Felicity Scott's 'Acid Visions' Explores LSD and Architecture in 1960s America

Columbia professor Felicity Scott examines the intersection of counterculture, architectural utopias, and information technologies in 1960s America. The book 'Acid Visions: Architecture Under LSD' (Éditions B2) describes how LSD use altered perceptions of time and space, fueling fantasies of a networked society. Scott draws on Marshall McLuhan, Timothy Leary, and Jonas Mekas, linking these visions to space exploration, cybernetics, and hippie culture. LSD becomes a tool for 'augmented' consciousness, with Buckminster Fuller's geodesic dome as a key reference—Fuller himself connected his color and shape visions to psychedelic experiences. At Drop City, an artist community founded in Colorado in 1965, residents aimed to dissolve boundaries between self and environment, building a giant dome for an 'electronic psychedelic theater' with strobe lights. Scott also analyzes the darker side: 'acid visions' as signs of a death drive and desire to disconnect from a dystopian society. The book highlights the ambivalence of techno-hippie experiments.