Everything-Can-Happen-Parade, “FÖRSTÅ GEMENSKAPENS KAPITAL”, Anna Witt, 2013. Photo: Mikaela Krestesen
ABOUT MARABOUPARKEN LAB
Under the heading Marabouparken Lab., we initiate long-term local collaborative projects, which are allowed to develop through interaction between artists, commissioners and locals both in and outside the art gallery. It may be a group of children and an artist who plan a model for a public artwork for their local environment. Or an artist who collaborates with municipal planners and local residents in order to explore how existing green areas should be defined and designed. As the name suggests, Marabouparken Lab., focuses on experimental projects, which are open-ended and explorative, in the borderland between art and education. The idea is to link artists, people, education and public space in order to take advantage of creativity and experience from various sources in an interesting dialogue about how to shape our city.
PROJECTS
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In the exhibition Participant Observers, Henrik Andersson completes his investigation of an area in Ursvik in northern Sundbyberg where the Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI), was located until 2005. Using material from, among others, the FOI art collection, the photographic collection of the Museum of Sundbyberg and the archive of the Public Art Agency Sweden, Henrik Andersson traces changes in physical as well as mental landscapes. In these times when armed conflicts seem to creep ever closer, Henrik Andersson brings to the fore FOI’s placement in Sundbyberg, its connection to the period after the Second World War and its changing social climate. In the wake of the activities of FOI, we discover art, protocols, photographs and inventories that raise questions: What role have art and artists played in the Swedish national defence? And what is the status of the Swedish peace movement today?
A wooded area the size of a small nature reserve south of Järvafältet in northern Sundbyberg, Ursvik, was until recently the location of the Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI). From 1930 onwards, a branch line of the Northern Main Line carried shipments of ammunition into a large rock shelter. The area contained shooting ranges, administration offices and depots, and, most importantly, high level research was conducted there. The research included everything from the development of Swedish nuclear weapons to medical research into surgical methods of treating crush injuries. The activities were top secret and what really went on behind the fence remains shrouded in mystery. In the early 1960s, public support for the Swedish nuclear programme waned and in 1961 the first protest march against the atomic bomb in Sweden went to Ursvik. Pictures from the march are preserved in the Museum of Sundbyberg. The Swedish Defence premises in Ursvik also housed something else, an art collection, which was primarily acquired by the Public Art Agency Sweden. An art collection at a secret location – what was it doing there?
– Henrik Andersson
The exhibition Participant Observers is a part of Henrik Andersson’s Marabouparken Lab project. These serve as local collaborative projects that link artists, local actors and common spaces in Sundbyberg with the aim of enhancing our collective memory connected to sites, and hopefully, at the same time, making the current societal development emerge in a clearer light.
Henrik Andersson (born 1973 in Gothenburg) is based in Stockholm and studied Fine Art and Curating at Konstfack, the University College of Arts, Crafts and Design, Stockholm. He has exhibited at, among others, Moderna Museet, Index and the Tirana Biennial in Albania. From 2013–2014 he worked with Asger Jorn’s photographic archive in the project Museum Jorn that was exhibited at the Baltic Art Center in Visby. He is a member of the editorial board of the journal Paletten and has previously worked as a curator at Röda Sten Konsthall and taught at the School of Photography in Gothenburg.
PARK LEK II: BÅDE UTOPISKT KONSTPROJEKT OCH ETT REELLT INGREPP I STADSPLANERINGSPROCESSEN
Kerstin Bergendal 2011–
Som en del av Marabouparkens invigningsutställning 2010 bjöd konsthallen in konstnären Kerstin Bergendal att skapa ett projekt med parkleken som inspiration och utgångspunkt. Projektet PARK LEK förde samman tjänstemän och politiker från Sundbybergs stad på konsthallen för att överväga hur stadens parker kunde fungera som beröringsyta mellan medborgarna. Under samtalen kom en kommande förtätning av stadsdelarna Hallonbergen och Ör upp som ett konkret exempel på hur stadsutvecklingen långsamt äter sig in i parkernas rum. Drygt ett år senare gick PARK LEK – projektet in i en andra fas, denna gång med fokus på stadsutvecklingen i just Hallonbergen och Ör. Kerstin Bergendal fick i uppdrag, av Sundbybergs stad, i samarbete med Statens Konstråd och Marabouparken Konsthall, att föra sitt samtal vidare, nu med boende och andra lokala aktörer i de två stadsdelarna. Tillsammans med dessa kartlägger hon just nu tankar, idéer och strukturer som de ser i sina områden i dag. Målet är att föra in de lokala aktörernas perspektiv i kommunens planarbeten för Hallonbergen och Ör och därmed komplettera och kanske korrigera det förslag om förtätning som lagts fram i december 2011. PARK LEK är ett utopiskt konstprojekt, men samtidigt ett reellt ingrepp i en stadsplaneringsprocess. Karin Milles, stadsarkitekt på Sundbybergs stad är projektledare för projektet.
