New Silk Roads

about NSR

2009-03-01T12:30:00.000-08:00

New Silk Roads (NSR) is a multi-faceted urban research project that explores the nascent urban conditions emerging in rapidly expanding and transforming Asian cities and regions.

Through a nomadic practice, Kyong Park has conducted a series of sequenced expeditions through transitional regions and cities between Istanbul and Tokyo, documenting his encounters of the people and landscape through photography, video, and audio/video interviews of local and international experts

The project is an examination of territorial conditions that constructs the interconnected system of the contemporary Asian landscape. Approaching urban cities as an ecology of built systems, structures and institutions, NSR presents alternate understandings of urban research and theory through artistic practice.

Our work embraces informal and emergent structures of the city to show that the multiplicity of urban processes and actors exceed single-minded domination of city construction by architects or planners. Some of the key investigations are: transnational migration; the rise of supranational economic and legal institutions; evolution of extraterritorial zones and the social and spatial effects of globalization, centered particularly on the digital exchange of economic trade (i.e. information/capital/services) that are weightless and immaterial, yet guides the conditions of exchange and the links and partitions within and outside continental Asia. The research itself is not intended to be comprehensive, but case studies of particular points of connection.

NSR aims to translate such research into a visual language that can represent the complexity of the connections themselves. Through spatial and network mappings, time-based and data-driven visualizations, and dynamic constructions of information in visual, graphic form, NSR will translate information gathered through research into a visual expression of complex systems of contemporary Asia.

NSR Expedition 1
July 20 — October 2, 2007
Shanghai > Singapore > Seoul > Tokyo > Guangzhou >
Foshan > Dongguan > Shenzhen > Hong Kong > Macau > Beijing

NSR Expedition 2
December 17, 2007 — January 7, 2008
Istanbul > Delhi > Dubai

NSR Expedition 3
September 1-25, 2008
Buchara, Samarqant, Toshkent [Uzbekistan] >
Almaty > Astana [Kazakhstan]

URBAN ECOLOGY: Detroit and Beyond

2009-02-28T11:06:00.000-08:00

Kyong Park
Map Office, Hong Kong
Sept 2005
192 p.

Under the confluence of nomadic economics, technologies, and industries--commonly known as "suburban sprawl"--the city of Detroit, segregated and isolated, constitutes one of the great monuments to decay by a modernist city. It is perhaps the clearest and earliest example of the effects of a globalized economy and labor market. Urban Ecology contains a collection of projects generated by the International Center for Urban Ecology (iCUE), a nomadic laboratory for future cities. Since its founding in 1998 by Kyong Park, iCUE has accomplished five significant projects through international workshops like "Architecture of Resistance," installations, videos, and urban designs. The laboratory investigation promotes discourse on the decomposition and possible reconstitution of a "moving city"--a more useful term through which to identify a city like Detroit. iCUE's projects have taken anti-architectural and non-urban perspectives, using multi-disciplinary processes and integrated collaboration with local communities and activists. Urban Ecology brings together essays on Detroit and many other cities in crisis around the world.

patience please. site under construction.

2009-01-22T17:48:00.000-08:00

Astana

OldHouseNewHouse/NewCityOldCity

2009-01-22T16:06:00.000-08:00

A individuals and families have moved out of Detroit, or were unable to move, from one house to another, one hood to another, one city to another. Starting from the most recent house, and tracing each subject back to previous houses, the video follows the work and life of the individuals and families, and also their memories and thoughts about the future. Comparing the decline of Detroit and the growth of its suburbs, OldHouseNewHouse/NewCityOldCity creates a physical and historical record of capital, labor, and cities that are becoming more nomadic than ever in the postmodern cultures of the developed nations.

Full transcript

Words Images Spaces (WIS)

2009-01-22T15:19:00.001-08:00

City Mix

2009-01-22T15:17:00.001-08:00

OldHouseNewHouse/NewCityOldCity full transcript

2009-01-21T17:50:00.000-08:00

01-c
Virginia The hub of this community was the elementary school. We had two large churches here. All kinds of restaurants. And we had five movie houses. People could stay right here because we had everything. And we lived all together and nobody looked at anybody as if to say we are better than the next person.

2-b Charles’ friend We had a Laundromat out there, a Coney Island joint. The restaurant, the shoeshine, the hat cleaning place, the hardware [store] that was up there. All you had to walk off three, four blocks and you could get anything you wanted.

3-c Virginia The population at that time, in this neighborhood, was probably four thousand or more families, and there was a house on every single lot.

4-b Charles It was a boarding house. I paid twenty-five dollars a week. Shit. And everybody shared one bathroom. It was my first house. First of my own, that I lived in. You understand?

5-c Virginia Right now, there are seven families left in the eighty-three acres [here].

6-b Charles This right here was a school [Kennedy Elementary School]. Right here was the entrance, right here. Check that out, "No parking on school days, 8 to 4 PM." And it's still there, incredible huh?

7-c Virginia
In 1997, there was a meeting with city officials. We went to this meeting and the city officials said, “This is going to be a redevelopment area, and by the way, you are not going to be part of this, we're going to buy your property. And if you don't sell us your house, then we will declare eminent domain, and we will take your house.” So that was the beginning of the end of this neighborhood.

8-b Charles
This is where I lived with my mama and daddy before they divorced, right here. That's where the house was.

9-c Virginia
The city council had voted to take this [land] and declare eminent domain, and that was it.

10-b Charles
That ain't what we've got now. That's a lot of [empty] land here too, ain't it?

11-c Virginia I told the city at the meeting that I will not go, [and] that is my home, [and] this is my community. I've been here for forty-six years; I'm going nowhere. And the only time I'm going to move is when I decide to move.

12-b Charles We are the richest country in the world right? We should have health care, automatic, by law, [and] free! [A] motherfucker gets sick, [then] go to the motherfucking doctor! And none of us should pay for that shit. Y'all sending motherfucking billions of dollars over to those motherfuckers who got oil. That's some crazy shit!

13-c Virginia The day they came to tear down the church, I asked them if they could please leave those trees. [But] they cut this big huge tree down. That tree was 137 years old. You destroy the whole community, [and] you destroy people’s homes, but the least you could do is leave the tree that's been here for one hundred plus years.

14-b Charles There was a store on that corner right there. They still got the phone booth up! Ain't that something? The phone [booth] is [still] there but the building is gone. Ain't that something?

15-c Virginia This is my home, and I intend to stay in this home until I get ready to go to my final home. And that's going to be of my choosing and the Lord's choosing, not the city.

16-a
Mario I feel very much at home, I feel very safe here.

John Safety, quality of life here. Scott Having that comfort and having that camaraderie between the families, and [in] this community we watch out for each other.

17-d Charles Growing up around the same people, I know all the people in the neighborhood, they [all] know me.
Randy I always felt safe.
Jane I could count on the neighbors, and they were more willing to help than [my] family was.

18-a
Scott Better suited for our lifestyle and has everything we could possibly want in a home.
Audra It’s an American dream, to have a good life and have money.
Randy Cause its quieter, you know. Peaceful.

19-d
Cassandra It was tree-lined, it was so green and pretty.
Mario Everybody's lawn was manicured, there was pride in their property.
Randy A great neighborhood, I'm telling you, like one in a million.

20-a
John People wanted lower taxes, [and] wanted more space.

Michelle A dream home . . . a house that is perfect, [and] that has everything you want in it.

Scott And they are developing three or four miles beyond [here], and continuously going where the land is cheaper. They are building larger homes on cheaper land.

John Home ownership has always been a cornerstone of America and why America is so great.

21-d
Lorenzo It was a big, big house.

Mario Back in those days when they built a home, they built a home. It was solid.

Cassandra The houses were kept up, and there weren't any empty or vacant spaces like it is now.

22-a
Michelle The "main drag" . . . is M-59. It has every single store or restaurant you could ever possibly need, within a mile from my house. Everything is new, the house is new, schools are new, [and] that’s what I like about it.

23-d
Jane I have real fond memories of going downtown shopping on the bus as a kid. Randy The riots killed downtown.
Gary The cops started the riots.

Randy Was I scared out of my mind. I saw the burning buildings, people going in and out [of burnt stores]. It was unbelievable.

Mario Well my folks left [Detroit] right after the riot.

24-a
Larry Yeah, we live in the outskirts of metropolitan Detroit. We are [way] out here.

Mario I hear they [are] moving more out here than [moving] down there.

25-d
Audra The whole street was selling their houses. [And] everybody moving in was black.

Randy A mile down my street, there was probably fifty to sixty for [house for] sale signs.

Jane Well, our neighborhood changed considerably, and everyone kind of moved to the outer edges of Detroit or into the suburbs.

Cassandra It just seemed like the neighborhoods [in Detroit] just went down.

26-a
Michelle We moved out here [to the suburb] for financial [reasons].

27-d
Cassandra The drugs came in.

Charles They had dope going all up and down the street.

Ronnie Which lead to my addiction for crack [and] cocaine. I felt helpless; felt betrayed, and kind of gave up on life.

28-a
Michelle We moved out here and paid $50,000 less for this house. It's brand new and so much bigger.

29-d
Gary It started up with the cops and it ended up with crack. Cops tore the city up, and brought the crack in. Then you had the guns, the dope and the gun shootings.

Lorenzo It [was] scary to be outside, and it was not a safe place to live.

30-a
Michelle We've made a huge return on our house. We'll make $80,000 dollars when we sell this house.

31-d
Mario You've got to live with bars on your windows? Come on. Give me a break.

Lorenzo She [my wife] didn't want to move, but I said [it's] time to go.

32-a
Scott [It's] a great community, at a great price. We are using the benefit from the original purchase of this home, and . . . purchasing a second home that's larger [and] more valuable.

33-d Michelle I try to avoid going there, even during the day.

Scott You're afraid of getting a flat tire. You're afraid of running out of gas, because she thinks we are gonna get carjacked.

34-a
Michelle So we are upgrading to double the size [of our current] house, and we are not going to be paying any more money [for it]. That's why we are staying here.

35-d
Mario All the burnt houses, and all the properties and buildings that are just abandoned. Thousands of them. John We had to remove lots of the structures that were not cost effective to restore. They are no longer useful, so they need to be removed.

36-a
Michelle But because this area is the way it is, [and] they build [houses] so cheap [here], we're able to [have] our first house, and our second house, [that] most people don’t get until they are forty or fifty.

37-d
Audra We drove through and literally there [were] no houses. They have ripped almost every house out.

Cassandra Houses being burnt, [and only] the shells [of them] would just stay there.

38-a
Scott+Michelle We had an opportunity to capitalize on [financially]. And that opportunity will arise again because we're basically replaying the same scenario.

