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This paper is about my personal experience in the communicating (in) the city course. The paper highlights how we can communicate, explore, sense, listen, walk, experience, feel the city in a different and unusual way.
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Communicating (in) the city of Aarhus Maps, hybrid space, audio‐stand, .walk and mis‐guide
Artini Chiara 20097355
Communicating (in) the city Lone Koefoed Hansen
June 2010
University of Aarhus Aesthetic department
Table of contents
Introduction .................................................................................................................3
Mapping the city (ASSIGNMENT N°2 – SUBJECTIVE MAP OF AARHUS) .......................4
Cities and hybrid spaces (ASSIGNMENT 3 – HYBRID SPACE) ........................................5
Listen to the city (ASSIGNMENT N°4 – AUDIO STAND) ................................................6
Walk in the city (ASSIGNMENT N°5 – CREATE AND PERFORM A .WALK and swap with
another group) .............................................................................................................7
Guide through a Mis‐Guide (ASSIGNMENT N°6 – CREATE A MIS‐GUIDE TO AARHUS) 9
Conclusions ..................................................................................................................9
References..................................................................................................................11
Appendix ....................................................................................................................12
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Introduction In this paper my personal experience in the communicating (in) the city course shall be discussed.
To this end I will relate to what I came across and learnt throughout this course, which was its
main purpose and how theory and practical activities are linked together.
First of all I would like to point out that all the six assignments ‐ excluding the first one that was
just a presentation of myself ‐ are connected together by a unique aim that is to communicate,
explore, sense, listen, walk, experience, feel the city in a different and unusual way.
In this sense the aim of the course was to discover how people can experience and communicate
in and the city, also with the use of technology.
This fundamental aim is based on the Situationist International theory, that it is a radical art and
political group formed in the 1957. “The group’s primary concern was with contestation and revolt
in a variety of forms.” (Pinder 1996, p. 413) They gave their attention to the urban setting,
developing theories related to the perception of it. They developed the concept of
“psychogeography”, “situation” and the “dérive”. All these concepts are useful to explain and let
us understand how is it possible to perceive and experience the city in an unusual way.
As it has been mentioned above in this paper I will directly start with talking about the second
assignment, and I will continue describing the rest of my assignments. I will explain how these
assignments could be useful to rediscover and communicate (in) the city – especially in the city of
Aarhus ‐, with the aid of different maps, technology, sounds, walks and mis‐guides.
The most important theories are used to describe my assignments and the connection with the
course. I sum up my assignments in a portfolio that is to be found in the appendix.
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Mapping the city (ASSIGNMENT N°2 – SUBJECTIVE MAP OF AARHUS)
How can we communicate (in) the city? How can we explore the city? The composition of the
urban setting can reshape and modify our daily lives and our perception of the city. We can find
different ways to perceive and explore the city.
In the course of time lots of artists and groups become more and more interested about this sort
of things. The Situationist International, as previously mentioned, was the most prominent group
in these arguments, they especially developed theories to better understand how it is possible to
explore and study the city in different ways
One of these theories it is about Psychogeography. Psychogeograhy is “the study of the precise
laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, whether consciously organised or not,
on the emotions and behaviour of individuals.” (Debord 1955, p. 8)
Situationists wanted to explore how psychogeograpy can change the emotions of people when
interacting with the urban setting. In this sense “the situationists argued that maps and techniques
of mapping could play a particularly important role in its development, contributing to the tasks of
studying the city and of exploring the possibilities for change.” (Pinder 1996, p.415)
According to this we can talk about maps well different from the ordinary and officially know ones.
These maps are not abstract but rather they have specific aims and purposes, they want to
stimulate the exploration of the city.
This kind of mapping refers to the subverting cartography, that is a practice designating the
reinterpretation/creation of unusual maps. As David Pinder said “‘subverting cartography’ should
therefore be taken in a double sense: it refers to attempts to both subvert existing maps and
cartographic conventions, and to produce other subversive maps and forms of cartography.”
(Pinder 1996, 406)
According to this theory Pinder refers to the Situationist International, theory of psychogeography
and situation, referring to Guy Debord1 in particular.
