Shinsekai Analysis

Experience Management

2012-01-12T17:57:00.000+01:00

Milan's new Armani Hotel

In January I teach Experience Management to retail design students at the Rotterdam Piet Zwart Institute. In a short radio interview with Amsterdam FM I discussed the state of the experience economy almost 15 years afters its inception:
We discussed the new Armani hotel along Via Manzoni in Milan, but also the little Amsterdam restaurant The Couscous Club, a Miami Beach parking lot designed by Herzog de Meuron and finally New York's High Line. How do these exicting place relate to world of experience economy? Listen here at AmsterdamFM/ Goede Zaken. (in Dutch only)

At the Piet Zwart Institute over the course of four weeks we will look at the topic of Experience Management. Here is a quick tour de horizon of the topics for discussion. During the last fifteen years the term Experience Economy has popped upregularly in marketing and retail theory. The authors Pine and Gilmore coinedit initially in a Harvard Business Review article from 1998. Since than it hasbecome part of the marketing dictionary. How we experience our builtenvironment has a large impact on our behaviour and well being. To beexperienced means to have been through or accustomed to a certain situation.The managing and staging of experiences and spectacles is age old, and it hasdeveloped into a field of architectural theory and practice: From the opera tothe drive-through cinema, from the department store to the nightclub and theflagship store.

Parking Lot Part @ Herzog de Meuron' South Beach parking garage

The meaning of experiences differs amongprofessionals. Some express that they are about emotions, others refer totheatre, the opportunities of internet or moods. Some focus on the structuralchanges that take place in society and the consequences these have for ourvalue propositions and organizations and marketing.

A group of food trucks in Miami's Wynnwood district

Tounderstand and analyse experiences is not only important in retail design. Especiallya number of other commercial environments offer important lessons in experiencemanagement. The success of these places is related to the way in which they areable to create stimulating, exciting, thought provoking environments. In thefield of tourism, a fairly young industry, heritage branding has become aninstrument to point out the touristic roots of certain places themselves. Alsoin the luxury industry which normally works with larger budgets, but has todeal with extremely high expectations from its consumer base, and in therecreation and hospitality industries a trend is noticeable that owners andmanagers should think about all facets of the consumer experiences.

Herzog de Meuron's Vitra shop offers the consumer a narrative path through their showroom.

Then, there is also a critique that thefocus on experiences is nothing more than an effort to sell more goods andservices for higher prices to desperate or otherwise bored consumers.Experience management and the experience economy take place against thebackdrop of post- or late modernity. Thus the role of images deserves specialattention. French philosophers like Guy Debord, Roland Barthes and GastonBachelard, in the 50’s to 70’s looked at the experience of the city andarchitecture in different manners. We glance briefly at their thoughts to seehow critical theory can have a say on contemporary practices.

Finally we will analyse alternative waysto provide meaningful and enjoyable experiences. How does the online worldprovide opportunities that enrich the physical domain? Can online environmentsbe just as stimulating as physical ones? The number of game addicts and the commercialsuccess of video games suggest a virtual environment need not be lessstimulating than a physical one.

How does the focus on green or ethicalsources of products impacts consumer experiences. Can the promise of ‘transformations’be the new experience economy, asPine and Gilmore hinted at, in the final part of their book The Experience Economy? They themselvesset their sights on the domain of authenticity.How should organizations provideexperiences that are authentic, and how does that aim in itself provides aparadox for early 21^st century companies.

Want to have a discussion how the domain of experience management can impact your business? Drop me a line at kai [at] shinsekai.nl.

related entries: the NYT has an article on the state of parking lots. Can even they be an experience?

Air time: What way up for the city?

2011-09-08T13:35:00.000+02:00

What way up for the city?

Last week I spoke on local radio station AmsterdamFM on urban trends and developments in Amsterdam and other cities. What is happening on the waterfront? Where do cities find inspiration? What does the rise of Global South mean for them? But also a reflection on the practice of predicting trends itself. In Dutch only, here is the link.

Without forgetting where it actually comes from..

Arles + Avignon: A is for art's sake

2011-09-05T09:33:00.000+02:00

Arles and Avignon; the two charming cities in the South of France are more than worth a visit for art's sake this Summer and early Fall. Arles is home to the yearly Rencontres d'Arles photo festival spanning the whole city. I was impressed by my first visit, while Avignon grand city of the Provence and the Pope in early times has a richness of art collections old and young. Here follow the best some tips for a visit to both cities.

Arles' amphitheater

Arles, city along the Rhone river traces its roots back the days of the Roman Empire. Its amphitheater still testifies to its former grandeur. Now it comes across mostly as a very relaxed Southern town. One of its high points is the yearly photo festival which opened in early July. I visited it in mid-August and discovered some older and younger photographers in the many exhibitions across the city centre. There were a great many exhibitions dedicated to Mexican photographers. Graciela Iturbide was a must. She elegantly captured Mexican life. The pictures of rich Mexican ladies by Daniela Rossell made one laugh and feel some discomfort for the disgrace of riches, while Enrique Metinides documentary images of traffic accidents, suicides and domestic and street violence turned over one's heart in sorrow. Mexico's streets have been covered in loss and tragedy if you Metinides's work as cue. The country had indeed a strange relationship, worshiping of death, that predates its recent drug wars that made death again so prevalent on its streets.

One of Rencontres d'Arles exhibitions spots

An overview of Douglas Gordon and Miguel Barcelo at the Mejan failed to impress me. How much old photo's can one burn? How many collectors can one find to want one of those 'iconic' images?

Explaining how an iconic NYT cover came into being

One very clear high point was the exhibition in two locations by the New York Times. Kathy Ryan, the Times photography editor was the show's gracious high priest. The largest of the two exhibitions in old church, was like a candy shop: Upon entering the building, one did not know where to look, let alone where to start. But if you just delved in, you would find yourselves comfortably meandering through some of the most exciting NYT's photo-documentaries from the past two decades or so. The images work differently in scale, on the front page, in a magazine, or a wall. In each chapel-niche a specific theme, topic or photographer was high lighted.

NY Times magazine lay out's

A combination of the chosen photos, the ones that didn't make it and emails documenting the whole process of making and selecting the images gave a generous glance into the photo editorial process. In giving this insight, one (imagines to) understand(s) better how photos find they were way into the public realm, into the media and how and why some photos can become iconic. Examples of this are the two lights that marked the Twin Towers, the fight to to tame the burning oil well of Kuwait in 1991, a series on Times Square and the CERN centre in Geneva.

NYT: seductive images of Cern

A little outside the historic city one finds in the Parc des Ateliers a number of shows clustered around old derelict buildings. The different shows are clearly curated and the curators who range from different back grounds are given attention as the artists in the sense of having text blocks and photos explaining who they are. In one large show, Points de Vue: Prix decouverte des Rencontres d'Arles, curators could each choose three (young) photographers and in the texts next to the photos explain why they had chosen so and so. I think made a selection that was both representative of contemporary photography developments and made sure they selected some corners of the photography world that are less seen.

Arles, Parc des Ateliers

My favorites of this selection included Raphael Dallaporta's drone based photography (now also in FOAM Amsterdam) (for a related art work think of Omar Fast's impressive video in the central pavilion at the Giardini/ Venice Biennale.) Not new, but indeed good: Michael Subotzky's research into the Ponte Tower in downtown Johannesburg. Super market photography from Cameroon shown here as a collaboration of Jean Luc Cramatte & Jacob Nzudie.

A large show was dedicated to the rise of the internet. I did not get a very happy feeling of that, nor was that probably the shows intent. Funny and somehow reflective of online culture was Thomas Mailaender's chicken museum

Hommage a Ed Ruscha

A Google world based work showing parking lots offered one of the more interesting historical quotes, in this case on Ed Ruscha's 26 gas stations photographs, themselves on view in the Lambert Collection in Avignon

The work of Mishka Henner which showed Dutch (google based) aerial photography of protected places was beautiful. The sites deemed too sensitive to be detailed online are blurred in color patterns that by chance(?) have a very strong visual aesthetic. A graphic designer could have been proud of such work. One could dream away seeing these modern landscape images and connect them to early impressionist paintings like Monet's garden series or the pointillist take on the landscape.In the city of Vincent van Gogh these contemporary images get a little extra layer. A layer or deepness or meaning that was mostly absent in this show that celebrated the quote as though the whole of post-modernism was blossoming again (or maybe had never happened) and thus I ascended upon the stairs that took me over the fence that protected the show, thinking mostly: 'So, what this internet based photography?' Rencontres d' Arles, until September 18, 2011.

Musee Calvet, Avignon

Avignon, the former Papal city, is sometimes referred to as Babylon along the Rhone. In 1791 it had become part of France, after being a Papal state since 1348. The city still has much of its historic grid and airs a kind of grand and dignified atmosphere. It houses many collections and private museums. I had decided to travel to Avignon to the show with Cy Twombly's photography in the Lambert Collection as a kind of personal farewell. My favorite artist since the age of 13 had died in July and this seemed a good way to say goodbye and see the last show on which he had worked in his life. But first in the early Saturday morning I wandered through the old city and found my way up to the gardens on the fortress next to the Papal palace. From there one overlooks the city, the aqua-duct, the neighboring castle across the river and the landscape in the vicinity. You could almost feel the power that must have transcended from this papal pluche for such a long time.

Twombly, farewell in Avignon

At 11 o clock I was one of the first visitors to the Lambert collection. The show is titled Le Temps Retrouve, slightly bold in its resolute answer to Proust's A la recherche du temps perdu. In it are contemporary and old artists that apparently Cy Twombly had chosen to show in relation to his own photography. The artist had come up with the concept of the show in Spring 2011, before passing away this Summer. I decided upon a counter clock wise move trough the exhibition, so I could first be alone with Twombly's photographs. They are romantic, often blurred with a strong sense of the colors present, almost as though color is the real subjects of his photography (flowers, vegetables, the studio, Sally Mann's studio, the beach at Gaetta, self portraits), one series stands out in brightness and in humor. In one case Twombly had taken pictures of toy animals in a vending machine in the local Walmart in Lexington Virginia (his hometown), in another situation he photographed a bakery shop window full of painted cup cakes. They have almost extravagant, bright colors for which his later paintings have become so renowned.

The Lambert collection

Up on the upper floors one finds Ruscha's parking lot series, a giant installation of Sol Lewitt photography, analysing daily objects and some of Muybridge' repetition work. One can also see a large amount of Louise Lawler photographs depicting old photography in the house of an Avignon collector and later one see the works photographed them selves. It evokes a thought on the context and representation of the photographic image and our subjective view on and presence near those images

Richard Long installation in an old church

Later on the day I briefly ventured into the Musee Calvet. A marvelous entrance welcome the visitor to a stately home. Lots of old masters and a collection that tells of the joy of painting. Twombly would have liked it here. The Petit Palais museum was a real discovery. It houses a marvelous collection of 14th and 15th century Italian paintings bought by Napolean from a dandy collector named Campana living in Rome at the time.

details from the Petit Palais

Than there is the small and quite cute Musee Angladon museum. It houses the impressionist collection of the couple Angladon-Dubrujeaud which inherited the collection of the Paris fashion designer Jacques Doucet. The house is for a large part still in historical style which a good impression of the collection in its time.

Avignon seems to have a very good restaurant scene. I had an excelent lunch in restaurant Michel Peyaud. I was served by the chef who single-handedly managed the kitchen and the tables. I was also intrigued by the restaurant Le Petit Bedon, 70 rue Joseph Vernet. More upmarket and very elegant is Hotel d'Europe on the West side of the old city. this part of town also has a really elegant retail and antiques scenery.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis, August/September 2011

Marazzi on the violence of financial capitalism

2011-08-17T20:22:00.001+02:00

I have just finished an excellent small book on the financial crisis and its consequences by the Swiss academic Christian Marazzi. It theoretically captures the current financial markets uncertainty, the London riots, IT patents wars and takeovers, the quest to privatise the commons as well as the longer term economic transformations in the world in a bold, independent and forward looking manner.

It is the new edition of The Violence of Financial Capitalism, published March 2011, after an earlier paper and version from 2010. The pocket book has 136 pages and consists of six chapters and an appendix that explains the dictionary used by financial institutions. Marazzi opens with a quote of French philospher Gilles Deleuze, It's not a question of worrying or of hoping the best, but of finding new weapons. There after he dives into the world of banking and finance and offers a readable and compelling analysis of the financial crisis and its aftermath: how it has impacted credit and debit, companies, banks, governments and individuals. He quotes mainstream and non-mainstream economic thinkers as he tries to explain processes of accumulation and the effects of the new public indebtedness, caused not in the least part by the financial bail outs. Against the backdrop of both the recent riots in London and the fall of European stock markets it is difficult to ignore his analysis of financial capitalism and the amount of terrain it has captures since the 1980's.