39-d
Jeff What we have [here] is a lot of open space.

Charles+Gary So every time we have the Devil’s Night, the east side [of Detroit] will burn. So my theory is 'cause it's closest to the water [front]. So [they] want to burn down all them houses over there, so [they can] build up new condominiums, alright? Alright? Buy up all that land, and put up condos 'cause it closest to the water.

40-a Rudy You have a job, you make money and you spend that money. It's a consumer system. It’s about supply and demand. That's America.

41-d Mario Why would you want to go down there [to Detroit]? What kind of incentive do I have to go back to live in that town. There is nothing for me [in Detroit].

42-a Toni There's not that many places to go [here], like there's no museums. There's not many activities within walking distance of your house.

Michelle So if we wanted to do something we would have to go downtown. If I had to drive to do that once a year, that’s fine.

43-d
Lorenzo Lot of things to do in downtown. They have the car shows, and we go to football games, and we go to baseball games.

44-a
Larry+Cassandra Entertainment for us is [our] family or the church.

45-d
Gary They don't worry about us on the other side of town, [on the] other side of the freeway. Two different worlds. You [are] looking at the Hollywood when you in downtown, and at the other side, you are looking at the ghetto.

46-a
Cassandra Ah, recreation we just drive around. Larry I love to drive with my family.

47-d Scott Walking, on the sidewalks, [or] down the side of the streets. Not everybody has a car down there [in Detroit]. Out here, everybody has a car. You drive everywhere. In the city you walk.

48-a
Jane Here I [feel] kind of secluded and isolated.

Toni I don't know if it is boredom, but it's a lack of stimulation.

Cassandra My kids don't have any friends on our block.

49-d
Mickey Quality of life [and] bigger piece of property. Wanted a larger home or a newer home.

Toni There's no central area, just intersections, with strip malls and gas stations.

Mickey Once you had all the highway system, making it easier to get out of the city . . . people just kept moving out to newer areas. 50-a

Larry You know the media portrays Detroit worldwide as [a] really bad place. No, Detroit is not a bad place.

Gary Washington, DC is worse than Detroit. I've been there. Right around the corner from the president's Oval Office.

51-d
Rudy In the suburbs everybody go behind their walls and that's it.

Jane People would drive into their garages, close the door and you wouldn't see them get out.

52-a
Charles You got to stay real close to the peeps [people], cause we got to keep together.

Audra Families living together, [and] helping each other out.

Charles: You got to get unity. Everything [gotta be] tight.

53-d
Jane So isolated. I just felt like "Gosh, we are not part of the world anymore."

Audra Because there isn't that sense of community, I think. 54-a

Randy Urban pioneers. I want to be one of those guys that move back into the city, to an old house, and fix it. You know those old beautiful houses.

Audra Why don't we try to get a real house, a house that has substance to it, a brick house, something that has been around for a long time [and] has a character, to spend our time there, put our love and energy to make it better.

Charles We go out. The Europeans come in. That's the way it is.

55-c
Ronnie You see, over the years and months people kept setting [it] on fire. They were selling dope out of here, and then the police kept setting it on fire. I guess [the police] were trying to get it torn down. But people still got to have somewhere to go. It's sad. But you got to do what you got to do, [and] come in here to sleep.

56-b
Michelle Welcome! This is a three-bedroom, two-full bath Ranch. This is called the "great room" out here. We expanded it quite a bit from the original floor plan, so we bumped the kitchen out, [and] made it nice and big. I like antiques, so these [table and the buffet] are really, really old.

57-c Ronnie I stayed a winter and a summer here, but I had heaters. Yeah, I had propane heaters, had everything boarded up. I had plastic all over the windows to make sure everything was comfortable, so I wouldn't be too cold.

58-b Michelle He is so proud of his grass. It was all completely dirt when we bought this house. We had a sodding party one day and all of our friends and family came over, and we all threw the grass down.

59-c Ronnie When this apartment was [occupied], a guy died right in that bedroom. Right there. He caught on fire, [and] got burned up right in that room; an older guy. Here is another part where someone sleeps. Someone is sleeping here because they got [the windows] boarded up, [so] they [can] keep the wind off of them or the rain.

60-b Michelle This is my safari bathroom. You know, just cause all the animals, and the African theme. This is my daughter's bedroom. We love lavender. And purple is her favorite color, so everything is purple.

61-c Ronnie A girl got raped in this room and [they] killed her, a "hooker." The guys brought her up here. They molested her; they tied her arms together and strangled her to death right in this room. Right here!

62-b
Michelle+Scott None of this used to be here. Lot has changed. Lot of these subdivisions used to be golf courses. Basically, in here, they have Ranches, which are one-level, [and] Colonials, which are two-levels, and the split levels, which is ours, a kind of a combination between a Ranch and a Colonial.

63-c
Ronnie Like I said, over the years of the fire damages [it] had, they just discarded the building. The drywalls, all the plaster, and the structure of the building just started to come apart. And the way you keep taking [the] bricks away from it, you [are] taking support away from it. I think what's holding it up is the pilasters outside [and] around the building.

64-b
Scott They have different faces of the home called elevations you can choose. And each elevation costs, as you upgrade the elevation obviously the price [goes up]. Some of the things [on the elevations] we didn't find important cause this really doesn't add a lot of value to the home as much as square footage would.

65-c
Ronnie They have no respect over there. (A homeless man) No respect! Not at all, not at all. Ronnie Just because a person is down and out on their luck. God said he created everything equal, and . . . that’s why he say "What good a man to gain [in] the world if he loose his soul?" So [the] people [who] got it all, but still be miserable inside. (A homeless man) Hey, no pictures of me!

66-b
Scott The master bath; this could be someone's apartment. There is one, two, three, four, five bathroom sinks [in the house]. This will be the kid's room where all of their toys and stuff are, [and] study room as they get older.

67-c
Ronnie You see people change their boots and stuff [here]. Hey, these are nice boots, man. So apparently someone is staying up here cause they are covering stuff. So in reality, you have four, five sets of peoples that come in and out and sleep [here].

68
Scott Oh, I forgot. There's a bathroom downstairs, another half bath.

Detroit: Making It Better for You

2009-01-20T12:57:00.000-08:00

A gritty tapestry of images on the destruction of Detroit, a city struggling to sustain its communities in the face of global economic greed. The video’s "drive-by-shooting" style is emblematic of the mythology of Detroit as both the "Motor City” and the “Murder City.” It offers street-level views of the urban clashes between inner-city realities and suburban myths.

Full transcript

Detroit: Making It Better for You (2001)

2009-01-20T12:39:00.000-08:00

We, the corporations, are ready to build a new city here in Detroit. Our plan, which began fifty years ago, is now almost complete. The entire city will soon be under our control. The government, desperate for jobs and money, is willing to give us big tax breaks and build roads and parks for us. We have successfully raised taxes, increased living costs, and used eminent domain and other legal and illegal means to force the residents to sell out and get out. The new city will be built according to our design and concept. We took land away from the natives, and now we are taking it from the disenfranchised and uneducated black underclass that currently lives in the slum that is Detroit. We have a clean slate with which to start fresh.

Here is how our plan has worked:

After World War II, our victorious soldiers came home from Asia and Europe. We needed to build new houses so they could start families. The city was packed with old houses, which cost too much to fix. We simply let them go to ruin.

We designed and built generic houses so that everyone could fill them with the exact same things. We generated tremendous economic gain because people bought new things for their new houses: refrigerators, ovens, heaters, air conditioners, furniture, bathrooms, washers, dryers, lawn mowers, swimming pools, and more. As long as we made new things, people bought them.

We then built bigger, more expensive houses, farther and farther away from the city. People bought the newer houses and filled them again, with our newer products. We successfully made consumerism a mass addiction.

But we needed to do more; we needed to keep the newly created, massive white middle class in constant motion to increase our profits exponentially. So we realized that our plan would require nothing less than the total destruction of the city of Detroit.

We realized that the best method to reclaim land other than by force was to exploit urban fears and racial hatred. Through media control and manipulation, we’ve created an unquestioned impression that all domestic violence and other urban ills are caused by black people.

Also, we designed exit ramps of the highways in Detroit so they could be closed easily and quickly; this way, inner city crime, chaos, ruin, and riots could be contained, ensuring that people would burn their own neighborhoods.

Then we moved all our big factories out of Detroit, and then all other businesses, stores, and even gas stations followed us. But we let the liquor stores stay, to successfully pollute the mind and soul of city people. We’ve made damn sure that it’s easier to get guns, drugs, and sex in Detroit than voter registration. We let the people there just keep on killing each other. We made Detroit so violent that people continue to flee from it, just like from a war zone. With their lives in danger, city residents sell their properties fast and low.

This set the stage for the disinvestment and total abandonment of the inner city. It became impossible to build new houses and buildings there because nobody would loan the money. All new houses and buildings were built exclusively in the suburbs.

We’ve also undermined Detroit’s education system by pulling out funds and corrupting school officials. We’ve crowded the classes, paid less to teachers, and supplied no new books nor built new libraries. Our goal has been to make the entire population of Detroit illiterate and unqualified for any professional work.

As education failed and jobs moved out, the inner city became bankrupt. Public buildings and houses have been abandoned by the hundreds of thousands. We let them all rot or we burned them. Thus we have created an extremely inhospitable and dangerous environment, which has infected the whole population with an inescapable hopelessness. This has driven the land price down further and further. So low, that land in Detroit is now practically free.

To better control the population, we had to educate some of the city residents. They now help us oversee the rest of the people. That’s how things were done with the slaves, and we continue that practice today. They work hard and long hours, always hoping that the American dream someday will take them to the suburbs. But we will keep them locked up in the city, just like we do with the natives on the reservations.

Occasionally, we’ve given the city some money, but never quite enough. All the city departments fight among themselves for it, and this has bred wide-scale corruption and graft in Detroit. No public money ever gets to the people that need it. But it has made us look generous and compassionate, while our goal of the complete destruction of the inner city continues, uninterrupted and unsuspected.

We have moved out, but we are coming back. Our plan has taken about fifty years to completely destroy Detroit and its population, at no cost to us or our shareholders. Most of the buildings and houses have been burnt or demolished, and it won’t take much more to "clear cut" the rest of them. With so many vacant lots and open spaces, the city now looks more like the countryside. A tabula rasa has been created, so that we can take back the city dirt cheap.

Using this plan, we have successfully tested new techniques of profitable land seizure, without resorting to the costly use of armed force. Hidden by countless layers of economic agreements and legal manipulations, we have written a new chapter of colonialism, with techniques deeply embedded in the automated global matrix of advanced capitalism.

