GLISTENING MIRRORS

"This is the story of Echo and Narcissus. One day Narcissus was walking in the woods when Echo, an Oread (mountain nymph) saw him, fell deeply in love, and followed him. Narcissus sensed he was being followed and shouted "Who's there?". Echo repeated "Who's there?" She eventually revealed her identity and attempted to embrace him. He stepped away and told her to leave him alone. She was heartbroken and spent the rest of her life in lonely glens until nothing but an echo sound remained of her. Nemesis (as an aspect of Aphrodite[3]), the goddess of revenge, learned of this story and decided to punish Narcissus. She lured him to a pool where he saw his own reflection. He did not realize it was only an image and fell in love with it. He eventually realized that his love could not be reciprocated and committed suicide

Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the fairest one of all?

Vanity is not quite the same thing as narcissism, in that, vanity extends into the non visual value of self appreciation whereas narcissism is an obsession with one's aesthetic effect to oneself. In fact, in the more dramatic version of Narcissus that I've heard, he leans over to kiss the reflection in the pool, loses balance, falls into the water and drowns. That is one weird dude but we all have that capacity of turning esteem into a pathology in a prurient fascination with the inverted image of oneself.

In modern architecture, the mirror is associated with illusion; a device that can double the perceptive size of an entire room. In a department store the buying and selling has become an abstraction of an activity that used to be fundamental to the urban experience. The mirrors that reflect are placed strategically to prevent the minds of the customers from engaging in critical thinking. The reality of an object displayed in this setting loses its gloss immediately upon taking off the packaging and being placed with the rest of the mess in the bathroom.

If your eyes are not there to be overwhelmed by their powers, can the glistening mirrors even be said to exist?

In Snow White, the mirror always tells the truth. Yes, there is someone fairer that you, it tells the evil queen, repeatedy and each time a new murderous scheme is concocted in the queen's head obsessed with the idea of being the fairest. It is a study of a peculiar feminine ambition, for to a woman, beauty is everything. Just ask any one among the myriad of cosmetics manufacturer on display at the store. Mirrors come in all sizes and a woman invariably carries one in a handbag. Why?

Notice too how the fad is to distort the reflections. If architecture is a system of symbolic representation of universal archetypes, what do we make of this desire to see life reflected by a mirror as a dissolution of form posing as beauty?