Marazzi describes crises as an intrinsic part of the economic system, as almost semi-permanent state of being, and crises as a way to each time capture, privatise what were before common goods, as a process of accumulating what was under developed or periphery. That periphery is shifting continuously and it is with debt and being 'in debt' that the relationships are re-written, renegotiated and re-enacted.

In the last section, the afterword, Marazzi looks at what is happening to the commons. He analyses how in a kind of externalization of production the consumer is turned into a co-producer of goods and performs free labour. (p113.) How via debt, emerging market countries are persuaded to deplete natural resources at record speed, or when it comes to common goods in the form of knowledge they too are increasingly being privatized via patents and copyrights (investment funds). (See for example this article in the New York Times on the dark sides of the patent quest in relation the Google Motorola Networks takeover.) Marazzi also draws a parallel to the 1970's New York City debt crisis in pointing out how different crises have spatial and regional effects.

Past April (2011) Marazzi held an important lecture at Queen Mary Universtity in London on Money, Finance and the Commons (site Queen Mary with further links). A review of the lecture by Andrew Osborne, including Marazzi;s references to Elinor Ostrom's 'eight “design principles” of stable local common pool resource management.'

Andrew C Culp, Department of Comparative Studies, The Ohio State University was kind enough to publish his notes from another lecture Marazzi held in Pittsburgh titled: “Financial Entropy: The Struggle Within and Against Empire”

In an article of September 14, 2010 in the Guardian, Marazzi takes aim at neo-liberalism in Europe and its call for austerity packages. (see here for a Dutch translation)

Finally a good in depth book review of The Violence of Financial Capitalism. Christian Marazzi seems to be a bold and original thinker who reflects on the crisis and its impact for the world's citizens.

To order it at the MIT Press, Amazon or Selexyz, click on the respective links.

All photos and text (c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis, August 2011

Spring/ Summer 2011 Art Book Accumulations

2011-08-08T15:14:00.001+02:00

Best of Class: Art books Spring/ Summer 2011

Looking back at my recent book accumulations, here is a list of my favorite art books I have acquired or received during the past months. The Summer is good moment to take stock of them. They range in topic between art, design, urbanism and economics. Here we go:

Nr. 1 clearly is La Carte D'Apres Nature, the catalog accompanying the inaugural show at the Villa Paloma/ Nouveau Musee National de Monaco which ran until February 2011. The show (which I haven't seen) was curated by Thomas Demand and deals with the photography of Luigi Ghirri and the way he and a number of younger artists play with and depict the landscape. The title of the show and the book are borrowed from a magazine Rene Magritte used to publish between 1951 and 1965. The book looks splendidly is sure to become a collector's item. It was published by Steidl/Mack, but is sold out already. The show is now on at Matthew Marks gallery in NY until October 18. The book captures the mind set of the show as a stand alone just as well.

La Carte D'Apres Nature

Nr. 2 in arts is probably The Art of Tomorrow, an overview of up and coming contemporary artist, edited by Laura Hoptman, Yilmaz Dziewior and Uta Grosenick and published in 2010 by Distanz, the new publishing house by Uta Grosenick and collector Christian Boros. The book is spot on in its selection of artists and found the right balance between surprising the reader and showing those artists of which you had a hunch yourselves.

Nr. 3 in arts is Privatzugang, written by Skadi Heckmuller, (Distanz 2011) a distinct guide with entries to private art collections in Germany, Austria and Switzerland that are open to the public. Next to the information and backgrounds on the different collections it also gives tips on nearby restaurants, and how to get there by car and public transportation. Technically speaking one could build a whole holiday around this book.

Nr. 4 is a book I received recently as a gift but wanted for a while. It is a very specialized art book; The Hongs of Canton; Western merchants in South China 1700-1900 as seen in Chinese export paintings. The title says it all. It is written by Patrick Conner, a specialist in the field of historical paintinsg related to the East India Company and the China trade and the director of the Martyn Gregory Gallery in London. The gallery has a booth at the TEFAF art fair and each year I marvel at the paintings they have of the old Hongs, trading outpost across China. They tell about the development of Canton and what has now become the global metropolis Hong Kong. A smart real estate developer could take the book and paintings as inspiration for a new residential or hotel development along the shore and create a modern day Hong.

Nr. 5 is the catalog of a series of exhibitions that was held in May and June 2011 in Vienna. For the third year in a row 21 leading galleries in Vienna collaborate and offer their spaces to international curators. This year’s project, East by South West, took as its starting point the importance and relevance of Vienna for Eastern and Southeastern European contemporary art and artists. It resulted in some very good solo and group shows. The way the different galleries worked together and aligned their interests could be a model for many other cities. The catalog brings together all these artists and curators and gives a snapshot of some of the things that are going between Vienna and its Eastern and Southeastern European neighbors. .

Nr. 6 is a wonderful small book called Sechsundzwanzig Wiener Tankstellen, Twentysix Viennese Gasoline Stations, Roma publication 143b, 2011. The book is the work of Sebastian Hackensmidt with beautiful photographs by Stefah Olah of indeed 26 Viennese gasoline stations. It is a smart and as one book reviewer, Joerg Colberg calls it 'a very convincing and surprisingly engaging book'. I would like to agree. It takes it motto and its inspiration from Ed Ruscha's classic booklet about 26 gas stations in Los Angeles in 1967. It is a very urban book. It shows the mundane world of gas stations and yet also their intense elegance. Ruscha can be happy that Olah and Hackensmidt work along the lines he started.

Nr. 7 has the look and feeling of a DVD box, but is a book dedicated to the work of New Zealand artist Simon Denny. It is called Video Aquarium Broadcast and it is published by Galerie Daniel Buchholz and Michael Lett. The artist deals with media, piracy and general forms of subversiness. The book shares those qualities which makes it not the most easiest to browse through, but at the same time gives you the feeling you are very close on the artist's work.

Simon Denny's book

Nr 8. is a Swiss book and I will end my list in a kind of Swizzeria, acknowledging the enormous production and innovation that happens in the country. I start of with Andrea Tal's publication Chewing the Scenery- Reading the Cud. It is part of the Swiss entry to the Venice biennale 2011 and will be published in three different, all in away incomplete version. I have a version which starts with a text by philosopher and queer theorist Antke Engel. The publication existing of different folded texts and images looks very seducive, but even less than in the book of Simon Denny lets you easily enter its content or storyline. This a graphic designer at work and at play. The book is a kind of art work in it self breaths a certain air of mystery; What is the narrative? What is the relationship between the texts and the images; What to make of the order of things? I feel attracted to this slightly mysterious publication, but will admit at once: I am not able to tell you exactly what it is about. (to order the first version, see Edition Fink)

Nr. 9 is a catalog I received from a show that took place already in 2009 in the Fotomuseum Winterthur (link includes page with links to artist websites). Karaoke -Bildformen des Zitats, (Kodoji Press, Baden CH 2009) was a very progressive photography show that researched the quote, das Zitat. The exhibition featured works by Becky Beasley (GB), Thomas Galler (CH), Aneta Grzeszykowska (PL), Thomas Julier (CH), Anja Manfredi (A), Ryan McGinley (USA), Taiyo Onorato / Nico Krebs (CH/CH), Clunie Reid (GB) and Oliver Sieber (D). Many of these who present strong original images and image narratives and whose work keeps intriguing and popping up. To order at Motto distribution.

Anja Manfredi from Karaoke- Fotomuseum Winterthur, 2009

Nr. 10 finally is the little exhibition catalogue Labour/ Arbeit, showing the 7th thematic set of works from the Fotomuseum Winterthur's own collection, edited by curator Thomas Seelig. This time the show focussed on the history of labour, and how work and its imagery and representation have changed over time. Brochure style booklet, very rich in content.

Arbeit/ Labour, inside view

Art & Car Summer

2011-08-06T17:55:00.001+02:00

Erwin Wurm, Fat Car Convertible (Porsche) 1/3, 2005 at the ZKM

2011 Marks the 125th anniversary of the automobile. The object was instrumental in creating an acceleration of mobility and has been an object of desire and disaster during the past century and a quart. Three exhibitions in in the South of Germany and in Basel, Switzerland celebrate the car and show how it is and has been an inspiration to artists Whether a car or an art lover, or both, these are three interesting and complimentary exhibitions. .
The museum Tinguely in Basel took the life long love of the artist Tinguely as a starting point, although it certainly does not overshadow the rest of the show. It gives a thematic and historic overview how different artists have used or depicted cars in the work. The name of the show, in German: Fetisch Auto. Ich fahre, also bin ich, Car Fetish, I drive therefore I am, is telling. Cars, especially after the Second World War have been part of the mass consumer culture and give the owners unprecedented freedom to move around. That cars also create enormous negative externalities, in form of traffic, accidents and pollution, especially if there are a lot of them is also shown in the exhibition.

Arnold Odermatt, Wolfenschiessen, 1964

From the Italian Futurists, to Ed Ruscha romantic paintings of the industrial lands and roads of the US to object love of photographer Patrick Weidmann and artists Erwin Wurm and Damian Ortega's lover
The catalog is excellent and different authors reflect on the themes that the art works and artists bring forward in the show. Another feature of the exhibition is its film program which only shows car and road movies. Car Fetish, the exhibition on view until September 9, 2011.

ZKM's art car parking

A second show, is on view North of Basel in Karlsruhe in the ZKM, the museum for media. The approach the topic from the perspective of Car Culture: media of mobility. The ground floor of the show looks like a giant car park with the strangest car sculptures. They are joined by videos, installations and sculptures. The show takes a particular approach in the way it connects the mobility theme of cars to wireless mobility and tracks the developments of wireless communications on the first floor. The catalog shows a lot of car sculptures in the beginning and ends with a more academic view on car and wireless mobility. The ZKM bookshop has the best selection of art & car books from the 3 museums.

The ZKM has a good selection of art & cars books.

An 1975 work by collaborative Ant Farm stands out: In the film, Cadillac Ranch Show & Media Burn a fake US President speaks to the audience before the Ant Farm artists crash their car in a wall of television's. Lover's of Porsche will gruel at the sight of a Porsche 911 pressed into a square metallic sculpture and the video both by Gottfried Bechtold (2006) that shows the coming into being of this particular unhappy Porsche. It reminds a bit of the UK music act the KLF which 20 years ago burned a million dollars.

Brain Car und Brain Car Dreams, 2005

Dutch artist Olaf Mooij succeeds best in giving the car a personality; his cars carry large colourful brains on their back, giving the impression that cars have a mind of their own. (which some drivers will agree too). Erwin Wurm is probably the artist that has most pieces in the show. His far cars and bendable trucks come in the strangest of shapes. Here is a true car-art aficionado at work. His short film Tell, 2007/2008 shows a couple discussing reality while driving up a building. The film was made in 2007/2008 before the Hollywood.blockbuster Inception in which the city and reality is folded in a similar way. Mr. Wurm has a strong and beautiful mind to show this idea in such a simple gesture. Car Culture will be on view until January 8th 2012.

Erwin Wurm, Tell 2007/2008

Inception, folding walls Paris 2010

Mercedes-Benz museum Stuttgart

Finally, the Mercedes-Benz museum in Stuttgart pays tribute to its art collection of which parts are normally on view in its Berlin Potzdammerplatz gallery. This Summer a selection of works is shown in the context of the Mercedez-Benz museum. Not all the art works are car related. I think the best works are humorous and sometimes make fun of cars and car culture. Sylvie Fleury is very good at this, as she portrays female Formula 1 drivers who spray Magnum champagne bottles after winning a fictive Formula 1 race.

Fleury Car Magazine Covers in the Silver Arrows Gallery

Nic Hess, Installation im Mythosraum 7 Silberpfeile - Rennen und Rekorde

Artist Nic Hess intervenes in the car show room and turns cars into tents and cute home-like sculptures. Roman Signer too plays with the topic of cars and mobility. He researches the attraction of speed. In one of the videos he sits in a kajak while being pulled over small road next to the water, while being accompanied by a group of cows who have never seen such a strange sight. The best experience of all, is probably the museum itself, a design of Amsterdam based architecture firm UN Studio. They have created a superb experience and environment in which the cars and the history of Mercedes Benz unfolds itself against the backdrop of the history of the last 125 years. The visitor is being shot up into the air with a futuristic elevator. Your expectations are managed perfectly whilst you descend through history and into the now. Once you have entered ground level, it feels only naturally to check in the showroom next door and buy yourself a Mercedes. (Disclosure, the author of this article has no drivers license.)

Warhol's Mercedes Benz series

One of the most intriguing works is right in the beginning. It is the series of Mercedes Benz cars that the company commissioned from artist Andy Warhol. The series is unfinished because Warhol died while working on the prints. The works that were produced by him, make you wonder just as with the rich and famous he portrayed: Did he portrayed them out of choice, for the money, for both or for other reasons? That question sometimes surfaces when you look at artistic commissions (not only with car companies, luxury companies too are good at this kind of work) when companies ask artists to work very closely with a brand or object.