The purpose of this plan has been to establish the next form of government. Detroit is the place where the secret revolution of corporations is being realized.

The Slide (2003)

2009-01-20T12:14:00.000-08:00

THE SLIDE is a continuous transparent tube that descends eighteen floors from the top to the bottom of an empty hi-rise building in Halle Neustadt. Visitors can ride inside THE SLIDE on a specially-designed sled, flying through the walls, floors, and ceilings, and even outside of the building. THE SLIDE is a new kind of entertainment that combines the reality and fiction of architecture, and is ideal for so many empty buildings in East Germany.

Hey Mom and Dad. I went through a building today!

Singapore

2009-01-15T18:16:00.001-08:00

Seoul

2009-01-15T18:14:00.001-08:00

Guangzhou

2009-01-15T18:11:00.000-08:00

Hong Kong

2009-01-15T18:10:00.000-08:00

Macau

2009-01-15T17:13:00.001-08:00

Istanbul

2009-01-15T17:05:00.001-08:00

Delhi

2009-01-15T17:01:00.000-08:00

Tashkent

2009-01-15T17:00:00.000-08:00

Bukara

2009-01-15T16:59:00.000-08:00

Samarqand

2009-01-15T16:52:00.001-08:00

Almaty

2009-01-15T16:20:00.000-08:00

Astana

2009-01-15T16:19:00.001-08:00

About KP

2009-01-13T20:18:00.001-08:00

Kyong Park is involved in a wide range of productions on Public Culture, including research, documentation, and representations focused on the urban landscapes that delineate the economic, political and cultural borders and territories of the contemporary social geography. Working in visual arts, architecture, theory and criticism, Park incorporates text, photography, video, installation and new media into his work, a practice that is rooted in research, participation and activism in social, cultural and environmental spaces. For Park, art is a process for cultural inquiry, examination and articulation. It is a visual language to supplement text and other traditional forms of communication, a community rather than a commodity. His first project was the founding of StoreFront for Art and Architecture in New York, an internationally respected exhibition space that he directed from 1982-1998. He then founded International Center for Urban Ecology in Detroit, producing workshops, urban initiatives and videos, in collaboration with activists, community organizations and universities [1998-2001]. They include: "Detroit Making It Better For You," a narrative video on a fictional conspiracy to destroy the city [2000]; and "24260: The Fugitive House," a vacant house that 'escaped' Detroit to travel ten cities in Europe [2001-2008]. Since then, he has traveled and worked in various cities in Europe, developing a nomadic practice on urban investigation. The results were: “The Slide," a proposal to build a transparent tube that people can slide through in an empty high-rise building in Halle Neustadt, and "BAR/GDR/FRG," a 3-channel video on the three different ideological cities within Dresden, both projects in Germany [2003]. He was also a co-curator and artist for Shrinking Cities in Berlin [2002-2004], and the founding director of Centrala Foundation for Future Cities in Rotterdam in The Netherlands [2005]. There, he co-produced "Lost Highway Expedition," an expedition through nine major cities of ex-Yugoslavia and Albania in 25 days, in which several hundred people participated [2006]. His current project is "New Silk Roads," a series of expeditions between Istanbul and Tokyo, focusing on the relational conditions of Asian cities within the geography of globalization, which will be presented in a solo exhibition at Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Castilla y León in 2009, along with the publication of a book on this project with Actar in Barcelona [curated and edited by Octavio Zaya]. Kyong Park was a Loeb Fellow at Harvard University (1996/97), a curator of Kwangju Biennale in Korea (1997), a Visiting Chair of Urbanism at the University of Detroit Mercy, School of Architecture (2000-2001), and the editor of “Urban Ecology: Detroit and Beyond,” a book on his projects, with contributions from 32 architects, artists and critics [2005].

NSR at MUSAC

2009-01-03T11:05:00.000-08:00

KYONG PARK: NEW SILK ROADS
Museum of Contemporary Art of Castille and Leon [MUSAC], Spain
Curator: Octavio Zaya

The New Silk Roads is a research project involving a series of journeys whereby the artist, urban theorist, curator and activist Kyong Park explores the new rapidly expanding and transforming urban landscapes that are emerging in Asian cities and regions. The title of the project and the regions travelled through allude to the Old Silk Road as one of the earliest landmarks of globalisation.

Making use of the method of urban research he calls “nomadic practice” Park has endeavoured a number of successive expeditions through regions and cities along the intricate route between Istanbul and Tokyo, first documenting the physical evidence of the urban mutations⎯through photographs, videos and interviews—and later combining them with data, information and analysis.

The project encompasses several objectives, such as the investigation of the new cultural, economic, political and social relations that are developing between East and West and the spatial and physical effects of globalisation, placing special emphasis on the relations between material movement (products, work and resources) and immaterial movement (information, capital and services).

For MUSAC Park has created an investigation and documentation space for the display of each and every one of the textual, documentary, visual, graphic, statistical and geographic elements that shape the complex framework sustaining the whole work-in-progress. This multidisciplinary space is complemented by the inclusion of photographs, maps, projections and a detailed itinerary and timing of the expeditions made in recent years through Eurasia, Central Asia, the Indian subcontinent, Northern Asia, Southeast Asia and the Middle East.

The result can be conceived as an attempt to trace the relations between all these elements by seeking an understanding of the dynamics of urban transformation accompanying the social, economic and political evolution of the Asian continent.

Kyong Park (Tong Yeong, South Korea, 1955) graduated from the University of Michigan in 1978 with a degree in architecture and he is currently an associate professor of Public Culture at the Visual Arts Department of UCSD, San Diego, U.S.A. His most outstanding achievements include founding and directing diverse centres specialised in the study of urban space: StoreFront for Art and Architecture, New York; the International Center of Urban Ecology in Detroit and the Centrala Stichting voor Toekomstige Steden of Rotterdam.

This project has been supported by UCSD-University of California, San Diego (U.S.A.), The Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in Fine Arts, Smac Scribemedia Art and Culture, assisted by his team of research and visualization (Kael Greco, Jia Gu, Alexandra Lerman, Laura Hanna, Giacomo Castagnola, Andrea Dietz and Sean Franklin).

Watch the Video

The Profiles of Moving Exploitations

2009-01-02T02:02:00.000-08:00

The Profiles of Moving Exploitations (LINEasia)
2009
Designer: Andrea Dietz

Close Up

Using primarily line graphic, and constructed on three layers, Line Asia is a research into geographical and topographical condition of the continent, presenting various data that are related to the land use.

(1) Geographical Base
The geographical base layer is composed of manipulated maps of Asia from the Geographical Information System. At the bottom three-quarters of the drawing, the conventional map of the world is flattened and stretched to accomodate the dimension and proportion of this drawing. Over the map is a series red lines between different cities, connecting 18 cities that Kyong Park has visited in his three separate expeditions, linked according to the actual path of his travels, thus as three independent looping red lines. A series of grey lines between these cities conceptually connect these cities horizontally, simulating what would have been if his travel was a single expedition, like the Old Silk Roads have functioned. He did not travel along the grey lines. Here, Kyong Park's travel is represented according to the condition of actual geography.

On the top one-quarter of the drawing, Kyong Park's travels has been laid out according to his exact travel patterns over the continious and standard narration of time in one continuous blue line .Continuous blue lines indicates his travels by air, and dashed lines indicate his travel by land. The time of travel is indicated above the blue lines. Dotted blue lines are also used to connect cities between his expeditions, for example Beijing, the last city of his first expedition, and Istanbul, the first city of his second expedition. However, the time of travel is absent on the blue lines between his expedition. Here the conventional world map is sliced and reassembled together, according to his, or contemporary, fragmented pattern of travel, creating New Silk Roads.

On the three-quarters of the drawing, geography determines the representation of his travel, like in the continuous linear system of the Old Silk Roads, while on the top one-quarter of the drawing, the contemporary fragmented and round about travel pattern fragments and re-orders the geography according to human behavior. The drawing, therefore, visualizes the space and time contradiction between the Old Silk Roads and the New Silk Roads, and the disjointed relationship between our movements and landscapes.

Along the dividing line between the top one-quarter of the drawing [world map drawn in red] and the bottom three-quarters of the drawing [the world map drawn in blue] is a graphic contour of two related data. Rising vertically in a seismic grey line is the topographical elevations of Asia, along the straight line between the 18 cities that Kyong Park has travelled. Gathered from the Geographical Information System, this seismic grey line is an actual cross section of the land mass of Asia, from Istanbul to Tokyo, vertically exaggerated so that the rise and fall of the land could be visible in the proportion and scale of this drawing.

Falling vertically, along the same line as the topographic elevations of Asia, is a continuous red dotted line. This line indicates the population of all major cities that lies on the straight lines between the 18 cities that Kyong Park. Cities of his visit, and major cities between them are identified by name and the number of population. The population magnitude of the 18 cities of New Silk Roads are visualized by different diameters of red circles with blue infills, while the territorial size of the 18 cities are indicated by different diameters of red circles with no infill color. The purpose of having the topography of landscape and the level of population along the same shared line, is to visualize the relationship between land and people, at least in numerical terms.

(2) Statistical Data
Various data of 10 locations of New Silk Roads [8 cities and 2 nations] are grouped together, into a collection of line graphics. These accumulation of facts and figures for each city are grouped into four categories; Land, People, Culture, and Economics. Each group is identified by different graphic type of graphic line or color. And within each group, there are several different line graphics that visualizes specific data, identified by a line of text that begins from the beginning or the end of each line graphic.

The Y-axis of these line graphics of Statistical Date represent the values of data subject. However, each subject has different unit of measure, as there are either no international measurement standard for these subjects, or they were exaggerated to make them visually relative to other subjects. For example, the value in one graph may be 0-10,000, while in another 0-1 million. Each subject also has their own zero measurement line, located at different height of the drawing. Thus, the subjects' value in measurement does not reflect consistent values, only proportional values.

The X-axis or the horizontal grid, at the very bottom of the drawing are a measure of time, with each block representing one year. The time span of our Statistical Data covers only one century at most. At Each line, data is articulated by short explanortory text ▪ The critique network layer, a gathering of phrases from a variety texts scattered dynamically over the visual field, encourages conceptual connections through the surfaces of the representation. They themselves are connected by lines, to indicate network of relations between them.

The purpose of the Statistical Data is to provide a general information about each city, and to visualize the possible relations between data.

