Joost, Jasper, Pieter-Paul, Touria en Francis hebben met vereende krachten de Moonshine Bus een zeer lastige bijzondere verrichting laten uitvoeren. Na een paar rondes langs de pont en een mislukte poging om de bus achter uit in te steken, reed Joost terug naar de Mosveld rotonde, alwaar zij opgewacht werden door de politie die hen vroeg; of waar zij wel niet mee bezig waren? Met een grijns en een knipoog reden Jasper en Joost en Leon( van Whilling Wheels) langs de dubbelgeparkeerde auto's op de Van der Pek. Hier werden zij met luid gejuich ontvangen door Touria en Francis. Op naar de Tolhuistuin voor poging twee. Na veel heen en weer gemanoeuvreer, heeft de bus voor de Staalvilla een straatje weten te keren. Palen en nietjes en plantenbakken werden door de noeste strijders naar betere oorden verwezen. Joost op de trekker, Francis achter het stuur, Jasper het brein, Touria het hart en Pieter-Paul de longen en interne organen (koffie en Gas op die Lollie!) Kortom......feest! De Bus staat. En kijk dan hoe strak hij langs de stoep staat!
Last Monday on Dutch (VPRO) television bro "Doorstart Detroit" (reboot detroit) was broadcasted. About the shared faith of GM an Detroit, and if the crisis will lead to new insights or not. Watch it full below, (All in English, Dutch Subtitles) » Read more
Beyroutes. A guide to Beirut was reviewed in NRC Handelsblad, the Dutch quality daily newspaper on 30 January 2010. The guide book initiated by Studio Beirut was celebrated because of its succesful collaboration between Lebanese and Dutch architects, artists and others.
Journalist Herien Wensink mentioned the maps by artist Jan Rothuizen, photos by photographer Cleo Campert as well as the 'Fantasy Houses' article by Rani al Rajji and Christian Ernsten.
Order at your local bookstore: Beyroutes. A Guide to Beirut ISBN 9789077966549. Or online via NAi Booksellers of Reisboekhandel Pied a Terre.
In 2004 heeft de Gemeenteraad gekozen voor de slogan ‘I amsterdam’. In de opdracht stond dat deze helder, kort en krachtig moest worden. Reclamebureau Kesselskramer is hierin geslaagd: de huidige slogan is makkelijk te onthouden en mensen kunnen zich eenvoudig mee identificeren. Maar is dit genoeg?
Den Haag staat bekend als de ‘stad van de vrede’, en ‘Rotterdam werkt’. De boodschap ‘I amsterdam’ daarentegen verwijst slechts naar zichzelf. Er worden geen kwaliteiten van de stad of haar inwoners benadrukt of uitgelicht. Het benadrukt eerder individualiteit dan gemeenschappelijkheid. Wanneer zou je ‘Amsterdam’ zijn? Ben je ‘Amsterdam’ na een dagje in de Kalverstraat? Ben je ‘Amsterdam’ als je er als expat woont maar de taal niet spreekt? Ben je ‘Amsterdam’; zodra je je hebt ingeschreven in het register? Is iedereen ‘Amsterdam’? Maar wat ben je dan?
'I amsterdam' blijft een inhoudsloze slogan, een zwakke kopie van de beroemde slogan‘I love New York’ (waar een sterke emotie uitspreekt). Of scherper geformuleerd: I amsterdam lijkt een hedonistische oneliner voor een stad die veel meer te bieden heeft. Waar gaat het nu echt om in Amsterdam? Wat maakt Amsterdam nou echt tot een unieke plek in de wereld?
Op vrijdag 2 oktober jl. stond er een interview in NRC Next met priester Wilson Varela die in 1999 vanuit Colombia naar Nederland kwam. Hij wist bij aankomst niets van Nederland, maar zijn gedachte over Amsterdam was tekenend: ‘Mijn beeld ging niet verder dan kaas, molens en Amsterdam als icoon van vrijheid.’ Inderdaad, Amsterdam is internationaal bekend als hoofdstad van een gidsland op verschillende terreinen, zoals euthanasie en het softdrugsbeleid, homoseksualiteit en vrijheid van meningsuiting. De Amsterdamse openheid richting andersdenkenden en de bereidheid omstreden kwesties met een objectieve blik tegemoet te treden is een traditie die eeuwen teruggaat. En dit is wat Amsterdam wereldwijd bekend en geliefd maakt.