Warhol's Mercedes Benz series

The Warhol- Mercedes paintings go to the core of the problem and yet the leave the question open because they are so exciting. Just as he questions the seperation between the copy and the original, it seems hard to tell whether his boyish love for fast cars caused his fascination for Mercedes, or whether it was an older man's fascination with the greenbacks he would receive for making these works. Does it matter? He is a master of playing this game, erasing the line. It just all comes together, and (and this is a side step) if you look at how the market for his art works has developed after his death and certainly in the past 10 years, it still all comes together. The title of the show is Art & Stars & Cars, when it comes to Mercedes Benz it is impossible to keep one of these words out of the equation. On show till September 25, 2011 at the Mercedes Benz Museum.

.
the Art & Stars & Cars catalog

Venice Art Biennale Tips 2011

2011-08-05T21:51:00.003+02:00

One of Venice' markets by night

The 2011 Venice Art Biennale for me is just as much about what happening outside of the Arsenale and the Giardini as about what is happening inside. The two main curated shows by Bice Curiger, the many country pavilions and a great number of privately curated shows have to compete for the visitors attention. In this article I recommend some of my personal highlights.

They are pointed on the map and can probably best be seen if you download the image of the map on your computer. There are three groups; Biennale special country pavilions in the city, private art space and finally some suggestions for food and drinks.

Surrealist authentic Venetian experiences

The Giardini and Arsenale shows: Like a Swiss clock

La Biennaleopened at the beginning of June. There are an increasing number of biennales inthe world, yet none has the appeal of Venice. The city in the Laguna hosts theart and architecture biennales every other year. This Summer it is all aboutart in Venice. There are so many exhibitions at the moment in the city, it isdifficult not to see art. That situation is in sharp and said contrast to thehome situation in many countries, where the arts are under pressure and facelarge budget cuts. Here follow some of my personal favorites andrecommendations for a Venice Biennale trip this Summer of Fall.

I cannothelp to make the comparison with a Swiss clock when talking about the main showcurated by Swiss curator Bice Curiger. It felt pleasant, it was not toocommercial and it certainly was accurate, but I was not too often surprised bythings I had not known before. Probably the most popular work in the show isthe work the Clock by Christian Marclay. The meticulously researched work is a24 film project showing parts of films in which time features prominently onclocks, watches and other time piece. The film shows time proceeding in realtime, in other words when it 5.15 PM you will see elements of films where thetime in the film is 5.15 PM. Shifting back to the biennale by Curiger, it wason always on time, never late- which could have resulted in too popular or verycommercial works, but Curiger’s clock on the other hand also never felt veryfar ahead of time.

My moodabout the biennale and all the different shows on view, taken all together, isfar from pessimistic. It was abundant. The country pavilions. The Swisspavilion in the Guardini had been taken over by Thomas Hirschhorn. Hetransformed it into one his signature caves made out of aluminum foil, tape,wood, dolls and images taken from fashion magazines and gruesome photosdepicting the casualties of war. He is an anti-brand man and yet his style hasbecome a signature. The Danes celebrated freedom op speech in an open andnuanced way. The Belgian pavilion was a kind of painting gone new media, theDutch a collaborative approach which was not that easy to comprehend. TheAmericans splashed out with Allora and Calzadilla. In the Arsenale I think back of Gerard Byrnes’work, of Elad Lassry’s photos, of the installation of the Chinese house takenapart, of Maria Castillo Deball’s installation and drawings and many, manyothers things.

Venice map with high lights, best to download and print

Favorite country pavilions in the city

Mexico Pavilion PalazzoRota Ivancich Castello 4421

My favorite country pavilion is the one of Mexico, showing the exhibition Red Square, impossible Pink by the artist MelanieSmith. She offers the viewer a well constructed narrative and leads him or her through an old Palazzo, showing films, paintings and a strange collection of objects. In the film Xilitla: Dismantled 1 (2011) she has filmed ‘Los Pazos’, the concrete-structure and tropical gardens of the collector Edward James. The film is a dramatic take on this surrealist landscape in the middle of the jungle. Not to be missed!

Melanie Smith video still

Close by is 'Call the Witness' the second Roma Pavilion housed in the UNESCORegional Bureau for Science and Culture in Europe, Palazzo Zorzi Castello 4930.It is a group show of 40 artists who have looked into the Roma's case and how they are lifestyle is being mistreated across Europe. The show is very telling for what is going on with the Roma people and how they are denied forms of citizenship. This is the second time the Roma have a pavilion at the Biennale and both times funding has come among others from George Soros. Dutch artist Aernout Mik made the exhibition design along the lines of an old design for a Roma city by Constant Nieuwenhuis. Constant, the creator of the famous New Babylon sculptures, was one of the founders of the SituatistionistInternational. This mythical group of artists and thinkers was highly influential on urban thinking in the past century. The group was founded in 1957 in the city of Alba, from which in the same year the Roma where deported by the Italian government, a relationship of which I was unaware before seeing the show.

A third, very special pavilion is the Lithuanian in the Scuoladi San Pasquale (San Francesco dellaVigna), Campo dellaConfraternita Castello 2786. In the exhibition: Behind the White Curtain by artist Darius Miksys one can ask to see from a physical depot many of the art works that the state of Lithuania has cofunded and financed over the past years. It makes visual what role the state plays in the production of culture. It won the Silver Lion for best young pavilion.

The Scottish pavilion by artist Karla Black in Palazzo Pisani Santa Marina Calle delle Erbe, Cannaregio6103 is another Jewel. It is in Cannaregio en route to the Fondamente Nuova vaparetto stop. Rich in a sculptural tradition, and dont think to much about the Lush soap brand.

The second Swiss pavilion is a far location and placed wrongly on most maps. It is 200 meters North West along the water from the Fondamente Nuova vaparetto stop, on TeatroFondamenta Nuove, Cannaregio 5013. The show, 'Chewing the Scenery' (click for detailed program) has a cool video by Pauline Boudry and very good graphic design by Renate Lorenz,Tim Zurlauf/ KMUProduktionen.Buy the book if you can.

Private collections

Than there are the museum and large private foundations who take the occasion of the Biennale to show which directions they see the contemporary art world going. For the past couple of years, Axel Vervoordt's Palazzo Fortuny often was the most surprising experience, but this years crown should go the Prada Foundation's exhibition. The minimalist approach paid off handsomely. It is located in theCa’Cornerdella Regina, Santa Croce 2214 and shows a range of works from the past 30-40 years from the Prada Fondazione holdings with an emphasis on early minimalists and artists with whom they have collaborated, like Carsten Höller and Prada's Double Club project in London's East End in 2008. Another high lights are the models of OMA's design for the foundation new permanent home in Milano.

Prada Fondazione in Ca' Correr

The Palazzo Fortuny, on Campo SanBeneto, San Marco 3780 is another recommendation. Axel Vervoordt, Belgian decorateur extraordinair has turned the old textiles merchants family house into a collection of art from different centuries and styles. Rather holistic and definitely worth visiting if you haven't done so in the past.

The Future Generation Art Prize at the PalazzoPapadopoli, San Polo 1364, just South West of the Rialto bridge is the brain child of Ukrainian collector Victor Pinchuk. There quite a few discoveries to be made in this group show with among others KerrenCytter, Nathalie Djurberg, Cao Fei, Mircea Nicolai, Katerina Seda, EmilyWardill and Hector Zamora.

In the PuntaDella Dogana, the former weapons depot-turned art gallery by Tadao Ando is the show; In praise of doubt which shows part of the Francois Pinault collection. This is the second Venitian spot of the PPR/Gucci group, luxury impressario. In contrast to the title of the show, there is not so much room for doubt here, the works exhibited all smell of money and a particular collector's taste. Not so much room for risk and the un-established. Even the anti-establishment art of Sturtevant is turned into establishment in a split second.

In the Palazzo Grassi, on Campo San Samuele is more of the same. Very good art, very particular take on recent art history. The bookshop I have to say is one great. Every time I come there, I leave with a few kilo's more.

Palazzini Grassi

Around the corner of the building is the Palazzini Grassi, a most remarkable boutique hotel, restaurant and bar which I certainly recommend for a drink. A kind of contemporary rococo or baroque meets large yacht interior. See for your self!

'Real Venice' is an exhibition, on until September 30th, curated by Elena Foster and organized by the Venice in Peril charity in which many established and some younger artists and photographers share their views and images of the city. Some of the works on show will be auctioned later on during the year at Philips de Pury in London. Here is a review. It can be seen at San Giorgio Maggiore.

The PeggyGuggenheim Collection on 704 Dorsoduro houses the collection of this grand dame of the Venetian art scene. At the moment it shows 1900 – 1961. ITALIANART IN THE GUGGENHEIM COLLECTIONS. Lots of classic modern art-excellent location along the Canal Grande.

Finally there is the Academia, Campodella Carità, Dorsoduro n. 1050. Venice's its classic museum. No better place in the world to see Guardi and Canaletto.

Food and Drinks

OsteriaSan Marco

One of my favorite restaurants with an excellent wine list is OsteriaSan Marco. (Frezzeria 1610, T: 041 528 5242)The waiters like the food and wine just as much as the customers do. Attracts a good clientele during biennale openings. Two minutes walking from the North West corner of the San Marco square, (I think between the Briono and Zegna stores or so to the right in a narrow ally.)

For a sweet break in between Rialto bridge and the Fortuny Palazzo do go to Andrea Zanin, Campo San Luca 4589 T: 041522 4803. The master patticier won't dissappoint. For an interview with him.

Is Harry’s Bar a Venice classic or a tourist trap? I never figure out. Paul Bett's, the FT columnist is a fan in any case. (Calle Vallaresso, 1323, T:041528 5777) Just behind San Marco towards the direction of the Monaco et Grande

We were taken to Enotecae Trattoria, La Bitta recently and that was a discovery worth sharing. Make your reservation if you want to go there. (S. Barnaba, Dorsoduro 2753/a T: 041 523 0531) 300 meters from the vaparetto stop Za Rezonica. Good food and relaxed if of course you do your best to fit in too.

Corte Sconta's menu

Close to the Arsenale is the restaurant Corte Sconta, (Castello 3886, Calle del Pestrin, Arsenale location map) excellent for a long lunch in between art viewing. Make your way from the waterfront to find Corte in a back way. Worth it. The website of the Associazione dei Ristoranti della Buona Accoglienza lists Corte Sconta and a number of other Venetian restaurants that care about food, local products and good atmosphere.


La Venissa

If you want to leave the city for an afternoon and evening and forget about it all go to LaVenissa, the restaurant, winery and hotel on Isola Marzobo next to Burano. It offers a superb, and yes expensive, experience. Take the boat to Burano, walk around, if you have a lot of time cross to the opposite island for the old church, come back and walk to La Venissa via its vineyard. The food is seasonal and very good. Make sure to check the boat time table which is irregular at night before you go to dinner, in case you don/t go there by private boat. This place could become grand.

Venissa's outdoor restaurant

Want to read more on Venice' history? Here is a good review of the book City of Fortune; How Venice won and lost a naval empire by Roger Crowley. The book review already gives you a good impressions of these robber-bastards turned this city into the jewel that it is today.

No guts, no glory; no guilt, no glitter so it goes for the history of Venice, and probably also for the art at the 54th Venice art Biennale.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis, August 5, 2011

NRW fotowedstrijd over consumentenbeleving

2011-07-19T18:41:00.002+02:00

De NRW, de Nederlandse Raad voor Winkelcentra organiseert dit jaar een fotowedstrijd met als thema “Consumentenbeleving”.
Hoe beleeft de consument het winkelen in Nederland? Is dat het eten van een ijsje, het zien van overvolle boodschappentassen of misschien toch lekker shoppen met vriendinnen? Aarzel niet en leg dit moment vast met je camera. Ze zijn op zoek naar foto’s die in beeld brengen wat winkelen voor jou betekent.

Ze zijn op zoek naar foto’s die zijn gemaakt in Nederland. De actie loopt van 1 april t/m 31 augustus 2011. Een vakjury zal de foto’s beoordelen op kwaliteit, creativiteit en originaliteit en één winnaar aanwijzen. De prijs is een city trip voor 2 personen naar NY. Meer over de prijs en de voorwaarden op de site van de NRW fotowedstrijd.

Het is een mooie gelegenheid om in beeld te brengen waar winkelen allemaal over gaat en wat van belang is als je op een succesvolle retailplek bent.

Tesamen met de volgende mensen zit ik in de jury:

Pim van den Berg	Pim van den Berg Perspectives
Judith van Deelen	Retail Management Center B.V.
Kai van Hasselt	Shinsekai Analysis
Peter Paul Huf	Het Lab
Linda Kruit	NRW
Job Posner	Synchroon

Tax Ethics Jungle

2011-07-16T12:08:00.000+02:00

Tax ethics

Taxes, nobody likes paying them, but it is the oil to society. Even better one could argue because many societies that are rich on oil, generally don't function that well and suffer from a resources curse, as Thomas Friedman and others have pointed out. Favorable tax can be an extremely competitive business advantage both to owners of assets and companies, to a company itself and of course to their customers.