(3) Critique Network
Various short phrases were collected different books and articles, and were position at different geographical and statistical locations. They are to critique the inherent short falls of data or geographic mappings, that they in fact are not factual, only an approximation. Phrases contextualize them with economic, cultural and political, even philosophical understandings and definitions of data and geography, to give them further accuracy. These phrases are networked together by thin blue lines, to offer relational thoughts between themselves.

select lectures

2009-01-01T17:16:00.000-08:00

February 6, 2009
Madrid Abierto
Madrid, Spain

January 13, 2009
Global Neighborhoods: Rick Lowe and Kyong Park in Conversation
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago

November 7, 2008
“New Silk Roads”
Spheres of Interest Lecture Series
San Francisco Art Institute

September 14 - November 23, 2008
Into the Open: Positioning Practice
The U.S. Pavilion for La Biennale di Venezia
11th International Architecture Exhibition

October 29, 2007
Double Edge Lecture Series
UCLA

July 22, 2007
Get It Louder, Beijing

February 27, 2007
Lost Highway Expedition
presented by Engaging the City

May 8, 2004
University as Patron of Cutting Edge Architecture
with Frank Gehry, Robert Venuti and John Curry
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Intern Open Call

2009-01-01T16:43:00.000-08:00

New Silk Roads (NSR) seeks part-time interns for Winter and Spring quarter for assistance in research and project development.

NSR is an artistic-urban research project focused on the cultural, economic and political exchanges and development between East and West, with a conceptual reference towards the Old Silk Road. Urban landscapes are documented through photography, video, and audio/video interviews of local and international experts through a series of sequenced expeditions through the transitional regions and cities between Istanbul and Tokyo. Alongside these traditional documentary strategies, NSR is also producing a series of dynamic visualizations that will map the collected research.

The project culminates with 400 pg. publication with ACTAR Barcelona (www.actar.com) and "New Silk Roads" exhibition, to open in July 2009 at the Museum of Contemporary Art and Architecture (www.musac.es), in Leon Spain. Interns will work under the direction of Kyong Park, Associate Professor in Visual Arts/Public Culture.

Winter and spring quarter internships require a minimum commitment of two days per week (approx. 10 hours) and are unpaid.

Research Interns (2-3):
Interns assist in gathering research material and data on historic and present-day routes, territories, and timelines of the Asian continent, specifically the migration of labor and capital in and out of Asia and the transnational flow of information and media. Interns will work independently or in teams depending on their capacities and topic. All research materials will contribute to the dynamic visualizations by the production team. Interns must have STRONG research experience, preferably juniors or seniors.

Graphics Production Interns (2):
Interns work alongside Kyong Park and programming team in generating graphics for the exhibition. General knowledge of Adobe CS3 required; strong graphic design skills preferred.

Programming Interns (2-3):
Interns works with Kyong Park in generating dynamic visualizations of the information collected. Projects include: dynamic maping of the physical growth of select NSR cities; mapping of flows of materials, labor, capital in and out of Asia. Interns must have a familiarity with Java, C++ and object oriented programming skills, familiarity with Actionscript 3.0 and an interest in visualization graphics. Familiarity with Adobe Flash, Photoshop, Illustrator and web design a plus. Available 5 - 10 hours a week.

Interested applicants can send resumes to kdpark [at] ucsd [dot] edu (subject line: NSR)

Words Images Spaces

2009-01-01T13:20:00.000-08:00

Architecture of Resistance

2009-01-01T13:19:00.001-08:00

Detroit Making It

2009-01-01T13:19:00.000-08:00

Kyong Park: From Urban Ecologies to the New Silk Roads

2009-01-01T12:35:00.000-08:00

A conversation with Octavio Zaya
Atlantica Magazine, Spring 2009

Octavio Zaya: You conceived and founded StoreFront for Art and Architecture in New York in 1982, and left its directorship behind in 1998. Since then, you have been engaged in a process of nomadic research and projects concentrated around contemporary cities as moving organisms. We might say that you have been involved in some sort of laboratory-on-the-move, dealing with, analysing, and confronting the effects of globalisation on urban and suburban spaces, and considering and promoting new urban thoughts and approaches toward a post-capitalist future. These activities and commitments have taken you all over the world. How did this turn in your career come about? What prompted you to create the International Center for Urban Ecology (iCUE)? And how do you see the relationship between the work at StoreFront and what you have been doing since then?

Kyong Park: There were several important transitions in my relationship with art and architecture when I moved away from StoreFront to begin iCUE in Detroit. At StoreFront, I was concerned with the end of the art production process, or the exhibitions of the final product. At iCUE, I moved to the beginning of the art process, by initiating projects that would require the eventual making of art. And moving the site of my work was fundamental in bringing forth what you have described as "a laboratory-on-the-move", or what I like to call a "nomadic practice". My dissatisfaction with the increasingly gentrifying and normalising cultural condition of New York City certainly helped spur my exodus to Detroit, a city devoid of such post-modernisation. I also wanted to disengage myself from the producers, curators, and dealers of the art market, because I still believed that art is a community, not a commodity. Moreover, I sensed the demise of the centre and the potential of the periphery, and thus the possible rebirth of Detroit. This meant that I could be a part of the beginning of something new, rather than a participant in the sale and resale of end products in the world's biggest art market, New York.

OZ: What was it that you hoped to do in Detroit?

KP: Moving to Detroit completely changed my work. Working and living in one of the pre-eminent urban ghettos—the near eastside of Detroit—as opposed to a neo-bourgeois enclave within a global city—Soho in New York—radically changed my context. I thus learned that the best way to change my work, as well as my life, was to change my context. Artists, curators, directors, etc. were replaced by activists, urban pioneers, and ordinary citizens, and the reasons for making art were no longer about getting shows, reviews, fame, and fast money. Instead, the challenge was whether art possess any value to the families and communities of the city that has been getting fragmented, shrinking, or literally disappearing for more than half a century. Living in a half-renovated house for $200 a month, in front of two acres of urban farm at the heart of four square miles that only retained 20% of its original built structures, of which half were unoccupied or burnt—a third world at the heart of Fordism— certainly is different from living in a city that has virtually commodified art to serve its economic agendas.

OZ: But you didn’t have the intention of settling in Detroit for good, did you? Were you already thinking according to your conception of “nomadic practice”?

KP: Another important transition began with my project called 24260: The Fugitive House, an empty house in Detroit that began to travel through ten cities in Europe from 2001. My role in this project was to perpetuate the life of a homeless house by moving it out of the city that would surely destroy it. It was the American dream gone haywire: once a typical first home for factory workers of Detroit. The purpose of its nomadic state was to search for where the ideal of a perfect home might exist today. By coincidence, 9/11, which soon followed, destroyed my own belief in the existence of a perfect home or of the ideal nation-state. Feeling somewhat stateless, and no longer believing in the American Dream, I found myself living a nomadic life in Europe for five years, together with the house that I had made nomadic.

Life is again nomadic, in this geography of the infinitely ephemeral and temporary, which is the true tenet of globalisation if you will. Nothing is absolute anymore, in this post-ideological life ruled by neo-liberalist self-gratification, which is already trading your grandchildren's air, water, and food as “futures” in commodity markets. As the world becomes more outsourced and offshored, the real issue is our inability to locate our sovereignty, identity, and home in one fixed space and time. With everything becoming relational, it makes no further sense to observe the world from one fixed location. And what 24260 taught me was that I myself must become nomadic, if my practice was to get a real sense of our urban and cultural landscape, which is a continual transformation and movement from one city to another, and from one nation-state to another. Nomadic practice is a necessary paradigm for the documentation, examination, and representation of contemporary cultures. Therefore, what I am doing now has absolutely no relation with the work I did at StoreFront, which was prolonging a static view within a very unstable world.

OZ: So it seems that you felt as if your interests and projects at StoreFront had been exhausted, and that your work experienced a major transformation, taking you from curator to agent-producer, urban analyst, and activist. Your professional practice changed from static to nomadic. We might say that, now, you are observing the world from many angles and many places, instead of a fixed position, and that, in a way, your new approach and strategies are reflections of, and reflect upon, the realities and conditions of globalization—from outsourcing and offshore economies to the dissolution of space and time in the relations and transactions of peoples, in the new communication technologies, etc. Following your own ideas, we may say that none of us are static any longer. We are not relating to, or engaging with, any fixed entity from a fixed situation. So what happened to the concepts of place, culture, nationality, and identity, in this equation? How are your projects addressing this question?

KP: There are two choices that I can think of for how to live and act within this world of uncertainty. One option is to unplug oneself completely from the system, off from the infrastructure of the grand society, or, more specifically, from the empire syndrome. The other is to think of a new paradigm—which, by the way, is different from suggesting a utopia. At least to me, it’s obvious that the former choice is, in terms of survival, a self-mutilating way toward a dystopia. I side with the latter, which has a chance to be more constructive. But to do this, I feel the need of understanding a complete view of how the system really works, and how it fails to live up to our contemporary cultural and social expectations, not to mention any possibility for a future to our civilization. This is the main reason why I now work on a project called New Silk Roads.

OZ: Looking back, what do you think you accomplished at StoreFront for Art and Architecture that brought you to the creation of the Center for Urban Ecology, and then how did the Center of Urban Ecology prepare you to enter into the territory of this new project you are involved with now? Perhaps it might be useful to mention that StoreFront still is a challenging cultural space with a rather engaging exhibition program in Soho, New York, and that the Center for Urban Ecology prompted the projects and works you conceived and developed throughout the Balkans and Eastern Europe two years ago.

KP: You are right. StoreFront is still a very important forum and an exhibition space that continues to define critical relations between art, environment, and public on the international stage. And you might say that its influence on the creation of the International Center for Urban Ecology (iCUE) is substantial, such as the idea of art as a process that begins with issues that can produce discourses, which can then render visual representations. An example of that is Adam’s House in Paradise (1984), which attempted to save an instance of urban anarchy called Garden of Eden in the Lower East Side of New York, produced by a man who called himself Adam Purple. Adam obviously links to Eden, while Purple comes from the fact that he dressed in the color purple. Under the order of its demolition, to be replaced by a low-income public housing project, StoreFront brought it internationally to the attention of various architects and artists, asking them to propose designs that could make possible the co-existence of the garden and the housing project. Although the Garden of Eden was ultimately replaced by a very mediocre example of public housing, we had made a significant impression on the New York City Housing Authority, and were almost successful. Other examples are Project Atlas (1990), a design competition on the reuse of abandoned Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles in Adirondack Park in New York State, which was timed with the dissolution of the Cold War and responding to the then-popular political rhetoric of “peace dividends”; Homeless at Home (1985), on various ideas and designs to house the vast homeless population of New York City in that period; After Tilted Arc (1985), on works that could serve as alternatives to the controversial sculpture, eventually removed, by Richard Serra in Foley Square, New York City; Before Whitney (1985), generating alternative proposals to the never-built expansion of the Whitney Museum in New York, a post-modern malformation proposed by then-influential architect Michael Graves; and Project DMZ (1988), on proposals addressing the re-unification of Korea.

