VOL

24(

3)

NOV

2010

Focus: Design & Informal Cities

IA&B

- NO

V 20

1018

In a conversation with Sarita Vijayan, Editor and Brand Director, IA&B, Dr. Marla Stukenberg talks about ‘The Promised City’ project and the variety of works within the exhaustive project, ‘The Promised City’.

SV. Tell us more about ‘ The Promised City ’ project. How did the initiative originate?MS. At the beginning, t wo European c i t ies were in the spot l ight of ‘The Promised Ci t y ’ projec t : B er l in and Warsaw, v i r tual neighbours in the hear t of Europe, t wo major poles in that par t of Europe. These t wo c i t ies are d i f ferent, but they a lso have a lot in common. B oth are l ive ly c i t ies which need to come to terms with thei r d i f f icul t past. When drawing up the concept of the projec t, we soon real ised we had to open a window to the wor ld outs ide Europe. B ecause, in a g lobal ised wor ld we s imply cannot af ford to be se l f-absorbed, and we cannot understand Europe only f rom within. The ex ternal perspec t ive, in th is case the Indian one, was needed to understand the complex i ssue of the ’Promised Ci t ies’ that ex is ts today.

SV. What in your opinion does the city promise? Does the city fulfil its promise?MS. The city not only al lows us to project different wishes and ideas but also provokes us into doing so: be it the pressing need to earn a l ivel ihood and secure the sur vival of the family; or to chalk out a f i lm career in Bollywood city; or be it an attempt to break free of tradit ion and experiment with alternative ways of l i fe. A range of different forces unleash their energy from the distance, the metropolis seems l ike a shining star that one must reach out for in order to sur vive or to real ise an individual dream. But the promise of the metropolis is, however, not only the “promise of good for tune” but the outrageous and the unimaginable are also an implicit par t of the premise: the danger of being a spectacular fai lure, the risk of experiencing only the dark side of a metropolis, only

Dr. Marla Stukenberg studied Political Science and German Philology in Freiburg and Frankfurt, Germany. She did her Ph.D. in Political Science in 1992 on the theory of ethnic conflicts, researching the Sikh-conflict in Punjab as a case study. After completing her research, she worked as an editor on the history of non-European countries for German publisher C.H. Beck in Munich. She joined the Goethe-Institut, the German Cultural Institute, in 1999 and was posted in the head office in Munich, in Karachi and in Jakarta, where she was coordinating cultural programs for the region South-East Asia, Australia and New Zealand. Since 2008 she is the Director of the Goethe-Institut at the Max Mueller Bhavan, Mumbai.

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super f icial ly covered by gl itter. To me it is almost as though the promise is vir tually dependant on the possibi l ity of fai lure. Over decay and death, we see the metre -high, brightly i l luminated bil lboard –the promise of luck and good for tune that the megacity hold out to al l those who persevere, who conquer the hosti le l iving space and make it their own.

SV. Berlin, Warsaw and Mumbai. One can understand the interconnected histories of Berlin and Warsaw. How does Mumbai contribute to the project?MS. Berlin and Warsaw are linked by a chequered German-Polish histor y that provides frequent impulses at shor t inter vals for a cultural exchange between the two European cities. The Indian city of Mumbai helps expand the radius of our study of the other city. Mumbai adds aspects to the project which, given their size and range, highlight many of the issues addressed in the project on a scale that would not be possible in Berlin or Warsaw. In the coming decades, Mumbai will continue to be an exemplar y megacity in a globalised world and will cer tainly expand its role as the gateway to the South Asian continent. At the inter face between economic growth and socio-cultural transformation, Mumbai will cer tainly remain one of Asia’s major cities. It is, therefore wor thwhile to look beyond Berlin and Warsaw when engaging with ‘The Promised City’. The discussion about Berlin and Warsaw is also exciting for Mumbai, with the new focus on Warsaw, in par ticular, being new and inspiring.

SV. It is a general observation that ‘ The Promised City ‘project consciously refrains from addressing the physical aspect of the city and focuses more on the experiential aspect. Could you shed light on the reason behind it?MS. In the past, Max Mueller Bhavan Mumbai hosted many projects on urban planning, cityscaping, cultural spaces and architectural issues. Together with our par tner institutions, we raised issues like the inadequate transpor t infrastructure, deficiencies in housing, employment, health care, drinking water, school education and the tremendous lack of public space. And we will continue to look at these issues in for thcoming projects. But under the large umbrella project ‘The Promised City’, as you rightly say, we wanted to focus more on the experiential aspect. Here we wanted to add other aspects, star ting from the fact that Mumbai is India’s largest, most modern and most populous metropolitan area besides being the largest migration hub in the countr y: over 50 per cent of its population are migrants, making Mumbai a melting pot of the subcontinent’s different cultures. Why do so many people migrate into Mumbai ever yday? How do they cope with the above mentioned deficiencies? How do people shape their city? We have to ask such questions, define the driving forces behind the recent developments in today’s global cities and take those experiences and obser vations into consideration when working on the physical aspect of the city as city planners or architects. The two have to go hand in hand to make a difference. The city is an idea and a place.

SV. ‘ The Promised City ’ project brings together diverse mediums and produced a variety of works and ideas. What according to you is a common thread connecting all these works?MS. Ar tists, curators and academicians from Germany, India and Poland have developed various new creative productions. All of which are interdisciplinar y and evolve around subjects of dreams, illusions, and promises of modern metropolises. These completely diverse works of different ar t genres and from various cities reveal that the promise of a city goes beyond the personal, and structures the society. The correlations between migration, consumerism, architecture and city planning unfold in the various works. They, therefore, hold the key to comprehension of our cohabitation in the metropolises of this world.

SV. When the initiative originated, what were your initial expectations regarding the outcome of the project? MS. Our initial expectation was that we wanted to highlight the issue of ‘cross-boundaries’ through a ver y wide range of perspectives and bring out new experiences, new ideas and new international networks. We wanted to contribute to a better understanding of what megacities consist of, if we look at them from an experiential perspective.

SV. How did you see the people in these three cities engage with the project?MS. We saw a tremendous interest and engagement of people in all the three cities, as well as from the media. Many people attended almost all the events and we could reach out to a larger public. There were many discussions; people came up with their wishes and interests, for example, they asked us to repeat the film screenings, or to show the photo exhibition once again. It seems that the issues raised were of the people’s individual concerns, not foreign, not abstract to them. It made people more interested to look at their city more consciously.

SV. ‘ The Promised City ’ project ends this month. What impact did the project have? How do you want to take the project further?MS. ‘The Promised Cit y ’ has given a big impetus for new approaches, points of v iew and issues that have emerged. The ar t ist ic exchange has created last ing net works and contac ts that can be used by the individuals involved either in future projec ts or even outs ide the inst i tut ional f ramework . The interest thus aroused for the other c i t y wil l cer tainly help create and advance other projec ts and ideas. The projec t therefore has the potential to be the foundation stone for fur ther developments. In the for thcoming ‘Germany Year’ in India (2011-12), we wil l continue to look at urban issues and use the experiences made during ‘The Promised Cit y ’ projec t. The sustainabi l i t y of the projec t is one of our key concerns.

To read more about project, refer to the article titled ‘ The Promised City ’.