Journal.
Cities within cities
Adam Greenfield and Nurri Kim’s Systems/Layers Walkshops are a fascinating exploration of our cities, seeking to better understand the interface between us, our public spaces and networked technologies.
Part of their Do Projects collaboration, Greenfield describes the walkshop concept as follows:
‘What we’re looking for are appearances of the networked digital in the physical, and vice versa: apertures through which the things that happen in the real world drive the “network weather”, and contexts in which that weather affects what people see, confront and are able to do.’
Their focus is on asking walkshop participants to consider:
- ‘Places where information is being collected by the network’
- ‘Places where networked information is being displayed’
- ‘Places where networked information is being acted upon, either by people directly, or by physical systems that affect the choices people have available to them’
So far, Greenfield and Kim have run wonderful half-day sessions in Wellington and in Barcelona.
As I said on Twitter the other day, I’d love to see them in London – a city so ripe for exactly this sort of exploration and analysis, filled with pseudo-public spaces now controlled by private property companies (Spitalfields Market, where The City meets the East End being one example, Canary Wharf another), CCTV and opaque lines of authority.
So, consider this an open invitation. Me and Bashford are in. How about you?
Further reading:
- How to bring a Systems/Layers walkshop to your town
- These cities within cities are eating up Britain’s streets
Photography credit: Banky’s ‘One Nation Under CCTV’ by Jordi Martorell
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Andrew Travers
10 July, 04:24 PM #
Ok, adding Pixeldiva and Solle to that.
We are four.
Who else?
Update: Five.
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