See The Bigger Picture – sustainable architecture?

Photo:Alex Marttunen

Finnish 12 years old Alex Marttunen  has won the first prize in See The Bigger Picture photography competition, launched by National Geographic. The picture of a crab, carrying it´s new house was taken in Thailand.

Global EcoForum09

mc mahedero / zonas verdes photo: ulla taipale

Capsula takes part to the second edition of Global Ecoforum, a meeting point of public and private sector and NGO´s, taking place on Monday 26th  and Tuesday 27th October in Barcelona. The first day is celebrated in Torre Agbar and the second in Espai Bonnemaison.

Yesterday, spanish artist MariCarmenMªMahedero occupaid a piece of urban soil, denominated as “zona verde” (=green zone) by the catalonian urban regulations and “painted” it green. MariCarmen and Raquel Rennó are invited to talk about their perspective about the urban space and residues on Tuesday 27the October  at 15.45 pm in the presentation called Art, thought and green citizenship.

In the following text MariCarmenMªMahedero explains the work (sorry in spanish only):

ZONAS VERDES / MCarmen GªMahedero
Hora y lugar: 27 de Octubre, 14-15 horas, Espai Bonnemaison, proyección en auditorio

Ironía y juego son los puntos de partida del trabajo planteado por MCarmen GªMahedero. Jugar con el espacio, con las palabras y con el entorno en que se ubica la “area preferente. zona verde”

Zonas verdes plantea un espacio público, la calle, como algo realmente común a todos: el que tiene coche y el que no. La “área preferente. zona verde” son áreas urbanas destinadas al aparcamiento de vehículos, creadas para aligerar el tránsito interno en la ciudad y combatir la contaminación. En principio beneficia a los vecinos del barrio que son los “abonados” (no olvidemos que es un servicio de pago)  al que el resto de usuarios “no preferentes” tiene acceso por un máximo de 2h a 2,54 €/h. Sin embargo, según urbanismo, “zona verde” son las áreas metropolitanas destinadas a parques y jardines de obligada construcción cada cierto número de habitantes por metro cuadrado.

La OMS recomienda que las ciudades dispongan, como mínimo, de diez a quince metros cuadrados de áreas verdes por habitante. Las zonas verdes y los espacios libres constituyen un sistema en la ordenación urbanística y son indispensables para proteger y mejorar la calidad de vida y conseguir el bienestar urbano

A raíz del aumento de plazas de parking con categoría de “area preferente. zona verde” MCarmen GªMahedero subraya el hecho de utilizar las mismas dos palabras zona verde, para definir dos realidades muy diferentes, la existente: áreas urbanas destinadas al aparcamiento de vehículos y, la declarada por urbanismo: áreas metropolitanas destinadas a parques y jardines de obligada construcción cada cierto número de habitantes por metro cuadrado. Asfalto, alquitrán y pintura luminiscente; ¿zona verde?

Bajo esta perspectiva, la artista ocupará durante varias horas la superficie de un vehículo, 15m2 de parking, con césped, registrando todo lo que ocurra en dicho tiempo y quedando totalmente expuesta a cualquier tipo de intervención por parte de urbanismo.

Raquel Rennó will present her investigation about “Waste materials used as informational and innovational potential”, which aims to comprehend the generation and usage modes of residues in urban spaces through the relations among language systems, understood as cultural elements.

The different manner in which informational and residual objects can be appropriated requires an intense ability of adaptation as well as the creation of a new language system. The appropriation of information, spaces and objects that appear randomly is related to the adaptability of an individual or group, although this adaptability is sometimes the result of an emergency and extreme deprivation.

MCarmen García Mahedero (Badajoz, 1980)

Desde que obtuvo su licenciatura en Bellas Artes en 2003, ha participado  en exposiciones individuales y colectivas, encuentros de artistas europeos y festivales artísticos en España, Portugal, Polonia y Austria. Ha realizado proyectos artísticos centrados en las relaciones que mantenemos con la naturaleza gracias a becas como “Ayudas a la creación Francisco Zurbarán” de la Junta de Extremadura, con la que edita el libro Pintando Naturaleza, y “beca para Talleres Internacionales de Paisajismo Blanca” (Blanca, Murcia 2009). Participó en la primera edición de Global EcoForum con una intervención artística llamada “En la ciudad”, realizada en el patio de Espai Bonnemaison el octubre 2008.