Amsterdam zou erkend moeten worden als stad van de vrijheid. Nergens anders dan in Amsterdam is het zo duidelijk dat vrijheid een handeling is - Amsterdammers nemen de vrijheid: van Gay Pride tot het in de wind slaan van het rookverbod - maar ook een dialoog. Discussies over gedoogbeleid, het recht om te discrimineren en kraakbeleid zijn geen trends, maar kenmerken van een diepgewortelde traditie van vrijheidsbeoefening die voortdurend getest wordt.
Dit is Amsterdam. De stad waarin buurtinitiatieven floreren, waar alternatievelingen naar hartelust kunnen experimenteren met kunst en muziek, waar iedere nieuwkomer de kans krijgt eigen initiatieven te ontplooien. En vooral de stad waar we over al onze verschillende waarden en opvattingen kunnen discussiëren. In Amsterdam leeft men, sinds eeuwen, in vrijheid. Dat moet we koesteren en toekomst geven.
Partizan Publik
P.S. Bij onze oosterburen in Hamburg is in augustus 2009 een manifest gepubliceerd dat in gaat op de gevolgen van city branding, herstructurering en top-down gentrification. Het manifest was de aftrap van een in Duitsland inmiddels op nationaal niveau gevoerde discussie over stedelijke ontwikkeling en het 'recht op de stad'.
Reactie van Richard Florida op het manifest van Hamburg.
Or actually - finding a wind turbine - for electrification was one of the outcomes of a meeting Partizan Publik had with people from the Tolhuistuin about designing a self-powered Neighbourhood-Coffee-Bar-Bus.
1. Bus, Buiksloterham. 24 January 2010.
Inquiry with our friends from Design 99 in Detroit proved very usefull. Mitch Cope explained that for their Power House project they use the Air Breeze wind mill. Mitch also explained he's using a Deka 8a8d 225 amp/hr battery.
2. Power House by Design 99, 16 December 2009. Air Breeze on the roof.
3. Power House by Design 99, 16 December 2009. A Deka 8a8d 225 amp/hr battery.
4. 'Look Out with Wind Turbine' by Marjectica Portc. 24 January 2010 Piraeus Building
5. 'Look Out with Wind Turbine' by Marjectica Portc. 24 January 2010 Piraeus Building
It will be an interesting assignment to figure out how to use a wind turbine for the electrification of the bus. But besides that we still have to do work on isolation, heating, the roof, the floor and furniture. Help and advise is more than welcome.
In March 2008, Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, a former Soviet republic in the Southern Caucasus, briefly made its way to our television screens. News channels displayed how, after a disputed election, angry masses filled the city’s central streets and squares. Northern Avenue, a recently finalized prestigious development project in the centre of Yerevan, being one of them. After an intense period of daily demonstrations and protest, outgoing president Robert Kotcharian declared a state of emergency and restored order. In response to his aggressive intervention, during which many were severely beaten and imprisoned, citizens made Northern Avenue into the key site for civil disobedience. During several months, mothers with children, elderly and veterans ignored the ban on public gatherings and held daily meetings at five o’clock in this street to demand accountability of the public administration.
Yerevan, March 2009. Photos by Karin Grigoryan
Although the buildings’ mortar is still fresh, the Northern Avenue is the final realization of a city plan, designed by bolshevist architect Alexander Tamanyan in 1924. Tamanyan circle shaped city is based on the fictional Sun City in Tomasso Campanella’s early utopian work La città del Sole (1602). The twenty-seven meter wide Northern Avenue with eight to nine floor buildings on either side is the first pedestrian street in Yerevan. The owners of the expensive apartments are, amongst others, the more affluent members of the Armenian Diaspora. The assortment of shops and boutiques on the ground floor, notably Dolce & Gabbana or United Colours of Benetton and alike, clearly also cater to the high-end consumer. With the Northern Avenue the post-soviet elite of Armenia fulfilled their desire to create a place for all Armenians to be proud of and ‘an earth quake in terms of the architecture of their city.’(1)
Aerial photo of central Yerevan, the circle shaped city.
