extreme relativism. Postmodernity saw an explosion of information and images, of meanings, and of truths. As a result, postmodern life and architecture valorised signs and signifiers, and engaged itself in a semiotic feast. An explosion of popular images, of consumption and of multiplicity. The result in art and architecture has been a fetishization of the individual, of authenticity and of uniqueness.

Inextricably linked to this new world order were developments in technology and mass media, transport and communication infrastructures, as well as global economics. The result has been the mass movement of people and information. A world in which speed is becoming paramount, appetite insatiable and desire eclipsing need.

Supermodernism has been a reaction against the multiplicity of postmodernity as well as a response to globalisation. In supermodernist architecture there is a turn away from the semiotic towards those elements which are inherent to architecture itself: light and materials, structure and space. According to Hans Ibelings: “The new frame of reference – unlike that of postmodernism and deconstructivism – will no longer be dictated by the unique, the authentic or the specific, but by the universal.” (‘Supermodernism: Architecture in the Age of Globalism’, 1998) An international generation of architects has emerged and with it a trend to erect new buildings which are increasingly detached from their surrounding context.

Devalorisation of context along with increased mobility and consumption have led to supermodernism being associated with the transient and the fleeting. The meaningless traversal of space. Marc Augé more specifically associates “supermodernity” with the disappearance of place and the development of “non-places” which include places of transit (‘Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity’). The enormous scale of supermodern spaces challenge the accepted notions of rigid space. Movement and speed become threats to established boundaries.

The focus on cities or outskirts has been replaced by an increasing awareness of midtowns. In London and Tokyo the growth of suburbs and the increased transportation links to these once peripheral areas is especially evident in new developments such as the Docklands and those suburbs joined by the Yamanote Line. Rem Koolhaas refers to the emergence of a new urban situation between city and landscape as “SCAPE”. Moving people from one space to the other becomes a regular necessity of urban life and transit becomes a parallel to the flux embodied in supermodernism.

Contemporary utopian projects, dystopias or heterotopias, are based upon a need to acknowledge chaotic urban expansion as well as the economic necessity of such growth. The chaotic logic to global expansion tends to follow capital flows and communication networks. Once again, places of transit become not only a result of but a metaphor for the wider context within which they are situated. Hou Hanru and Hans Ulrich Obrist claim that: “Such a process of urban transformation causes inevitably contradictions, contests, chaos and even violence.” (Exhibition text accompanying ‘Cities on the Move’). By removing the importance of context and undermining historically laden markers, this chaotic and movement driven sphere undermines the public place as a locus for human interaction.

Despite the dislocation engendered by supermodernity, Hans Ibelings states that: “…a new architecture is evolving which now attaches greater importance to visual, spatial and tactile sensation.” (‘Supermodernism: Architecture in the Age of Globalism’, 1998) Through the exploration of paradigmatic places of transit in London and Tokyo, Sylvia Grace Borda’s photographs engage both with the notion of supermodern spaces as well as their legacy of postmodern symbols. The images demand at once a detached and universal response to the spaces represented whilst also pointing to recurrent symbols and markers which enable the spaces to be understood.