This week ActionAid, Fairfood and FairPensions published a paper on tax planning and corporate supply chains. Although companies won't change practices easily, and NGO's should do their best to understand corporate standpoints, tax ethics is a topic worth a nuanced discussion.By analysing practices and making tax behavior and planning a kind a topic of public debate, companies are faced with an internal negotation between what they would probably call, their internal fiduciary duty towards their shareholders to optimize their tax structure, (a.k.a.- pay the least as possible and structure the business so it is taxed in a favorable manner. These are all sound competitive business arguments.) and a public call to make transparent where and how companies pay tax, one of the many ways they contribute to society. Because of NGO and others actors attention, activity this second point is increasing in importance. Here is the full paper on tax responsibility.

The ability to outbid public companies by private equity groups and the gains they create doing so, is for a very large part possible because of the use of debt and debt leverage. The increased interest payments lower the profit and thus create a tax shield which allow PE groups to operate differently and more aggressive. The tax shield gives them a serious competitive advantage. Can you blame somebody for seeking a tax efficient route if it exists? No, most likely not.

Another example is Amazon, the online retailer currently in the news for its aggressive stance against Californian legislation it should collect and pay sales taxes over its Californian online sales. It vigorously defends itself and calls the Californian taxes unconstitutional. Christopher Caldwell makes an excellent case in the FT of July 16 why 'Amazon's tax-free landscape needs bulldozing'. He states that it is 'the tax exemption, not the technology, is what distinguishes the company from its rivals.' Politicians have the right to act up and close the loop hole.

Half a year ago I wrote on tax ethics and governance structures as part of my 11 for '11 predictions (point 5 Governanceand tax ethics: the new green?). I stand by those words: People will demand anarrative about taxes, let’s call it tax ethics. Not having one is not a good line.

Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis, July 16 2011

Colloborative Writing

2011-07-14T23:51:00.000+02:00

The past months I have collaborated on a number of books and publications.

Mokum, an alternative city guide to Amsterdam was published at the occasion of 4/5 May, memorizing the end of the Second World War. In the guide a great many authors question whether the city of Amsterdam is still a city of freedoms and liberty and/or to what extent such liberties are under attack or not to be fought for in other domains. My contribution looked at the example of 'scheef wonen', a Dutch word which describes the act of living in social housing, whilst relatively earning more than you were supposed to. I proposed a kind of tax or extra rent so that you were not forced out of your house, but that your income is more in balance with you rental expenditure. Recently the Dutch government decided to implement a similar instrument whereby rents were raised an extra 5% for people in higher income brackets living in social housing. (see Vastgoedmarkt article). I think it is good step forward in seeking greater spatial justice. For more on this see also an earlier entry on 'Narratives of Spatial Justice from May 2011'

Dealing with 'scheefwonen' and seeking spatial justice

A second essay for an book on peer education dealt with Kolb's theory of learning cycle and how experiental learning can be a source of inspiration and reflection for peer group education. Taking daily experiences from youngsters seriously, they become learning environments and a potential pool of knowledge and transformation. Furthermore companies, organizations, and educational institutions should look at individual learning styles and preferences with the aim of optimizing the collective learning curve. Some more thoughts on Kolb and cities as learning environments from April.

Kolb's learning cycle and its relevance for peer education

Finally, a small publication by De Baak came out. It was the result of Route 66, a series of interviews by team members of De Baak, a renowned Dutch training institute and some external voices, me being one of them. The 66 interviewers with leaders of businesses, NGO's and not for profits were cross analyzed. The most important quotes on leadership and entrepreneurship were anonymously put together. Reflections on the Route ahead.

speaking at Urban Legends symposium, AAS Tilburg

2011-07-14T21:51:00.000+02:00

Invitation AAS symposium August 26th

I will speak at the upcoming Urban Legends symposium at the Academy for Architecture and urban design (AAS) at Fontys Tilburg on August the 26th together with Sabine Lebesque, Thomas Lommee. The academy celebrates 75 years of existence. It looks back at 1936 and some of the urban futures that were that were than predicted, against a very dark back ground we realize in hindsight. Now too debt and political turbulence and economic and cultural re-balancing are creating a new equilibrium. What consequences will this have for cities and the way we perceive them? What metaphors do best prepare us for the 'great urban re-balancing game' we can expect soon to manifest it self?

More on the AAS academy and the program there.

Being on the right side of the urban trade

2011-05-05T18:42:00.001+02:00

Sao Paulo at dust

AndrewHill has written a fascinating column “Streetwise strategy for an urban future” in the FT on how businesses need to deal withunpredictable urban growth. It is indeedthe mega trend of the century that Mr. Hill convincingly points out. Forcompanies that have to operate in and predict quantum leap urban development,it brings great uncertainty but also potential prosperity. It is interesting that mr. Hill reflects onurbanization in his management column, and thus brings the question forward howcompanies can manage this development.

Downtown Nairobi

Investors,including banks and (re-) insurance companies face the same reality, but seemto a lesser extent able or willing to consider mass urbanization as an urbantrade. If one considers it a trade similar to how for example longevity riskhas become a trade, than institutional investors seem mostly to be on the shortside of the trade, while the best hedge against the risks urbanization bringsforward, would be to position oneself on the long side of the trade to actuallybenefit from the trend.

Buenos Aires' parellel forces: decay and gentrification

Forbes, just put the topic of Megacities on the cover and did an interview with Siemens CEO Peter Loscher who explains (here) how the company is focusing on urban growth. It is part of Forbes.com three month' focus on megacities. Of course than there is also the big report which came out by the McKinsey Global Institute in March which maps the economic power of cities.

Investors,like companies and governments should take note of the metropolis’ rise andmake sure to be on the right side of the urban trade.

Kai vanHasselt, Shinsekai Analysis,

Kampala's commercial district

Sao Paulo's skyline

Santiago, Chili has some of Latin America's best shopping malls

Downtown Jo' burg. South Africa's banking scene is buzzing

Montevideo hovers between the old and the new world

Ruilen, Kiezen of Delen: 4 strategieen tegen krimp en verval

2011-05-04T11:59:00.001+02:00

Voor het maart nummer van Outlook magazine, het kwartaalblad van Het Financieele Dagblad schreef ik een artikel over strategien voor steden in verval en/of die met krimp geconfronteerd worden. Het stuk is nu online te lezen.

In het stuk omschrijf ik aan de hand van voorbeelden uit het buitenland vier oplossingsmethodes die dergelijkse situaties kunnen verbeteren. Dat zijn:

1) Krachten bundelen, zoek lokale specialismen en zet die bij elkaar;

2) Close Sourcing, stimuleer dat bedrijven in sterke wijken diensten afnemen in nabijgelegen zwakke wijken;

3) Delen, ruilen combineren, zet bibliotheek, politiepost en welzijnspost samen in een school; en

4) Sepuku urbanism, stimuleer verhuizen, geef de wijk terug aan de natuur en spaar dure infrastructuur uit.

Het FD Outlook magazine is via deze link nu digitaal te lezen. Vanaf pagina 66 treft u het artikel.

Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis (C) mei 2011

Narratives of Spatial Justice

2011-05-02T23:26:00.003+02:00

The concept of spatial justice describes the compelling relationship between spatiality, how the city and/or landscape evolves and issues of social justice and urban governance. The following events, works, books and other narratives all tell of and relate to this topic.
In an upcoming workshop at the TU Delft I will look at the topic of urban governance together with architecture students and try to define how and what kind of ethics of urban development and urban governance principles can be defined. It deals withthe ethics of being a city and how a city, as a complex organism, achieve itsgoals, how it shares it resources, wealth and pollution. Thus the definition ofthe urban metabolism is being used as a metaphor to describe the input andoutput of both cities.

To a large part, urban governanceis an economic question or at least a question that has to be answered againstan economic background/ context. The particularities for each city are rootedin its geography and history. DavidHarvey, Susan Fainstein and Edward Soja (titles see below) have all writtenabout the spatiality and geography of justice in the past two years. In short it about the question who gets what and how that question is answered geographically.

MOKUM guide (with a preview here)

I have taken the idea of spatial justice as a starting point for an essay I wrote for the soon to be released Mokum, A Guide to Amsterdam which looks at the notions of liberty in Amsterdam. It is produced in relationship to the yearly May 4/5 commemorations that reflect upon the end of the Second World War. The essay deals with scheefwonen, a Dutch word which describes people who live in social housing, but whose incomes are relatively too high for that (but who technically also cannot easily move somewhere else). How to deal with this, and to what extent is this also a question of spatial (in)justice? They receive a benefit because they are insider, because they have lived for a long time in the city. Social capital has become financial capital. Should it be taxed therefor?

During the Wiener Festwochen the topic of spatial justice is approached in a different manner: In Safe European Home?an installation and exhibition with a symposium, film night, library, workshops and fora the uncertainty of living conditions of among others the Roma is being discussed and placed under the limelight. On May 28 they will organize this symposium which looks promising.

Also during the Festwochen, Colombian artist Carlos Motta will show a video work, La Buena Vida – The Good Life / Six Acts: An Experiment in Narrative Justice - Survival Strategies. from their site: 'Motta examines democracy from different perspectives: In Six Acts, performers give public verbatim speeches by murdered former presidential candidates. The Good Life interviews citizens of 12 South American cities about the democratisation process in their countries.' More on that. The work reminds me of the impressive ans unnerving cartoon by Mel Chin which draws the parallels between the September 2001 and 1973 attacks.(preview below)

As Motta makes clear in combining the two videos, one on murdered presidential candidates and one on ordinary citizens of 12 Latin American cities in one work, under one title, La Buena Vida, the micro and macro are deeply interrelated. Spatial justice just like any form of justice plays at all levels, all the time. The narrative continues..

Spatial justice in books:

Social Justice and the City, David Harvey, Univ of Georgia Press, October 2009,

Seeking Spatial Justice, Edward Soja, university of Minisota, October 2010

The Just City, Susan Fainstein,Cornel University Press, August 2010

Culturele vernieuwers zetten eerste stap

2011-04-29T19:06:00.001+02:00

'Het landgoed De Horst in Driebergen-Zeist was op 26 en 27 april toneel voor de start van de Academie voor Culturele Vernieuwers. Uit veertig aanmeldingen selecteerden Kennisland en de Baak de zestien meest veelbelovende professionals met een leidinggevende functie in de culturele sector, om samen een traject van ruim een half jaar in te gaan.
Tijdens dit traject gaan de vernieuwers aan de slag met innovatieve projecten, werken ze aan persoonlijk leiderschap en bouwen ze een platform voor vernieuwing. De Academie biedt hulp en ondersteuning voor culturele instellingen om te vernieuwen en nieuwe verbindingen met de maatschappij aan te gaan.' bron site Kennisland.
Als een van de zes coaches ben ik aan dit programma verbonden. Ik zal me bezig houden met strategische marketing en onderzoek naar inpassingen van de plannen en concepten in de stedelijke, maatschappelijke en culturele trends en ontwikkelingen. Voor meer over het programma zie de site van Kennisland '

Cultural intelligence @ Shinsekai Analysis

2011-04-25T16:51:00.000+02:00

At ShinsekaiAnalysis we proud ourselves in providing our clients with urban strategies andcultural intelligence. As the latter isa rather new term and an exciting concept it deserves some explanation.

We chose culturalintelligence to describe activities whereby we tap into local culture andsituations with the aim of better understanding the (socio-) cultural,economic, political and societal developments and trends of particular place. Thisis important for our assignments if a client wants to develop something in anspecific country, city or culture with which he is not familiar (let’s saybuild luxury apartments in Kazakhstan, or see what the retail conditions for acertain city are.) or if a client wants to get an overview of developmentshappening in different markets and cities around the world. In both cases,cultural intelligence describes the analysis we offer to our clients. Ourresearch has a strongly qualitative character and often comes in the form ofimages, texts, narratives and data. This together forms the end product, acombination of slide show and lecture, backed by a literature reader, trend +issue mind maps and other data. It is based upon site visits and photography, extensiveinterviews with locals and local specialists, (regional) newspaper clippingsand (online + off line) research into the literature on the history, geography,economics and urban context of a place.

Our notionof cultural intelligence resonates within a wider understanding of culturalintelligence, a framework which has developed over the past decade. In 2003 ChristopherEarley and Soon Ang wrote Cultural Intelligence: Individual InteractionsAcross Cultures in which they describe cultural intelligence as “a person’scapability to adapt to new cultural contexts”. They use it as a managementtheory to distinguish between different cultural behavior. With this idea theywant to describe the ability of persons and organizations to be receptive to anunderstanding of cultural nuances and develop business strategies that accountfor these differences. In this sense cultural intelligence, (CQ) is to culture,what your IQ is to intellect and what your emotional quotient EQ (DanielGoleman and others) is to behavior and social interactions.

