The Momental-Markus Miessen

eröffnung/opening: 5. Mai, 2006 | 19-23:00
6. Mai - 10. Juni, 2006

	Calendar Curator Text Austellung/Exhibition Larissa Fassler Ivana Franke Germaine Koh Stephan Kurr Jeff Preiss Åsa Ståhl Lectures Mark Paterson Christel Weiler + Barbara Gronau Johan Zetterquist mit Judith Manzoni Workshops Stephan Kurr + Jürgen Krusche Markus Miessen


		Photo: Kenny Cupers and Markus Miessen

	Markus Miessen	Registration Required
	The Transient Institution – Institute of Urban Memory A spatial collaboration between Sparwasser HQ and the urban environment it sits in. 15 Participants \| May 20 -21, 2006 Tactile Urbanism What is an institution today? Does it have to be physical? Can it be temporary, ephemeral, re-occurring, or invisible? Uncertainty and spontaneity are Berlin’s most charming characteristics. Its urban character is based on instant local action while Berlin as an urban landscape opens up an unexpectedly contemporary view upon recent debates on public space. The city’s vacant plots offer the possibility of an immediate kinetic energy that celebrates the missing, tucked into its marginal urban territories. In a time in which the city is getting ever more populated by mediocre architectural intervention and homogeneous urban development, there is an ever more urgent need to stress the importance of marginal and transitory urban spaces as a focal component to the vitality of the city. A discursive field research programme will stimulate both an interaction with urban space, which is often neglected or overseen and further an in-depth participatory research about the urban tissue of Berlin. In a non-cynical manner, the public field research group will venture out into the territory to explore the various facets and traces of a DIY Urbanism, which is often overlooked by traditional planners. As a mode of exploration, the participants of the workshop and subsequent temporary archive at Sparwasser HQ will go through several urban performances, that allow them to understand how particular parts of the city can function as activators for micro-political and spontaneous activity whilst investigating the potential of a transient institution as a temporary host for individual items of urban memory. Rather than trying to institutionalise such urban spaces, the aim of the field study is to establish a link between the institution (Sparwasser HQ) and the wider urban landscape, a feedback mechanism, a hub for exchange, using the notion of the archive as something that is a memory itself as it disintegrates and is being fed back into the urban fabric. The workshop will: -Utilise the potential of the urban void. Rather than colonising it, the interaction will stress the importance of these urban sites as activators for micro-political and spontaneous activity -Investigate the potential of a transient institution as a temporary host for individual items of urban memory. Participants will: -Receive an Urban Research Kit and follow the structure of a one-day brief (either individually or teamed up in pairs). This Kit will be distributed about a week before the meeting at Sparwasser, so there will be enough time for participants to explore the terrain and collect their findings -Collect physical objects, talk to strangers and set up a reference for their micro-urban archaeology -Document their findings using different media of their choice (photographic, written, verbal recorded, MiniDV) -Leave physical traces on site, as focal points of micro-political action in the city, scattered reminders of urban life -Leave memories/ exchange memories/ take memories with you...and refer to their new/ temporary home -Return to Sparwasser HQ and present and discuss their findings in an informal manner, stimulating discussion and debate regarding the spaces they travelled Schedule Saturday (20.05.2006) -10.00 - 18.00: City Archeology -19.00 – 21.00: Discussion and Archiving (Sparwasser HQ) Sunday (21.05.2006) -10.00 – 18.00: City Archeology -18.00 – 20.00: Presentation of individual archives -20.00 – Open end: Discussion und Drinks The temporary archive created by workshop participants will be folded back into the exhibition. Markus Miessen (1978) M.Res AADipl(Hons) B.Arch is a frequent contributor to international magazines and journals, editor of the forthcoming publication „Did Someone say Participate?An Atlas of Spatial Practice“(MIT Press / Revolver, 2006), and the author of „Spaces of Uncertainty“ (with Cupers, Verlag Mueller+Busmann, 2002). An architect, researcher and writer, he worked for Daniel Libeskind in Berlin, General Public Agency in London and currently acts as a spatial consultant to the newly initiated European Kunsthalle Cologne. In 2004, he founded the Research Design consultancy Miessen&Murphy in London. Studied at Glasgow School of Art and graduated from the Architectural Association with Honours, he has exhibited internationally, most recently at Raumpioniere, Aedes and Urban Drift, Berlin, and the Rotterdam Biennale, concerned with alternative future practice. Markus is currently a visiting critic at several universities across Europe and a Unit Master at the Architectural Association. Questioning the role of the contemporary architect, he conducts research regarding spatial parameters of institutional structures in relation to conflict and non-consensus based models of participation. He recently completed his Master in Research degree from the London Consortium, and is currently a PhD candidate at Goldsmiths Centre for Architecture Research.