Subversive Maps are tools made to stimulate social change, to explore the city, to experience it in
a different way and to discover new places; in this sense when you explore the city you can create
‘situations’ that allow the continuously renegotiation, recreation and reappropriation of the
environment. In fact as situationists affirm you can have different perspectives of the city caused
by the mixture of ambiences (e.g. Elegant and poor streets). This is possible through the practice
1 A prominent member of the situationist’s group
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of the dérive that is “a technique of rapid passage through varied ambiences. Derives involve
playful constructive behaviour and awareness of psychogeographical effects” (Debord 1958, p.62)
In according to what situationists said in my second assignment (appendix, p. 13) I created a
subjective map of Aarhus, which is meanwhile also a subversive map.
Yet from the definition of “subjective map” we can easily understand that we are dealing with
something far from the official concept of mapping. As a matter of fact subjectivity means that you
can decide what you want to be mapped. Something that could be interesting, hidden or unusual
for you. This way, you can make your personal representation of the city.
I created an ecological map of Aarhus that reporting just a part of the urban downtown and his
surroundings. I mapped the recycle bins that I found near the downtown of Aarhus. I highlighted
something that we usually don’t find in an ordinary and objective map, and I pointed out
something that generally isn’t in the gaze of people and dwellers and that usually could result as
banal and not relevant, but that in my opinion has got an interesting meaning.
Apart from the fact that I like ecological matters, this map was a tool for me to discover new parts
of Aarhus and to pay attention to hidden things and places that maybe I wouldn’t have ever seen
or visited if I had used an ordinary map. This subjective path allows me to discover the city in a
different and unique way and lets me experience Aarhus. I did not choose my itinerary previously,
I simply discovered the city of Aarhus by trying to find something that was interesting for me
(recycle bins).
Hence I could affirm ‐ according to situationists theory ‐ that I can experience the city of Aarhus in
different ways through the practice of subjective mapping and of the dérive: passing through
different parts of the city I can explore the city having different feelings.
Cities and hybrid spaces (ASSIGNMENT 3 – HYBRID SPACE)
We can communicate the city and also communicate in the city, and also technology helps to
communicate in different ways. Today we are immersed both in physical and digital space, and
their combination gives us the possibility to communicate with other people and purchase lots of
information also passing through different cities. Mobile devices and internet connection allow us
to be always on and change the way we can perceive the urban environment. Users don’t notice
the distinction between what is physical and what is digital, they “do not have the feeling of
‘entering’ the Internet, or being immersed in digital spaces”(de Souza e Silva 2006, p.263). Every
environment characterised by these features is an hybrid space. According to De Souza e Silva
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definition (2006, p. 262) “hybrid spaces are mobile spaces, created by the constant movement of
users who carry portable devices continuously connected to the Internet and to other users”.
In addition “hybrid spaces merge the physical and the digital in a social environment created by
the mobility of users connected via mobile technology devices.” (de Souza e Silva 2006, p.263)
In my third assignment (appendix, p. 14) I chose an augmented reality browser as an example of
hybrid space, called Layar. With which it is fundamentally possible, to see some new information
of the physical space looking through you phone camera, such as every kind of interesting points
like restaurants, shops, tourist attractions and so on.
In augmented reality data are overlaid to reality and change dynamically in relation to your
movements, especially if you use a device like a mobile phone.
Layar is a very good example of hybrid space, because you have access to the internet, through a
mobile space with which you can purchase information ‐ overlaid on buildings, streets, squares
and so on ‐ every time and everywhere. It allows you to explore the city being simultaneously
immersed in physical and digital space. In this sense we can communicate in cities and cities
communicates back to us through the physical and digital mixture, allowing a different perception
of it. You can think to use this kind of browser also as a tool to explore the city of Aarhus.
The only element that this example lacks is sociability. We could think about sociability in case in
which it is possible to discover information added by users, related to hidden places in browsers
like this. In this sense not only our perception of the city would change in another different way
but also we could contribute to change other people’s urban perception.
Listen to the city (ASSIGNMENT N°4 – AUDIO STAND)
Not only can we perceive and explore the city with our eyes, but also with our hears.
