Other Europes

By christina | Published: January 27, 2012

In October 2011 I presented at the panel Arts and Politics of Urban Resistance during Imagine! Other Europes .

I was asked to focus on strategies for changing spatial realities, reclaiming the city and generating possibilities for personal involvement. I put together a free and open-ended list of thoughts around these urban concerns.

I talked about latest FabAgit activities in Berlin and at the end of the presentation I asked the audience to Tell me something good., tell me how To walk better. and to give me a map of a tour they would like to give or get. Above is the outcome of this impromptu brainstorm.

Imagine! Other Europes took place at Ballhaus Naunaynstrasse, Berlin.
It is produced by the post-graduate course of the institute of European Ethnology.

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YKON @ DMY

By christina | Published: December 16, 2011

DMY International Design Festival Berlin, June 2011
The YKON Game was presented at this year’s DMY International Design Festival in Berlin as part of the DMY MakerLab.





The DMY MakerLab serves as a public experimentation space, providing access to new technologies, and enabling the communication and exchange of new concepts. Inaugurated during the 2010 DMY design festival, MakerLab was the first large maker platform in Germany and was enthusiastically received by the press, public and professionals. Entirely dedicated to open source, collective and co-working concepts, the lab produced a monument of physical accomplishments, but above all expanded minds towards a new understanding of cooperative and creative processes. The lab united inventors, designers and visitors in a workshop area, fitted with some of the finest technologies and materials available, side by side with low-tech instruments and applications.



The YKON Game was adjusted to the dynamics of the Festival and its audience. The visitors could take part in several modules of the Game, creating interactive sessions each of about five minutes, giving the chance to understand the Game, and its playing style. The full version of the YKON game was played on the third day of DMY Festival in a separate, reserved play space.

The YKON Game was selected by the jury as one of the ten finalists for DMY Design Award 2011 and later exhibited at the Bauhaus Archive, Berlin.

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STAR STAR STAR STARO RIGA

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011

Riga 2014 Light Think Tank, Riga October 2011

Scouting Riga for spatial tension

The Riga 2014 Light Think Tank was a cause driven interdisciplinary think tank researching urban architectural tensions in Riga and working on experimental solutions using light related technologies. The main frame of the think tank was the light festival STARO RIGA and the foundation of Riga 2014. The think tank will run every year before the STARO RIGA light festival where the ideas will be executed.

I led a workshop to generate ideas for what can be done with architecture under tension. I employed process based tools to uncover the observational and creative potential of the participants. This part served as an introduction and to reveal each participants’ approach to and focus on architecture and urban gestures. In the second part I engaged my workshop group in the development of unconventional ideas to transform the spatial reality of Riga by means of light, architectural interventions and concepts for activating abandoned spaces.

I just found out that some of the ideas generated will be realized during this year’s festival and also considered for Riga 2014.

Building under construction. Riga is covered in a green veil


Riga’s activate local night market


Night meeting: selecting the most urgent cases to work on during the forthcoming workshop


Observational drift during the warm up session of the workshop


Workshop participants were asked to walk around a small territory and write down everything for 10 minutes that would capture their attention


A consultancy session during the workshop


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8th Mercosul Biennial, Brazil, September 2011

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011


The 8th Mercosul Biennial, was dedicated to the topic of Geopoetics: territoriality, and its critical redefinition from an artistic perspective. It brought together 105 artists from 31 countries, with works regarding the notions of country, nation and identity.

In addition, the Biennial emphasized cross-disciplinary education and the mission to connect art with everyday reality and people without a specific relation to arts. The Biennial opened September 10 and will run until November 15th 2011. Within the framework of the 8th Mercosul Biennial, YKON was commissioned to present two projects: the YKON Game, and a new work called The Flag Piece. I traveled together with Ulu, Pekko and Oliver to Brazil and further developed and produced the two commissions on site.

