Stolper Steine/Stumbling Stones Project

Our group met last night to talk about the project. We discussed our thoughts/reactions to the Stolper Steine in general as well as to what drew us to this project. Because the meeting was very much a brainstorming session, the notes are in bullet form:

• Reminds us of a history that should not be forgotten.
• A memorial present in every day life, on the streets we walk on and the walls we walk past.
• It is simultaneously a very visible (in the middle of the sidewalk) and invisible (we walk right past them without noticing) memorial
• The people who passed away/were killed should be honored/remembered
• The stones can serve as a memorial for the families of the dead
• The people who were killed in concentration camps do not have individual grave sites. In a way, these Stolper Steine are their head stones
• When we first heard of the project, some of us thought it was referring to the hand/footprints of famous people on Mariahilferstrasse
• Conversation about the stones on the ground vs on the walls of houses:
• plaques on houses are often there to indicate that someone famous lived there
• is one location (wall/ground) more respectful? 
• Stones on the ground are in some way poetic because you can imagine the individuals walking exactly over that spot during their lives. It is also presumably the path they took when they left home for the last time. On the other hand people walk on the stones without looking at what they are.
• Walls are where we hang things we are proud of/want to honor (ex. diplomas/photographs). You don't walk on a grave site (if we see the Stolper Steine as grave markers/headstones)

These were some of the points we discussed. We look forward to presenting more on this project to you all throughout the semester!

- Agnes, Hanna, Erica, & Mike

This is the 2nd part of our post:

A capsule measures 2.3 m × 3.8 m × 2.1 m ....

I could imagine living in a capsule for a couple of days but I won’t do that for a year. Probably I would feel like a hamster in a cage next to other lonely hamsters. But perhaps a homeless person would like to live in such a capsule and have a room which he could call “my home”.

Could you imagine living in such a capsule?

 hello everbody!

I would like to post some impressions of our project Nakagin Capsule Tower  :-)

This is some general information which you should know:

·         Building is used as residential and office tower

·         designed by architect Kisho Kurokawa

·         Ccmpleted in 1972

·         example for Metabolism (experimental architectural movement)

·         today: the building felt into disrepair

·         located in Tokyo, Japan

The capsules

·         Looks like two connected towers à eleven and thirteen floors

·         140 capsules: a capsule measures 2.3 m × 3.8 m × 2.1 m and provides a small living or office space, possible to replace capsules (no one did it) – without damaging another

·         one capsule includes: a wall of appliances and cabinets, including a kitchen stove, a refrigerator, a television set, a reel-to-reel tape deck, a bathroom unit (like an aircraft lavatory), a large circular window over a bed

Interesting idea for the future (people living in capsules) à that didn’t have much success…

Photos of the Nakagin Capsule Tower:

 

And this is what i tried to post yesterday,

a very nice docu. on the relationship between people and cities.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxywJRJVzJs 

enjoy, 

Hei you all, 

This is my first blog post ever! I wonder if it is gonna work, 

i just wanted to share this interesting project...

/http://www.gabrielegalimberti.com/projects/mirrors-and-windows/

"In a world that is increasingly shaped by global standardization and IKEA aesthetics, this work explores the rooms of the conventional and the eccentric, the rich and the poor, the mother and the single, the pious and the unbelieving, the sports-obsessed and the shopping-addicted, the tomboy and the girly-girl, the tidy and the shambolic."

inci 

Kick-Off

I just sent out an invitation to everyone who was there this week and write down his/her email address. Plese follow the instructions of the invitation email you received from blogspot (or check your junk-folder).

If you have not received an invite, I probably misspelled your handwritten email addresses - please send me your email again to: kathrin.moertl@sfu.ac.at then, thanks!

Material, including the BOOK-SCAN with the Therapie(t)räume will be online next week, I already forwarded it to our media assistant to put it online. 'Online' means: in the internal area (ww.sfu.ac.at, then hit 'Studierende', login, goto English Programe > Lecture Notes, or goto Download PTW Skripten > Moertl_Steiner).

Next class: THU, Nov 7., 4pm-6pm

GEORG SIMMEL: Metropolis and Mental Life
Please read the text until then! Great read - promised.

The Simmel text (ger/engl) is also in the internal SFU download area, as well as in the SFU online forum. If you have questions about the projects, publishing on the blog, etc, let me know. To post on the blog, look at the TOP RIGHT corner and you see 'Login', and then 'New Post'.

Happy posting, Kathrin Moertl & Stephan Steiner

Welcome to the blog!

Use this space to write about the process of your projects. Pictures are welcome.
To write on this blog, I need to invite you - so please send me your email address (you need to register to blogspot with a google account) to kathrin.moertl@sfu.ac.at.

If you have trouble joining, let me know!