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PUBLIC Issue 43: Suburbs: Contemporary Dwelling in Transition
Publication: March 2011
Abstracts due: July 30th, 2010
PUBLIC: Art / Culture / Ideas is devoting an issue to the theme of “Suburbs: Contemporary Dwelling in Transition.” Writing in 1961, in ‘The City in History’, the critic Lewis Mumford wrote about the utopian aspirations of the modern suburbs. Drawing on the Garden City movement, Mumford envisioned suburbs as an alternative dwelling model to the megalopolis; the suburbs would be self-sustaining communities, the scale of which would be kept in check by their distance to the streetcar stop. With the advent of mass automobile ownership and the reduced cost of house ownership, Mumford lost hope in the suburb’s utopian ideals of harmony and exclusivity. In place of the mass-produced houses of the post-war period, we are now seeing the proliferation of “monster” homes, condominiums, and “new urbanist” villages. In the 21st century, the suburban model remains both valorized and disparaged. The utopian and dystopian articulations of the suburb in post-war media culture have produced powerful cultural imaginaries that have conflated ‘Suburbia’ with generic corollaries like Disneyland, industrial parks, apartment complexes, gated communities, shopping malls, car culture, sprawl and so on. The suburbs are seen as deserts devoid of culture but full of consumption, privatized repressive containers of middle class life. Suburbs and urban sprawl are often used as a shorthand for the erosion of public urban culture and the civitas enabled by face to face encounters in the city.
While there has been work on the demystification of suburbs almost since their inception, we believe that there is a strong need to develop nuanced and grounded understandings of the cultures that grow out of and are embedded in suburban spaces. Urban and place-based cultural researchers need a new vocabulary to describe these complex and differentiated spaces, given that suburbs are at the forefront of urbanization and are highly contested spaces for developers, politicians and environmentalists. Given the gaps, omissions and assumptions about suburban culture in work on the culture of cities, “Suburbs" is an initial foray into new methodologies, artist practices, spatial narratives and research questions for studying these metropolitan spaces: how best could current urban and cultural theory be re-directed to include analyses of suburban cultural communities? What kinds of new research tools, images, aesthetic and political strategies could we develop to engage with place-based cultural phenomena in suburban spaces?
Papers are invited that investigate the current state of suburbs throughout the world. As enclaves that have become crucial to processes of urbanization, this call seeks critical and artistic contributions that consider the state of suburbs, both past and present.
Please send 300 word abstracts to public@yorku.ca by July 30th, 2010. If accepted, final essays will be due October 30th, 2010 PUBLIC, is a peer-reviewed journal based in Toronto, Canada. We welcome a variety of formats, from scholarly essays to more experimental forms of writing and artist projects.
Editors for this issue:
Steven Logan
Graduate Program in Communication and Culture
York University
Janine Marchessault
Canada Research Chair in Art,
Digital Media and Globalization
York University
Michael Prokopow
Associate Professor
Ontario College of Art and Design
PUBLIC Issue 45: Art and Civic Spectacle
Publication: Spring 2012
Abstracts due (250 words): September 2010
Text and project deadline (3-6,000 words): February 1, 2011
With the rise of all-night events such as Nuit Blanche in cities worldwide, large-scale performance and art interventions have gained prominence in the urban context. This special issue of Public will analyze the dynamics and significance of these popular mass events. How do the monumental artworks of city-wide exhibitions relate to the diverse histories of spectacle? Which formal and ideological continuities and discontinuities can be discerned? What are the opportunities and challenges of such events? When audience levels reach into the hundreds of thousands, what issues are raised about spectatorship and participation? The texts in this issue will explore the aesthetic, social and political implications of civic spectacles for contemporary art, audiences and the city. Interdisciplinary perspectives and artists' projects are welcome.