Furthermore, there were three exhibitions at StoreFront that greatly influenced me to move to Detroit. They were The New American Ghetto (1991), by Camilo José Vergara, with his photographic documentation of the demise of Detroit and other major American cities; Warchitecture-Sarajevo: A Wounded City (1995), on so-called “urbicide”, the destruction of history, culture, and memories during the siege of the city during the new Balkanisation of the former Yugoslavia, and Beirut, (1997) photographs on the destruction of that city during its civil war up to 1991. These exhibitions were about the destruction and decay of cities, alluding to both the fragility and the value of urban landscapes as vital instruments and forms of social, cultural, and political evolution. Detroit then seemed to be an ideal location of my future work, offering me the possibility of being a part of its reconstruction, preferably moving towards new urban and cultural paradigms.

OZ: After Detroit, you embarked on the Balkans project, right? How did it come about? What did you get from it? Was there an approach or a methodology that has in any way informed or influenced the work that you are now involved in?

KP: The year 2001 was another crucial moment for my work, perhaps the beginning of my nomadic practice. Besides it being the beginning of 24260: The Fugitive House, travelling through Europe, and before I ended up in the Balkans, I began to work as a member of the curatorial committee, a co-curator, and a participating artist of Shrinking Cities, a project initiated by the German Cultural Foundation, which was under the directorship of Berlin-based architect Philipp Oswalt. With Detroit, Liverpool/Manchester, Halle/Leipzig, and Ivanovo (Russia) as the project’s main case studies, we investigated urban decay—mostly in developed countries—and try to to imagine critical and innovative responses to this emerging global condition. I was travelling between these cities, as well as working on other projects in eastern Germany, such as BAR/GDR/FRG (2003), a multi-channel video project about competing urban ideologies from three historical periods within the once-fire-bombed centre of Dresden; and The Slide (2003), a proposal to build a continuous transparent sliding tube through eighteen floors of an empty high-rise former dormitory building in Halle Neustadt, the depopulated socialist utopia built in the former German Democratic Republic.

My work in the Balkans was centred on a partly-realised project called Europe Lost and Found, which started with the Slovenian artist Marjetica Potrc, when we travelled together through twelve cities in the Western Balkans, in four weeks or so at the very end of 2004. While it started as a kind of exploration through the land that coined the notion of Balkanisation, we soon began to see its potential to serve as a future model of decentralised and networked political relations that may become the eventual destiny of the European Union (EU). What interested me was the comparison between the now virtually completed territorialisation of the EU, against the fragmentation of the brief and incomplete utopia of Yugoslavia, which had fallen victim to the revival of ethno-nationalism, partly tinged with the fascistic legacy that had earlier been crushed by the Tito-led Partisan movement during the Second World War. At the same time, we were witnessing the evolution of a semi-supranational statehood for the EU that hints at the gradual weakening of the nation-state— or, according to some, even its end—and we considered how this might be different from earlier forms of supranational statehood, such as the Soviet Union or Yugoslavia.

Granted that the origin and the goal of the EU are purely matters of economic interest, whereas those of the Soviet Union were more political and ideological, and Yugoslavia may have found its legitimacy through a shared ethnic, cultural, and linguistic commonality, to a certain extent. Seeing the fragmentation of the latter two, not too far apart in time, it is relevant to question whether, and how, the EU would continue to hold its legitimacy over an extended period of time. It is common among the victims of the dissolution of Yugoslavia to predict that a similar kind of fragmentation awaits the EU eventually.

Nevertheless, I was interested in the contestation between the post-modern and neo-bourgeois expansion of the semi-neoliberal structure of the EU against the so-called “barbaric” or emotional states that hold sway during the remaking of nation-states under heroic or even monarchic notions. Equally, the process of disintegration of Yugoslavia into micro-nation-states, which has produced a variegated collection of non-parallel entities, along with their informal economy, may stand as a warning, not only about the future of the EU, but also about the very functionality of the globalised economy and its industries—a warning brought back to mind now amid the current world-wide economic crisis.

These and other issues about our future intrigued me to continue to travel throughout the Western Balkans and Western Europe. This literally made me functionally homeless—or stateless in a political sense—as I moved between cities at a rate of one per week, pursuing my urban research, while seeking collaborations in both regions.

Finally, starting with a team of eight collaborators, we were able to realize Lost Highway Expedition during the summer of 2006, where roughly two hundred people travelled together through nine major cities of the Western Balkans in 25 days, two days in each city, with one day of travel in between. With collaborating organisations at each city putting together unique programmes of activities, exhibitions, lectures, and discussion, the expedition produced a series of publications, exhibitions, and other activities throughout Western Europe and the Western Balkan since then.

These projects, which I initiated or in which I participated, are centred on the question of the contemporary or future status of “place” and “identity”, amid shifting conditions, fragmentation, and reconstruction, within the ephemeral and unstable geography of our locations and heritage, where the desire or sustainability of singular or organised conditions seems utterly questionable. With much debate going on about the need for precise and accurate prescriptions for the redefinition of globalisation, now under further challenge from the current global financial crisis, we seem to require new paradigms and a more realistic strategy or structure for our existence within the simultaneous, yet conflicting, geographies of no-where and every-where.

OZ: The New Silk Roads, the ongoing project in which you have been involved for the past two years, although it is more complex and ambitious than the project you developed in the Balkans, seems further to reflect and to expand on what you call “the question of the contemporary or future status of ‘place’ and ‘identity’, amid shifting conditions, fragmentation, and reconstruction, within the ephemeral and unstable geography of our locations and heritage”. I’m thinking, for example, of the dismantling of traditional Chinese neighbourhoods and the new urban settings erected in their place, which go together with the reconfiguration of the socialist government in a market economy, etc. Following your interests, we may consider this link as a metaphor for the transformation of a power and the concrete realisation of a new framework of life when we are trying to make any sense of the urbanisation of China, etc. But the New Silk Roads project seems to be set beyond those parameters as well. You originally conceived it as an expedition-based urban research project to examine the contemporary complexity of Asia’s transformation through photographic, video, and audio documentations of the transitional regions and cities between Istanbul and Tokyo. You wanted to focus on the relationship between the materialized movements of products, labour, and resources against the immaterial movements of information, capital, and services over the real and virtual landscapes of Asia. As of now, you have visited some eight countries, of the roughly twenty that you will be involved with by the end of the project. To what extent can you say that you now understand better the cultural, political, and economic interplay within and between East and West, including their colonial and post-colonial relationships and conditions? To what extend are you interested in the new geo-political changes taking place along and around the historically globalised vectors of the old Silk Road?

KP: It’s unfortunate, but my work and experience in the Balkans did not come to a desired conclusion, particularly in producing a work in some form that could be presented to the public. But, as usual with me, I hope to return to the Balkans on a later day and finish it. I also feel that—in many ways—my work has certain consistent trajectories or interests, which link StoreFront to New Silk Roads, and everything in-between, as one single project. What exactly that is, I am not sure. Only my own life, and the works that would define it, would eventually answer that, and perhaps that is the reason why I have never been able to separate my life from my work, which could easily be shared by other artists.

The use of art as a visual language, with the purpose of understanding the riddles of life, both for individuals and society as a whole, and of presenting certain revelations that offer purpose, belief, and value to our existence, is the key reason for being an artist. Additionally, we, the artists, are given the special and perhaps tragic fate of having parallel or overlapped states of life and work. This would be my answer to those who think that we are free and irresponsible: our inability to compartmentalise our living and our working. Their inseparability is precisely the ground of our intentions, the peculiar nature of being an artist, although we do not have a monopoly on such privilege or tragedy.

In this light, it becomes clear that my nomadic practice is equal to my nomadic life, a situation where I belong to no place and to no identity. As I mentioned before, 9/11 was a precise moment when I no longer believed in the nation to which I had migrated and which I had adopted. For many, it was the moment when an empire began to decline. At least it was beginning to lose its position as the object of cultural and socially reverence throughout the world—a reverence that I myself had had as a young child in a small and remote city in Korea. But now, having lived most of life in the domain of empire, culturally assimilated to it voluntarily, I find myself unable to return to my origin, which itself has changed significantly in the meantime. Therefore, I find myself without a singular identity associated with the sovereignty of a nation or a culture, even feeling “stateless”, wanting to be no longer a member of any particular society, culture, or state, since these are no longer at the forefront of worldly advancement in human rights or equality. 9/11 was for me a point where I began to feel homeless, like 24260: The Fugitive House from Detroit, which could only sustain itself in existence by wandering through different places, away from the place of its origin.

Maybe this is the clearest explanation for my travelling throughout Western Europe, then to the Western Balkans, and now through Asia. My expeditions through Asia since the summer of 2007 are a prolonged wandering in search of a new “home”, like that of 24260, but probably without reaching or finding it at the end.

OZ: What is the reason then, and the purpose, of such a nomadic life, of this apparently never-ending working on the move?

KP: Perhaps the answer is that our perpetual movement is not limited to the objects in question, like a “home”, as in 24260, or a “person”, like me, but places, cities, and territories themselves are moving as well. This is the point that I made in Shrinking Cities, where I felt that Detroit was a “moving city”, one that slowly wanders over the land over time. Such a notion recalls the Continuous Conveyor Belt City, one of the Twelve Ideal Cities developed by Superstudio in 1972. Like an enormous snake, made of a population of 8 million, the Continuous Conveyor Belt City moves across the landscape, progressing at a speed of 40 centimetres (15 inches) an hour. Its mouth devours the natural landscape, the green fields, to construct fully equipped and operational city districts within its body, while leaving decayed and destroyed wasted landscapes behind its path, in which only the social outcasts dare to survive among its ruins, just like the inner city of Detroit. And Detroit too has moved across the landscape, outward from its centre, more like the pulsating heat wave ring of a nuclear explosion that expands out, rather than the static image of a fat doughnut that most urban geographers favoured for decades. Detroit has moved out roughly 30 miles in 50 years, 3240 feet each year, or 9 feet per day, and 11.5 cm (3.5 inches) per hour, roughly at 1/4 of speed of the Continuous Conveyor Belt City.

This is the nature of mobility: it moves the capital from "sunset" to "sunrise" locations, and Detroit is the iconic victim of the de-industrialisation of developed national economies during the 1970s and 1980s, or the single largest sacrifice to the neo-liberal economic policies that cut up the nation-state industries to feed the internationalised economic structures, which are typified by the proliferation and elevation of multi-national corporations and the legitimisation of supra-national states and institutions. The southwesterly movement of capital and labour from the northeastern region of the USA, or, more precisely, from the Rust Belt to the Oil Fields in and around Texas after the OPEC Oil Crisis of 1974, which laid the groundwork for the further and rapid demise of Detroit since the 1960s, later escalated into a virtual wholesale movement of manufacturing industries from the West to the East, first creating the export-oriented Tiger economies of South Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, which have now broadened to Southeast Asia in general, and, most importantly, to China and even India.

