Mapping and Games: Experimental Participatory Research
Our workshop incorporated non-traditional ideas of mapping and games, using them as processes of investigation and to create interactive, educational outputs.
Category Archives: moscow
Body, Borders, & the City
Videos from the bodies and borders investigation at Kurskaya station:
Bodies Under the Bridge
It seems inevitable that an investigation on invisible borders would bring one to encounter the self and the body as the ultimate boundary control center.
Invisible Borders: Presentation + Performance
A presentation, interactive exhibit and performances emerging from the Invisible Borders Workshop hosted at the Strelka Institute, examining unseen borders (urban, social and mythical) in Moscow.
Research Simulator: The Kremlin’s Invisible Borders
In the past, all of the main public functions of the city were concentrated at the Kremlin. Despite the fact that the Tsar’s residence was also located there, city residents had free access to spaces within the walls.
Research Simulator: Red October
A high-profile site in the heart of Moscow with a rich legacy of manufacturing, in recent years it has emerged as a hub of media, arts and culture.
Research Simulator: Slavyanski Mir
A vibrant market on the edge of Moscow (and a gateway between the old and new city), preceded by a history of markets as contested ethnic enclaves and informal economy networks. Slavyanskiy Mir represents a bordered yet borderless world on the edge of Moscow.
Research Simulator: Kurskaya Station
A gateway to Moscow located on the site of its former historic walls, the area around Kurskaya station is a great place for observational studies and to understand the impact of planning and architectural borders.
Typology of Borders in Slavyanskiy Mir
Slavyanskiy Mir is filled with a variety of visible and invisible borders between spaces, people, and goods. many of these boundaries are quite visible at the human scale, such as this permeable boundary of informally placed stones. Others are less visible. Here are a list of borders identified form our site visit.
Day 6: Mapping Slavyanskiy Mir
As part of our collaborative investigation of Slavyanskiy Mir on the 9th, we’re creating a map of the market and starting a Slavyanskiy Mir page on Wikipedia.
Day 5: Understanding Slavyanskiy Mir
Our field visit to Slavyanskiy Mir revealed a place quite different from what we experience within the center or even the MKAD borders of Moscow. It exists in stark contrast to nearby global shopping markets which are also like mini cities, like Ashaan, IKEA, and Stockmann.
Day 4: Learning about Slavyanskiy Mir
Today we zeroed in on a case study for our workshop – the Slavyanskiy Mir market, cafe and bus terminal eco system which lies just beyond the outer limits of Moscow, accessible by bus from metro Tyopliy Stan.
Shadow Empire
Evgeniya Nedosekina’s comprehensive research of the former Cherkizovsky market, which opened after the fall of the Soviet Union and operated as one of the largest informal markets – perhaps in the world.
Investigating Border Stories in Slavyanskiy Mir: Site Visit on July 9
Slavyanskiy Mir is an informal, partially open air market and bus station in Moscow. It sits at the “border” of what is considered old and new Moscow.
Day 3: The Networked Trace of Urban Border Crossers
In identifying the sets of invisible urban borders, we came to see the important role of personal experiences crossing borders, thresholds, divides in the city. Urban borders are not self-evident in the built environment as they are on maps. The boundaries become visible through personal experience, border stories reveal the hidden lines.
Invisible Borders Lab @ Strelka :: July 11-15
Invisible Borders Lab is a 5-day co-design, performance and learning experience hosted at the Strelka Institute, examining unseen borders (urban, social and mythical) in Moscow. Participants will investigate people’s perceptions of borders in the city through techniques such as urban mapping, social research, game design, location-based digital narratives, social network analysis, visualization, dance and performance.
Day 2: Perceptions of a ‘Real’ Muscovites
Marijka Semenenko shared her investigation surrounding the relationship between nationality and the state. Her research focused on the Friendship University in Yugozapadnaya.
Day 2: Ethnic Cafes and Social Borders
Moscow is a city without ethnic enclaves, but it has ethnic nodes in the form of local cafe communities. Anna Rocheva has been working with a team to study migrants’ perceptions of Moscow.
Day 2: Memory and Historic Borders
Natalia Melikova shared the Constructivist Project whose mission is “to raise awareness of the threat to cultural heritage and to promote the preservation of avant-garde monuments.”
Day 2: Courtyard Boundaries
Petr V. Ivanov of the Higher School of Economics shared his experience studying courtyards using a hand-drawn visual.
Day 2: The Borders in Moscow and Those that Cross Them
In the second day of our workshop, we fleshed out the list of borders in the city and sorted them into categories. Afterwards, we identified the themes that interlink and influence the visibility of these borders.
the path to a work permit in Moscow
In this video, a migrant worker documents just one of the sites of friction that is encountered along the path to a work permit in Moscow. For citizens of the CIS, the “simplified procedure” to attain a work visa involves crossing many urban borders.
The Wrong Move
Artist: Dima Fillipov, Moscow Based on personal experience of almost every human process, overcoming the distance from home to school, is almost the only time spent alone with him, and out of the zone of influence. Of course, as a rule, children are attending groups, but sometimes there are moments of loneliness.
The Border Line Effect
20 years after the fall of the Soviet Union several young directors come to the borders of previously united countries. Their personal stories dedicated to people, who find a way to remain united, despite the new borders.
The Drawing of Our Lives (2011)
The Drawing of Our Lives, Dan Berlin 2003-2011 A project documenting their movement patterns in daily life for 10 years, using GPS.
Here-now-There-now
Art project of two Moscow based artists looking at their mental and physical borders in contrast to the city of their origin – Yekaterinburg.
Exhibition “Frontier” in Moscow
Science art as an area of complex investigation that leads humanity to a new world view. Art/artist has the ability to enter the territory of the experiment science of trial and error.
Bodies in Urban Space
“Bodies in urban spaces” is a performance intervention which tries to uncover and challenge restrictions to movement and behavior in the city.
Day 1: The Borders We Cross
Great start to the workshop, with discussions about concepts and perceptions surrounding borders. We found a lot of interesting contrasts rooted in language and in culture, leading us to conclude that visible and invisible borders are highly socially constructed which need to be tactically addressed in context specific ways.
Personal Boundaries
Imponderabilia (1977) was a collaborative performance by artist Marina Abramovic and Ulay, in which they flanked the entrance to the Galleria Communale d’Arte Moderna in Bologna, Italy—completely nude.