Potential topics:
Edited by Jennifer Fisher and Jim Drobnick Please send proposal, c.v. and bio to: jefish@yorku.ca and jim@displaycult.com
Publication: March 2011
Abstracts due: July 30th, 2010
PUBLIC: Art / Culture / Ideas is devoting an issue to the theme of “Suburbs: Contemporary Dwelling in Transition.” Writing in 1961, in ‘The City in History’, the critic Lewis Mumford wrote about the utopian aspirations of the modern suburbs. Drawing on the Garden City movement, Mumford envisioned suburbs as an alternative dwelling model to the megalopolis; the suburbs would be self-sustaining communities, the scale of which would be kept in check by their distance to the streetcar stop. With the advent of mass automobile ownership and the reduced cost of house ownership, Mumford lost hope in the suburb’s utopian ideals of harmony and exclusivity. In place of the mass-produced houses of the post-war period, we are now seeing the proliferation of “monster” homes, condominiums, and “new urbanist” villages. In the 21st century, the suburban model remains both valorized and disparaged. The utopian and dystopian articulations of the suburb in post-war media culture have produced powerful cultural imaginaries that have conflated ‘Suburbia’ with generic corollaries like Disneyland, industrial parks, apartment complexes, gated communities, shopping malls, car culture, sprawl and so on. The suburbs are seen as deserts devoid of culture but full of consumption, privatized repressive containers of middle class life. Suburbs and urban sprawl are often used as a shorthand for the erosion of public urban culture and the civitas enabled by face to face encounters in the city.
While there has been work on the demystification of suburbs almost since their inception, we believe that there is a strong need to develop nuanced and grounded understandings of the cultures that grow out of and are embedded in suburban spaces. Urban and place-based cultural researchers need a new vocabulary to describe these complex and differentiated spaces, given that suburbs are at the forefront of urbanization and are highly contested spaces for developers, politicians and environmentalists. Given the gaps, omissions and assumptions about suburban culture in work on the culture of cities, “Suburbs" is an initial foray into new methodologies, artist practices, spatial narratives and research questions for studying these metropolitan spaces: how best could current urban and cultural theory be re-directed to include analyses of suburban cultural communities? What kinds of new research tools, images, aesthetic and political strategies could we develop to engage with place-based cultural phenomena in suburban spaces?
Papers are invited that investigate the current state of suburbs throughout the world. As enclaves that have become crucial to processes of urbanization, this call seeks critical and artistic contributions that consider the state of suburbs, both past and present.
Please send 300 word abstracts to public@yorku.ca by July 30th, 2010. If accepted, final essays will be due October 30th, 2010 PUBLIC, is a peer-reviewed journal based in Toronto, Canada. We welcome a variety of formats, from scholarly essays to more experimental forms of writing and artist projects.
Editors for this issue:
Steven Logan
Graduate Program in Communication and Culture
York University
Janine Marchessault
Canada Research Chair in Art,
Digital Media and Globalization
York University
Michael Prokopow
Associate Professor
Ontario College of Art and Design
PUBLIC Issue 45: Art and Civic Spectacle
Publication: Spring 2012
Abstracts due (250 words): September 2010
Text and project deadline (3-6,000 words): February 1, 2011
With the rise of all-night events such as Nuit Blanche in cities worldwide, large-scale performance and art interventions have gained prominence in the urban context. This special issue of Public will analyze the dynamics and significance of these popular mass events. How do the monumental artworks of city-wide exhibitions relate to the diverse histories of spectacle? Which formal and ideological continuities and discontinuities can be discerned? What are the opportunities and challenges of such events? When audience levels reach into the hundreds of thousands, what issues are raised about spectatorship and participation? The texts in this issue will explore the aesthetic, social and political implications of civic spectacles for contemporary art, audiences and the city. Interdisciplinary perspectives and artists' projects are welcome.
Potential topics:
- Nuit Blanche (Paris, Toronto, Brussels, Rome, etc.)
- historical precedents to Nuit Blanche
- city-sponsored art events (e.g., art at the Olympic games, city centennials)
- the potentials and problems of civic spectacle
- mass audiences for art
- aesthetics and the public sphere
- nocturnal flânerie and psychogeography
- civic boosterism and tourism
- public art and urban regeneration
- interventions and spatial politics
- participatory art and democracy/citizenship
- temporary architectures and projections in the cityscape
- the role of art in the urban experience
- curatorial practice and large-scale events
- notable artistic examples of monumental artworks/performances
Edited by Jennifer Fisher and Jim Drobnick Please send proposal, c.v. and bio to: jefish@yorku.ca and jim@displaycult.com