In many ways, my movement through a series of expeditions in Asia, in principle, corresponds precisely with the movements in general that define the contemporary condition of capital, labour, and culture, which are economically too restless to be confined to a particular territory. Again, as in the cases of 24260 and myself, perhaps the only identity that we could have from now on is a moving one, or one that is transformative and multifaceted at the same time. Not only do we see a resurgence today of transnational migrations, from labour exporting nations such as the Philippines and Indonesia to the labour importing states of the Persian Gulf, or, within a single country, China, a floating population of nearly 100 million that is currently moving from the countryside to cities; we also have Palm Springs in Hong Kong, the California suburb in the Iranian desert called Arg-e-Jadid, Malibu Town outside of Delhi, Napa Valley and Orange County villa estates outside of Beijing, or Fontainebleau Villas in Shanghai and many more replication of Western “places”, according to Laura Ruggeri, where these gated communities “have become standardised products, like cars or television sets” that can be exported and dislocated from one place to another. This self-colonisation, in contrast to the anti-Western movement to impregnate the French Concession and International Settlement areas of Shanghai with native administrations during the ascendance of the Republic of China, not only indicates a certain amount of reverence or desire to “catch up with the World”, but, more importantly, it shows that people assume the right to appropriate any culture of their own desire, albeit a popular, media-rendered one, rather than being victims of that culture. In this regard, it’s not just the East seeking the West, or, more specifically, the current mythological status of Southern California, but the latter itself dreams of Mediterranean cultures, with the frequent naming of its housing enclaves and developments after the places and styles of Spanish or Italian coastal and countryside towns and places. Such tendencies can be found in Almaty and Astana, the old and new capital of Kazakhstan, or even in the boutiques, cafés, and restaurants of Samarkand, Uzbekistan. Overall, every place seems to want to “move” to another place. Every culture is dissatisfied with having just one place, or its original place.

OZ: What about the new geo-political shifts, national conflicts, ecological issues, and scarcities of resources overwhelming parts of Asia? Are you addressing these matters in the New Silk Roads project?

KP: The breakdown of former unions of states is causing nationalist tendencies and conflicts to emerge. With the new mini-states of ex-Yugoslavia, all of them are hoping to be eventual members of the EU, which some already have become, but all independently, through separate means and ways. In turn, in Central Asia, the struggle over the resources of oil, gas, water, and arable land has pinned countries into unresolved conflicts, whereas before, they were centrally controlled by Moscow, which dictated their equal sharing, more or less. Now Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, possessing about 85% of the water resources of Central Asia, but without much oil and gas, are building dams to generate electricity during the winter period. This causes water runoff during winter, downstream to Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan, flooding them, while their giant cotton fields, established to supply the rest of the Soviet Union in times past, remain dry during the summer. The lower states’ insistence on water being a universal resource to be shared by all is not equated to the idea of oil and gas as natural resources to be free to all when they are a highly price commodity in the global market, particularly because of the ever-increasing thirst to run the industries of China and India in the future.

The wars over resources, particularly that of energy, began soon after 9/11, and were partly pre-empted by the United States upon its invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, the latter for geo-political purposes. This is the initiation of a return to colonialism throughout the territory of the globe, spurred on by environmental concerns, which, without a doubt, will increasingly include water, air, pollution, and waste disposal as well. The labour migrations throughout Asia are another indication in the new millennium of the movement of labour even if the movement of capital and commodities might be slowed and nationalised through the period of the current global financial crisis. In fact, the latter condition will likely only increase the importance of Asia in relation to the rest of the world, particularly the West, as well as the importance of emerging economic and political relationships within Asia itself.

As you already mentioned, New Silk Roads is an expedition-based urban research project that will explore the new urban landscapes that are emerging in rapidly expanding and transforming Asian cities and regions. Using the research method that I have been calling “nomadic practice”, I have already conducted a sequence of three expeditions throughout the transitional regions and cities between Istanbul and Tokyo. The first one was through Shanghai, Singapore, Seoul, Tokyo, Guangzhou, Foshan, Dongguan, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Macau, and Beijing, in that order, from July 20 to October 2, 2007. The second was a horizontal cut through Asia, by travelling to Istanbul, Delhi, and Dubai from December 17, 2007, to January 7, 2008. The last one was made through Central Asia: Buchara, Samarkand, and Tashkent, in Uzbekistan, and then Almaty and Astana, in Kazakhstan, from September 3 to September 24, 2008.

There are several key objectives for New Silk Roads. First is to investigate new cultural, economic, and political relations between East and West that may be developing, with a conceptual reference to the old Silk Road as one of the earliest examples of globalisation. This will include the colonial and post-colonial conditions in Asia, together with the political, economic, and cultural transitions in the post-communist territories of the former Soviet Union, as well as the neo-socialist territories of the People’s Republic of China, including the new geo-political shifts that are now emerging around the middle region of the historic old Silk Road. Second is to represent the spatial and physical effects of globalisation by visualising, as you quoted, the relationship between the materialised movements of products, labour, and resources and the immaterial movements of information, capital, and services over the real landscapes and virtual spaces of Asia. Thirdly, the project will examine various conflicts and cooperation between developing and developed nations occurring within their multinational, transnational, and post-national cultures, as well as their economic and political dynamics at local, regional, and metropolitan levels. Finally, it will study the renewed interrelation between vastly different regions of Asia itself, ranging from the economic strength of the Pacific perimeter to the emerging empire of the People’s Republic of China, the renewal of Central Asia, urban fantasies in parts of the Middle East, the political stasis in Eurasia and Northern Asia, the “offices of world” in South Asia, and more.

The result may be an attempt to trace relationships between texts, data, graphs, photographs and visualisations, to offer a more comprehensive understanding of the dynamics of the urban transformations that attend the cultural, economic, and political evolution taking place on the continent. The underlying platform is the geography of territory, with data, text, and information overlaid in a time-based format, so as to create a dynamic visualisation, a kind of motion-graphics of the evolution of Asia. It’s a hugely ambitious project, obviously. And, despite a lack of resources, in terms of labour, skills, technologies, and finances, I hope, at least, to show the potential of this kind of process. Hopefully, with the exhibition and publication we are going to present at MUSAC this year, I will be able to convince many more people that this is a project for the construction of what I would like to call “knowledge software”, made from the interrogation of data, critical analysis, and intuitive speculation, and that it can show us how the geography of unstable cultures, histories, and identities might change over time and space in the future. Furthermore, to explain why it is necessary to take on such a large scope and such a vast territory in this project, I am trying to develop a notion of “relational knowledge”, a sort of anti-expert knowledge, and a counterweight to specialised and isolated disciplinary history. With the ascendancy of global human and environmental issues, it become essential, undeniable, and necessary to recognize that there is no limitation nor boundary in the quest for a better understanding of the resources and production, of anything that has relevance to the sustainability of our existence. Like the functionality and evolution of ecology, a better understanding of all elements of existence, actions, and thoughts must be pursued in order for both natural and artificial systems to function properly.

support

2009-01-01T11:06:00.003-08:00

New Silk Roads is undertaken with the support of the Visual Arts Department and the Division of Humanities and Arts, the Graham Foundation, University of California's Institute for Research in the Arts (UCIRA) and the Academic Senate Research Funds at University of California San Diego.

the team

2009-01-01T11:06:00.002-08:00

Kyong Park Director of New Silk Roads; Associate Professor, UCSD Visual Arts
Kael Greco Information Design & Project Development
Jia Gu Research, Design & Project Development
Andrea Dietz Information Design & Research
Sean Franklin Graphic Design & Photo

THE TEAM

The NSR team is a fluid group of professionals, students and volunteers who work with KP in the development and implementation of research and production material. Individuals have contributed much of their own time, energy and resources into the development of exhibition material. A sincere thank you to everyone involved.

RESEARCH UNIT
Sarah Case September 2008 - June 2009
Siqian Wang September 2008 - June 2009
Alyssa Lucca October 2008 - June 2009
Heather van Buren January 2009 - June 2009
Victoria Azurin March 2009 - June 2009
Katherine Logan April 2009 - June 2009
Angela Bartholomew June 2008 - September 2008
Dora Quach June 2008 - September 2008
Janice Atmadja September 2008 - December 2008

VISUALIZATIONS/PROGAMMING
Nick Echols September 2008 - present
Randell Baltazar September 2008 - December 2008

GRAPHICS
Lily Xu January 2009 - present
Stephen Stroben January 2009 - present
Maksim Volovik April 2009 - present
Ryan Shih kang Lum May 2009 - present

PHOTOGRAPHY
Glenna Jennings June 2008 - present
Pinar Istek June 2008 - September 2008
Alex Kim June 2008 - August 2008

2009-01-01T11:06:00.000-08:00

Kyong Park: From Urban Ecologies to the New Silk Roads
A conversation with Octavio Zaya
Atlantica Magazine
Spring 2009

"...Life is again nomadic, in this geography of the infinitely ephemeral and temporary, which is the true tenet of globalisation if you will. Nothing is absolute anymore, in this post-ideological life ruled by neo-liberalist self-gratification, which is already trading your grandchildren's air, water, and food as “futures” in commodity markets. As the world becomes more outsourced and offshored, the real issue is our inability to locate our sovereignty, identity, and home in one fixed space and time. With everything becoming relational, it makes no further sense to observe the world from one fixed location. And what 24260 taught me was that I myself must become nomadic, if my practice was to get a real sense of our urban and cultural landscape, which is a continual transformation and movement from one city to another, and from one nation-state to another. Nomadic practice is a necessary paradigm for the documentation, examination, and representation of contemporary cultures. Therefore, what I am doing now has absolutely no relation with the work I did at StoreFront, which was prolonging a static view within a very unstable world...(more)"

METROPOLIS: The Dark Side of Architecture

DETROIT METRO TIMES: Kyong Park and his talking house

2009-01-01T11:05:00.000-08:00

The Map of Original and Final Collectivism

The Map of Original and Final Collectivism offers a unique opportunity to view virtually the entire geographical territory of Asia within one physical space. Unlike the computer monitor display of geographic territories, this physical display offers the rare sense of seeing the whole continent in one view, as well as each city in recognisable resolution. It gives us the notion that the greater amount of visual information requires a larger screen size, which still cannot match what actual space can offer. Perhaps future digital display systems will so enlarge the virtual display surface that it will be able to rival physical space. The Map of Original and Final Collectivism, therefore, brings together the technological “edge” of our digital display systems with the spatial limitations of the natural display system. From a different point of view, The Map of Original and Final Collectivism suggests the need for digital display systems that can present images as large as this map, capable of displaying interactively all the data, research, analysis, and visualisations presented in the other spaces of this exhibition. This may be the ultimate potential of this project, but at some distant future, and with much more human and financial resources.

