a quarterly of art and cultureIssue 54 the accIdentus $12 canada $12 uK £7c

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Political action Committees (pacs), think tanks, trade associations, lobbying agencies, and advocacy groups are everywhere in Washington, dc, a con-founding and frustrating (non)place that is home to the United States’ culture of political gridlock. ideologically, these institutions run the gamut, and often pretend to be something they are not. Some are clearly aligned with bipartisan efforts toward regulation and the public good, while oth-ers transparently represent business interests; still others have mastered the dark arts of public rela-tions camouflage and of covert campaign financing. Classifying all of these disparate institutions, espe-cially the lobbying agencies and pacs with their shifting agendas, is next to impossible. Despite this elusiveness, all are finally situated at real places with actual street addresses and suite numbers. Behind mirrored facades, between neoclassical columns, and nestled in landscaped office parks in the sub-urbs surrounding the nation’s capital, appointed experts and their wealthy funders gather to discuss and strategize how to create political and economic environments that help secure their visions of the future. Parallelograms is concerned with these near futures—some more probable than others—and, more importantly, with a world parallel to our own. The project operates at the intersection of the vec-tors of geography, landscape, politics, economy, and temporality and their architectural and spatial manifestations. Typological representations of archi-tecture, the photographs on the following pages also offer a glimpse into this complex political terrain and its flourishing shadow economy, a clandestine

world of power and money. in this sense, the ways in which material elements of architecture frame but also distort reality become increasingly evident as we become aware of what the institutions inside stand for. The names of these institutions are also often implicated in these machinations. While the activities of the Corn Refiners association and the national Rifle association are self-evident, those of Citizens United or the Hudson institute, for example, are not. applying Timothy Morton’s term, this campaign-industrial complex has become a hyperobject. its massive scale and scope defy perception. Like radio-active waste, climate change, or plastic, we struggle to understand just how much influence it has on our everyday lives.1 Parallelograms aims to give form to these amorphous entities and to illuminate the opaque discourses that obscure them.

The images presented here are stills from Rowell’s forth-coming video documentary, also titled Parallelograms. This selection is culled from a larger set of institutions included in the video and on the accompanying map.

1 morton often refers to these examples when defining what a hyperobject is. see Timothy morton, Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology after the End of the World (minneapolis: university of minnesota Press, 2013).

aRTiST PRoJECT / PaRaLLELoGRaMSSteve Rowell

Opposite: This 1859 survey map of Washington, DC, serves to contrast the topography of a nascent Federal District with the corporate-industrial-political geography of the twenty-first century. Of the hundreds of office sites housing Political Action Committees (PACs), think tanks, trade associations, lobbying agencies, and advocacy groups (shown as white dots), Parallelograms is primarily concerned with extremist, obstructionist, and covert organizations, as well as with lobbying and legal firms that have profited from representing these organizations and political campaigns. These are shown as red dots.

American International Group901 K street nW, suite 1050Washington, DC 20001

American enterprise Institute1150 17th street nWWashington, DC 20036

American meat Institute1150 Connecticut Avenue nW, suite 1200Washington, DC 20036

America’s natural Gas Alliance701 8th street nW, suite 800Washington, DC 20001

American Israel education Foundation251 h street nW Washington, DC 20001

American Petroleum Institute1220 L street nW, suite 900Washington, DC 20005

American Bankers Association1120 Connecticut Avenue nW, suite 600Washington, DC 20036

American Legislative exchange Council1101 Vermont Avenue nW, suite 1100Washington, DC 20005

American sugar Alliance2111 Wilson Boulevard, suite 600 Arlington, VA 22201

Arab American Chamber of Commerce1050 17th street nW, suite 600Washington, DC 20036

Bituminous Coal Operators Association 801 Pennsylvania Avenue nW, suite 612Washington, DC 20004

Cassidy & Associates 700 13th street nW, suite 400 Washington, DC 20001

AT&T Government solutions1900 Gallows roadVienna, VA 22182

Booz Allen hamilton Government Operations20 m street se, suite 1000Washington, DC 20003

Cato Institute1000 massachusetts Avenue nWWashington, DC 20001

Atlas economic research Foundation888 16th street nW, suite 400Washington, DC 20006

Burson marsteller1110 Vermont Avenue nW, suite 1100Washington, DC 20005

Center for American Progress1333 h street nW, suite 1000Washington, DC 20005

Center for Defense1779 massachusetts Avenue nW, suite 615Washington, DC 20036

Competitive enterprise Institute1899 L street nW, suite 1200Washington, DC 20036

Distilled spirits Council1250 I street nW, suite 400Washington, DC 20005

Center for security Policy1920 L street nW, suite 210Washington, DC 20036

Corn refiners Association1701 Pennsylvania Avenue nW, suite 950Washington, DC 20006

Financial services roundtable1001 Pennsylvania Avenue nW, suite 500Washington, DC 20005

Citizens united1006 Pennsylvania Avenue seWashington, DC 20003

Crossroads Grassroots Policy strategies1401 new york Avenue nW, suite 1200Washington, DC 20005

Goldman sachs Government relations101 Constitution Avenue nW, suite 1000eWashington, DC 20001

The heritage Foundation214 massachusetts Avenue neWashington, DC 20002

national Association of realtors500 new Jersey Avenue nWWashington, DC 20001

new America Foundation1899 L street nW, suite 400Washington, DC 20036

The hudson Institute1015 15th street nW, suite 600Washington, DC 20005

national rifle Association11250 Waples mill roadFairfax, VA 22030

Pharmaceutical research and manufacturers of America950 F street nW, suite 300Washington, DC 20004

Koch Industries Government relations600 14th street nW, suite 800Washington, DC 20005

national security network1225 I street nW, suite 307Washington, DC 20005

us Chamber of Commerce1615 h street nWWashington, DC 20062