During the years soundscape is changing. Especially industrial revolution have contributed to
produce new sounds and a lo‐fi soundscape, in which “individual acoustic signals are obscured in
an over‐dense population of sounds.” (Shafer 1973, p. 25)
Nowadays we have a mixture of natural sounds, human sounds and tools and technological
sounds (Shafer 1973).
Around us there is a significant amount of noise, provoked by cars, people, bells, trains and so
forth; we are used to ignore those sounds, trying to mask those noises with music, or even
building walls that delimitate and isolate us from the noise. (Shafer, 1973)
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The change of the soundscape induce to a forgetfulness of what surround us, we are no longer
able to perceive all these sounds, especially natural sounds, such as rain and sea, because they are
mixed with the city noise.
For these reason many artists record noise of every day life or perform with it, like John Cage in his
work “4’33” (1952) or Bill Fontana in his Sound Island (1994). They are trying let people to
understand, pay attention and appreciate sounds that are missing and forgetting in the urban
setting whit the help of a performance. (Butler, 2006)
Another famous example is Janet Cardiff’s audio‐walk, The missing voice. It is an audio story
guided by a narrator mixed with sounds of every day life. This allow you to experience the city, pay
attention of what happen to your surroundings, and create/imagine scenarios and stories through
the mixture of reality and fiction (Pinder, 2001). This can carry a different and unique perception
of the city through sounds.
According to what I said above what I tried to do with my fourth assignment (appendix, p. 15) was
to communicate a place that I like in Aarhus through a recording of only 30 seconds. By doing this I
tried to listen carefully to what happened in the city and to background sounds. I chose a little
bar/pub (open at night) where you can listen rock and metal music and while drinking beer. This
kind of place is composed by technological sound, is to say music, and human noise. This two kinds
of sounds are mixed and can give you the experience or the perception to be in a concert because
people sing and constantly raise their voices.
Moreover this kind of audio‐stand could be contextualised in a sound walk or a performance and
can enable a person, according also to what situastionists said, to perceive and explore Aarhus in a
different and unusual way, imaging stories or having different feelings based on what you listen
and what you see.
Walk in the city (ASSIGNMENT N°5 – CREATE AND PERFORM A .WALK and swap
with another group)
According to the concept of psychogeography and the theory of situation and the dérive, many
artists developed many performances as a way to discover, investigate and experience cities in
different ways. As Pinder said , “many activities encouraged different uses of spaces, and sought to
divert or subvert routinized spatial practices.” (Pinder, 2005, 391)
An example of these kind of performances is the Conflux festival (2004), an event that aims at
exploring the geography of the city through artistic performances. (Pinder, 2005) “This includes
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practices of studying, representing and telling stories about cities; it also involves ways of sensing,
feeling and experiencing their spaces differently, and with contesting ‘proper’ orderings of space to
allow something ‘other’ to emerge.” (Pinder 2005, p. 386‐387)
What I want to suggest is that another way to explore the city is by performing walks, that are not
like simple strolls. Walks allow you to discover, explore, investigate city in unusual way. As Iain
Sinclair said “walking is the best way to explore and exploit the city” (Sinclair, Lights out for the
territory, p. 4.)
Walking in the city allow to create situations, passing by different zones of the city, discovering
hidden places. Through the practice of the walk you can ascribe a new meaning to the city and you
can create “norms about how urban space is framed and represented, and where they may help to
open up other possibilities.” (Pinder, 2005, p. 385)
When you perform a walk your path is not always random, or casual. It is possible to follow a
script or an ‘algorithmic walking’. This kind of walk includes some pattern that you have to follow.
In this sense my fifth assignment (appendix, p. 16) refers to a ‘.walk’. In a group of three we
decided the code of the walk, made by three instruction (2nd street right,
1st street left after you see an "Å" somewhere, Turn over 180° after you hear
some heel ticking) and we performed this for one hour from a starting point (Aarhus station)
that we had decided. Afterwards we performed the .walk of another group.
Our //Å + ticking heels .walk and the other //Ah, Brown!!! .walk were tools to discover
new things, like pieces of urban art or some colourful building, in the city of Aarhus and live a
different experience. In our walk we paid attention also to the sound that surround us.