Indeed, some distraction from daily life of Yerevan seems more than welcome to its inhabitants. The ending of the Soviet Union and the subsequent war between Armenians and Azeris over Nagorno Karabakh (1988-1994) brought the average Armenian a lot of hardship. Not only in terms of war trauma and loss of family, but since 1994 a clan controlled economy, as well as, a blockade imposed by Azerbaijan and Turkey have resulted in widespread poverty. Fifty percent of the population lives below the poverty line. And even though a committed Diaspora guarantees a steady influx of money, really only the happy few live a better life since the political transformation from communism. (2) That said, the Northern Avenue has little to offer for the majority of the inhabitants of the city accept as a shortcut route for pedestrians or as a symbolic place to protest at against the current regime.
Destruction of homes
The city quarter of which the Northern Avenue is part is as large as ten hectare and used to be made up by ‘illegal’ partly wooden houses of one or two stories. These buildings were in bad condition. According to Narek Sargsyan, the city architect, the structures were of no particular architecture and could be considered as ‘a cancer in the city’(3). The privatization of the area in 2000 cleared the way for a radical urban makeover. Approximately 2000 inhabitants were convinced to evacuate from their houses. They were entitled to have a reimbursement of 300 USD per square meter. Interestingly, a bonus system gave people an incentive to abandon their houses promptly: leaving within five days meant gaining 40 percent extra per square meter. Yet, since real estate prices in Yerevan during the last few years rose at an incredible pace none of the original inhabitants of this area found alternative housing in the neighbourhood.
Numbered house, Yerevan 2008. Photo by Aukje Dekker
Not only were tenants forced from their homes and were their houses destroyed, the realization of the Northern Avenue project also meant the destruction of an important site of memory. When clearing the area, bulldozers destroyed the green zone in the nineteenth-century Pushkin Street. The old fruit trees in this street were of symbolic meaning to the inhabitants of the city. They had survived the onslaught onto the city’s greenery during the winters of the early independence years. In this harsh period electricity black outs were so frequent that people desperately burned whatever they could find to survive temperatures of minus 25. Yet, families living in Pushkin Street adopted the fruit trees. They protected them and confined them their secret stories. And over the course of time also many others sought shelter and comfort with these plants. The destruction of the neighbourhood let to protest and to the founding of a National Citizens’ Initiative, which examined potential violation of property rights. Yet, the government muted its efforts by incriminating the lawyer who defended some of the residents.(4)
Numbered house, Yerevan 2008. Photo by Aukje Dekker
Instead, in order to pacify the people, officials promised to preserve some houses on a different location. Indeed, they pledged that the buildings would be carefully taken down stone by stone, stored, and rebuild on a later moment. They envisioned a proper nineteenth century street to be fabricated, a thematic collage from the fragments of the old buildings. Twenty-nine houses were considered worthy of rescuing according to government researchers. And thus, in a truly bureaucratic way – numbering each stone of the houses carefully - the facades of the newly appointed monuments were rescued. Yet, most inhabitants of Yerevan do not believe the government’s story. The only house that was reconstructed until now happens to be the current headquarters of the ruling Armenian Nationalist Party. Still, no one knows for sure what happened to the stones, feeding to the haunted ambiance of the Northern Avenue area.
Dreams of the future
‘This street makes me afraid’, remarked Vardan Azatyan, a local art historian.(5) According to Azatyan the new avenue, connecting Republican Square with the Opera House represents a new type of totalitarian politics, which came about since the ending of the Soviet Union. The street’s architecture is the product of an agreement between the post-soviet political regime and the capital from the Diaspora and Russian developers. The cultural vision transpiring from this agreement seems to be based on a complex set of Armenian experiences. The Northern Avenue could namely be understood as inspired by a four-vectored dream of the Armenian future: to the left – based on the remnants of the country’s Soviet legacy, to the right - celebrating the country’s national traditions, backwards - into the mythical Christian past and forward – firmly embracing market capitalism.(6) And, as such, the realization of Northern Avenue is an attempt by the Armenian elite to fix the post-soviet identity.
1.