Culturalintelligence, thus is how well you deal with other cultures, seen through abusiness and management perspective. Earlier emphasis on this topic, though notunder the umbrella of cultural intelligence, has been given by among othersGeert Hofstede and Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden Taylor (i.e. on therole of culture in leadership, business transactions and M&A processes) orKarel van Wolferen and Ian Buruma (on the specific culture of Japan and laterChina). Max Weeber’s outstanding and still deeply relevant book “the protestant ethic and the Spirit of capitalism”, (1904-1905) can be seen as a first effortto understand not only the nature but specifically the culture that drivesbusiness.

The wordintelligence has another connotation in popular speak. Intelligence as in Central Intelligence Agency. The CIAproduces excellent country reports on most countries of the world and on theirsite also link to some literature on the meaning of cultural intelligence. Itis interesting that they too take the cultural aspect of intelligence seriousand wrote an good review of the Christopher Earley and Soon Ang book from 2003.

A morebusiness and marketing style approach towards the importance of culture (in thesense of general or youth culture, even hipness) offers the book Chief Culture Officer by Grant McCracken. In it he describes the importance of(understanding) popular and subculture for businesses to succeed in all kind ofmarkets. The book furthermore looks at how one can embed this kind of know-how andintelligence in organizations and businesses. We see our cultural intelligenceservices and products as catering to this need and have worked with companieson implementing this kind of knowledge in their organizational structures andhow that can learn and innovate.

Can cities be learning environments?

2011-04-25T10:01:00.003+02:00

Recently I have been thinking on the relationship between peer education and the theory of experiential learning for an article I wrote for an upcoming book by Diversion on peer education. Experiential learning is a theory developed by the American development and educational psychologist David Kolb's which describes how experiences can be a source of learning. He analyzes how the learning process takes places through a cyclical process (see image below) and how people have individual preferences for different combinations from the learning cycle, so called learning styles.

Kolb's learning

One of my main points was to take a broad notion of learning environments, places where learning experiences take place, so that they could include as many environments as possible where people- especially young ones- can learn. The city plays a creates a crucial role here. It has often been called an emancipation machine by Amsterdam politicians, but also by for example Arnold Reijndorp in an interview. The question is whether the city is not only an emancipation machine, but also an educational machine? Can urban environments be learning environments?

The successful Brazilian journalist and activist Gilberto Dimenstein certainly thinks so. Together with among others MIT he has developed a a public journalism project called Catraca Livre, where one can find low cost things to do in the city, with the aim to turn cities into learning spaces. Furthermore he writes for the important Sao Paulo newspaper Folha de S.Paulo and he is a Fellow of the Advanced Leadership Initiative at Harvard University. For the HBR's website he explained his practice and thoughts in an elegant column on how the city can be a school. At Forbes' website is a feature on Club Idea, a similar initiative in Ciudad Neza close to Mexico CF. Than there is ofcourse Dave Eggers' cum suis concept of 826 Valencia / the Pirate Supply Stores, which transform empty retail spaces into work spots for freelancers who double as spots for urban kids to do their homework after school.

They are powerful ideas that deserves traction and attention. Mega cities cannot afford to let the potential of their (young) citizens untapped and uneducated. The issues they are facing are too large not to be faced by the greatest amount and diversity of people.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis, April 2011, updated May9th.

the catch 22 of re-embracing risk,inflation management and corporate ethics

2011-04-06T00:38:00.001+02:00

Some readings on ethics, risk and wealth

Ethics and risk continue to be among the subjects that I enjoy reading about most. The FT in the past week published some worthwhile articles on ethics and governance, some on the return to risk and one on the way that governments force companies to deal with inflation. Below follows a list, but first some of my own thoughts including the catch 22 that comes when companies under public support re-embrace risk.

Some industries seem to operate in a post-crisis atmosphere, others are still experiencing the effects of the severe downturn of demand or the trickle down effects of the financial crisis. In particular for companies that have a headquarter in countries that suffer the significant risk of having to be bailed out by the emergency European funds (Portugal, Ireland, Greece, Spain (?) it is very difficult to operate or be seen as more trustworthy than the country they are based in.

Companies and specially financial institutions that have received some form of government guarantee and/or support are confronted by political and popular outcry when they return to rewarding (larger) bonuses to their senior management or when they mention that they plan to re-embrace risk. This leaves them in a kind of Catch 22 situation. To some extent, taking on more risk (= /and leverage) will allow them to pay back the public investments that were made in them during the heydays of the financial crisis.

Sculptural management: How to realign the trust of the dog and its boss?

In the near future with the stringent Basel III capital requirements, it will be difficult, not to say impossible to achieve some of their traditional profits levels and thus to regain their lost capital. In a way, it means that governments will take a hair cut or at least not recuperate some of their investments in the banks. If they are allowed to take upon more risk, regulators, the European Commission and states will hopefully see to it, that this time there are far better instruments in place to align bank managers and employees with the long term well being of their financial institutions. Rewarding bonuses in the form of Co Co's, contingency capital (see earlier blog) could be a way to better align managers with the long term development of their banks. On the other hand, maybe there should be bolder experiments with truly new measures of risk and long term performance as concepts like VAR (value at risk) have become outdated. They have not been without their fair share of criticism that they misrepresent what is going on in the banks.

the news of Barclays enlarged risk appetite, and some wise words by Gillian Tett on Wall Street Black Swan fatigue. are they getting tired of risk, and does that mean as a society we are getting less modern? An interesting idea to reflect upon.

The ability of companies to push prices up to compensate for inflation and higher costs is in self turning into a major area of risk, as governments like China (fearing popular unrest) stop Unilever from rising prices and Argentina (fearing the risk of not being re-elected) punish companies that publish the real inflation instead of the one the government measures. Weather this kind of behavior limits the underlying inflation remains to be seen, they, certainly in the case of Argentina lose their credibility in the financial markets. The FT on Argentina's inflation woos, how it forces prices upon energy companies and the IMF's response to the inflation index problem.

Seeing through the maze of corporate ethics. image: Haegue Yang installation at KUB Bregenz

on risk ethics: A beautiful tale on the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire by Gary Silverman and what it tells about risk appetite among entrepreneurs 100 years ago and now, here.
on tax ethics:Nicholas Shaxson and John Christensen, director of Tax Justice Network write a convincing comment in the FT that it is 'time to black-list the tax haven whitewash.'
on bribery ethics: Andrew Hill on the UK government's new anti-corruption guidance: When is fine dining fishy?
on the questionable ethics of corporate succession planning within the family: Michael Skapinker discusses Murdoch and Buffet.

Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis April 2011

Upcoming events: Spring 2011

2011-04-05T23:18:00.001+02:00

In the upcoming months I will participate in or at events around the Autorai, INDESEM and the TU Delft. At the end of March I published an article on strategies for shrinking and other vulnerable cities in FD Outlook, the quarterly of the Dutch Financieele Dagblad.
April 7, I will give a tour along of the hotspots of Amsterdam for a group retailers from CBW MITEX, the industry group for entrepreneurs from the fashion, sports, shoes and furniture and interiors.

On April 15, I will give a short lecture on scenario's for the future of work car mobility against the background of the trend of the flexible office and office work at a one day symposium marking the yearly Autorai in Amsterdam.

From May 13 to 20 I will be one of the workshop tutors at the INDESEM architecture workshop organized bi-annualy by the students of the TU Delft. Also in May I will give a workshop on urban governance at the TU Delft, architecture faculty.

Crowd funding + changing Dublin's culture

2011-03-31T13:32:00.003+02:00

April1st and 2nd I will make a brief visit to Dublin to visit two dear friends who have moved there. Furthermore I will pick up a drawing of an artist I acquired already quite a while ago. In the mean time, the government of Ireland is dealing with the results of the stress tests of the Irish banks.

Bea McMahon , 5:55am (2007), courtesy Green on Red gallery

Against the backdrop of this enormous need for Irish funding, (see FT here or the Lex column) I was pleasantly surprised by the crowd funding initiative of IMMA, the Irish Museum of Modern Art to acquire a set of 4 drawings by the young Irish artist Bea McMahon, the same artist I had to pick up my drawing of in the gallery. Here is a link to the Fund it set which explains the museum's thoughts for this appeal and a little film at the IMMA set explaining McMahon's work.

Bea McMahon from Irish Museum of Modern Art on Vimeo.

In the evening of April 1st I will visit the opening of Bear Bicycle's show at the Gallery Number One gallery to see and hear how the phenomenon of Dutch bikes and bicycle chic is taking on Dublin.

It this doesn't look picture perfect, I don't know what does. I am curious to hear how the company is doing. Their efforts reflect on the large efforts cities across Europe are undertaking to develop more sustainable urban life forms. For those to succeed is not just a technological question, but to a large extent also one of changing perceptions. People have to be seduced into this other lifestyle and as landscape architect Martha Schwartz for example frames it, there should be attention to the softer side of sustainability. Bikes are no landscapes, but they sure make the landscape accessible in a far nicer way than cars do.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis March 2011

Upcoming Armory week in NY.

2011-02-22T18:56:00.001+01:00

A very brief selection of events.

The first week of March New York City hosts a number of art fairs. It will be hectic, and hopefully worth it. Here is a very brief selection of events and links to them. The Armory show opens on Wednesday for a preview. From Thursday to Sunday the fair is open fromnoon to 8PM. Advance tickets are available online: PURCHASE TICKETS

Ticket prices General Admission US$30 Students US$10 Groups (10+) US$15 Run of Show Pass(4 day) US$60 The Armory Show/VOLTA NY Pass US$40

There is also the venerable Art Dealers Association of America Art Show at the Park AvenueArmory. Here you will find the more established artists and galleries. I havenever been, but this year I will go and I think it could be exciting.

March 2–6, 2011 Park Avenue Armory Park Avenue at 67th Street New York City

Admission $20Wednesday – Saturday: noon to 8 pm Sunday:noon to 6 pm

Then, thereare the Volta Show, the Scope art fair and last year’s hit the Independent artfair. This is a must see! It opens onThursday. Hours ThursdayMarch 3, 4 – 9pm Friday March 4, 11am – 8pm
Saturday March 5, 11am – 8pm Sunday March 6, 12 – 4pm

Admissionis free

INDEPENDENT is located at 548 W 22nd Street,on the south side between 10^th Avenue and the West Side Highway. Subway: C or E to 23rd Street/8th Avenue; F or V to 23rd Street/6th Avenue; orL to 14th Street/8th Avenue. >Google Map

Ofcourse there are also NY's great institutions small and large like White Columns, the New Museum, the Whitney, PS1, the Sculpture Center, the International Center for Photography and ofcourse the MoMA

A special exhibition curated by the Long Island Sculpture Center for the Bloomberg NY office (that is the company not the mayor) is titled Speculative Futures. Featuring works by Julieta Aranda, Beth Campbell, Cao Fei, and Ana Prvacki, Speculative Futures looks at futurological tendencies in art and how they may relate to the context of the economic hub that is the Bloomberg New York office. Speculative Futures is curated by Regine Basha and organized by SculptureCenter for Bloomberg. The exhibition will be on view from February 1 - April 29, 2011, by appointment only.Click here for more information.

At the this link you can find all the events, museum shows and special openings that arehappening for Armory week. For people that are in particular focused on the Artindustry there is an:

ArtIndustry Summit Presented by The Art Newspaper in association with ADAA: Transparency in the market: can wehave more of it...

Thursday3rd March, 5.30pm. Park Avenue Armory, New York

Transparencyis a topic of much debate and controversy within the art world. Transparency is seen as healthy but is this always the case? Would moretransparency ruin the art market as some believe? Or are the intricaciesand complexities of transactions forms of art themselves? THE ARTNEWSPAPER Art Industry Summit in association with the ADAA aims to addressthese questions in a panel discussion at the Park Avenue Armory, Thursday 3rdMarch at 5.30pm.

HOST Anna Somers Cocks, Founder and Group Ed. Director of The ArtNewspaper

PANELISTS
Peter Stern, Art Lawyer
Richard Feigen, Art Dealer
Lucy Mitchell-Innes, Art Dealer
Allan Schwartzman, Art Consultant
Ed Dolman, Chairman Christie’s International

LOCATION The Park AvenueArmory 643 Park Avenue, New York City

FOR MORE INFORMATION OR TO RESERVE A SEAT
please visit www.artdealers.org/events

There is also a talk on how the Met Acquired allits Picasso’s for people who really want to know that.

The Buzz Club @ULIParis

2011-02-10T15:20:00.001+01:00

The High Line NYC

Yesterday was ULI Europe's yearly Winter conference in Paris at the Westin Hotel. It was a full day in which many real estate topics were discussed.
There was a very lively debate on the merits of listed vs. unlisted real estate investment vehicles, a reflection on the future of in the US European relationship by former Irish Prime Minister and former European Ambassador to the US, John Bruton. Ricky Burdett of the LSE Cities Center reframed the perspective on urban growth in the coming years to focus on the cities of the Global South and to include thinking about informal settlements which make up for 33% of the global urban population. He concluded with some signs of cities and countries that are moving towards a sustainable development path.