But Is there something that can influence our walks? The contemporary city is ‘scripted’, in the
sense that is formed by analogical and digital script. The script is something written that ascribe
meaning in a place. Scripted space “denotes an urban experience scripted through architecture,
visual media, signs, and semiotics”(Christian Ulrik 2010). In this sense we can say that also scripted
space contribute to give meaning to the geography of the city and in the case of a walk, like ours,
can carry a different perception of the city. One of our walk instruction was: 1st street left
after you see an "Å" somewhere. The "Å" is an analogical scripting that influence our .walk
so our perception of Aarhus.
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Guide through a Mis‐Guide (ASSIGNMENT N°6 – CREATE A MIS‐GUIDE TO AARHUS)
I described new ways allowing different perception, experience and exploration of a city. How it is
possible to communicate (in) the city with the help of maps, technology, audio and walk.
The last thing that I want to highlight now, but not with less importance, is about guides, in
particular about mis‐guides.
Guides on a general basis give the possibility to people to visit and explore the city. They suggest
places to visit, interesting points, route to follow, usually they supply a map.
Along all this paper I talk about different ways to explore the city and the Mis‐guide is another
answer that allow this. Mis‐guide is like a guide but only in the form. Yet from the first part of the
word ‘Mis’ we can understand that we are dealing with something different, unusual to the
normal guide (Fiona Wilkie, 2007). “Mis‐guide gives you the ways to see your city or environment
that no one else has found yet. A mis guide is both a forged passport to your ‘other city’ and a new
way of travelling a very familiar one” (Wrights & Sites). “It suggests a series of walks and points of
observation and contemplation within a particular town, city or landscape” (Wrights & Sites).
People can become performers and contribute to give meaning to their (or another) city. They can
discover unknown or hidden places and perceive the city in different ways. In this sense the mis‐
guide refers again to the theory of the ‘derive’ and the ‘situation’ of Guy Debord.
In my sixth and last assignment (appendix, p. 30) I developed a mis‐guide of Aarhus. I found
something that for me is characteristic in Aarhus and can stimulate the discovery of the city. I
noticed that in the streets you can find many pieces of furniture. So thinking about the idea of
“urban homestanding project”2, my concept is about “furnishing”. The aim is to find pieces of
furniture in the city (that usually are to be found in the outskirts) and tick them on a list. It is also
possible to stop for five minutes and reflect on what happen around you. This is a good way to
reinterpret and experiencing cities, can guide you to rediscover the environment surroundings in a
unusual way.
Conclusions
Along this paper I suggest ways that allow to communicate (in) the city in unusual ways, speaking
especially of my experience in Aarhus. According to situastionist’s theories you can perceive and
rethink to your city, you can reimagine and gives a new meaning to the geography of your (or
other) city.
2 See more: http://urbanhomesteadingproject.wordpress.com/
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To sum up I can say that all these assignments contribute to communicate (in) the urban
environment, also through the use of technology. I believe that the mis‐guide represents the
summary of all these assignments. In a mis‐guide you can find walks, suggestion on the use of
technology for a particular aim that let you to do something in the city, you can find maps, codes
to follow or instruction that ask you to pay attention to your acoustic surroundings.
