urban occupation : berlin

by Ivan Andonow (BG) Jakob Pawlowski (PL)

The Rosa Luxemburg Platz today is not a centre for left activism or a meeting point of the left intelligenzia. It has become a cliché of it’s past. The area is neat and clean, quiet and fantastically white-bread. People living and working there use symbols, behaviours, language, ideas of the left as attachments to their identity, rather then living the ideas they use to make themselves appear more interesting, different.

Berlin offers all the problems of the modern (urban) life in a nutshell, failed immigration, the failed transformation from a industrial society to a service economy, the failed social reunification of Germany, the lack of money spent on education and social money, the imbalance between the rich and the poor, the powerful and the people etc. However, none of this is actually visible there. Instead, the Rosa Luxemburg Platz and the people using this space have created for themselves a peaceful island within reality, from which they observe the world around them like animals in the zoo.

However, this behaviour not only occurs to the people using the area and not only affects political/social activism. It is within everyone that with time we feel overburdened by the social, political, global reality and try to find/create a peaceful niche for ourselves. This might be good for us to close our eyes in order to feel better, safer, happier. But it doens’t change reality and only bridges the time gap until we ourselves become victims of what we ignore.

“Maybe you forgot something” aims questions to passers-by, that aren’t political, although some can be interpreted this way. The messages on the speech bubbles don’t mean to have an instant, even radical imapct on people. The questions are subcutaneous, maybe even formal and not communicating aggressively. They are meant to stay in people’s minds and maybe, in a different context, be the trigger for individual experience of self awareness.

documentation (pdf): maybe you forgot something

by Niklas Kuhlendahl (D), Shaun Motsi (CAN) and Catalin Werb (D)

Josef Ackermann, ‘Ché’ Guevara and Lenin have, maybe because of the current crisis, buried their political differences and become friends. Their willingness to compromise has been rewarded with: a new job! They’ve become the mascot team of a supermarket chain called “World Trade” which has just recently opened their newest affiliate in Berlin, at, of all places, Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz. Like Zombies subsisting on the living political leaders and theorists, they flutter around the place, reminding us of the popular accusation that our generation/time was ‘apolitical’. Here we are at the pivotal point of the installation: We want to further inquire this common assumption and find out if it is rightful, or if not just the means or the appearance or the sphere of political struggle has shifted. In order to find out, our three alter egos approach the passing participants in capitalism, asking them for anything disposable which they can deposit in the ‘bad bank’. This litter is immediately turned into credit for the shopping basket. After having chosen a give-away, they are invited to leave a political slogan of their choice in our ‘supermarket of political vanity’, eventually creating a ‘zeitgeist-collage’. Of course, it is over the top to declare the resulting collage of stickers a representative compilation of present political attitudes, as the repertory of slogans was limited and predetermined. However, as a general reminder of other times when people actually dared taking a chance and trying to change the course of the processes affecting them, we hope it might have worked.

The way that the installation dealt with its surroundings could be called parasitic, as we used (even manipulated) the existing facilities for our purposes. We have to admit that the cubes framework was a piece of luck; originally we intended to use the billboard instead (which proved to be illegal). With our supermarket table and our supermarket soundtrack, it was possible to subtly evoke a distinct room amidst the public space – without having to visibly/physically border it. The many nice associations created by attaching a sign ‘World Trade Centre’ to an actual tower-shaped construction site are open to the passer-by to either appreciate or ignore.

Photos of the action:

Ackermann in action

At the supermarket.

Lady attaching a flyer.

Group Photo

Overview of the finished action.

documentation (pdf):World Trade Supermarkt

by  Mesimaaria Koponen (FIN), Caitlin Mills-Sheehy (AUS), Caitlyn Parry (AUS), Laure Severac (F)

The two starting points were public space as a means to an ends (a space that must be overcome to reach ones destination), and the definitions of a territory.  We were interested in prompting a response from the public using a technique that did not require a direct asking of them, which was proven as the most successful way of engagement from the instant occupation action.   One travels through a number of spaces or territories in any one day. These territories, on a gross level, can be defined by structural elements such as walls, doors, signs etc, however we were wanting to explore and set up situations where one (the public) had to create a territorial membrane from more non tangible elements. We decided to create a territory where the barrier (referred to as a membrane) to the territory takes the form of the senses (touch: static and dynamic, sound and vision: reflections). Four methods of territory definition were created, each performed for 15 minutes over 2 cycles.  3 people participated at one time, with the third documenting.

Act one was shuffling along the stairs with the intention of obstruction the public’s line of travel (with the intensity of the obstruction adjusted to the individual’s capacity to interact ie: elderly were omitted),

Act two involved lying on the stairs forming zig zag spaces to see if the public would step over the performers or conform to the created pathways.

Act three was to create a triangular space with sound (each person making a noise ie. clapping, vocal noise and scraping metal object down tiled wall).

Act four was using mirrors to create an intensity between the 3 performers where one reflected the others image in the triangle.

The questions to be answered were: which of the methods was more conducive in creating a non-permeable membrane to a territory that the public acknowledged, respected or were confused by, how can one engage the public and provide a haptic experience, and what methods broke the daily monotony of the pedestrian action of the exiting/entering the u-bahn.

documentation (pdf): Territorial Membranes Action

by Christopher Comrie (GB), Ryan Finn (GB), Elba Garcia Clark (ES), Antoine Martin (FR)

The intention of our group occupation was to engage with the public by presenting them with the opportunity to re-acquire, in essence, their discarded products, possessions and waste. The intention of the experiment was to make passers by believe that there was, initially, edible food on display. However, upon closer inspection they would soon realise that it was in fact filled with indigenous rubbish collected from in and around Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz. After being able to acquire someone’s attention by offering them a sandwich, we would then go on to explain our agenda in detail; that being to recycle and clear the surrounding area of rubbish, In the hope that this would encourage them to take one or more of our sandwiches, which would actively involve them with their own community. We believe that it would be in¬teresting to literally translate the idea of capitalism recycling itself within society, and the idea of it being one giant vicious circle. Therefore, by giving back waste, leftover from products they have consumed, it represents the idea of buying and selling of which capitalism con¬sists. With regards to relevance to the site, this touches upon the notion of trading which has historically taken place within public squares. Overall, we hope this experiment will achieve a certain level of success as it involves the public interacting with their community, and also will encourage them to interact with us and give us their own opinions on our experiment. Such as, whether they feel that our experiment is a success or not.

documentation (pdf): Would you like a Junkwich?