2. Northern Avenue, Yerevan 2008. Photos by Aukje Dekker
Indeed, strangely enough, the design of Northern Avenue is inspired by Stalinist architecture but becomes carrier of new type of Armenian nationalism (7), ‘high technological nationalism’, according Azatyan. To Sargsyan, the architect of the city, the Northern Avenue is, first and foremost a stylistic synthesis of the Neo-classicist Opera House and Modernist Republican Square. Yet, in explaining the origins of the project, he firmly places the dream to finalize Tamanyan’s city plan in the period of the nationalist war with Azerbaijan. It was in 1990 that Sargsyan and his colleagues were under siege in Nagorno-Karabakh, when he decided that Armenians all around the world needed the Northern Avenue as a new national symbol.(8) For Diaspora Armenians their visits to Yerevan could be seen as a spiritual experience and, align to this, their contribution to the city’s renewal a way of paying redemption for their absence. Financing the Northern Avenue is a way for them to re-root or regain a home they were once forced to abandon.
Northern Avenue, Yerevan 2008. Photos by Aukje Dekker
Mourning the past
Paradoxically, due to the construction of Northern Avenue again a part of Armenia’s past is lost, namely that of the Pushkin Street quarter. The realization of the street exemplifies how one man’s dream can be another’s nightmare. Moreover, it displays how the destruction of habitat appears to be a returning element in the Armenian history (e.g. the Armenian genocide and the loss of the national symbol, Mount Ararat). Azatyan detects a strategic mourning amongst Armenians leading to an extreme spiritual seclude in terms of the national collective experience, namely a focus on the exclusive role of the Armenians in the Christian history and the suffering they had to endure. Explaining the remaking of the capital, he argues that Armenians make their own suffering last longer by a perpetual destruction of their own cultural environment. As such, Northern Avenue can be seen as cutting open an old historical wound.(9) And, as a result, the every day memories of the old neighbourhood are erased by mythologized history of collective survival.(10)
Northern Avenue, Yerevan 2008. Photos by Aukje Dekker
Northern Avenue constitutes a particular dream about the Armenian future, align to a nationalist ideology; the numbered stones of the houses are the evidence of a more fragmented past. The memory the neighbourhood only lives through in oral history of the people. Consequently a question comes to mind, namely: who owns the Armenian past? And, would there be space for a different politics of hope? Instead of contributing to a further marginalization of the urban poor, urban professionals could give an incentive to deal in a more profound way with the socio-economic and cultural challenges of post-Soviet Armenia. Could the Armenian dream encompass an ambitious urban agenda and a vision on human rights and social justice? At the moment, the first people move into the new apartments above the fancy storefronts of the Northern Avenue. As their first act they could reconcile with the old inhabitants of the place, which pasts were outnumbered by their vision on the Armenian future.
By Christian Ernsten and Joost Janmaat
Sources
1. Interview with Narek Sargsyan, 29 May 2008.
2. URL: http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=2454&l=1 (5 October 2008).
3. Interview with Narek Sargsyan on 29 May 2008.
4. URL: http://oneworld.blogsome.com/2007/02/28/protest-outside-presidential-palace/#more-1388 (12 October 2008) and URL: http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/EUR01/017/2006/en/dom-EUR010172006en.html (12 October 2008).
5. Interview with Vardan Azatyan on 17 Januray 2008.
6. Idem.
7. Interview with Vahram Aghasyan on 22 January 2008.
8. Interview with Narek Sargsyan on 29 May 2008.
9. Public Culture 2 (2008).
10. Interview with Vardan Azatyan on 17 Januray 2008.
Housing Corporation Ymere, which owns about 100% of the housing stock in the Van der Pek neighborhood in Amsterdam - North has made two buildings available for testing out future model homes.
1. Looking from the Van der Pekstraat towards the Tolhuistuin.
2. The boarded up building on the Van der Pek Street.
The buildings at the Van der Pek Street and the Begonia Street, which will be transformed from eight household blocks into something new, are boarded up at the moment. The neighborhood use to be totally social housing for lower income families.
The families are in a process of being relocated to elsewhere in Amsterdam and during the last years these houses where inhabitants by artists.
3. The Van der Pek Street
4. Side view of the building on the Van der Pek Street.
A critical discourse on these urban renewal development in Amsterdam is coming together. Take a look for example at the Nomads in Amsterdam - West project or at the work of academic Justus Uitermark.
5. Gardens behind the building.
6. The boarded up building on the Begonia Street.
7. Front view of the building on the Begonia Street
8. View from the Buiksloterweg on the transformation of the former Shell terrain.
At the Staalvilla we're in the process of setting up a cooperative, why? The Staalvilla is part of the Tolhuistuin a so called: incubator or broedplaats. Amsterdam has the 'creative class' high on the agenda, and these incubators are part of their vision on how the cit should develop. But what is our possition is creatives in this? Especially we as small independent creatives, that are not primarily driven by earning money, but by doing the projects they believe in.