MORE

Information Is The Key to Global and Human Transformations

Lab Asia is a simulation of the laboratory of New Silk Roads, the studio of Kyong Park at University of California San Diego. However, it is not physical replica of his studio, instead a transporting of New Silk Roads laboratory to MUSAC, to suggest that it will remain as a nomadic practice. On "working tables' designed by the Peruvian architect Giacomo Castagnola, lay various materials—books, photo copies, reading materials, sketches, notes, maps and others—that were used during his expeditions and research. These materials are open to view and interpretations by visitors, in which they could also be involved in their own construction of New Silk Roads.

Located at different points, are five video works by Alexandra Lerman, who traveled together with Kyong Park through Central Asia, documenting his travels as well as his meeting with different experts at five cities in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Also located is a video interview of Kyong Park by Laura Henna, which was first presented at the U.S pavillion of the Venice Architectural Biennale 2008.

With these materials combined, Lab Asia suggest that New Silk Roads is a production of a process not a production of objects. When produced, the objects are only documentation of a particular moment or idea of this process. Furthermore, New Silk Roads as a project is a process to visualize something that does not exist yet. It is rather a process that attempts to incubate, or perhaps even to create, the idea or presence of New Silk Roads in the future. Therefore, it is an emergent structure that attempts to connect the existing, yet unintelligent, cells of New Silk Roads that hibernate beneath the surface of current structure of globalization. When connected—through various researches and visualizations of this project—the relations between these segregated and unconscious cells would develop, to bring forth a coherent, mature and high intelligent organism of New Silk Roads.

MORE

The Profiles of Moving Exploitations

The Profiles of Moving Exploitations (LINEasia), 2009, Designer: Andrea Dietz

Using primarily line graphs, and constructed on three layers, The Profiles of Moving Exploitations represents research about the geographical and topographical condition of the continent, presenting various data that are related to land use.

(1) Geographical Base
The geographical base layer is composed of manipulated maps of Asia from the Geographical Information System (GIS). Geography determines the representation of travel on the larger bottom section of the drawing; on the top quarter, a contemporary, fragmented, and round-about travel pattern fragments and re-orders geography according to human behavior. The drawing, therefore, visualises the contrast in space and time between the Old and New Silk Roads, and the disjointed relationship between our movements and our landscapes. Layered within this information is the world map drawn in red at the top, a jagged grey line shows the topographical elevation profile of Asia connecting the 18 cities Park travelled; the dotted red line reveals the population of all major cities that lie along the straight path connecting the 18 that Park visited.

(2) Statistical Data
Various data about ten locations along the New Silk Roads (eight cities and two countries) are shown together in a collection of line graphics. These accumulations of facts and figures for each city are divided into four categories: Land, People, Culture, and Economics. Each group is identified by a different type of line or colour, and, within each group, several different line graphics visualise specific data, identified by text running along each line.

(3) Critique Network
Various short phrases were collected from different books and articles and were positioned at different geographical and statistical locations. They are used to critique the inherent shortcomings of the data or geographic mappings, to suggest that they are not facts so much as approximations. Phrases provide economic, cultural, and political, and philosophical contexts, as well as definitions of data and geographical features. Thin blue lines tie these phrases together into a network to suggest possible relationships.

MORE

The Theoretical Indices of Human Happiness & Obedience to the Standards

The Theoretical Indices of Human Happiness and Obedience to the Standards (BARasia)
2009
Designer: Andrea Dietz

10 different geographic locations—some as cities and some as nations—are organized horizontally in rows. Informations about these cities are organized vertically into 4 major categories: Land, Population, Culture, and Economy. Each major category is divided into several minor categories. For example, Economy is divided into agriculture, manufacturing, real estate, information, financial, etc. And in some of these minor categories, there is a set of bar graphs on specific data sets about these cities and regions. Where there are no bar graphs, we were not able to find the necessary data. Overlaid are some data that we constructed common value systems between 10 different geographic locations. A collection of phrases were also added throughout the drawing to contextualize their values.
Bar Asia is a visualization on how a collection of individualized and specifically isolated datum can create a galaxy of fragmentations and a universe of incoherence. Our tradition of creating and working with disassociated data may have historically contributed to the illusionary understanding and use of our environment, and this paradigmatic problem becomes visible when data are visually brought together into one drawing like this. Yet, Bar Asia does illuminate the given complexity of New Silk Roads, and how relative understanding between different geographical location is vital and necessary step toward creating more realistic and organized understandings of our use of time and space. Using bar graphics, this drawing emulates building shape and clusters in cities, which are the combined product of the data that are visualized here.

MORE

There Are No Individual Cities, There Is Only One City

There Are No Individual Cities. There Is Only One City is a collection of different parts of the 18 New Silk Roads cities to construct one single city. This visualisation reflects the increasing physical similarities nascent in all cities; more specifically, how each city contains certain parts that are more connected to other, similar parts of some other city than to the rest of its own geography. Rather than showing the “global city,” the type of privileged city that is more vital and connected than others within the networked globe, this visualisation shows how all cities in the globe contribute a certain part of themselves to the generic requirements of a fragmented global city, a single city that is disseminated like a virus all around the globe. The spaces between the different fragments of each city in this installation are the parts in each city that are left out of this one, fragmented but networked, global city, the parts in each city that are increasingly becoming invisible and globally left out. This installation also presents some indigenous and distinctive elements that are being threatened or “devoured” by this single global city.

Capitalism is A Movement Over Geography

Capitalism is A Movement Over Geography is a digital scroll made of a collection of panoramic photos taken by Kyong Park from the cities of the New Silk Roads. Presented on eight continuous plasma screens, installed in a circular pattern, Capitalism is A Movement Over Geography reflects both the linearity of the Old Silk Roads and the circumventing forces of international flights and airports that define the New Silk Roads. As the digital scroll moves horizontally from one monitor screen to another one, the static image of the photographs begins to take on the dynamic quality of moving images, embodying the conflict between the immovability of a physical place and nomadic condition of its identity. The static images in movement also suggest the fleeting quality of a particular time

MORE

Thousand Pictures for One Asia

At times, these collections of photographs will also run in random sequences, beyond the control of our subjective or categorical tendencies. The idea is that we can sometimes learn more from our research when we have less control: the random sequences can give rise to understandings that elude us when we organise our materials to support our preconceived theories.

The most important aspect of 1000 Asia is the notion that cities cannot be explained by few selected photographs. Instead, the indefinable reality of its overwhelming complexity can only be captured by a virtually unlimited number of images. This less editorial approach to the depiction of cities is consistent with the immense multiplicity of images collected and consumed by the public in the age of digital photography, which goes far beyond the older urban photography once dominated by professionals. Urban images are increasingly matters of public consumption and contribution, and 1000 Asia reflects the public, globalising representations of cities today.

MORE

Cities Sprawl Endlessly while Geography Changes Constantly

Screen capture of Exploding Cities: Shanghai

Cities Sprawl Endlessly while Geography Changes Constantly shows two kinds of metamporphosis. One is a collection of exploding cities—Dehli, Istanbul, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Seoul and Tokyo—how they have grown from early 1900s until few years ago. Rendered in dynamic animations, this collection illustrates that cities behaves more like an organic form, unlike as it was described as machines during the Industrial Age. One other animation, "Expandition," present how the standard geography of Asia contracts and expands, depending on the movement of migration, capital, resources and travels takes place between different regions and locations of the continent. For example, labor movements from different countries into United Arab Emirates causes these nations to physical get closer to Dubai, thereby changing the shape of the whole continent. Since no geographical mapping in 2-dimensional depiction is completely accurate, our animation that contorts the continent according to various kinds of movement presents the "real maps of Asia," maps that shows how Asia actually functions and perceived by its occupants and users. In addition, we suggest that Asia cannot be depicted by one standard map. Instead, Asia can truly be 'mapped' by many maps that changes according to time and subject, as geography is no longer a static substance or terrain.

NSR at Venice

2008-12-16T04:57:00.000-08:00

The U.S. Pavilion for La Biennale di Venezia,
11th International Architecture Exhibition
September 14 - November 23, 2008
Curated by William Menking, Aaron Levy, and Andrew Sturm

The exhibition Into the Open highlights America's rich history of architectural experimentation and explores the original ways architects today are working collaboratively to invigorate community activism and environmental policy.

In the absence of large-scale public infrastructure projects in the United States, local initiatives are becoming laboratories for generating new forms of sociability and civic engagement. These new community-minded architects are questioning traditional definitions of practice by conducting unique research into the socio-economic challenges and environmental rifts that define our times. They are going beyond building-- defining architecture not just as a physical infrastructure, but also as a social relationship.

Into the Open debuted as the official United States representation at the 2008 Venice Biennale, where it offered international audiences insight into the ways America's architects are reinventing public space.

NSR at Parsons

2008-12-14T14:56:00.000-08:00

INTO THE OPEN: POSITIONING PRACTICE

March 4 - May 1, 2009
The U.S. Pavilion for La Biennale di Venezia
11th International Architecture Exhibition

On view at the Sheila C. Johnson Design Center
Parsons The New School for Design

Opening Reception: Wednesday, March 4, 6 -8 pm
Symposium: Friday, April 24, 5 - 9pm

details

Into the Open: Positioning Practice features 16 architectural groups who actively engage communities, responding to social and environmental issues including shifting demographics, changing geo-political boundaries, uneven economic development, and the explosion of urban migration. These intellectually entrepreneurial actors are designing the conditions from which new architectures can emerge--becoming activists, developers, facilitators of inclusive urban policies, as well as innovative urban researchers. Reaching creatively across institutions, agencies, and jurisdictions, they are negotiating hidden resources in the private, public, and non-profit sectors.

NSR at Nam June Paik Art Center

2008-12-01T04:48:00.000-08:00

Exposition of Mythology – Electronic Technology
Nam June Paik Art Center, Seoul, Korea
June 12 - Oct 4, 2009
Curated by Youngchul Lee, Director of Nam June Paik Art Center

Exposition of Mythology - Electronic Technology attempts to suggest possible translations and readings of the Big Bang effect of Paik's first solo show Exposition of Music Electronic Television on the fields of music, art and technology. In 1963, by introducing manipulated TVs as art for the first time, Paik expanded the ontological parameters of music by pushing music composition and appreciation beyond the limits of their traditional canons, and also brought the participatory role of the receiver in both art and communication to the fore.

