The Whitechapel Gift Shop is an art and architecture project by public works, in collaboration with the clients Pilar and Pele Cortizo Burgess.public works were the architects for the Whitechapel Gift Shop creating a home, which looks at the shifting boundaries between public and private realm and questions the necessity of institutions as predominant contemporary cultural spaces. The project tests the boundaries of public and private further with the public event of the performance - 'Plastic'.

public works collaborated with 30 bird productions creating 'Plastic' as a spatial and site specific performance 2 years ago for Edinburgh Festival and now we are collaborating to recreate it in the domestic context of the Whitechapel Gift Shop project.

'Plastic' was nominated for a Total Theatre Award in Edinburgh 08 and selected by The Guardian as one of the top four shows in the festival. It is coming to London to The Whitechapel Gift Shop from 18-27 March. Tickets can be booked online at: www.wegottickets.com/30birdproductions.

For more info on Plastic visit 30 bird productions website: www.30birdproductions.org

For more info on 'Whitechapel gift shop' please see www.publicworksgroup.net/giftshop and the client's website www.thewhitechapelgiftshop.com

View article on website

Archive of Shared Interests - Transfer Zone - Temporary Life - Temporary Communities
30 Theoretical approaches, architectural and artistic dossiers for communities in the Transfer Zone

Communities are defined by artists, scholars and urbanists as an antithesis to general society and its constraints, but they differ widely from one another in the roles they play. Whether the community is thought of as a secret utopia or as a threat to the individual, whether as a cooperative, a neighbourhood or a societal group, and whether or not the respective community is to be dissolved - every time, a certain artistic, architectural or theoretical concept of community initiates a subtext directed toward the public. Certain actions are implicitly designated for the visitors, the users, the readers; the public is revolutionized, integrated, informed, instructed, involved or controlled. The archive is conceived as a project apparatus on the broad theme of "community", an apparatus representing different and contradictory approaches and points of view on the basis of which "community" can be discussed. The archive will serve prospectively as the project apparatus of a research project and be expanded.

The archive is curated by Karin Frei Bernasconi, Siri Peyer, Dorothee Richter,
Exhibition design Jesko Fezer with Postgraduate Program in Curating, ICS ZHdK,
Graphic Design Megan Hall.

White Space // Office for Curating / Art / Theory
Programming: Dorothee Richter, Siri Peyer
Militärstrasse 76
Zugang über Kanonengasse neben Café Aloha
CH - 8004 Zürich
www.whitespace.ch

View article on website

We've just launched the pilotphase for the COLCHESTER INN project by presenting the KNOT CURTAIN at the current firstsite gallery. The curtain is the first of a series of new elements which will over time construct the COLCHESTER INN - a new public meeting space in Colchester.

The individual frames refer to chinese forms of hosting and the tradition of Chinese knot making. Assembled they works as a division wall/room curtain/display. The frames are on sale at firstsite and the profit will be reinvested into the new meeting space.

View article on website

The main focus for both events was the issue of temporary use - an agenda heavily promoted by the LDA. Our presentation focused on two projects which start to initiate and rethink local cultural organisations from the bottom up. The folk float as part of Creative Egremont and the Wick Curiosity Shop which is an ongoing project in Hackney Wick.

View article on website

View article on website

Visiting local cafes for tea stops, local initiatives and meeting residents who run the Somerstown Festival will give you the opportunity to find out what is going on in the area from a local perspective. As we walk we will fly poster the DIY tips which were collected during the summer residency in and around Kings Cross.
Get your blu-tac ready and eyes open!

We will meet outside the café 'Albertini's' on 20 Chalton Street, NW1 1JH
(5 mins from British Library)
To reserve a place email POLLY polly@publicworksgroup.net
MAP FOR MEETING SPOT: http://www.qype.co.uk/place/399299-Albertini-London

View article on website

Colchester Inn is a project about hosting and welcoming in Colchester. On completion Colchester Inn will exist as an independent, pavilion like structure, designed through a collaborative process with local groups. It will provide a new meeting and hosting space outside firstsite's new building and will be available to be used by the general public. Each component of the space will be designed and developed in collaboration with a different local group around their specific customs of hosting and welcoming.

public works were commissioned by firstsite to develop a long-term collaborative project working with new and existing community groups. The Knot Curtain is the first result of this process and the first physical component of Colchester Inn. It is the result of a year-long collaboration between public works and participants from the Colchester Chinese Culture Society (CCCS). The Knot Curtain will be on display in firstsite's Project Space throughout March 2010.