PARK LEK HÖSTEN 2011–SOMMAREN 2012
Intervjuer och samtal med människor i Hallonbergen och Ör Under de senaste månaderna har Kerstin Bergendal talat med omkring 120 personer som bor eller på annat sätt har anknytning till Hallonbergen och Ör. Förutom boende har konstnären träffat polisen, lokala föreningar, fastighetsägare, politiker, tjänstemän, bibliotekspersonal och affärsidkare. Genom det personliga samtalet har konstnären försökt fånga den subjektiva känslan för staden, den personliga erfarenheten av att bo eller arbeta i områdena och de mellanmänskliga relationer som präglar den enskildes vardag. Varje samtal har dokumenterats med video och fotografi. Diskussionerna har berört vitt skilda ämnen som bostadsrättsomvandlingar som konflikthärd i Ör, förbättringar av Hallonbergen Centrum, hur nedläggningen av skolan i Hallonbergen påverkar barnen och om exempelvis odlingar skulle kunna motverka segregation.
Workshops för en alternativ plan!
Under samtalen var det fritt att drömma och diskutera utopiska förslag. I nästa fas konkretiserades och förhandlades de många förslagen på en gemensam nivå. Under två workshopstillfällen den 24–25 mars och 31 mars–1 april på Kulturcentrum gavs alla de medverkande möjlighet att träffas och diskutera sina synsätt med varandra. Dessutom fick de tillgång till professionella arkitekter, landskapsarkitekter och planerare som kunde hjälpa dem att koordinera och kvalificera sina idéer så att de senare kunde samlas till ett parallellt, boendestyrt program för det framtida Hallonbergen och Ör. Genom ytterligare tre workshops med lokala institutioner i området fokuserade PARK LEK även på bristen på samarbeten mellan lokala aktörer.
Efter workshopparna “översatte” Kerstin Bergendal alla samtal och idéer till en modell och ett alternativt program för Hallonbergen och Ör. Modellen, som från början var en vanlig landskapsmodell av området, blev genom processen en slags hybrid av de boendes drömmar och den konkreta verkligheten. Modellen användes sedan som diskussionsunderlag under en workshop för politiker, byggherrar och tjänstemän 22-23 maj på Marabouparken Konsthall. Beslutsfattarna fick genom workshoppen möjligheten att ta till sig de lokala aktörernas tankar om Hallonbergen och Ör genom att bearbeta de boendes idéer. Processen för förtätning är igång, men ännu inte cementerad. PARK LEK agerar i detta glapp mellan det konkreta och det utopiska och utmanar de professionella planerarna att ta fram andra sätt att samarbeta kring gestaltningen av offentliga miljöer.
PARK LEK är del av utställningen Hembyg(g)d på Marabouparken Konsthall, 7 september–25 november, 2012
För mer information om Hembyg(g)d, klicka här
SAMVERKAN
PARK LEK ryms dessutom inom forskningsuppdraget “Samverkan om gestaltning av offentliga miljöer” som leds av Statens konstråd, Riksantikvarieämbetet, Boverket och Arkitekturmuseet (för mer info: statenskonstrad.se). Sundbybergs stad samarbetar med Marabouparken Lab. om realiseringen av projektet som ett sätt att fördjupa medborgardialogen och ser PARK LEK som ett led i en metodutveckling.
Kerstin Bergendal är en svensk konstnär (född 1957) baserad sedan länge i Köpenhamn där hon gjort sig känd för sina storskaliga offentliga interventioner och participatoriska projekt. Hon var med och bildade den konstnärsdrivna plattformen TAPKO 1991 – 2005. Hon stod för omdaningen av Overgaden Institut for Samtidskunst i Köpenhamn 1996 – 2002. I Roskilde har hon drivit ett elvaårigt konstprogram i relation till kommunens utveckling av en ny stadsdel (Art Plan Tre Kronor). I maj 2012 invigs ett nytt slags offentligt rum i Trekroner, som hon utarbetat tillsammans med de boende i området – “En Ny Faelled til Trekroner”. Hon har även varit kommittémedlem i danska Statens Kunstfond.
PARK PLAYGROUND
A research project on the park idea
Kerstin Bergendal 2010 –
The artistic research PARK PLAYGROUND began in 2010 and processes including the role of park games played in the urban green rooms during the 1900s in Sweden: A unifying platform that indirectly contributed to maintaining a vibrant community in a local area. Kerstin Bergendal reusing this platform as an artistic strategy. In one of the rooms of the gallery, the artist has drawn up an “art playground” where art knowledge and methods are playful tool for anyone visiting this place. She invites people with a clear relationship to the parks in Sundbyberg – municipal officials, politicians, residents or park visitors – and ask them to consider the park idea and function: How to reflect the town’s green areas residents’ relations to each other? Can a local community occur if culture permeates the city planning? Here is a playful state of emergency.
The call is made without real limitations and participants give their experiences and thoughts on to the artist. The talks were part of the mapping of Marabouparken that the artist began in early 2010 and is still continuing. The first phase of this artistic research project resulted in a proposal that would one day serve as an intervention in one or more parks in Sundbyberg. The survey and the proposal was presented with a large model, photographs and drawings in the exhibition Parkliv – Marabouparken Konsthall inaugural exhibition in August 2010.
