Blogs / Topographies of the Insignificant: Seeking Contributors from Rome, Berlin, Vienna, Bratislava, Paris, Luxembourg and Moscow...
Topographies of the Insignificant: Seeking Contributors from Rome, Berlin, Vienna, Bratislava, Paris, Luxembourg and Moscow Originally found at: http://turbulence.org/blog/2010/06/04/topographies-of-the-insignificant/ In early 2009, Anders Bojen & Kristoffer Ørum initiated a collaborative project in which a team of architects, artists, designers, engineers and musicians created an alternative vision of Copenhagen, an imaginary future as a reaction to present day. All the contributors shared an interest in alternative realities and how these, through the internet and other media, play an increasing important role in their common understanding of the world. Using Google maps and Wiki technologies, together they strived to rethink Copenhagen in both dystopian and utopian terms on Radiant Copenhagen. Continuing on from the project Radiant Copenhagen, they are working on the fictionalization of ultra local spaces in a series of different cities rather than one whole city. The project is envisioned as a contemporary version of An Anecdoted Topography of Chance by Daniel Spoerri, set in the globalized media saturated world of 2010. Topographies of the Insignificant will connect local micro-topographies of Rome, Berlin, Vienna, Bratislava, Paris, Luxembourg and Moscow in a network of fiction and fact. They are seeking a selected number of collaborators based in, with connection to or are simply knowledgeable about these cities. The project takes the form of a website with an “infinitely” zoom-able map of the world. Extra detailed zones that enable the user to zoom down to a micro level and see actual cracks of the pavement as they were great valleys will be added. The extremely detailed map of 7 very limited locations is in close proximity to the physical show where the project also will be presented on one or more computers. Throughout each of the locations, 100-200 click-able points are located. Each click-able point on the map opens up a small text window featuring fictional or factual information on this specific point, and links to other points and texts. Multiple narratives weave in and out of each other and researched facts about found objects and their history will mix freely with fictional accounts and imagined micro-topologies. The collaborative writing process itself will take place online on a wiki-page during July, August and some of September, in parallel with the actual programming of the final website. New points will be placed on the maps and text will be written for them. All texts are open for editing or expansion by other members of the group and the hope is to blur the boundaries on ownership between the participants and make as many connections between the different points as possible. Through a willful misunderstanding, we hope to turn the apparently well-known city pavements into a mixture of space operatic visions of the future and histories of the past. The online photographic and narrative portrayal of the website will be supplemented by physical interventions and alterations on the sites of the photographs in each of the cities: The same coffee cup will feature in each city, the splotch of paint etc., further blurring the boundaries of fact and fiction. Through collective and deliberate misunderstanding, over-interpretation and fictive connections between the 7 physical sites, we hope to reflect upon the possibility of radically rethinking the city from the bottom up. If you are interested in participating, please send an email containing a brief bio, a couple of lines of text describing how you would approach the project and anything else you may find relevant to the project, before July 1st. You need not be an artist, but you should be fairly proficient in English, have some writing experience and an interest in urbanity. Please write to: topograph...@anders-kristoffer.dk " target="_blank">topograph...@anders-kristoffer.dk The project is a part of the European month of photography (http://90plan.ovh.net/~europeandq/) P.s. There will be a small fee for participants, the size of which depends on whether or not we receive the funding we’ve sought - It will not make you rich but it might make your life just a little easier. _______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list NetBehaviour@netbehaviour.org http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