We as 'creatives' have to acknowledge that we are being instrumental:
- IN THE CITY’S IDENTITY A.K.A ‘CREATIVE CAPITAL - IN THE CITY’S URBAN DEVELOPMENT A.K.A ‘BROEDPLAATS’ OR ‘INCUBATOR’ - IN THE GENERATION OF REAL ESTATE VALUE A.K.A ‘AWARENESS OF A PLACE TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC’ - IN THE PROCESS OF ‘GENTRIFICATION’
We as 'creatives' are primary driven by oppurtinism:
- AS LONG AS THE RENT IS LOW ENOUGH - AS LONG AS THERE ARE ‘KINDRED SPIRITS’ AROUND
It's all OK, because what we want is:
- AS LITTLE HASSLE AS POSSIBLE. - TIME & SPACE TO CREATE.
So how do we move beyond being used by, the municipality and real estate developers, we could ask ourselves these questions:
ECONOMICALLY - CAN’T WE GET A BETTER DEAL FOR ‘MAKING A PLACE’ ‘GENERATING REAL ESTATE VALUE’ THAN JUST A “LOW” RENT?
IDEOLOGICALLY - AS ‘CHANGE AGENTS’ CAN’T WE PLAY A MORE MEANINGFUL ROLE BESIDES KICK-STARTING GENTRIFICATION?
SO: LET'S UNITE!
A perfect way to do this, where economic and ideological interests of the group 'small creatives' can be brougth together is in the cooperative model.
- DEFINITION: A co-operative is an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly-owned and democratically-controlled enterprise.
- VALUES: Co-operatives are based on the values of self-help, self-responsibility, democracy, equality, equity and solidarity. In the tradition of their founders, co-operative members believe in the ethical values of honesty, openness, social responsibility and caring for others. - More can be found here: Statement on the Co-operative identity
So what would be the objectives of a cooperative for small creatives are our interests:
ECONOMIC - SHORT TERM: GET A BETTER DEAL - LONG TERM: DEVELOP OURSELVES
IDEOLOGIC - SHORT TERM: GET INFLUENCE IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF NORTH - LONG TERM: DEVELOP AND EXECUTE ALTERNATIVE STRATEGIES OF CITY DEVELOPMENT IN WHICH ‘GENTRIFICATION’ IS COUNTERED
Now we'll work out what would be the first steps in terms of who to enter in dialogue with, and how to actually set up a cooperative in legal terms.
Maandagmiddag tekende de twintigjarige voetballer Vagif Javadov, in aanwezigheid van FC Twente voorzitter Joop Munsterman en zijn vader Fizüli, een contract dat hem voor drieëneenhalf jaar aan de club uit Enschede bindt.
De aanvaller van FK Qarabagh Agdam is het grootste talent van Azerbeidzjan. Hij maakte indruk tijdens de Europa League-ontmoeting in augustus. “That’s Javadov, right?”,... » Read more
The front section of the New York Times featured two extensive articles on midtown Detroit--one on several small creative enterprises, the other on TechTown, the Wayne State sponsored incubator. Most of the businesses in the first--Leopold's Books, Good Girls Go to Paris, The Bureau of Urban Living and the excellent Burton Theatre are all within walking (!) distance of one another. Leopold's specializes in graphic novels, Good Girls has a great, diverse bustling vibe, and The Burton show... » Read more
In fields of business, politics and design unfamiliar partnerships focused on the necessity of radical urban change seem to be occurring. These collaborations are focused on sustainable innovation among communities of different types of users. Local neighborhood strategies are enriched with experiences from elsewhere on the globe. Industrial research organizations are trying to mobilize knowledge from across the globe to innovate better and faster. Municipalities are trying to stimulate neighborhoods and their industrial base.
The incentive of these experimental collaborations, which could perhaps be referred to as ‘community labs’ is a refreshing type of culture of engagement: a process–oriented collaboration, with an open type of communication, which is not necessary end-goal driven, yet focused on sharing knowledge in order to improve.