The artist’s proposal consists in an ever changing version of the small pavilion at the wading pool in Marabou Park, with its flexible system of doors can facilitate a range of activities the parks as a café, performances and community center. In the large model of Marabouparken illustrating the proposal, we can see how the planned promenade outside the Marabou Park and the boat club could samleva if instead of a traditional design for mono operation, introduced the current negotiations as a planning principle for public spaces.
Field Recordings of invisible worlds
Christine Ödlund 2010
In the autumn of 2010 a unique school project on the basis of the exhibition Parkliv (28/8-7/11 2010). Together with artist Christine Ödlund got students from IT college Sundbyberg try to do field studies and interceptions with a geoelektriskt measurement of the sculpture park’s invisible world.
Everything-Can-Happen-Parade, “FÖRSTÅ GEMENSKAPENS KAPITAL”, Anna Witt, 2013. Photo: Mikaela Krestesen
EVERYTHING CAN HAPPEN-PARADE
Anna Witt is a German artist (b. 1981) who often works in different local contexts with performative interventions in public space involving strangers, often passers-by. The works in the exhibition Manifesto are connected to a new site-specific work that the artist has been working on in Sundbyberg during the winter. A common theme of the new work and the works in the exhibition at Marabouparken art space is that they act as playfully staged situations where people can express their ideas about society – a characteristic feature of Anna Witt’s artistic practice.
Together with the residents of Hallonbergen Anna Witt has composed a manifesto that was conveyed in a parade during the spring 2013, the so-called Everything Can Happen Parade, where the participants, using sculptural letters, will form the text as the parade moves along. Manifestoes are historically connected to a certain cultural scene or to a political agenda whereas the Hallonbergen manifesto will voice a multitude of perspectives and levels. Concrete topics in Hallonbergen, private matters and global concerns face each other and create a private but at the same universal agenda for the future.
Image gallery from the Everything Can Happen Parade
PARK LEK is possibly the first art project in Sweden that successfully managed to challenge existing plans for re-development of a residential area, and replace it with a constructive set of counter-proposals and guidelines for how the municipality could work with urban planning in the future.
For the duration of four years, from October 2010 – till May 2014, artist Kerstin Bergendal worked together with the local community. Not only did they propose and gain support for an alternative way to densify the neighbourhoods Hallonbergen and Ör, they also managed to change the way the city thinks and acts on issues regarding urban planning. This was done through concrete work with ideas and form, combined with “administrative activism” in Sundbyberg municipal administrations and the City Council.
PARK LEK started off with an invitation from Marabouparken art centre to think and reflect on the City of Sundbyberg’s green public spaces. The result consisted, among other things, of a subjective hand-drawn map of the area of Sundbyberg, presented in an exhibition at the art centre in 2010. This marked the beginning of the project’s next phase where Kerstin Bergendal was invited by the planning department of Sundbyberg to lead a parallel dialogue process regarding the densification of the two neighbouring districts, Hallonbergen and Ör.
PARK LEK part of a research project
The second and third part of the project was realised by the artist Kerstin Bergendal in collaboration with Marabouparken art centre and Sundbyberg City Council as part of the research project Collaboration on the Design of Public Spaces which was organised by The Public Art Council Sweden, The Swedish National Heritage Board, The National Board of Housing, and The Swedish Centre for Architecture and Design.
Completion in a bright pink room
The project’s final part, PARK LEK PARLIAMENT, materialized as a bright pink open space in Hallonbergen Shopping Centre, where discussions and workshops were conducted in full view amid the shopping centre’s other visitors. At the end of the project in May 2014, the municipal government in Sundbyberg, made the principal decision to use proposals, as well as the working methods of the PARK LEK project in their future work with the urban development.
After four years, the artistic heritage left by the PARK LEK project, to the city of Sundbyberg consists of: fifty filmed interviews with more than 140 participants (for the whole project more than 300 people participated), an accumulation of perspectives on the districts, gathered in a layered map of Hallonbergen and Ör, and a new public platform for discussion in Sundbyberg named PARK LEK PARLIAMENT.
Last but not least the artist handed over a set of guiding principles that can serve as a recipe for increasing local democracy in urban development:
Utopian thinking as planning method.
Accumulation of perspective, rather than streamlining.
The skills of life lived.
Address: Who am I talking to?
Conflicts are part of the work – and can be a good thing.
Time! Time! Time!
Read more about the project at: www.parklek.com
Kerstin Bergendal awarded Broder Ejves Scholarship 2014
Artist Kerstin Bergendal has been awarded Broder Ejves Scholarship 2014 for the PARK LEK project, where she used herself as “cross-runner” between groups of people, places, and governance models. The scholarship is awarded by Konstfrämjandet.
About the artist – Kerstin Bergendal
Kerstin Bergendal is known for large-scale interventions and participatory projects that map the participants thoughts and ideas regarding their local surroundings. Trough a structured, yet intuitive process – different groups are presented to each other in order to engage in dialogue about local urban development plans. In this way the artist, in her practice acts as a catalyst for new ways of thinking regarding urban space, design- and building processes.
Curator and artistic director, Helena Selder
helena.selder@marabouparken.se