Location: The Academy Exhibition in Stenersen Museum,
Oslo Architecture Triennale After Belonging, Sept. 9-16, 2016.
Migration. Conflict. Environmental changes. They are all interconnected, as parts of a bigger picture.
They are all objects of investigation. The paradox of this connectivity is that, usually, when you want to find something, you must not look at the object, but elsewhere.This replicates the principle of migration itself.
This exercise is a matter of perception and representation, an investigation of migration and multiculturalism through the perception of the city. The starting point is Erling Viksjø's Høyblokka, the building where the government was functioning at the moment of the first bombing in 2011, just before the massacre on Utøya Island. It is situated only 600 m away from Grønland and Tøyen, the icons of multiculturalism in Oslo.
The aim is not to engage in such a sensitive subject, but to question the circumstances that allowed for this to happen. Fear. Hatred. Misunderstanding. Intolerance. Traditional values? In a context of intensive migration, of territory finding, of terror, this case is extremely relevant. Therefore there is a need to ask the right questions. To raise awareness. To invite to take action.
The city can be read by four strands: anti-urbanity, violence, governmentality and controversy. Isolating the objects through images helped to recreate the relationships between them, in other words, to post-perceive the city. Coincidental or not, the iconic elements of the research were located inside the abandoned Stenersen Museum. They were there. They needed to be exposed, by asking the right questions.
Who are these iconic elements?
What do they mean?
AN ANTECHAMBER OF A PARLIAMENT
A representation of the city of Oslo.
THE TOWER.
You can feel it when you go down the stairs.
The stair is Høyblokka.
THE CITY.
The reading of the city is honest and subjective. It implies snapshots, rearranged upon layers, in an order that would conserve the first steps into the investigation.
The polyptych is the city.
THE THRESHOLDS.
They are the change of the environment you encounter when going from one point to the other. The conflicts, contradictions, obstructions, barriers found in the research. They are both physical and intangible.
The door frames are the thresholds.
THE BRIDGE.
It is a loyal instrument to control the views and the exhibition tour. In reality, it is a gate and a border between Grønland and the rest of the city. It is a negotiation space.
The bridge is the bridge.
GRØNLAND AND TØYEN.
Textured, mixed, rich and controversial, they require all your senses to experience them. They seem like a great place to belong. It is a place where every passenger has left his mark. You can read them in strata.
The wall is Grønland & Tøyen.