At the YLX factor Frank Uffen of Buena Gente pitched for the idea of the flexible office space2.0 and how large office investors should take note of the rise in flexible, community type spaces. They require a totally different mindset of investors to succeed in that area.

Jo'burg's Arts on Main

The Buzz Club is the title of a famous video by Dutch artist Rineke Dijkstra about a Liverpool club in the 90's. Here a brief, not official view of it.
It however, also was the title of one of the concluding session at ULI Paris, the Buzz Club- non traditional ways in which land is being re-used. Gerard Groener, CEO of retail investor Corio guided the panel in we looked for ways in which cities and landscapes are redeveloped, emphasizing other development strategies and a focus on the landscape. I gave an introduction to the main speakers and showed along examples like the High Line in New York City, CentQuatre in Paris, Arts on Main in Johannesburg, the area behind the Mailbox in Birmingham (panaroma view), urban event space and urban beach Rev@lution and the yearly temporary Serpentine Pavilion what this could be all about.

Nouvel's Serpentine Pavilion

Landscape architect Martha Schwartz emphasized the extremely important role landscape plays in changing (the perception) of challenged places. Often these places are looked upon as value-less or even as traumatic as the site of a bomb attack in Manchester, or former mining landscapes and quarries. Through investment in the public landscape people can see that such places are able to transform and become beautiful, and in the end valuable again. Schwartz showed many examples of the firm through their designs were able to shift the perception of place and thus enable a physical transformation and set in motion and upward cycle. In the discussion after the talk the question was raised what kind of financial instruments there are to re-capture the value of such up front investments. This is the domain of value capture finance and we have done some research about it here. Here also a link to an excellent exhibition and book about new ways of recreation in the city some years back by Zoe Ryan at the van Alen institute.

Martha Schwartz Design for the Dublin Dock Lands

Gert Urhahn, urban designer and founder of Urhahn Urban Design explained the process of spontaneous cities and the book which he just published about that theme. For Urhahn it was import to see these non-traditional redevelopment processes not merely as marginal and alternative, but increasingly as the only way forward. Forward looking, it is worth wile to see what capabilities more traditional real estate developers and investors should invest in to be better prepared to participate in and lead urban developments, the new and non-traditional way!

Feb. 2011, (c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis

How does it feel to be old?

2011-02-10T12:48:00.000+01:00

Image source MIT Age lab

The New York Times/ International Herald Tribune ran an interesting article on the Agnes Suit and other businesses and programs being developed for the growing elderly population. Don't know how it feels to be age-challenged or simply said-older? Well, researchers at the MIT Age lab have developed the Agnes Suit. If you wear Agnes, short for Age Gain Now Emphanty System you can feel how it feels if you are elderly and if you are for example a product designer you can thus create better solutions for this growing population. Here is the link to the article and the MIT Age lab.

Activities Winter 2011: No slopes, just the grid

2011-01-28T13:06:00.000+01:00

Here a brief overview of some (public) activities activities I participate in this Winter.

From end of December until mid January I taught Philosphy for retail Design at the Rotterdam Piet Zwart Institute, the post-graduate program at the Willem de Kooning art academy.

Half January I took the research and education council of the NRW, the Dutch Council for Shopping Centers on a urban exploration tour along the West Side of Amsterdam. From Toko MC in the Westergasfabriek, to innovative super market Marqt and retailer plus interior stylists Friday Next, via Smart Project Space to the new and exciting Cafe Zurich at Mercator Plein. We explored the new concepts that have popped up on the West side while we reflected upon the transformation that different shopping streets are undergoing.

On Saturday the 29th I participate in panel discussion organized by the Amsterdam Fashion Week and Vodafone. In the first Vodafone Creative Corner discussions the topic up for debate is how Dutch fashion (can) relate/s to the much broader known concept of Dutch Design. Does it make sense to bridge the gap or are there reasons why the images of both fields diverge abroad?

On February 4th I will give a lecture titled Artist Impressions at the De Nieuwe School in Rotterdam. The talk discussions the way artists look at the city against a background of the omnipresent use of highly realistic renderings to depict proposed future developments. The near bankruptcy of Dubai and other cities where models and renderings were used as examples after which to build the actual cities calls for a consciousness about the use of such imagery and for a new Post Rendered Reality that new room for imagination.

On February 9th I will present an introduction to a panel discussion moderared by Gerard Groener, CEO Corio NV and with landscape archtitect Martha Schwartz and urban designer Gert Urhahn at the ULI Paris Winter Conference on February 9th. In the panel titled "The Buzz Club - Non-traditional ways in which land is being re-used" we will look at what commercial real estate player can learn from successful- not traditionally planned urban hot spots and how they can incorporate such ventures and activities in their own businessses. What qualities does it ask from developers/investors, from cities and from (end)users?

Beginning of March it is of to New York City for a look at the Armory Show on the Hudson river and the Art Show by the ADAA, the Art dealers Association of America.

Lunch and leadership

2011-01-24T13:36:00.002+01:00

A newspaper needs good connections to its sources and the subjects of the writing, yet it should also not fly too close to the fire in the urge to catch the latest scoop. How to balance? Between lunch and leadership, between an Indonesian coal mine and the Davos mountain tops.
The FT has had a couple of good lunch sessions the past few weeks with among others Rem Koolhaas, and Nicolas Berggruen two weeks ago. This investor, the son of a famous art dealer cooked up a plan for a bi-partizan Think Long Committee for Calififornia to think about and solve some of California's massive deficit problems. The interview is interesting and has you wondering if the financier is able to change some things in the Sunny States. Money talks, but do enough people listen? Will the think tank rise above the level of the Milken Institute, or the Peterson Foundation. If there is a model in sight, it probably is OSI. Here is a link to the Nicloas Berggruen institute.

The same day they did a big 2 pager on Nat Rothschild' Indonesian coal adventures. It read like a James Bond script or as a scene from a more recent 'business' tale, the film Inception. It was exciting to read but the combination of the earlier November 'man in the news' item, and the consecutive pieces on the Vallar-Bumi deal and the Rothschild-Bakrie-Roeslani families felt that the FT editorial staff had been a bit to close to the deal. In any case it was a very good PR firm and than, some days later there was a very sweet rectification in the FT that Nat did not fuel around when he was working in the financial sector, no it was before!

Last weekend's lunch with John Studzinski was interesting again, not least because of the many Studzinski's portrayed and the discussion of arts philantrophy. Today it is to Ken Jacobs, the new CEO of Lazard after one year in the job to come up with some good quotes about the banking world in the Monday interview.

This week the entourage will move to higher grounds for Davos. I liked Gillian Tett's article on the need for lonely CEO's to soul search. Will she be able to write as critically in the coming days about Davos as i.e. Paul Betts sometimes does about European business? The relationship between journalists and their sources and the subjects of their writing has always been a delicate balance. Let's see what a week of Davos will bring.

Finally ,the FT Guide to Davos with upcoming articles here.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis

11 predictions for the new year

2011-01-23T21:25:00.003+01:00

11 predictions for the new year.

While forecasting is virtually impossible, formulating possible trends and ideas allows one to reflect upon one’s own expectations of the future, and the limitations they hold. Our expectations help to structure our reality and world view, and in this way influence the resulting outcome. We live in reflexive times!

1Fashion: Rise of the global South

The rise of the global South describes the growing influence that countries fromAsia, Africa and South America have on many aspects on global politics,business and culture. Their circle of influence is growing and this happens in non-linearand complex patterns. The BRIC’s (Brazil, Russia, India, China) might catch theheadlines, the Next 11 ( the 11 countries US investment bank Goldman Sachspredicts will offer the next biggest development opportunities after the BRIC’s)might offer compelling investment strategies, but the story continues with theparticipation of more and more countries from the Southern hemisphere. Beforedelving into the numbers game(demographics, inflation, economic prognoses etc.), one should also familiarizeoneself with the culture, myths and narratives that drive these countries. Fashionlabels from the Global South are a good example of the potential impact thesecountries can have. Fashion is partculture, part business, creative ideas and scalable products that can be distributedglobally. Some examples of upcoming fashion designers from the global South whose creative work has the power to be turned intoglobal labels.


Tramando isa up and coming Argentinan label from designer Martin Churba.shops in Buenos Aires NY and Tokyo.

Min Agostini from Buenos Aires creates minimal architectural forms

Jefferson Kulig in Sao Paulo.

Johannesburg based fashion label Black Coffee captures the imagination.

2 Online:Algorithmic optimization

The strongest online platforms succeed where television rating agencies failed:to pin down the viewer and to predict with a great precision what he or shemight want next. Algorithms, powerful computer programs, are used in an evermore effective way to understand and service the customer. This has lead togreat innovations and gains in consumer experience, but as users of theseservices we should be aware of the consequences. The costs of opting out isdifficult to calculate but is set to go up.

In theindustrial age companies were all about optimizing and streamlining the businessprocess, now the game is algorithmic optimization with the aim to assemble thestrongest and most predictive data sets and analysis of this data. In many cases the primary process or serviceis shared for free and profits can only be made by analyzing or sharingconsumer data. The result is that algorithmic optimization is, like aderivative focused on the change of direction or focus of the consumer, not theconsumer itself, with the aim of predicting and influencing the direction ofyour choice.

If TV advertisement was a shot of hail, itwill not be long before your average Facebook or Gmail ad has developed into alaser like precision attack. Will the internet know your wishes and desires beforeyour subconscious does so?

3 Transparency:A double edged sword

Transparencyhas been in the lime light for a while. The subject will continue to be a hottopic. Not only because of citizens and consumers that wonder what others know aboutthem as they interact, shop and debate online, but increasingly offline too.Data is powerful and overwhelming. It is probably very hard, to opt out in ameaningful way. The new thing is that the spot has been directed to thosetraditionally accustomed to attention, but to the level of scrutiny possiblethanks to the availability of large numbers of files on governments, bigbusinesses and other large institutions. Will it change their actions?Possible, but very likely it will not change their output so much, as it willmake large institutions, that traditionally aggregate data, rethink how they store that data and what they do itwith. Can it withstand the light? If not it probably isn’t such a good ideaanyhow. The actions of Wikileaks have split people in their reactions. Thequest for transparency has turned into a double edged sword.

4 Datavisualization: The map incorporated and the corporation mapped

Datavisualization dates a long way back. The sign, the signal and the signifierhave been a topic of discussion many times. With the arrival of immense andinnovative data sets, the need to find your way through that data and theoutcomes of its analysis have become crucial. Data visualization is a fieldchampioned by graphic designers and some artists, but is now rapidly embracedby big businesses. They like it because it offers them the opportunity to tellstories and set an agenda in ways previously not possible- A) Because theunderlying data was not available and B) as there was no elegant way tocommunicate the outcome. In the process the map, as a tool to find your way outof a situation has been incorporated. More importantly, corporations becamemapped by themselves, by their customers and by NGO’s who care about what bigbusiness says and what they actually do.

Corporate data visualization. Kiwitobes took a UBS “Analyst Transparency Report” and made visual which analysts follow which companies.

5 Governanceand tax ethics: the new green?

Governanceboth referring to forms of governingthat are not done by government and in relation to this, to for example theyway (large) companies are being lead. Large institutional investors look at thegovernance structure and procedures of companies to see if they can and want toinvest in those companies. A variety of ways companies deal with theircustomers, society, personnel and with their shareholders- think executive pay,boardroom structures, sustainability, Corporate Social Responsibility, and itstax story-all are part of their overarching governance structure. That becomesthe overall story a company has to tell about how it manifests itself in themarket, whether it is the financial market, the labor market, orthe environment and society at large.

Thefinancial crisis also exposed more information about the location and levels oftax multinationals pay. This has not come unnoticed both by NGO’s likeFairfood, angry citizens and tax authorities alike. Transfer pricing is crucialfor companies, explaining and understanding the importance (why and how) to companies, consumers, NGO’s andgovernments. People will demand anarrative about taxes, let’s call it tax ethics. Not having one is not a goodline.

Updated example Jan 27 of the IKEA tax story at the FT site.

6Economics: Urban externalities trading

Ineconomics and cities it is time to take the externalities serious.Externalities are those goods a third party receives when a product is consumedor produced. They can be positive or negative. People tend to focus most on thenegative side effects of things. So there is an expression for these kind ofprotests, NIMBY-ism: Not in my back yard. The equivalent Yes, in my frontyard,please does not exist. In the past year, together with Peter Robinett Ihave compared 10 urban finance instruments for cities to attract and provideincentives for private actors to create goods with positive externalities.(City) governments are under great pressure to lower costs, yet the need forcollective action and common goods is only growing. At the Seattle Project site you can find apreview of our research. Expect more in 2011.