Artists participating in Exposition of Mythology - Electronic Technology: Nam June Paik, Mary Bauermeister, Sung Eun Chang, Marcus Coates, Honoré ∂'O, Jimmie Durham, Chul Ki Hong, Yun Ho Kim, Christoph Meier, Ute Müller, Ujino Muneteru, Jong Woo Park, Kyong Park, Pedro Diniz Reis, Han Kil Ryu, Una Szeemann, Javier Téllez, Gregor Zootzky and others.

Thousand Pictures for One Asia

2008-01-08T05:50:00.000-08:00

1000 Asia from nsr on Vimeo.

Thousand Pictures for One Asia is a collection of 1000 photographs taken by Kyong Park from the cities of the New Silk Roads, each tagged with certain words. Software organises these photos according to their tags, to suggest certain organising tendencies present among these cities. Yet within these shared tendencies, there are also certain differences, determined by the particular conditions of each city, which alter such intruding global formulas as "Globalisation with Chinese Characteristics." Here, one can imagine that globalisation is not a one-way street. Beyond the intrusion and domination of a globalising system upon local distinctions, the particularity of certain indigenous urban structures might contribute to globalisation in a different way.

At times, these collections of photographs will also run in random sequences, beyond the control of our subjective or categorical tendencies. The idea is that we can sometimes learn more from our research when we have less control: the random sequences can give rise to understandings that elude us when we organise our materials to support our preconceived theories.

The most important aspect of 1000 Asia is the notion that cities cannot be explained by few selected photographs. Instead, the indefinable reality of its overwhelming complexity can only be captured by a virtually unlimited number of images. This less editorial approach to the depiction of cities is consistent with the immense multiplicity of images collected and consumed by the public in the age of digital photography, which goes far beyond the older urban photography once dominated by professionals. Urban images are increasingly matters of public consumption and contribution, and 1000 Asia reflects the public, globalising representations of cities today.

The Theoretical Indices of Human Happiness & Obedience to the Standards

2008-01-08T05:10:00.000-08:00

The Theoretical Indices of Human Happiness and Obedience to the Standards (BARasia)
2009
Designer: Andrea Dietz

10 different geographic locations—some as cities and some as nations—are organized horizontally in rows. Informations about these cities are organized vertically into 4 major categories: Land, Population, Culture, and Economy. Each major category is divided into several minor categories. For example, Economy is divided into agriculture, manufacturing, real estate, information, financial, etc. And in some of these minor categories, there is a set of bar graphs on specific data sets about these cities and regions. Where there are no bar graphs, we were not able to find the necessary data. Overlaid are some data that we constructed common value systems between 10 different geographic locations. A collection of phrases were also added throughout the drawing to contextualize their values.

Close-up view

The Theoretical Indices of Human Happiness & Obedience to the Standards is a visualization on how a collection of individualized and specifically isolated datum can create a galaxy of fragmentations and a universe of incoherence. Our tradition of creating and working with disassociated data may have historically contributed to the illusionary understanding and use of our environment, and this paradigmatic problem becomes visible when data are visually brought together into one drawing like this. Yet The Theoretical Indices of Human Happiness & Obedience to the Standards does illuminate the given complexity of New Silk Roads, and how relative understanding between different geographical location is vital and necessary step toward creating more realistic and organized understandings of our use of time and space. Using bar graphics, this drawing emulates building shape and clusters in cities, which are the combined product of the data that are visualized here.

Videos

2008-01-01T13:58:00.000-08:00

Film by Alexandra Lerman
Produced by Michael Cervieri
SMAC: ScribeMedia Arts Culture

NOMADIC PRACTICE
Duration: 14 mins

Kyong Park calls his work and research Nomadic Practice. He looks at cities as ongoing historical documents and reads urban environments not in their individual particulars but as an ecosystem. In this video, he reveals his process and discusses what he sought when traveling through Astana and Almaty in Kazakhstan, and Tashkent and Bukhara in Uzbekistan.
Central Asia provides a rich fabric for the study of the ideology of Socialist modernism as expressed through architecture. Today this philosophy has been interrupted and reinterpreted to serve the needs of the newly independent nation states.

Tashkent: The Utopian Soviet City
Duration: 10 mins

Uzbekistan's capital was largely destroyed in a 1966 earthquake and rebuilt as a model Soviet city. This video is narrated by people the artists met during their trip, tells the story of how this centrally planned modernist capital was created and shows what is happening today to public spaces originally designed to glorify the Soviet State.

While Tashkent's Soviet-era urban planning makes it a livable modern city, the era's immense public housing projects are crumbling and private residencies are booming.

In addition, Soviet symbolism has been replaced and reinterpreted to fit the new Uzbek image since the country gained its independence.

Astana: The New Ideology
Duration: 13 mins

In 1998, Kazakhstan moved its capital from Almaty near the Chinese border to Astana, in the middle of the country. This 10-year-old capital is being built in the place of a pre-existing Soviet town. Some consider the move as purely practical ‚Äì a necessary reflection of geo-political reality ‚Äì and a move made possible because of Kazakhstan's traditional nomadic culture.

Astana is attempting to define itself as a one of the world's truly global cities and is commissioning star architects such as Norman Foster to build key symbolic structures.

Sliding Identity
Duration: 10 mins

This video is a meditation on the identity of those who live in Central Asia and an attempt to see where they stand in relationship to their ethnic origins and the geographic histories of their families.

The histories of many of those interviewed for this piece have been affected by Stalin's forced resettlement campaigns as well as economic opportunities provided by the Soviet Union in its attempt to populate Central Asia.

For example, Aigul Mukei is a ethnic Kazakh educated in the Russian language and Russian literature. She did not learn her native language until she reached graduate school.

Alexander Ugai's Korean grandparents were forcibly moved from the Korean border to Uzbekistan to work in the cotton fields. Today, Ugai neither speaks Korean nor feels any ties to Korea.

Nelly Shifrina's grandparents were forcibly resettled along with countless other ethnic Germans from the Ukraine to Kazakhstan during World War II. She considers herself culturally Russian. While she has relatives in Germany, she has never considered moving there.

Alexei Volkov is the second generation Russian living in Uzbekistan. While many ethnic Russians returned to Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union, Alexei did not. Even though he does not speak Uzbek, he considers Tashkent his home. While culturally significant to him, he does not consider Russia a homeland.

OIL/ WATER/ DEMOCRACY
Duration: 10 mins

Central Asia has been and remains a crossroads for international economics and politics. Released from the centrally planned economy of the Soviet Union, national fault lines are appearing as each country tries to fulfill its aspirations. Countries such as Kyrgistan and Uzbekistan spar over the use of water and natural gas. Some countries are gravitating toward Europe and the West while others to Russia, China and the East.

With various cultural ties pulling the region both east and west, political systems are also evolving independently with some becoming more democratic while others remain authoritarian.

Western notions of democracy remain elusive though. Many who were interviewed alternatively described their countries as "teenagers" that need to grow up, as emerging countries that need "50 years of peace" before considering true democracy and as independent countries that will evolve local forms of democracy that may or may not adhere to Western ideals or standards.

Cities Sprawl Endlessly while Geography Changes Constantly

2008-01-01T05:57:00.000-08:00

Nsr on Vimeo.

Thousand Pictures for One Asia

2008-01-01T05:50:00.000-08:00

Capitalism is A Movement Over Geography

2008-01-01T05:32:00.000-08:00

PanAsia from nsr on Vimeo.

Capitalism is A Movement Over Geography is a digital scroll made of a collection of panoramic photos taken by Kyong Park from the cities of the New Silk Roads. Presented on eight continuous plasma screens, installed in a circular pattern, Capitalism is A Movement Over Geography reflects both the linearity of the Old Silk Roads and the circumventing forces of international flights and airports that define the New Silk Roads. As the digital scroll moves horizontally from one monitor screen to another one, the static image of the photographs begins to take on the dynamic quality of moving images, embodying the conflict between the immovability of a physical place and nomadic condition of its identity. The static images in movement also suggest the fleeting quality of a particular time

Shots of exhibition view

Shots of exhibition view

Shenzhen

Hong Kong

Shanghai

Information Is The Key to Global and Human Transformations

2008-01-01T05:00:00.000-08:00

Lab Asia is a simulation of the laboratory of New Silk Roads, the studio of Kyong Park at University of California San Diego. However, it is not physical replica of his studio, instead a transporting of New Silk Roads laboratory to MUSAC, to suggest that it will remain as a nomadic practice. On "working tables' designed by the Peruvian architect Giacomo Castagnola, lay various materials—books, photo copies, reading materials, sketches, notes, maps and others—that were used during his expeditions and research. These materials are open to view and interpretations by visitors, in which they could also be involved in their own construction of New Silk Roads.

Located at different points, are five video works by Alexandra Lerman, who traveled together with Kyong Park through Central Asia, documenting his travels as well as his meeting with different experts at five cities in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Also located is a video interview of Kyong Park by Laura Henna, which was first presented at the U.S pavillion of the Venice Architectural Biennale 2008.

With these materials combined, Lab Asia suggest that New Silk Roads is a production of a process not a production of objects. When produced, the objects are only documentation of a particular moment or idea of this process. Furthermore, New Silk Roads as a project is a process to visualize something that does not exist yet. It is rather a process that attempts to incubate, or perhaps even to create, the idea or presence of New Silk Roads in the future. Therefore, it is an emergent structure that attempts to connect the existing, yet unintelligent, cells of New Silk Roads that hibernate beneath the surface of current structure of globalization. When connected—through various researches and visualizations of this project—the relations between these segregated and unconscious cells would develop, to bring forth a coherent, mature and high intelligent organism of New Silk Roads.

The Map of Original and Final Collectivism

2008-01-01T02:47:00.000-08:00

The Map of Original and Final Collectivism offers a unique opportunity to view virtually the entire geographical territory of Asia within one physical space. Unlike the computer monitor display of geographic territories, this physical display offers the rare sense of seeing the whole continent in one view, as well as each city in recognisable resolution. It gives us the notion that the greater amount of visual information requires a larger screen size, which still cannot match what actual space can offer. Perhaps future digital display systems will so enlarge the virtual display surface that it will be able to rival physical space. The Map of Original and Final Collectivism, therefore, brings together the technological “edge” of our digital display systems with the spatial limitations of the natural display system. From a different point of view, The Map of Original and Final Collectivism suggests the need for digital display systems that can present images as large as this map, capable of displaying interactively all the data, research, analysis, and visualisations presented in the other spaces of this exhibition. This may be the ultimate potential of this project, but at some distant future, and with much more human and financial resources.