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References Andersen, Christian Ulrik and Pold, Søren (2010). “The Scripted Spaces of Urban Ubiquitous Computing” Butler, Toby (2006), “A walk of art: the potential of the sound walk as practice in cultural geography”, Social & Cultural Geography, 7 (6), 889 ‐ 908. Crampton, Jeremy W. & John Krygier (2006), “An Introduction to Critical Cartography”, ACME: An International E‐Journal for Critical Geographies, 4 (1), 11‐33 Debord, Guy‐Ernest (2006 [1955]+[1958]+[1959]), “Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography” + “Theory of the Dérive” + “Détournement as Negation and Prelude”, in Ken Knabb (ed.), Situationist International anthology (Berkeley, Calif.: Bureau of Public Secrets), 8‐12+62‐66+67‐68 de Souza e Silva, Adriana (2006), “From Cyber to Hybrid: Mobile Technologies as Interfaces of Hybrid Spaces”, Space and Culture, 9 (3), 261‐78. Fiona Wilkie’s review of "Mis‐guide to Anywhere" PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art. PAJ 86 (Volume 29, Number 2), May 2007 Mort, Frank (1998), “Cityscapes : Consumption, Masculinities and the Mapping of London since 1950”, Urban Studies, 35 (5‐6), 889‐907 (FC) Pinder, David. 2005. “Arts of urban exploration”. In Cultural Geographies vol. 12, no. 4. SAGE, 383‐411. Pinder, David (2001), “Ghostly Footsteps: Voices, Memories and Walks in the City”, Cultural Geographies, 8 (1), 1‐19. Pinder, D. (1996), “Subverting cartography: the situationists and maps of the city”, Environment and Planning A, 28 (3), 405‐27 Schafer, R. Murray (1973), “The music of the environment”, Cultures, 1 (1), 15‐51. Wrights & Sites “A misguide to anywhere” http://www.mis‐guide.com/mg.html
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Appendix
Portfolio
ASSIGNMENT N° 1 ‐ PRESENTATION OF MYSELF
Hi I'm Chiara and I'm 23.
I come from italy (Tuscany) where I study Interaction Design (University of Siena).
I'm passionate about design, technologies, cinema (especially cartoons and comedies), music (rock
and metal), cooking (many people say to me that I'm a good cook), traveling and visiting cities, but
about shopping too.
I'm an erasmus student and for 5 months I will be here in Aarhus :‐).
I'm interested to this course because i think it's important for my studies, and because I'm
interested in urban spaces, interactive spaces and communicating (in) the city thematics. What I
expect from this course is to improve my knowledge about this field of study: people
communicate each other, discover cities and places, urban communication, interactive
installations and spaces, green power, environmental sustainability.
Hej Hej!!
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ASSIGNMENT N°2 ‐ SUBJECTIVE MAP OF AARHUS
As I wrote in my profile description one of my interest is about the environmental sustainability, so
when I arrived in Aarhus two weeks ago, one of the firts things that I noticed was the attention
that this city gives to the environmental sustainability. An organised well recycling system, that is
completely different form Italy (so bad!!!!). Every contanainer is semi‐buried to ensure that waste
does not clutter up the city.
I mapped places where the recycle cointainers are. As you can see I used the recycle logo to map
the three type of containers:
‐ waste (brown color)
‐ paper (yellow color)
‐ glass (blue color)
‐ white (to show cases where containers are 2 rather than 3)
I found out that the greatest part of these containers aren't in the very downtown of aarhus, but
immediatly outside.
13
From the connection of all the recycling logos I drew an Aarhus ecostreet, useful for every person
who would like to recycle.
ASSIGNMENT N°3 ‐ HYBRID SPACE
Hybrid Space ‐ Augmented reality browser
Layar augmented reality browser
See the video at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b64_16K2e08&feature=player_embedded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t51fz5FYXso&feature=player_embedded
The Layar augmented reality (or hybrid space/augmented space, reality etc…) browser looks at an
environment through the phone’s camera and overlays data on top of points of interest such as
restaurants, shops and tourist attractions (http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/10/layar‐
iphone/).
Below there is a version of Layar developed by Zehnder Communication for Voodo Experience
Festival in New Orleans (2009).
Through the browser and phone’s camera it was possible to frame the stage and view information
about band outline, lineup of the day, short band biography, and it was also possible pointing at
the rest stop to view day prices and menus. Moreover, by rotating the phone 360°, it was possible
to find toilets, infermiery and emergency exit. (http://www.wired.it/news/archivio/2009‐
11/24/voglio‐una‐realta‐aumentata.aspx)
This example belongs to the second use cathegory (in relation to the technology) of augmented
reality described by Milgram and Colquhoun (1999, pp, 5‐28) is to say "any case in which an
otherwise real environment is augmented by means of virtual (computer graphic) objects.”
