fusionbureau has submitted an urban concept for the Human Cities festival in Brussels. The proposed concept is a grand gesture in object creation for public spaces. Not simply a seat/bench/fountain or tree, but instead an entire experience, and like all good experiences, it is fleeting, ephemeral. The temporary nature of the concept will heighten the experience - 'not to be missed', 'gone tomorrow', 'once a year', are valid catch-cries to develop interest, buzz and involvement from the local community.
The creators of this project believe that sustainable living in urban environments is only possible on a community scale. It can only be fully realized when the occupants of a community (of whatever size) utilize their collective spirit, knowledge, and motivation to bring about transformation and development as a whole. To facilitate this, focal points are needed in day-to-day life to provide people with markers and reference points, rather than living in a purely repetitive cycle. In this sense, the importance of festivals throughout human existence demonstrate that the human spirit, and indeed human nature, craves such markers in time, not only to satisfy more pragmatic needs (communal meeting, dancing, singing, etc) but also spiritual ones (sense of place, of community, etc). Key to creating the environment for community activity to take place are the development of urban spaces, and following the creation of events in those spaces - both are inextricably tied, and reliant on each other for their own success.
This approach suggests that sustainable living is concerned with far more issues than simply the amount of power or water consumed on a per-capita basis, or what material your sofa or new apartment is made out of. It is more about creating the environment where discussions can take place, and indeed be instigated, directed, and developed on all levels. These discussions in turn can be harnessed, adopted and devolved on a community level, spreading organically with an effect far greater than the initial sum of their parts.
We are living in a time where digital media dominates our lives, and as one of the many side effects, an individual's need, desire and motivation to physically interact with their immediate community is being eroded. An outcome of this is that the physical environment and community suffers, as it transitions to a more polarized and segmented organizational model (public 'places' to meet become bars and cafes where various 'tribes' gather together and tend to exclude 'outsiders' - whether consciously or not).
In many parts of Europe, and in Brussels in particular, such segmentation of society is already well established along nationality, ethnicity and socio-economic lines.
The darker, colder part of the year is when this situation feels at its most acute. The loss of light and cold temperatures seem to manifest in a self-induced city hibernation. In winter, an average 8 hour day will provide less than than 5,000lux (the measurement of light intensity), so our proposition, and hence the name of our event, is to provide at least double the expected daily amount of light into a persons life. “10,000LUX” will be an iconic event, in perhaps one of the city's most culturally diverse areas - Place Flagey in Ixelles. Not by design, but rather by 'divine' coincidence, the square is also the center for the Human Cities festival - a most appropriate location viewed by the project's designers as the 'crossroads of Europe'.
Shawn Cooper
Johan Rooms
Mathieu Maes
Wayne Moskwa
Human Cities, Places to Be
http://www.humancities.eu
fusionbureau is a creative agency in Tokyo and Brussels
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