Origin of the name
Initially known as ''Dériville'' (from "ville dérivée", literally, "drift city"), it was later renamed ''New Babylon''.Goal and rationale
The goal was the creating of alternative life experiences, called "situations",n the 1950s, Constanthad already been working for years on his "New Babylon" series of paintings, sketches, texts, and architectural models describing the shape of a post-revolutionary society. Constant's New Babylon was to be a series of linked transformable structures, some of which were themselves the size of a small city--what architects call aNieuwenhuys' ''New Babylon'' was based on the idea that architecture itself would allow and instigate a transformation of daily reality. As Nieuwenhuys wrote:megastructure A megastructure is a very large artificial object, although the limits of precisely how large vary considerably. Some apply the term to any especially large or tall building. Some sources define a megastructure as an enormous self-supporting a .... Perched above ground, Constant's megastructures would literally leave the bourgeois metropolis below and would be populated by ''homo ludens ''Homo Ludens'' is a book originally published in Dutch in 1938 by Dutch historian and cultural theorist Johan Huizinga. It discusses the importance of the play element of culture and society. Huizinga suggests that play is primary to and a nece ...''--man at play. (Homo Ludens is the title of a book by the great Dutch historianJohan Huizinga Johan Huizinga (; 7 December 1872 – 1 February 1945) was a Dutch historian and one of the founders of modern cultural history. Life Born in Groningen as the son of Dirk Huizinga, a professor of physiology, and Jacoba Tonkens, who died two y ....) In the New Babylon, the bourgeois shackles of work,family life Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Ideal ..., and civic responsibility would be discarded. The post-revolutionary individual would wander from one leisure environment to another in search of new sensations. Beholden to no one, he would sleep, eat, recreate, and procreate where and when he wanted. Self-fulfillment and self-satisfaction were Constant's social goals. Deductive reasoning, goal-oriented production, the construction and betterment of a political community--all these were eschewed.
It is obvious that a person free to use his time for the whole of his life, free to go where he wants, when he wants, cannot make the greatest use of his freedom in a world ruled by the clock and the imperative of a fixed abode. As a way of life, Homo Ludens will demand, firstly, that he responds to his need for playing, for adventure, for mobility, as well as all the conditions that facilitate the free creation of his own life. Until then, the principal activity of man had been the exploration of his natural surroundings. Homo Ludens himself will seek to transform, to recreate, those surroundings, that world, according to his new needs. The exploration and creation of the environment will then happen to coincide because, in creating his domain to explore, Homo Ludens will apply himself to exploring his own creation. Thus we will be present at an uninterrupted process of creation and re-creation, sustained by a generalized creativity that is manifested in all domains of activity.
See also
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