art as community identity building process (Halberstadt)

Absthof, Halberstadt - marking out the emptiness

Photo by Kerstin Faber 2007

art as process in Halberstadt
As I transcribe an interview with Martin Peschken, one of the professionals involved in the “actions” in Halberstadt about rethinking what “Leere” (emptiness, vacancy, void, blankness) means, I am beginning to do some of the anticipatory analysis that happens during the research process and noticing patterns in what I’m hearing, reading, and seeing. The use of art-related activities – “Actions, Interventions” etc. as a way of engaging community in a participatory process that isn’t a traditional community design process or community meeting format, seems to be an important theme – an important skill developing in these situations that could be generally applied, although it must vary depending on place, people, themes, stage of progress etc. But the skilled team of planners, artists, sociologists, community members, etc. should be able to think this way – an atmosphere of an event, as opposed to a meeting, makes for a totally different perspective on the part of participants. And the idea of focusing on process rather than product is also very important here – the events are not intended for consumption, as Dr. Peschken emphasized, but for involvement.

Trainingspfad des Sehens - Training path for seeing. (Photo by Nella Young)
View of the Cathedral through the only physical remainder of the path on this site.

I also find it interesting to think about this in terms of the challenges of documentation and product. To be honest, I’ve really gotten the best sense of projects from the stories told to me by people involved in them – so far, this has mostly experts/professionals who were involved. Sitting down and asking someone to tell me about these projects and places – tell these stories - has been a simple structure but has yielded the richest content and is much easier to connect with and get a full image of (especially when I talk to a few people) without any pictures. Of course, the pictures sometimes help you see how the reality looks on the ground, which can be very plain. But maybe that’s the challenge of this IBA – there are expectations from architects and planners that a physical product be the result, but perhaps that is actually not as powerful, long-lasting or valuable for a community as the process, the shared narrative, the joint experience, and the sense of identity, community, and belonging, that results from the process and that makes people feel a place is home, where they have relationships and where their opinion counts.
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Absthof, Halberstadt - a reading picnic
Photo from the city of Halberstadt 2007

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In the context of shrinking cities, where it is more important that people living there want to stay than that new people move in, building identity and sense of ownership seems to be a high priority and a worthwhile result.