tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6612236787910598522.post7918113447729932311..comments2024-03-28T03:51:53.434-07:00Comments on Will Wiles: Urban Farming and Apocalypse ChicAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15010578099446949633noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6612236787910598522.post-11874000531990920412009-08-04T05:05:24.776-07:002009-08-04T05:05:24.776-07:00I’m going to pick up a copy of Icon before I end u...I’m going to pick up a copy of Icon before I end up repeating any more of your research! It’s just the hipster thing that threw me (being hipsterish myself)...<br /><br />I'd put the preponderance of hip down to the convergence of art/design exhibition and dalston demographics rather than the draw of cynical shackitecture - relocate the finsbury health centre to another trendy patch of east london and stage an art/design exhibition and you might find modernism's social allegiances becoming similarly fraught. It seems an overstatement to say EXYST eschewed a bolder image of change for some glib post-apocalyptic aesthetic rather than pursuing a different definition of sustainability (why not temporary, seasonal, found?) given that they used the same components and techniques in their last project. Free of the mill’s programmatic and demographic determinations, the Lido seemed to encourage more casual and unaffected engagement from a broader crowd (maybe this means we can confine the eschaton to hipsterdom?).<br /><br />This isn’t to say there weren’t many hipsters (there were many hipsters when I went too), only that attendant apocalypse chic wasn’t intended. Looking at the mill’s flickr stream I wonder if in fact this insularity was just my idiosyncratic experience, imported or not, there seem to be many more families and local people than I remember in these pictures:<br /><br />http://www.flickr.com/photos/38054348@N05/sets/72157621806933145/muthacouragehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18278422221710978832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6612236787910598522.post-77777883798139618052009-07-31T10:15:47.120-07:002009-07-31T10:15:47.120-07:00One of the many interesting things that John Thack...One of the many interesting things that John Thackara told me in the course of my urban farming research was that ultimately we need new forms of social organisation to emerge, in order to manage urban spaces that are turned over to cultivation. Obviously we don't want to lose precious open space in cities to private exploitation, so urban farms will have to be run along local co-op lines, according to practices and covenants we haven't really explored yet (although another interviewee pointed to the way that London's garden squares are run). It is, I would think, impossible to simulate that sort of thing on a small, temporary scale, so that's not something I expect of EXYZT. One of my wife's friends made a very telling criticism of Dalston Mill: he said it would have been much more fun if he had brough along 12 friends "like everyone else there". The sociality there is simulated, or rather imported, and a hipsterised space like that can be pretty exclusive.<br /><br />Sure, necessity can become desire, but I think the process would be helped along if the facilities of the new age were well-made and attractive - desirable symbols that could be turned into rallying cries, like Finsbury Health Centre is here:<br /><br />http://www.ww2poster.co.uk/posters/imagebank/yourbritainabramgames.htmAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15010578099446949633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6612236787910598522.post-33846127028634538412009-07-30T15:38:51.788-07:002009-07-30T15:38:51.788-07:00I think the Mill missed some of the vibes of the L...I think the Mill missed some of the vibes of the Lido because it didn’t have as many opportunities to get stuck in, and even if I managed to get to a bread making class it would have felt more like a lesson and an “experience” than part of a daily routine of self-sufficiency...that’s stating the obvious but then how do you encourage broad, voluntary lifestyle change in something like inner city farming? I can’t help but think that compelling social practices (viable models of employment, volunteerism, distribution, remuneration etc.) will have more to say on this than communicative aesthetics. There’s also no telling whether or not submission to necessity will shade into voluntary desire, like an arranged marriage, we might not know until we do it, but the important thing is having done it at all.<br /><br />Being well-made and attractive maybe even bold, is no guarantee of coherent commitment, as the flag-ship eco-towns prove - whole quarters of supposedly permanent solidity can support compensatory models of sustainability, where one community's profligacy can be (aspirationally) offset by another's efficiency.muthacouragehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18278422221710978832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6612236787910598522.post-13915906320853076552009-07-30T06:43:57.156-07:002009-07-30T06:43:57.156-07:00PS thanks for commenting, this is certainly someth...PS thanks for commenting, this is certainly something open to debate.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15010578099446949633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6612236787910598522.post-9152624151339161172009-07-30T06:43:25.775-07:002009-07-30T06:43:25.775-07:00I was a big fan of both Southwark Lido and AOC'...I was a big fan of both Southwark Lido and AOC's LIFT pavilion, both projects that seemed to be far more considered and finished than this one. (AOC, incidentally, features heavily in my urban farming feature as a practice that has done some really interesting work in the, ahem, field.) Another similar and interesting project is the Baltimore Development Cooperative's Participation park:<br /><br />http://765.blogspot.com/2009/07/artisanal-parametrics.html<br /><br />My feelings about Dalston Mill aren't set in stone, something so evidently well-meaning doesn't deserve to be dismissed out of hand. What I can't see it doing is anything really new or interesting. If it is an experiment, what are we learning? That all demountable structures have to look like scaffolding? My point is that if our responses to the crisis are designed to appear slipshod, temporary and patched-up, then people will see these responses as being simply a temporary measure until "normal service" (that is, rampant industrial consumerism) is resumed. We have certainly had enough of spectacular formalism, but there's a well-made and attractive middle ground between that and Mad Max.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15010578099446949633noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6612236787910598522.post-31018214189286903432009-07-29T15:25:32.539-07:002009-07-29T15:25:32.539-07:00I'm not so sure EXYST were trying to confront ...I'm not so sure EXYST were trying to confront the apocalypse so much as trying to make a minimal structure that could be dismantled and recycled when the installation was over - their southwark lido project last year shares the same look and all the materials from building structure to sandals were either sold, recycled or distributed to neighbouring communities and project partners. To me the mill doesn't reference Mad Max so much as other temporary festival pavilions, eg AOCs LIFT theatre and it seems a mistake to confuse an experiment for a polemic. If anything EXYST should be applauded for (and judged on) their prioritisation of sustainability and sociability above the spectacular introversions of form and aesthetics - haven't we had all too much of that?muthacouragehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18278422221710978832noreply@blogger.com