The Neighborhood at the Park

The work is composed of a city plan and video which portrays a certain behavior of people in public space: standing around. The habit is less and less familiar in our dynamic contemporary society and is even disapproved of. The district of Kreuzberg was used in this project as a space for observing. The street and park act as an profane ”open air stage” for residents.By observing, one quickly sees that many people use the streets and neighborhood parks as a ”second residency”. The public spaces are not necessarily used for a predetermined leisure activity or density. The city plan (A0, folded) is a scale representation of the neighborhood without portraying the urban infrastructure of streets, buildings, etc. Instead the area was represented through the use of pictograms displaying the people or ”regulars” of certain neighborhood areas who are well known by residents. The video shows a motionless person standing in the bushes, with only the face visible over a long period of time.