The Knot Curtain is derived from the rich history of Chinese decorative knot-making. The group developed a modular curtain made of layered acrylic shape; these shapes have been drawn from specific Chinese as well as local seafaring knots. Each module doubles as a photo frame, inspired by the Chinese tradition of showing photos to visiting guests. The frames can be used singularly or joined together to produce The Knot Curtain.
The full process of developing the frame has been recorded on the project's website: http://www.colchesterinn.net.

Over the next couple of years public works will continue working with a variety of groups and individuals to explore how they host others and to collaboratively create the Colchester Inn.

View article on website

View article on website

We finally will go live with our new public works website.
The year is still young enough to have new year's drinks!

Join us for a get-together on Friday 5th February from 19.00 at our studio
at 1-5 Vyner Street, London E2 9DG

View article on website

Remise Bludenz/ Galerie Aller Art
Jan. 22 – Feb. 21, 2010 / Opening Jan. 21, 2010, 8 pm
Event Feb.6, 2010 | 2–6 pm Invitation to reconstruct the Palace of the Republic / 7 pm talk by transparadiso

_concept by transparadiso (Barbara Holub/ Paul Rajakovics) with
Michael Ashkin, New York
Stadtlabor_Osservatorio Urbano, Lungomare Bozen
Community Museum Project, Hong Kong
Céline Condorelli, London
Teddy Cruz, San Diego
feld 72, Vienna
public works, London
Jens Emil Sennewald, Paris
Allan Siegel, Budapest
SMAQ, Berlin
Gerald Straub, Wien
transparadiso, Wien
Georg Winter, Stuttgart/ Saarbrücken

“All utopias are depressing, because they leave no room for chance, for difference, for the “miscellaneous”. Everything has been set in order and order reigns. Behind every utopia there is always some great taxonomic design: a place for each thing and each thing in its place.” (aus: Georges Perec, Species of Spaces and Other Stories)

Who still believes in miracles? And what are actually urban miracles ? How much insistence, courage, boldness, despair and confidence is needed to make miracles happen in the public/ urban space and in socio-political realm? transparadiso has invited artists/ urbanists/ architects/ cultural producers from different cultural contexts to discuss these aspects and show their personal experience and interpretation of miracles happening in the public realm and urban space.

In spite of self-censorship and pragmatism resulting from experience and obvious restrictions artists, urbanists and architects keep insisting in making the impossible happen. Miracles amaze the most when they are least expected or seem to be completely impossible. We do not believe in miracles, yet sometimes they happen, or does believing and hoping contribute to the chance of making a miracle happen? Is it not the artist/ architect/ writer sometimes who produces that specific energy which seems as if in vein, to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time, and counteracting the pragmatism of today by producing a necessary, incalculable something, which one might wish to acquire more presence?

Park Fiction (Hamburg, initiated by Christoph Schäfer/ Cathy Skeene) could be considered the "Mother" of recent urban miracles. "it was finally opened in 2005, after 10 years of struggle and production of wishes. Thousands of people came to participate in this "Permanent Pick-nick against Gentrification" and used the opening of the park as an occasion to protest against the latte-macchiatization of the urban space in St.Pauli". Ever since then, Park Fiction is considered the reference project of the unexpected success of resistance which managed to prevent the investors from realizing their mere profit driven plans of urban development.

Miracles – especially urban miracles – are not linked to a scientific definition or theoretical category but rather to amazement. Therefore the contributions of the participants reflect their personal approach and interpretation of Urban Miracles. They offer a range of visible and surprisingly successful miracles in urban space to more poetic-narrative spaces which could eventually lead to miracles in real space. If one has in mind that each miracle is preceded by a longing, one might explore the potential of transferring the Urban Miracle to the Regional Miracle, or consider how a Regional Miracle could start on its own. Barbara Holub/ Paul Rajakovics

A catalog will be published by Bucher Verlag.

View article on website