7 Urbanism: Piracy venture capital and informalreal estate

Somalipirates are terrorizing the international waters. However there is a growing awareness that they hardlyhave any alternatives, in a failed Somali state where, for example, in theabsence of law enforcement, foreign fishing boats have emptied the Somaliseas. Now, as a Reuters journalist reported in 2010, some Somali’s have turnedpiracy into a community activity. They have created a stock exchange to sharethe risks of their activities. This kind of piracy venture capital feels a bitlike informal version of the early daysof the Dutch East Indies companies.

Informality,informal housing aka slum cities in general need to be taken much more seriousat large. Consumer brands have discovered that small packages can sell well inIndia and other emerging markets. The distribution of micro credits hasdeveloped into a major sector. Now concepts like micro-insurance andmicro-franchising are being innovated and tested with the speed of light. It istime for the real estate sector, amongst others, to develop concepts thatfunction in the complex world of slums. In her book Global Cities Saskia Sassenclarifies that informality (jobs, workers etc) were part of highly professionalizedglobal cities. In reverse, we now need to bring that professional and global classto start thinking how to service to the large informal cities and theircitizens around the world.

8 Architecture:Post rendered realities

Piracyventure capital At the past Architecture Biennial in Venice from September toNovember 2010 a couple of country pavilions and exhibitors stood out. Examplesare the Belgians, Dutch and Russian pavilions. These countries did not focus on invention and architecture indevelopment, however, they focused on the existing range of buildings in directneed of functionality. Furthermore they showed this way of thinking not by using the latest high renderings but bysomething else. I would like to call these post-rendered realities, images thatdo not compete in a quest to visualize a future with the most detailed renderings possible. In my opinion it was strongest shown in the RussianPavilion where one room was painted in Soviet realism 360 degrees view of anold factory town, or the ceiling of the Dutch pavilion by landscape architectRonald Rietveld. By not wanting torender everything in great precision, but by leaving open something to the viewerthey create a chance for ideas to actually capture the imagination.

Post rendered realities: sovjet realism at the Russian Pavilion in Venice 2010

9 Luxury:Between craft and care

At the FT Business of Luxury Conference 2009 inMonaco Bernard Arnault, of the LVMH conglomerate shared his opinion that luxurybrands play a role to promote and protect the crafts tradition. He stated thatthe group’s brands invest to keep the knowledge and know-how of craft alive andin production. Wherever you look within the sector quality and with itcraftsmanship --the ability to makeunique products that require some particular kind of skilled work-- distinguish it from the rest. As such, history and tradition often, but notnecessarily, play a great role. The past InternationalHerald Tribune Luxury Conference was themed Heritage Luxury. But adefinition of luxury framed between craft and care should be able to offer moreforward looking and innovative experiences. A suggestion for large luxury brands might be to take a closer look at howyoung and up and coming designers makequality and craftsmanship their priority and USP instead of mass consumerism.

Boundariescontinue to blur the luxury space. The distinction between apartment and hotel, between clinic and curated space, between jewelry and decorated product,between fashion and intellectual experiment and between transportation mode andstylistic mirror of the self, keeps being challenged. That has allowed luxury to develop into something between averb and a noun. Between craft and care,it is difficult to define, but you know it when you experience it, just asjudge Stewart Potter once remarked about pornography: ‘I know it, when I seeit!’

Craft and innovation: handmade stingray leather shoes by Amsterdam designer Jacob Lesman.

10Radical unorthodoxy: Start a mini brand

Radical unorthodoxy in names resembles but is not the opposite of radical orthodoxy, a Christian theological/philosophical school ofthought that employs postmodern philosophy to reject the paradigm of modernity.I would like to propose Radical unorthodoxy as a business and organizationalstrategy. To be radical is always honorable but in many industries very difficultto accomplish, let alone for people within a hierarchy to achieve. To beunorthodox seems lighter, to look at things in a (slightly) alternative/ otherway could be feasible, right? But being un-orthodox also carries a graver meaning,to step away from the orthodoxy from the mainstream thinking. When there is a paradigmaticbelief in the mainstream is, it calls for great courage to be unorthodox, letalone radically unorthodox. Yet it could be very healthy for an organization todo so, even with a small part of the business. One way of doing that is tostart a mini-brand within the company that approaches things radically unorthodox.In that way you test which organizational traditions and practices are valuableand which offer limitations to overall success.

11 Image culture

Our imageculture is influenced by many factors and agents. Artists play a subtle if not crucialrole in framing the issues we fail to see (yet) in societies at large. Theartists mentioned here all make you look at and question the destiny of theland, whether urban or rural.

I had notseen work of Los Angeles artist Edgar Arcenaux since the 2008 Whitney Biennal. Curious,I looked him up and was impressed by a powerful exhibition the past Decemberthat traces the ongoing changes Detroit faces. These paintings and sculpturestell the story of a city, where institutions like education and public servicesfail one after the other as industry, economy and society fall apart. This isnot new, but good to see it framed inthis context. Furthermore the tragedy that Detroit and other similar citiesface could be the future if the unbridled ethos of industrial and capitalisticdevelopment stay on their current course.

OtobongNkanga is a Nigerian artist who lives in Belgium. Her drawings tell powerfulstories of the personal, political and economic processes in Nigeria andelsewhere. Oil pipe lines turn into urban grids, arms into machetes; and people become puppets. Expect her to continue her upstreamexploration of the processes that govern our daily lives between the abstractand the up close and personal.

Dutchphotographer Sanne Peper had anexcellent show past Fall in Almere. In it she showed landscape photographydocumenting sites that play an important role in the history of the atomicbomb. She made reference to Tarkovski’s film Stalker and has as a modern dayStalker wandered the zones that surroundLos Alamos to Hiroshima and Chernobyl; memories build landscapes just as the structureswe inhabit do.

The Danishartist Jakob Kolding makes beautiful collages. His work has a modernist estheticthat critiques processes of urban gentrification and restructuring. They couldbe film posters, but the stories of urban change they point at are real.

In a Fair World

2011-01-23T14:48:00.004+01:00

A glimpse of the viewing experience at the new VIP Art fair

Traditionally the international art fair season starts in February with the art fairs in Madrid and Rotterdam (opens on the 9th of February). This year the new virtual, VIP Art Fair has stolen the march and opened yesterday for a week of art viewing and hopefully for the organizers art buying.

The million dollar question is whether this online kind of experience will work and for whom it will work. In the last two years a number of online art endeavors were announced with great fanfare. They all look at the art market, but some approach it more from an investment perspective, while others focus on how technology and strong algorithms can help collectors discover new artists. Art.sy (still under development) is such a company. It is founded by 24 year old Carter Cleveland, who graduated from Princeton University in 2009. The art venture's unique selling point is their in house research they call The Art Genome Project. With strong computer programing (I think) they are aiming to develop parameters that would give predictions based on the available data of your individual taste. An example would be, if you like Jakub Julian Ziolkowski, a young Polish painter and Bojan Sarcevic, a sculptor playing with modernist forms and structures, you might also like the work of Milena Dragicevic.

Through talking with somebody, a lot of learning, listening and looking at art, the mind of a collector, gallerist, art advisor of curator develops such connections and suggestions. It is probably true that a computer program can make such analysis as well. It probably won't be able to do the subconscious part that you brain does too, but it comes quite far and will go even further in the future through cloud computing and the increasing ability of computers to become learning systems. Art.sy focuses a lot on smart business and art world connections, probably in the same manner as many online start ups try to build an experienced board and venture capital/ angel investor base. It is a good business practice, but if you read about it in for example the FT, the Wall Street Journal or in the Art Newspaper, this fancy advisor/ collector base becomes the topic of discussion instead of the actual activity of the venture. Partly because there is nothing yet to be shown to the public, partly because art world gossip is so much focused on celebrity content. Earlier in the online art game was the German Independent Collectors. That is a kind of Facebook for art works and collectors. This operates more low tech and focuses most, if I understand it correctly, on bringing together a community of collectors and offering them an online/offline platform to trade art works and ideas.

Will the VIP art fair succeed in creating an environment of desire and exclusivity in which physical art fairs are so good?

The other venture, and the one that is in the spot lights this week is the VIP art fair. I tested it as my curiosity was strongly triggered by the 20 or so invitations I received in the weeks leading up to yesterday's opening. A smart advertisement at the bottom of yesterday's FT Weekend, had to be the final hint to those global financier-collectors that the first online art fair would open a 2PM European time and 8AM Central Eastern Time in the US. Depending on your location that was either a nice Louise Bourgeois drawing as a continental European lunch or a Koons sculpture for those NY'ers having breakfast. I always thought NY breakfasts were kind of heavy. I tried to log in to see some art in the evening in Amsterdam and it proved unsuccessful as there apparently were too many viewers and the website got clogged. That is probably the same as the long line that awaits collectors trying to enter the Frieze or Basel fairs at the opening, but it was also a major setback against those high expectations that the VIP art fair organizers had created among their potential clientele.

This morning I returned and things were better. The galleries are grouped in 4 sections: the biggest blue chip galleries, smaller, but still very established art galleries, emerging galleries, galleries doing solo shows. (very nice work of post art inventor Ray Johnson at Feigen and Co.) and finally publishers and partners. The map looks like the map of an art fair. When you have seen the gallery, the block representing it on the map turns into another color, a simple online mechanism, but something that would be great at an actual art fair. I think any art fair director looking at the online fair map, is talking to his technology provider and demanding an an intelligent art fair map as an Ipad or tab application right now. From the map, you enter the individual gallery and you are confronted by a selection of the gallery's work which you can browse through. Most participating galleries have made an excellent and exciting selection of art works that in the same way as an art fair creates an appetite to buy art. The new combinations that are presented make you think. You want to discuss those ideas with friends, fellow collectors or indeed with the gallery. They have created a kind of online chat option to do just that. That is a good option but also shows the limitations of an art fair that is essentially open 24 hours a day. Galleries operate in time zones and to have a gallery employee available 24 hours a day to speak with potential collectors is probably impossible for most galleries excerpt maybe for Gagosian who have staff and outlets in most international time zones.

Another interesting feature is that you can make your selection based on galleries, artists and art works and so make comparisons that are not so easy to make in the real world. The down side is that this art fair is a far more solitary experience than any other real world fair is, and for many people the joy of an art fair is in the unexpected and in the so much hoped for encounters. Some of that is solved by the fact that they offer tours by experts, collectors and curators. I followed New Museum curator Benjamin Godsill's tour and it is very interesting to see what selection he made and in that selection one can build up a story. I think this too would be a great Ipad application or a kind of game that curators and collectors could do to develop, express and structure their tastes. Ironically later on, I found a little video at the Art News Paper site where he explains in real what and how he makes his selection. That explanation on film unfortunately is so much richer that the final online tour that is the result of his thinking.

Finally, I come back to the online experience and unfortunately it is just not as smooth as you would want it to be. Now I can perfectly understand that they are not Facebook nor Ebay and the deep pockets that come with that and so there viewing environment can sometimes experience a hitch. I do think that fact will not help to turn that 'viewing environment' in a transaction/ buying environment. I am very curious how much collecting and buying will be generated by this online art fair. It will probably create and enrich many discussions amongst collectors, galerists and art fair director about what make for the optimal viewing experiences. I would predict that a number of this experiments its new features will be rapidly incorporated by the existing art platforms. They now have to come with their responses to the online art fair. The year has just began and the game is on!

(c) Kai van Hasselt/Shinsekai Analysis, January 2011

2 more links:
Here is a link to an Wall Street Journal online article that also compares Art.sy and the VIP art fair from a business and collectors perspective and a December article on recent developed applications for art museums (including the Stedelijke in Amsterdam) in the New York Times.

Dutch Delights: 12 shows for the Holiday season.

2010-12-19T23:28:00.001+01:00

Rinus van der Velde in Smart

12 Dutch cities and the best of the art on show for the holiday season. No matter where you live or strand because of the weather, there are a lot of good art shows nearby. Seek refugee before they have turn of the heat. For now the heat is on in a museum near you!

1 A tour through the Jordaan feels even more as if in the 19th century with all the snow. Fons Welters, Annnet Gelink, Tegenbosch van Vreeden, Diana Stigter, Ellen de Bruijne, Ron Mandos and Artpocalypse galleries in the Jordaan all have really interesting shows up. It is the last week and chance probably to buy art with 6% tax on it. Men in/and fashion in the Amsterdam Historic Museum offers an interesting look how clothing have shaped the image of men through the ages. Very accessible show, without being cheesy; On the West side one must see the current show at Smart Very
impressive murals by Rinus van de Velde and other intriguing works.

2 Mike Bouchet in the Cobra Museum Amstelveen offers a critical stance on America's living and consumption standards. The museum continues its strike of very interesting shows. Think Rob Voerman, Gijs Frieling, Isaak Zwartjes and now Bouchet.

