Nov 2010 Let's Partner

NOV 2010 VOL 24 (3)

Focus: Design & Informal Cities

18 IA&B - NOV 2010

Oblique Investigations 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’.

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.

SV. Tell us more about ‘The Promised City’ project. How did the initiative originate?

MS. At the beginning, two European cities were in the spotlight of ‘The Promised City’ project: Berlin and Warsaw, virtual neighbours in the heart of Europe, two major poles in that part of Europe. These two cities are different, but they also have a lot in common. Both are lively cities which need to come to terms with their difficult past. When drawing up the concept of the project, we soon realised we had to open a window to the world outside Europe. Because, in a globalised world we simply cannot afford to be self-absorbed, and we cannot understand Europe only from within. The external perspective, in this case the Indian one, was needed to understand the complex issue of the ’Promised Cities’ that exists today.

SV. What in your opinion does the city promise? Does the city fulfil its promise?

MS. The city not only allows us to project different wishes and ideas but also provokes us into doing so: be it the pressing need to earn a livelihood and secure the survival of the family; or to chalk out a film career in Bollywood city; or be it an attempt to break free of tradition and experiment with alternative ways of life. A range of different forces unleash their energy from the distance, the metropolis seems like a shining star that one must reach out for in order to survive or to realise an individual dream. But the promise of the metropolis is, however, not only the “promise of good fortune” but the outrageous and the unimaginable are also an implicit part of the premise: the danger of being a spectacular failure, the risk of experiencing only the dark side of a metropolis, only

let’s partner

superficially covered by glitter. To me it is almost as though the promise is virtually dependant on the possibility of failure. Over decay and death, we see the metre-high, brightly illuminated billboard –the promise of luck and good fortune that the megacity hold out to all those who persevere, who conquer the hostile living 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 history that provides frequent impulses at short intervals 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 exemplary megacity in a globalised world and will certainly expand its role as the gateway to the South Asian continent. At the interface between economic growth and socio-cultural transformation, Mumbai will certainly remain one of Asia’s major cities. It is, therefore worthwhile 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 particular, 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 partner institutions, we raised issues like the inadequate transport 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 forthcoming 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, starting from the fact that Mumbai is India’s largest, most modern and most populous metropolitan area besides being the largest migration hub in the country: 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 everyday? 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 observations 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. Artists, curators and academicians from Germany, India and Poland have developed various new creative productions. All of which are interdisciplinary and evolve around subjects of dreams, illusions, and promises of modern metropolises. These completely diverse works of different art 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 very 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 City’ has given a big impetus for new approaches, points of view and issues that have emerged. The artistic exchange has created lasting networks and contacts that can be used by the individuals involved either in future projects or even outside the institutional framework. The interest thus aroused for the other city will certainly help create and advance other projects and ideas. The project therefore has the potential to be the foundation stone for further developments.

In the forthcoming ‘Germany Year’ in India (2011-12), we will continue to look at urban issues and use the experiences made during ‘The Promised City’ project. The sustainability of the project is one of our key concerns.

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