Flag Piece
For The Flag Piece, 204 Flags – of the 204 countries recognised by the UN – were cut apart into their single colour elements and symbols such as stars, moons, eagles etc. In collaboration with a local seamstress association, these elements were re-united into a giant transnational flag (915 cm x 480 cm). The flag was accompanied by a video capturing the creative process and a selection of international flag laws defining the “proper” use of the flags, and anecdotes of “mistreatments” of those flags.

Taking a first look at the 204 flags in the suburbs of Porto Alegre


At the seamstress association Facção São Jorge in Porto Alegre where we took apart the national flags and reassembled them


Arranging the symbols for the final design


Flag laws defining the proper use of the flags, and anecdotes of mistreatments

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YKON GAME in Brazil

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011

The Game is played daily in the geodesic dome, constructed specifically for the game, marking the central educational site of the Biennial

The YKON Game was developed in 2009 and is a collective attempt to alter the World. Its development was inspired by Buckminster Fuller´s World Game, but instead of focusing on known problems, YKON Game seeks to uncover novel scenarios, ideas, problems and solutions that have not yet been considered. For the Mercosul Biennial, YKON developed a radically re-formed version of the YKON Game. In order to have the Game facilitated by a third party, we had to clarify its structure and set concise goals for its outcome and documentation. Thanks to our experience of the past 10 games in different locations, with a wide range of audiences and within varying contexts, we were able to develop design tools which help the generation of ideas by visualising the process from ideas into concrete and immediate actions. During the 90 days of the biennial the Game is played daily in a geodesic dome, constructed specifically for the game, and marking the central educational site of the Biennial. The local facilitators were instructed through intense work and play sessions led by members of YKON to help them understand the dynamics and process of the game, so that they can facilitate the Game after YKON’s departure.

The YKON Map is permanently installed on the floor


Interior view of the play space. The Game is played day and night time


The Game varies between contemplative and active moods


Using the Idea Board to process unconventional utopian ideas into concrete actions

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BAUHAUS-ARCHIV – DMY Awards & Jury Selection, Sebtember 2011

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011


To honour the nominated projects of the 2011 DMY International Design Festival in Berlin (see below), YKON was asked to exhibit the YKON Game in Bauhaus-archiv. We developed participatory play stations that could be experienced individually and without the help of an YKON facilitator. These stations represent the game in a compact yet faithful manner, transforming its approach into an exhibitionary form. In the exhibition’s press conference, YKON emphasized the importance of open, playful communication to facilitate the creative process and the development of unconventional ideas.

Thanks to the amazing correspondence and preparation work by the Bauhaus Crew and the help from Saara Kaatra, I managed to set up the entire exhibition in one day. Right in time for the press conference. Ulu and I were interviewed by Bold Magazine. The article should be out soon.




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Interactivos?

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011

At Media Lab Prado Madrid, June 2010
Interactivos? is a research and production platform for the creative and educational uses of technology. Its main goal is to expand on the use of electronic and software tools for artists, designers and educators, thus contributing to the development of local communities of cultural producers in this field.

Interactivos? events are held annually around the world and are a hybrid between a production workshop, a seminar and a showcase. A space for reflection, research, and collaborative work is created, in which proposals selected by an international open call are developed, completed and displayed. The process is open to the public from beginning to end.

For the 2010 Interactivos? in Madrid I joined the Society Of Urban Naturalists {S.U.N.}, a temporary, international collective of urban researchers dedicated to discovering the hidden relationships between nature, city and humanity. S.U.N. approached science and related questions through storytelling employing diverse methods and device inventions to either engage and/or observe the human within its natural and urban habitat. For this investigation cycle the society chose “El Parque Retiro” as the common playground and point of departure. The park as a hybrid in its own right joins the three key aspects of investigation. Besides rather classic scientific investigation methods we also developed a board game using simple forms found on-site and a set of rules to engage with the public in a reflection on Nature-Urban-Human interconnections. We also found and collected Nature-Urban-Human hybrids making new associations, cataloging and categorizing the findings for a folksonomy of a new nature.

El Parque Retiro, Madrid. Area of investigation


Prototyping the Game of S.U.N.


Shadow Hybrid. Natural or man-made, in shadows we are equal


Detail of our installation displaying our two-week research


New Nature. Detritus left in the park gradually becoming the new nature


Architectural pigeon


Playing the Game of S.U.N.


