1

MULTIPOSITIONALITY
AND ARTICULATION OF DIFFERENCES
>> initating conversations in micro-urban-
territories through artistic interventions.
Rio de Janeiro, Lisbon and Berlin.







Daniela Brasil



Proposal to an interdisciplinary practice-based PhD

Supervisor: Prof.Dr. Max Welch Guerra
Professur Raumplanung und Raumforschung
Fakultt Architektur - Bauhaus-Universitt Weimar

Co-supervisor: Profa. Dra. Margareth Campos da Silva Pereira
Professor of Urban culture, history of art, history and theory of urbanism
PROURB FAU Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro

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INTRODUCTION



This project wants to create conversations between cities and their
inhabitants through the intertwined field of politics, art and urbanism. Can
change and exchange in the urban structures be fostered by artistic
interventions?

Interdisciplinarity for the past two decades has become the most effective
tool of dealing with the public realm. To understand and work with urban
space and its political transformations is necessary to deal with difference
and with the multipositionality of the actors of society. Therefore this study
aims to bring traditional fields of urbanism (city planning, urban design and
spatial researches) together with humanities and contemporary art.

Focusing on processes that are produced by the interaction of cultures and
collective experiences - or that exists within the conflict of the different
discourses - "between spaces" will be traced as a potential terrritory of
action. The spaces to be observed are not limited to the conventional
understanding of public space, i.e. the outdoor squares and streets, the
spaces left in-between buildings without private owners, or the urban
theories that developed concepts that identify only the corporeal and legal
dimensions of space.

Mapping micro-urban-territories within metropolitan areas will be an
exercise of observing the phenomena of dematerialization of space fostered
by its cyber and mediatic dimensions, in junction with the approach that any
public space does not exist a priori, since it is necessarily socially, culturally,
economically and politically constructed.
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BACKGROUND


To situate this proposal within the development of my previous work I would
like to underline some of the conducting guidelines that perpasses the main
projects I have idealized and/or organized in the past ten years. The body of
my work may divert in its form, but the intention remains as an attempt of
touching the realm of society. Through the attentive perception of
landscapes, the excercise of questioning political power and cultural
practices; promoting encounters and exchanges; my projects are interested
in investigating and generating shifts on behaviours.

The wish of raising debate - through provocating established structures - has
always been present. The act of questioning is used to dislocate meaning,
hence to foment change. These provocations emerge from trained
observation, chance and poetical readings of the cities, drifting through
latent possibilities that tend to be hidden from the distracted eye. Expanding
the gaze, perception becomes intention and a mode of action.

Creating interstices to operate, these projects initiated contact and dialogues
with a series of actors of society, i.e. citizens, political and administrative
powers, universities, cultural and artistic institutions, private investors and
public funds. Inquiring the varied contituents of society is understood as an
effective way of potentializing different perspectives and therefore new
attitudes towards the public sphere.

Accordingly an advantage of my contradictory and momentaneous position
of distance and proximity towards the three chosen cities will be taken. The
intensive academic, professional and sentimental experience I have with
these environments gives me the required support to start this research from
an pre-acquired level of understanding of these particular urban cultures
and their inherent conflicts.

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INTENTIONS



In times where multiplicity is in the order of the day, the issues of where we
are positioned and to whom we are talking to are extremely important. How
to facilitate talks, how to create cooperative network systems where all the
components have space for reflection and intervention? How to articulate
between spaces - finding existing gaps and connections or creating new ones
- where dialogues among different languages can take place?

Considering modes of perception and forms of expression as the actual basis
for conviviality within the public realm, the themes of language and identity
will be a central point of the research.

By tracing out three categhories of interventional spaces, i.e. Cognitive
spaces (when people acknowledge their environment - through thought,
experience and/or the senses); Textual spaces (where discourse and its
interpretations are created); and Political spaces (where decisions take
place through dialogues); a mapping of the territory will lead to the
verification if it is possible to qualify public spaces through acknowledging
difference.

Facilitating dialogues and mediating connections within the three cities and
its inhabitants through interferences generated by artistic objects and
actions, this investigation wants to verify how can short-term interventions
generate long-term reactions.

As a result, a sentimental and scientifical cartography of the studied places is
to be expected.

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METHODOLOGY


The research will shift from theory to practice and vice-versa, as in a
chemestry laboratory of experiments. The theoretical substance will be
transformed into an urban interference; and the result of the action will be
analised becoming theoretical content. It is a practice-based investigation.
These practical exercises will be used as "case studies" created by and to the
studies, so that the idea of "case study" will not be as normally a pre-existing
one.

The process consists of mapping the territories and inserting artistic objects
and actions within chosen spaces. The criteria to choose the micro-urban-
territories of intervention will be developed during the preparatory phase.
The proposed research method of understanding the public space is based
on the superposition of bibliographic and cartographic studies, attendance to
seminars, in loco experiences and the elaboration of artistic devices.

To allow a basis of comparison, the same objects and the same actions will be
used for the three cities. The patterns of language and technics of
documentation will also be the same. In this sense, the artistic object and its
representation will be repeated, what will change is the scenario and its
inherent political, economical, cultural and social conditions.

The objects to be produced shall all fit in one suitcase. They have to be easily
transportable in order to allow their installation in any spot of the three
cities chosen for intervention.
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WORK SCHEDULE

1. Preparations >> Oct06 Feb07
1.1. Selecting the specific bibliography and cartography for each city
1.2. Creating the methodology to approach the space and the people
1.3. Idealizing and constructing the objects and the actions
2. Urban actions >> Mar07 - Nov07
Each city will be studied for a period of 3 months, one month for each of the
following steps:
2. 1. Tracing conflict, identifing and classifing potential areas of intervention
2.2. Chosing, analising and mapping the micro-territories
2.3. Intervening, following up and registering reactions
Mar Mai >> 1
st
.city Rio de Janeiro
Jun Ago >> 2
nd
city Berlin
Sep Nov >> 3
rd
city Lisbon
3. Reflections >> Dec07 Jun08
3.1. Analising and comparing the results
3.2. Generating a cartography of difference
4. Conclusion >> Jul08 Sep08
4.1. Writing the final thesis

ATTENDENCE TO SEMINARS
AND INSTITUTIONAL COLLABORATION

. Europische Urbanistik - Promotionsprogramm der Fakultt Architektur an
der Bauhaus-Universitt Weimar
. Programa de ps-graduao em Urbanismo da Universidade Federal do Rio
de Janeiro (PROURB FAU UFRJ)
. Centro de Estudos Geogrficos - Faculdade de Letras - Universidade de
Lisboa (CEG FLUL)
In particular the activities within the context of the Universitary cooperation
programme: CAPES - DAAD - 2005/2006 - Politik des ffentlichen Raumes
im Wandel: Rio de Janeiro und Berlin. Ein binationales Forschungsvorhaben.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY


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Articles and Catalogues:

AGUILAR, Nelson (org.). Catlogo Bienal Brasil Sculo XX. SP, Fundao Bienal,
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ALYS, Francis. Seven Walks. Artangel, London, 2005.
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