This type of engagement can be observed among artists and architects. It is emerging out of a sense of urgency and seeks to exploit the opportunity for a new kind of artistic agency in post-industrial cities, in which, to paraphrase curator Charles Esche, ‘regional art and site-specific production are combined, a kind of everyday life art’. The role of Design 99 in Detroit is notable in this context. The architect and artist that make up this collective do not only work as commercial design consultants, they collaborate with neighbors in a social and economic deprived neighborhood where urban governance has failed to make a difference in order to develop a more sustainable security level in terms of energy and security.
These unfamiliar partnerships can also be seen to emerge in business and social institutions. The roundtable projects of economist Jeremy Rifkin are of interest. In collaboration with national and city governments Rifkin intends to develop a system for generating clean energy and of sharing the production surplus through an exchange network with the neighbors. In collaboration with architects as Stefano Boeri, he is developing a scheme for buildings that can produce energy.
A third example is the lightning division of the Dutch company Philips, which is collaborating with local governments and museums in Eindhoven in order to further develop their society driven innovation approach. In a quest to find the successor for their successful home lab, an innovation test facility, Philips opened its communication channels to communities.
As Rifkin says, if successful, these projects could very well help what explore different types of human settlements. These cooperative projects, which have a clear local basis yet are very globally linked in the peer-to-peer world wide web. They could represent a form of transformation in which a small community supervises a process of improvement in close communication with the larger urban community, which is perhaps more skeptical and less flexible.
Sources: Jeremy Rifkin, The Hydrogen Economy (New York 2003), URL: http://www.bamboostones.net/, Stefano Boeri Lecture, 'Sustainanable City', Amsterdam 18 March 2009.
And yet Hantz is fully aware of the potentially historic scope of what he is proposing. After all, he's talking about accumulating hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of acres inside a major American city. And it's clear that he views Hantz Farms as his legacy. Already he's told his 21-year-old daughter, Lauren, his only heir, that if she wants to own the land one day, she has to promise him she'll never sell it. "This is like buying a penthouse in New York in 1940," Hantz says. "... » Read more
Edited by Christian Ernsten, Edwin Gardner and Andrew Herscher and designed by Nina Bianchi, the Detroit Unreal Estate Agency presented in Volume #22 the ATLAS OF LOVE AND HATE.
The Atlas, which was conceptually based on an idea of the geographer William Bunge, includes amongs others work by The Netherlands - based artists Lado Darakhvelidze, Jimini Hignett and Raymond Huizinga.
Andrew Herscher wrote the introduction, other University of Michigan affiliated contributors were Mireille Roddier, Marc Maxey and Craig Wilkins.
Herscher invited Detroit - based artists Nick Tobier as well as Shelby Moffett and Robert Smiley Jr. to contribute.
Partizan Publik's Ernsten, Gardner and Joost Janmaat developed three Utopia/Dystopia scenarios based on real existing urban renewal scenarios in Detroit.
Dutch Femke Lutgerink and Corine Vermeulen contributed with beautiful material from their 'Walk-in Portrait Studio'.
Bianchi's design was published as part of Volume #22 entitled 'The Guide'.
Available in Amsterdam in Atheneum and Architectura & Natura booksellers. Soon also in Beirut and elsewhere in the world the Studio Beirut initiated BEYROUTES. A Guide to Beirut published by ARCHIS and produced in collaboration with Partizan Publik and Pearl Foundation.
If you want to read more about the Eifel Tower, the Tate Modern or the Time Square of Beirut then don't buy this guide. BEYROUTES is not an ordinary guide, it won't bring you to the usual places.
Instead of providing facts and figures, landmarks and places to eat BEYROUTES presents a series of stories about the Lebanese capital. The stories are told by a varied group of individuals.
Experienced researchers, artists and writers as Tony Chakar, Mona Harb, Hassan Choubassi and Michael Stanton but also by local professionals and students in the fields of architecture, arts and design as well as foreigners as artist Jan Rothuizen and other frequent visitors of the city contributed and made BEYROUTES into a guide to experience Beirut at this moment of time.
The book which designed by Pascale Hares under art direction of Nicolas Bourquin and Jeanno Gaussi is losely organized around four chapters. The First Impression City, the Official City, the Emotional City and the Invented City.
By changing in each chapter the perspective on Beirut the editors attempt to give visitors tools to engage with the city and its inhabitans without providing an over-arching narrative.
