InitialConcept

Note: The following text was the first concept for the tetrapak-platform "ready2capture! HafenCity, an urban space?" for the artgenda 2002.
See also # UrsprünglichesKonzept? | # [Extended Concept] in German (as pdf)

TetraPak

ReadyToCapture! HafenCity - an urban space?

TetraPak is a group of cultural producers based on different disciplines as fine arts, philosophy, cultural sciences, graphic design and political work/ activism. tetrapak (Armin Chodzinski (AchoD), Anke Haarmann (AhA), Jelka Plate, Johannes Rieck, Ulf Treger (UlfT), MalteWillms) exists since 1999 in Hamburg. We have been reading and discussing texts and projects dealing with strategies of intervention and of participation/ cooperation of/ with groups or individuals. Each of us is at the same time working in different projects. The members of TetraPak are more interested in open processes than in a product. Many of the projects we are involved in or the texts we read focus on the changes of a city/ urban space and its effects like privatization and gentrification. Since about a year we are focussing our work on the >HafenCity< (Harbour-City).

The HafenCity is a plan of the City of Hamburg which has the aim to double the innercity space and thereby install a totally new city area. By selling the ground to investors the dream of the city is to finance a new container terminal which is built right now. The HafenCity will be built in the old harbour area (freeport) and is one of the largest urban development projects in Europe. It is advertised as an area of "an urban and lively mix of housing, working, commerce, tourism and leisure". A MediaCityPort is planned as well as a huge maritime museum, shops and coffee bars. The whole process is scheduled for about 25 years and what you can see at the moment is an informationcenter with a huge model of the future HafenCity.

The artgenda-project

The idea of TetraPak´s project >ReadyToCapture? HafenCity - an urban space?< for the artgenda is to set up our own exhibition- and informationcenter nearby the official one. We want this to become a place where urban space is shown and discussed as a collective space which isn´t reduced to economic rules and functions, but deals with the contradictions of life in the city.

We intend to start in November 2001 and have the following aims:

Before the artgenda:

1. We want to built a model of the HafenCity parallel to the one in the official informationcenter, which is consequently dealing with the possibilities of form and content of a model. The empty, marketing-based function of the architectural model is going to be confronted with a model which takes its artistic responsibility and embedded possibilties of participation. The work on the model questions expectations and representations which arise from the official model and the discours about the HafenCity: Why is the HafenCity going to be built? Who builts? Which perspective is developed? Who is meant to use the area? Which possibilities are offered in the HafenCity?
   Based on these questions we are interested in the development of a wide range of visions which are then put together to one model, obviously still able to be modified.
   This process is going to be created by the visitors and the artists before and during the artgenda. tetrapak understands its role at the same time as moderator and as group of cultural producers.
2. We want to set up an archive with material of the planning process of the HafenCity, of the changing process of former harbour areas in other cities as well as projects dealing with these processes.
3. We invite artists to send us sketches, models, documentations of projects before the beginning of the artgenda, to initiate a discussion of the HafenCity in Hamburg and amongst tetrapak and the artists invited. We would like to establish public events in our space before the artgenda starts in order to have publicity to work with during the artgenda.
4. We wish to cooperate not only with artists but also with sociologists, city planners and architects in order to be able to describe the subject in all possible ways and medias.

While the artgenda:

1. Together with the artists invited the model described will be built, modified, rebuilt, discussed.
2. On a construction site of the HafenCity parts of the model are built in a bigger scale, so that the models can be used as real spaces where presentations, lectures, discussions and film screenings can take place.
3. In the big models artists can present their idea of urbanism. The ideal situation would be the confrontation between the plans developed during the artgenda and the official plans and visions.
4. In additon to this other artists, theorists and initiatives have the opportunity to present their ideas of urban space either in the informationcenter or in the big models.

tetrapak 2001

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