Saturday 13 September <2.30pm>
Chair Caroline McCaw, Academic Leader Communication, School of Design, Otago Polytechnic
Andrea Selwood – Artist, Raising the Creek
Chris Berthelsen – Artist, Making Friends
Sarah Smuts-Kennedy & Taarati Taiaroa – Artists, Make the Park
5-10 minutes presentation each then facilitated discussion.
How often do we or are we able to think about all of the layers and aspects of a place? How well do we really understand it’s histories, structures, systems and patterns?
Patrick Geddes, known as the father of urban planning, introduced the then unfamiliar idea of the livability of a city. As a part of this work he considered the many layers of a place which he grouped as the mathematical, physical, biological and sociological elements of a place.
The ‘smart’ or ‘sentient’ city produces data on the systemic lifeblood of a city’s municipal systems. Visualisation and exploration of this and other data about our networks and lives can inform people’s understanding of their city, but does it spur them to action?
The work of the artists on this panel also seek to reveal and engage us with the different structures, systems and patterns around us. They however bring forward the forgotten networks of water, highways of bees, animal singing trees, and the global picture of city that have been consciously written out of our urban environments.
Nature reminds us of our own humanity. By bringing forward the life of the land underneath and beyond the concrete – they are also discussing the wellbeing of the people. In this way, are they also inspiring action?