The concept of augmented reality in general is related to the meaning of HYBRID SPACE for two
reasons: first of all because it is both immersed in physical and digital space, as de Souza e Silva
says that “users do not perceive physical and digital spaces as separate entities and do not have
the feeling of “entering” the Internet, or being immersed in digital space”. This is possible thanks
to "the mobility of users connected via mobile technology devices"
The second reason is that through your smartphone (i‐phone and android) you can access to it
whenever and wherever you want and collect any kind of information shown in front of your eyes.
14
In fact Manovich says “The flows of information that previously occurred mainly in cyberspace can
now be perceived as flowing into and out of physical space, blurring the borders between both.”
References:
de Souza e Silva, Adriana (2006), “From Cyber to Hybrid: Mobile Technologies as Interfaces of
Hybrid Spaces”, Space and Culture, 9 (3), 261‐78.
Manovich, L. (2002). The poestics of augmented space: Learning from Prada. Retrevied August 16,
2003
ASSIGNMENT N°4 ‐ AUDIO‐STAND
Make an “audio‐stand”. Find a place that you find sonically interesting and communicate it to the
rest of us in a soundbite; max 30 secs.
ESCOBAR at 24.00 on Friday
In you want to listen my audio stand go: http://communicity2010.wdfiles.com/local‐‐files/chiara‐
artini/chiaraartiniescobar.mp3
The place that I choose for my audio‐stand is the ESCOBAR. It's one of my favourite place here in
Aarhus. You can listen good music, rock and metal, and drink good beer. It's a small palce where
they put music at higher volume and it's nice because all people that are inside sing all the time.
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ASSIGNMENT N° 5 ‐ Create and perform a .walk and swap your walk with another group.
Group 2a:
Chiara Artini
Simona Conti
Alessia Vidili
Our .walk:
//Å + ticking heels .walk
repeat for 1 hour
[2nd street right
1st street left after you see an "Å" somewhere
Turn over 180° after you hear some heel ticking]
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.walk performed on April 8th from 16.45 to 17:30
Here it is the map describing our .walk . Each coloured line defines one of the three strings of
code:
‐ 1st string = pink line,
‐ 2nd string = blue line,
‐ 3rd string = green line.
We decided to start our walk from the very downtown (Ryesgade), in front of the railway station….
…the code instructed us to turn right in Rosenkrantzgade…
17
..there we saw an "Å" on a restaurant sign…
…we turned left in Fredensgade and there we saw a Vintage and SecondHand clothes shop that we
never noticed before that..really interesting :) …
18
…we crossed Sønder Allé, but we immediately heard some heels ticking on the street. We turned
over 180° and went back in Fredengsgade…
…then we turned at the second street to the right: again Ryesgade! There we see the second "Å"
in an advertising along the street…
19
…then left in Rådhuspladsen and straight on in Vester Allé untill…
…we heard some shoes heels ticking on the sidewalk near the AROS museum…tick tick…
20
…we went back and turned right in Park Allé and we….
21
…saw again an "å" (lucky us?!)…
…then we turned left in Banegårdsgade and in few seconds we heard again some heels ticking on
the pavement…
…we turned back again…
22
…and we turned right in Frederiks Allé…
23
…immediately sighted an "å" in a pub menù…
…we turned left in Skt. Nicolausgade…
24
…and we walked straight on along the Scandinavian Center…
…and on and on trying to hear someone with heels shoes passing…
25
…but we finally came at the end of Gebauersgade, in front of the railways…no way to go straight,
no pretty woman passing…This "system bug" ended our .walk after 45 minutes and almost 4 loops
of code.
Second part of the assignment:
Walk performed by Group 2a (Simona Conti, Alessia Vidili, Chiara Artini) on april 11th 2010 from 15:30‐16:30
Our performance of //Å + Thicking heels .walk//
26
…we started our .walk in Mejlgade, from the RisRas pub (which is definitely our favourite pub in Århus) and we found out this interesting street art piece…
…then we turned left in this small path that we probably would have never noticed in an ordinary situation…
27
…at about half of our .walk we passed through Norsgade: a tiny pretty street where we noticed some colourful builidings! And then, cheking group 2b's walk we discovered that they have passed through this same street and took a photo of the same houses…
28
…and finally, in Borggade we found out something we had never seen in our entire life: a burnt bin where someone kept throwing a banana skin. So funny!