Purposely BEYROUTES focuses both on known areas as Hamra and Ashrafieh or Solidere as well as lesser known quarters of the Lebanese capitals as Dahiya, Karantina and Bourj Hammoud.
Each chapter of BEYROUTES includes a background essay from a cultural or architectural perspective, a walking tour and a series of subjective tales about the different city quarters.
Christian Ernsten talks with Charles EscheCharles Esche is a leading intellectual in the contemporary scene of curators and museum people. His provoking work as the director of the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, as well as a curator of the Istanbul Biennale, addresses social concerns with a similar immediacy. His collaborations with artists focuses on enhancing some form of progressive change. Although the type of change he wishes to promote was not always obvious to me, I feel Esche is a guidi... » Read more
As a supplement to VOLUME # 22 The Guide, Partizan Publik presents the separate publication Beyroutes, a guidebook to Beirut, one of the grand capitals of the Middle East. Beyroutes presents an exploded view of a city which lives so many double lives and figures in so many truths, myths and historical falsifications. Visiting the city with this intimate book as your guide makes you feel disoriented, appreciative, judgmental and perhaps eventually reconciliatory. Beyroutes is the field manual for 21st century urban explorer.
Beyroutes was initiated by Studio Beirut in collaboration with Partizan Publik, Archis and the Pearl Foundation. Supported by Prince Claus Fund, Fund Working on the Quality of Living and the Netherlands Embassy in Lebanon.
The launch wil take place at Athenaeum News Centre, Spui, Amsterdam, December 22, 5-7pm.
The front section of the Power House would have a gallery and studio space. The rear would be the apartment of the artist. 1. Floor plan of the ground floor2. Costs estimation of basic renovation3. Drawing of solar heating system4. Planning for the first half of 2010 » Read more
Starting yesterday, Design 99 took up residence in the Gibbs Gallery at the Detroit Institute of Arts developing The Neighborhood Project.1.It's a work-in-progress workshop where until 20 March the Power House neighborhood will interact with the museum visitors.2.3.4.5.6. » Read more
The Power House is off the grid. Since the summer a wind mill on its roof and two solar panels are keeping the battery filled up. After their show in the Detroit Art Institute Design 99's Mitch and Gina plan to continue with the transformation of the house.1. The Power House, view from Moran Street - you can see the windmill on the roof2. The veranda3. The backyard4. The backyard, view from the back alley5. View from the veranda into the former living room, future gallery room6. The former ki... » Read more
It has been quiet on the Unreal Estate front lately. After a tumultuous first year we have been focusing the last months on gathering funds for an artist –in – residency and making a publication, ‘The Atlas of Love and Hate’. This will be published as part of Volume magazine on 23 December. The relative calmness of the editorial work gave us time to reflect on all the discussions we had, on what the effects of our endeavor has been until now and on the criticism and po... » Read more
We invite you to join us for the launch of VOLUME #22 The Guide.Athenaeum News Centre, Spui, Amsterdam, December 22, 5-7pmAbout this issue:Guiding – as it is commonly understood – is not about creating; it’s about helping. The guide has no goal other than to lead someone safely to the destiny of their choice. The guide is skilled; he or she actually can lead the way, but does so without ambition beyond delivering quality service. The guide sells safety where risk is involved... » Read more
Under the working title HAMUC: Hamtramck Unreal Estate Development Cooperative we're in the process of developing a Cooperative as a vehicle to put into practice "Bottom-up Urban Renewal". In this process we'll figure out what the goals of such a coop would be, how it would operate, what legal construction is needed or is possible under the current local cooperative law. So nothing is final, but these are the first idea's. Feedback is more than welcome. (click images for full size)M... » Read more
This is the first post in a new series called ‘The Consequences of Modernity’. In this series we will try to shed light on several large-scale, comprehensive social engineering practices and the related key figures which lay at the foundation of modernist urban planning. We will further try to use this practices as windows for... » Read more
At the IDFA (International Documentary Film festival Amsterdam) last week I happened to see a work-in-progress preview of a ‘Requiem for Detroit’ by ‘roll&roll’ documentary maker Julian Temple. It included some of our friends – Grace Lee Boggs, poet John Sinclair, the Packard plant and artist Tyree Gruyton. On the whole there were way too many white men talking and not enough coherent Afro-Americans included, but it linked threads of auto-industry and Mot... » Read more
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