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Sound Relay in Jackson Heights

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011

Workshops given at Parsons School of Design, New York 2010

Writer Block was a critical reading and writing course for first-year students across the disciplines at the Parsons School of Design in New York City taught by Adriana Valdez Young. The goals of the course were to activate the city as a laboratory for reading and writing by analyzing the ways that food, fashion and consumer lifestyles are produced, marketed, and manifested in the built environment. Visiting various sites, students learned new ways to document, map, and analyze the layers of spatial, ecomonic, political and cultural forces at play. Throughout the course, students staved off writer’s block by using city blocks as their starting sentences and writing as a crosswalk to critical, celebratory analysis. As visiting artist I conducted a workshop in Jackson Heights, initiating a sound relay and together we embarked on a spatial paan-tasting experience ride.

Put the paan in your mouth and write down your sensations. Keep writing while chewing the paan

‘Eating pan is to embark on time-space travel. People have been eating pan for thousands of years and the taste is like 3-D incense.’ (Adriana)

Sound Relay in Images. The students passed on an audio recorder while exploring one street

‘Most blocks in the neighborhood, 82nd street in particular, have outlawed horn honking and instated a fine of $500 for abusers; so the lack of car noise really helped us to take notice of other subtle sounds played throughout the neighborhood.’ (Malcom)

‘Every day I pass through tons of different neighborhoods but don’t always think of what makes them independent or unique areas.’ (Cori)

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Food Pieces

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011

At the Institute of Design Berlin, April-Sept. 2011

The Institute of Design has three locations in Germany: Hamburg, Düsseldorf and Berlin. It is committed to educate its students practice-oriented and visionary design literacy tools to understand contemporary information and communication structures in the virtual and real world to successfully develop critical design campaigns.

I taught the art direction class (Semester 4-6) at the institute in Berlin that was focused that semester on food. The young designers researched food’s capacity in shaping us, our cities and our day-to-day behavior. They investigated food logistics, technologies, social experiments, food design and aesthetics, food fiction, activism concerned with waste and sustainability, its economic power and political implications. During the course I conducted on-site exercises to mobilize thought and study behavioral structures of our food consumption. We visited local food venues to research trends, hybrid-enterprises and new tastes. In class we developed campaigns that would enhance awareness, re-form habits and hopefully find strategies for a tasty and sustainable tomorrow or the day after. We hosted a discursive picnic series turning picnics into a tool for public interaction, exchange and change. I edited a Picnic Manual that was published during the course and contains concrete instructions and study cases of the student’s proposals.

http://foodpieces.tumblr.com/

An introduction assignment to the critical design potential of food and its production, process, (re-) presentation, distribution, consumption and secretion. It involved a lot of tasting


With pencils and index cards at hand the team dispersed and observed the terrain


Area of investigation


Visiting local food venues: Researching trends, hybrid-enterprises, new tastes and potential for reshaping behavior and igniting interest and criticality in our daily food consumption


Sharing ideas for urban food interventions with the team


The Picnic publication is a collection of manuals for urban picnics as tools

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iSpy

By christina | Published: October 28, 2011

At Conflux 2010
Conflux is the annual New York festival for contemporary psychogeography, the investigation of everyday urban life through emerging artistic, technological and social practice. At Conflux, visual and sound artists, writers, urban adventurers and the public gather for four days to explore their urban environment.

Documentation booklet with instructions of how to play iSpy

For the Conflux festival I developed iSpy, an associative game with a situationist and poetic twist. I invited Chris Woebken, interaction designer based in New York, to have a cross-continental, non-verbal conversation with me in Berlin. Stationed in two cities, equipped with two cameras and two cell phones we practiced selective attention comparing our non-verbal association of the same assignment. The outcomes were published side by side.

“I see what you don’t see and that is brown and points into the sky”

Real-time coffee break

Cross-continental, non-verbal conversation with Christina in Berlin and Chris in New York

"I see what you don't see and that is dark brown and round."

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