BOXED IN
In Alex Garland’s movie Ex Machina a tech mogul isolates himself inside his remote forest retreat, then gets busy prototyping life-like female robots endowed with artificial intelligence and something very close to artificial emotion. The movie was filmed at the
Juvet Hotel
in Norway, designed by
Jensen & Skodvin, and this structure stands perfectly for the mogul’s values: physical and psychic isolation.
The hotel, comprised of several smaller buildings, is not much to look at from the outside. Its box-like suites, the size of suburban garages, are clad in dark wood siding and, in select spots, with full-height glazing. These windows allow spectacular views of untrammeled forest into the rooms, which are furnished in an opulent version of Scandinavian minimalism.
The mogul never steps outside, and spends much of his waking hours in the airless basement workshop. He works out
obsessively and works obsessively, and that’s about it. During the day views of the trees, mountains and river rush inside, like dazzling images on the greatest HD screen. At night everything goes dark, and the rooms feel like bunkers.
I can remember visiting an apartment in the Dakota years ago, on a wet fall day, and stepping out onto the turret balcony to see all of Central Park spread out before me. I felt like a medieval queen, with the wind pulling at my coat, birds circling above, and my dominion below. For centuries that power of survey – of looking and taking in what is yours – has been a measure of power. Now power might be what this mogul has – looking out onto a landscape without having, or wanting, any relationship to it. Nature is just another image. As the mogul concocts a female – for companionship and service – he holds the rest of the world at bay.