The 6th March we will participate in the MA Programme in Social Practice and the Creative Environment, Limerick School of Art & Design, Ireland.

From 10a.m to 6p.m. we will be talking, working, arguing, fighting and questioning with and against the MA students for Module 3 of the MA programme.

We will test their capacity to see the things in a different way: lateral thinking, participation, creativity, to sincronize local resource, …and a quite long etc!

If you are near by Limerick please: join us!

We promise it will be fun.

INHABITED BANGKOK with INHABITED PLASTIC BAGS
Proposal for an urban intervention in Bangkok by Basurama.
14th – 28th November 2012 on the BACC forecourt, Bangkok. Thailand.

Context
The plastic bag, a daily symbol of consumerism, will be the starting point of the project and the raw material to generate different artistic discourses. The interventions will highlight the existent duality of CONSUME / TRASH and its social and environmental impact.

According to the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration, more than 600,000 plastic bags are used in the city every day. Most of them will be eventually converted into waste in approximately 12 to 20 minutes. However, to be biodegraded a plastic bag could take between 15 to 1000 years.

Its annual disposal costs more than 600 million baht (18.5 million US$), according to Bangkok administration.

Be aware of these data and make them accessible and visible to citizens is essential to understand how people is related to consume, to their environment and the city in which they live.

Inflatable bubble monster made out of plastics discarded during the mounting of the  Istanbul 2012 Design Biennial.

Installation for the Istanbul Design Biennial 2012 at the Galata Greek School.

The Bubble was not actually designed, its shape came out of the plastics actually available at the biennial when we arrived and the courtyard provided to be exhibited.

It is inflatedonly using twodomestic fans.

The same techniques and materials used to package and wrap were used to build the bubble, allowing us to finish it in one day work and for only a 10€ cost.Taking care of waste is an act of love that transforms it into something desirable instead of deplorable.

Using waste for building the bubble was a way of proposing a new way of looking at the biennale. No one thought about the waste as waste, not paying attention to it when discarding, neither once collected to be used as building material.

The bubble was projected to be used as an urban intervention dispositif. We invite anyone explore this tecnhique, improve it and use it for that purpose or others. Is cheap, easy and very available, since  about 300 million plastic bags are discarded in Istanbul every year.

You can see a gallery with photos of the installation.

This Thursday July 19th at 2.30pm we’ll be organizing a hands on workshop in the Guggenheim Lab in Berlin, Germany.

Join in as we collaboratively confront our own trash by dismantling and analyzing individual pieces of locally sourced products and trash with the help of scales, databases, and waste-management data.

More info on the hashtag in Twitter: #dissectwaste

The workshop is a collaboration with Dietmar Offenhuber.

We all think we know what our waste looks like, but, in fact, a large part of it is invisible. Uncover and visualize the hidden processes and consequences associated with individual waste objects. Consider an apple, which apparently has no waste at all. However, if we count the bag in which we carry it home, the paper towel that we use to dry it, and the crate that is used to store and transport it, the footprint of that consumable item is much greater than it seems. Join in as we collaboratively confront our own trash by dismantling and analyzing individual pieces of locally sourced trash with the help of scales, barcode readers, open-source databases, and waste-management data.

After two weeks of hard work in El Cairo, the interventions in public space will begin next Sunday, July 1^st.

July 1st and 2nd 3rd and 4th we will be at Ard al-Liwa, a place where the formal and the informal city meet.
July 6th and 7th we will be at Midan Fan, Down Town Square (center) in El Cairo.

There will be a whole week of events and actions starting with an open hearing to present the project at the Town House, where we have been doing all the designs  and constructions during the first two weeks.

The event will take place Saturday July 6th at 19h. Omar Nagati, architect and partner in the project will be joining Basurama

Organize: Elnamla, cultural association

Finance: Embassy of Spain in Egypt

USW (Urban Solid Waste) Cairo begins the 15th of June. The squares of Cairo have been taken up by street vendors, artist and families after the revolution. The objective of the project is designing and building several elements for activating de public space and promote its use.

We will be working in Town House Gallery, in collaboration with the zabbaleen comunity (informal trash pickers), local artisans and theatre companies.

One week for designing
One week for building
One week for performing

Colaborators

Elnamla: cultural association from Cairo
Omar Nagati: architect
Town House Gallery: contemporary Egyptian and foreign art

Funded by

Embassy of Spain in Egypt

What about if we change the process and start working as a net where everybody has a role from the very begining till the end?

Is it that possible?
We can try…
What do we need?

Basurama lecture.
March 19th, 2012 at 6.00 pm in the ALH (Architecture Lecture Hall) Dar Al-Handassah Architecture Building

The video Chainwork has won the first price at CIWEM’s Environmental Photographer of the Year 2011, in the category Environmental Video of the Year.

The awards ceremony will take place December 8th at SW1 Gallery, 12 Cardinal Walk, London.