Raquel Rennó (Brazil, 1972)

Digital art researcher at CNPQ (National Counsel of Technological and Scientific Development, Brazil), member of the Institut Català D´Antropologia (ICA, Barcelona) and the Scientific Comitee of FILE (Festival Internacional de Linguagem Eletrônica, Brazil). Holds a PhD in Communication and Semiotics. Has been working since 2001 in digital art projects with artists from Spain and France and presented pieces at ZKM, ACM Multimedia, BIACS (Bienal de Arte Contemporaneo de Sevilla), Matadero Madrid among other art centres. Has published a book in 2006 intitled “Do Mármore ao Vidro – mercados públicos e supermercados, curva e reta sobre a cidade” analising the urban space as a medium and has presented papers and projects at UCSD (University of California, San Diego), Plymouth University, Universidad de Buenos Aires and Sussex University. Currently is part of ZZZINC, a cultural association for cultural innovation and research in Barcelona, Spain.

For Urban “Plant watchers”

Observe your urban environment and add to online map fruits, vegetables, nuts, fungis and othes edible flora!

http://commonsgarden.org/

The Garden of the Commons (GotC) web site hopes to encourage community engagement, broaden awareness, and create a greater appreciation of our natural environment by fostering public interaction around local edible flora that exist in public domain areas. The GotC web site provides the public with an accessible means of sharing information over the web about edible plants and trees that exist in public spaces.

Workshop directed by Agnes Brandis-Meyer_6th October

Workshop: Tools to Search & Core Sample Scanning

Saturday 6th October 2007 . 5 pm @ Comafosca, Node d’art i pensament a Alella, Barcelona, Spain

Examination of deep earth and other layers of reality. A workshop with Agnes Meyer-Brandis, founder of the Forschunsgfloss / Research Raft for Subterranean Reefology“, a small institute whose chief aim is to explore and confirm subterranean phenomena. The workshop includes a short expedition into deep earth layers, methods, ethics, search tools, discoveries and field work activity of the Research Raft. Furthermore you will also have the opportunity to investigate some core samples from location with the “Elf-Scanner”, the core sample scanner developped by the Research Raft.

As part of “taxonomies”, a project by CAPSULA and COMAFOSCA

www.comafosca.net

FREE INSCRIPTION!!!

contact: info@capsula.org.es

Dr. Natalie Jeremijenko and the Environmental Action Clinic

Have you recently experienced a heightened awareness of environmental concerns? Common symptoms may include: nausea, depression, feelings of helplessness, and increased fear of the words “polar,” “ice,” and “caps.” While there is as yet no cure for this condition, specialist Dr. Natalie Jeremijenko, of NYU’s Environmental Health Clinic, might be able to help. Since the clinic’s launch in February, Dr. Jeremijenko, along with her trained assistants, has been addressing the environmental anxieties of its visitors.

To be clear, Jeremijenko, 40, has a Ph.D., not an M.D. And the project is run under the auspices of NYU’s Art Department, not the School of Public Health. Her credentials as an artist and environ-mental activist, however, are solid. Since arriving in America in 1994, the Australian-born artist and engineer has been producing work that harnesses technology to make people’s interactions with the natural world more, well, interactive.

When visitors come to the clinic with an environmental health concern—like children’s exposure to lead—the clinic’s specialists don’t simply trot out advice about limiting exposure to paint chips (it’s a conceptual art project, not a health provider). “What differs,” says Jeremijenko, “is that you walk out with a prescription not for pharmaceuticals, but for actions and … referrals to interesting art, design, and participatory projects.” Concern about lead in the neighborhood might call for a prescription for planting sunflowers to detoxify the soil in the park where children play. The clinic then might ask for samples of the flowers to determine how many chemicals the plants had absorbed, while keeping detailed records that are available to the public. “The data is precisely not private—it has to do with the shared space, air, water, and environmental systems we inhabit.”

from Good Magazine : http://www.goodmagazine.com/section/Portraits/mad_scientist