Observations:
‐ Comparing our .walk perfomance to the one performed by group 2b we noticed that the two
courses are quite similar…starting from our favourite pub and ending almost at the same point (as
group 2b did). Plus, the shape of the two walks are quite similar too.
‐ Even if it was Sunday and we thought that it would have been difficult to see someone wearing
something brown, we were quite surprised to discover that it wasn't true at all!
‐ Finally, sometimes we had some difficulties in following some instructions (like the "go straight
on" one) because the very rigid structure of the city didn't permit it at all. So we set some
strategies to avoid these problems (e.g.: if we can't go straight on for some sort of obstacle, we
decided to choose the closer street in front of us).
29
ASSIGNMENT N° 6 ‐ create a Mis‐guide to Aarhus
Inspired by the “The Urban Homesteading Project”
What I’ve noticed here in Aarhus is that there is a lot of furniture on the street, but not in the main
streets. So i have thought that trying to find something, like pieces of furniture, it could be a good
and unusual way to discover new streets and unknown parts of the city.
The idea of my concept is to find pieces of furniture and tick in the check list on the page. During
your walk if you find a chair you can sit down and relax for 5 minutes watching and reflecting what
happen in the city.
And only for the bravest they could try to collect pieces of furniture and build their favourite room
useful to relax in the city and discover what happen in specific places.
Explore the city in a different way, reflect on what happen around you, see unknown places and
streets, feel the city.
30
My own “communicating (in) the city” experience
1. what is your most memorable experience from this course? It could be with regards to
readings, artworks or your assignments
All the course in its complex has been an interesting and enjoyable experience for me, both
practical and theoretical.
Specifically:
‐ the subjective map of aarhus was really useful for me. I was here only from about two weeks, so
it represented my first step to know and discover the city better in a funny and interesting way.
‐ a.walk (double) was my second step to deepen on the discovery of new and unknown parts of
the city.
This course has contributed a lot in the discovery of certain parts of Aarhus.
2. name the text that you liked the most (or that you learned most from) (or that provoked you
the most). Why?
Fiona Wilkie "Mis‐guide to Anywhere" and Wrights & Sites “A misguide to Exeter”
I like the idea of travelling and discovering cities in a new way, a familiar way. It gives the
possibility to observe, pay attention and discover new parts of the city, new things that you’ve
never noticed in the past.
I like the fact that you could “become partner in ascribing significance to place”. (Wrights & Sites ‐
mis‐guide)
3. name one thing that you have learned from the readings (or, which text did you like the
most? Why?)
The thing that i like the most is the mis‐guide (and the .walk too, the most pages in a mis‐guide
suggest you to do a walk) because I saw it as a sum of all the assigments.
I like the fact that it isn't like a normal guide, that says to you where you can go and what you can
visit.
Only with simple instructions allows you to perceive the city and its environment,and to discover
new places. You have the freedom to choose one instruction or another, every instructions will
give you a different perception of the city, a different experience.
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4. which artwork/artefact/performance presented in class did you like the most (or provoked
you the most). Why?
Sound of Silence ‐ John Cage
it was an experience listen to the silence, that I understood it was not so silent.
The Urban Homesteading Project
it was amazing see how private spaces and practices of the life were brought into the public life. It
was a way for people to experience and tell stories in/about the city, to communicate with
different kinds of inhabitants.
5. what was your reply to the assignments? List them all and think about how to present them –
as a whole – to others; as a collection, what have they contributed with to this course?
‐ assignment 1 Presentation of my self
‐ assignment 2 Subjective map of Aarhus
‐ assignment 3 Hybrid space
‐ assignment 4 Audio‐Stand
‐ assignment 5 (double) a.walk
‐ assignment 6 mis‐guide of Aarhus
I think they are all really useful to understand better the content of the course and theories
related to it.
They are all linked together and they could contribute to the development of a mis‐guide.
6. which assignment do you find most in line with the course content? Why?
I think the most in line with the course content are the subjective map, the .walk and the mis‐
guide. They both allow you to "listen" to the city, explore and walk in the city discovering new
places. The feature of subjectivity contributes and allows you to give and receive specific meanings
related to your city's experience.