Bourgeois in The Hague

3 A Tour de Hague is worth the trip this holiday season: Made in Holland in the Mauritshuis shows what a passion for 17th old masters (plus a lot of money) can turn into as a Dutch- US based couple shares with the audience the results of their collecting quest. Excellent works! Than there is Louise Bourgeois and Hans Bellmer in the Gemeentemuseum, an intriguing show at Stroom with a great Omar Fast film, a show by the young conceptual sculptur and image maker Frank Koolen in 1646, and a new gallery, Helder in de Tasmanstraat 188 showing the urban fantasies of Rik Smits and the design of Sajoscha Talirz..

4 Russian artist Andrei Roiter made an impressive exhibition of his works in the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam. It gives a good overview of his artistic practice and how he depicts the world through metaphoric paintings and constructivist sculptures. Definitely a must!

Jongerius show in Rotterdam

5 The Boijmans van Beuningen is filled with interesting art this Christmas. Whether it is Kees van Dongen, a Dutch classic but which made me look at contemporary painters with a new perspective, designer Hella Jongerius or the murals and glasses of Johan Thorn Prikker. You do not miss the front room installation and collage of Ronald Cornelissen!

6 The Kroller Muller museum in Otterlo has a landscape show with works selected by children, the newly acquired Gilbert & George, Ad Reinhard works and analysis of Helene Kroller Muller and the men who were influential to her. The show coincides with a new biography on her by Eva Roovers.

7 The Van Abbe Museum in Eindhoven dedicated their second floor to a show about museum models, as part of the larger exhibition on The Politics of Collecting - The Collecting of Politics.

Wiel Arets in Schunck, Heerlen

8 In the Bonnenfantenmuseum in Maastricht still an overview of Francis Alys, winner of the BACA award. On your way there, consider a stop in Heerlen to see a show on architect Wiel Arets.

9 The MMK museum in Arnhem shows the work of 3 South African artists who live in the Netherlands: Dineo Seshee Bopape , Marlene Dumas en Zanele Muholi. The inter-generational show offers critical perspectives on and some memories of South Africa.

10 In Leiden the Lakenhal is shifting through their collection in a very public way. I cannot fully understand it from their website, but that could be a reason to visit the space. In any case there contemporary works on view by the likes of Ni Haifeng, Jan Rothuizen and Roy Villevoye. Could be a really interesting museum experience!

11 Up in the North, the Fries Museum in Magie = Magic presents the attraction surrealism offers to contemporart artists like Erik van Lieshout, Keren Citter and Matt Mulican. The Filmhuis has a corresponding film program.

12 Finally in the Stedelijk Museum in Den Bosch you have a rare opportunity to see an exhibition of art grand dame Martha Rosler.

Martha Rosler in SM Den Bosch

Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis Dec. 2010

Fair reporting: Art Basel Miami Beach

2010-12-08T19:42:00.004+01:00

The Art Basel Miami Beach was held for the 9th time past week. The weather and the art competed for excellence. Both succeeded in a more than sufficient manner.

Breakfast at the Rubell's

Miami collectors opened their viewing spaces and houses. Fashion brands shared in the buzz surrounding the art fair and came out en masse to celebrate the arts, and of course their own brand's engagement with it. There were too many side fairs, even after the recession. It felt more relaxed than two years ago when I last attended. Local cabdrivers and gallerists still had the feeling that there were more people than last year. Many European collectors has stayed at home, but from the America's they were well represented with the Brazilians probably making the biggest splash both in presence and spending power.

A horse powered Hummer getting lots of attention at the Rubells.

Global
The extent to which galleries from for example Russia, South Korea, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa participate in the fair and in the recovery of the global art market makes very interesting to walk along the fair' alley. On one crossing you could compare the works of South Africa's leading gallery Goodman with that of Argentina's Ruth Bencazar. That comparison is not often possible in such close physical proximity and gives looking at art another dimension. It allows collectors and museums to consider art and artist practices normally continents apart directly. It potentially also leads to a kind of commodification effect on all the art works present, but this time, I felt not so worried about that.

Design Miami entrance

Design
The Design Miami fair had relocated from the Design District to the parking lot adjacent to the convention center but with only sixteen or so galleries felt rather small. On the outside was an installation by this years designer of the year which resembled this year's Summer pavilion by SOIL at PS1, NYC. Inside were 3 large minimalist structures by Dutch artist Krijn de Koning. Although well executed these kind of structures perform better against a more sober background, and proved difficult to compete with the bling of 16 design galleries, let alone a retro-futurist pump station right out of a Hopper painting warped into the future to host sponsor Audi's fascinating new car.

Audi retro-futurist pump station

Kempinas' world in turbulence

Art Basel Miami Beach
The main attraction was definitely the big fair. There was really excellent work. From an elegant Cy Twombly, lots of new photos by Wolfgang Tillmans to a mysterious Buchholz booth by young New Zealand artist Simon Deny who speculated on the only ever successful takeover of TV pirates of a public broadcaster in the US in 1987 . A timely work given that Jules Assange and the Wikileakes are operating as a kind of pirates and are exactly doing what governments are afraid of when people get unlimited air time. Zaha Hadid did booth design at Gmurzynska gallery, as did artist Pablo Bronstein in a minimal way at Gallery Franco Noero. At Yvon Lambert, Lithuanian artist Zilvinas Kempinas showed the world's turbulance, while Singaporian artist Ming Wong's retake on the death in Venice book and film was shown. It featured himself playing all the roles against the back drop of last years Venice Biennale. Very nice! Artist Pavel Altheimer at Neugerriemschneider spacious booth made statues from the waste of his father's plastic goods factory in Poland. The sculptures carried the faces of the workers from the factory and had an intangble quality. A bit like zombis from a distance but up close they also bring to memory the dramatic citizens of Calais sculpture by Rodin. I hope this is not the state of things to come.

Pavel Altheimer's creatures at Neugerriemschneider

Jorge Mendez Blake

Positions
The Art Positions- solo projects by young galleries and artists- traditionally housed in containers on the beach were integrated into the main fair. A couple of very interesting booths by galleries by among others Labor of Mexico City; an intriguing non linear film by at Cherry and Martin; a translated performance by traditional Colombian musicians of the 'star spangled banner' lyrics by Judi Werthein at Figge von Rosen and a neo-constructivist library by Jorge Mendez Blake gone splash and open source at Meessen de Clercq (Brussels). Christinger de Mayo from Zurich, gallery booth went low-tech minimal: Chilean artist Johanna Unzueta created a giant dark blue felt pipe system that critiqued among others water shortage in the South American continent and the broader implications of how those societies function and its wealth gets distributed. A number of other booths also looked very smart and the one artist, one work rule worked well.

Jakob Kolding at Janda

Art Nova
In the other corner was even more young art. A very large number of younger galleries had convened to bring refreshing aesthetics and stories. Favorites included Miguel Abreu gallery's booth with R.H. Quaytman's work Gallery Zero as always minimal approach; the good idea of gallery Alexander Gray Asc. to show a lot of Luiz Camnitzer work after a great show this Summer at the Daros collection in Zurich. Although an older artist with a large oeuvre with great gravitas is not what you expect in the Art Nova area, to show that in that environment full of young art and artists make a lot of sense and enriches the viewers experience. Martin Janda's booth was a personal favorite with the back wall given to Jakob Kolding's collages of and warnings for a modernist world going ore. They have a Hitchcockian gloom and black birds who circle the city in trouble. A giant red Kayak by Roman Signer hanging from the ceiling contrasted very well with a blackened leather alligator skin at an opposite booth.

Alligator skin turned art

South Beach

News Cafe, a South Beach institution

Miami's four decades of reinvention.
The chance encounter of the two art works, one more Everglades, the other more Miami Vice (Sunny Crockett being the man that teached my why to appreciate Gucci shoes) made one realize that this art fair takes places in the Southern tip of Florida, a place with a long and strange history. This current phase of Miami Beach's development is merely one of many and the city keeps reinventing itself. The economic reality has proved very difficult for the city in the past few years. Four gigantic empty tower blocks downtown were even described to me as the four horsemen of the apocalypse by a local real estate lawyer. Yet all that has not stopped this city from keeping its optimistic view of the future. Chicago might have been the original 'booster' city, Miami certainly could take pride in taking that title today. It is also being dubbed as the capital of Latin America, and it keeps capitalizing on the fact that the city has such deep ties with that region. In the 80's Miami brought fashion, modeling and ad agencies to town, in the 90's it became the celebrated tourist resort of Miami Vice; in the 00's through the help of local art collectors and real estate developers it transformed its former art deco hotels into design palaces again (and planted an extra few condo's in between) and rebranded itself as a design and art hub.

Shepard Fairley designed bar in Wynnwood Walls

Wynnwood Walls

Downtown Miami

Now, even as the worst of the crisis is over, foreign gallerists with local shops are reconsidering the underlying economics. French gallerist Emanuel Perrotin announced this week to end his gallery presence in Wynnwood, but in more positive news four block down the road Wynnwood Walls has developed into a very interesting graffiti and muralist art mecca with a thriving bar with interior by graffiti artist Shepard Fairey (who iconized pres. Obama image). On the verge of the new decade Miami has the honorable task to reinvent itself again. I'll put my money on two trends: 1, A continuous effort to transform the downtown area into a more approachable, walkable inclusive city (difficult, but great (societal) value if achieved.
See more at Dawntown for more on that and 2, a deepening of the Latin America scenario where Miami is able to continue the crown of Lat-am capital and function in a similar way Johannesburg, SA services and investment into and trade with the rest of the African continent, topped up with a gigantic trade on the possible and eventual opening up of Cuba. That would be a transformational event which would have great consequences for Southern Florida.

Wise words, but does anyone listen in Miami?

So much for the fair and the city of Miami. It was a good year. The art seems very alive among all the turmoil in the world and possible even to benefit here and there from renewed interest in it. There is definitely an appetite among collectors today for great artist's their canny ability to create the signs of the time.

Miami keeps reinventing itself: here a Herzog de Meuron parking lot

DawnTown Miami

2010-11-29T20:59:00.000+01:00

Only 3 more days to the announcement of this years Dawntown Miami architecture competition prizewinner!
DawnTown is the annual public international architecture ideas competition for Downtown Miami. DawnTown’s mission is to bring innovative architecture to Downtown Miami, and to tell the exciting urban story of Downtown Miami to the world.The event coincides with the Art Basel Miami Beach, one of the leading art fairs around, which opens on Wednesday. More on that later. Dawntown was founded in 2007 by co-founded by Andrew Frey, Neisen Kasdin and myself after an encounter at the 2007 ULI World Urban Summit in Shanghai.

If in Miami on Friday, please join the award ceremony! For details about the award and the event, please click here.

Ooh La La Landscaping

2010-11-24T10:58:00.000+01:00

Jardin des Fonderies, Nantes; photo origin: http://www.landezine.com/

Ooh, la la 10 excellent gardens and urban landscapes from around the world, contemporary and old.
1 With a title liked this we must start in France. Nantes to be precise where the Jardin des Fonderies / Foundries’ Garden is located on a former industrial island close to the Nantes city center. The Landezine blog provides the interested reader with excellent photos here.

Strootman_landscape_architecture_Belvederes_Drentsche_Aa_01

photo http://www.landezine.com

2 On the same blog images on a project of Amsterdam-based firm Strootman landscape architects for the Drentse AA region (North East of the Netherlands); smart minimal approach- Think Donald Judd goes landscaping. Do check out the firm's own site which has a nice overview feature. On the Landezine blog, another project of Strootman, this time in an urban context, a courtyard garden for a Pi de Bruijn designed office building in Arnhem, het Eusebiushof. Playful and fluide.

photo from Anouk Vogel's website

3 One of my favorite landscape designers, working from the Netherlands is Swiss-born Anouk Vogel. I learned of her work through a little green-white pocket book about her work. Special mention goes to the collaborative graphic designers Sonja Haller & Pascal Brun who designed the book. Recently she was selected for the Prix de Rome and has worked a lot on and with fashion designer(ers). Hope that many gardens will materialize!

Roberto Burle Marx design/ image from the Architect's newspaper

4 Roberto Burle Marx is the Grand Master of Brazilian landscape architecture. the designer, of German origin, born in 1909 made Brazilians appreciate the tropical natural beauty that was literally in their back yards. He created ebullient gardens well suited for the tropical climate of Brazil. His garden sketches as well as his murals have the quality of an Hans Arp or Paul Klee art work. His oeuvre is being rediscovered and luckily opened up or restored. Here an article from the New York Times on a show about him.

Dalton Trust image from KOOP Design

5 South African landscape rehabilitation.
The South African landscape has suffered in different ways than have its people. Whether they are post-mining fields or rural lands where the original species equilibrium has been disturbed, they deserves and luckily sometimes get attention and rehabilitation. On the subject of post-mining landscaping soon more, it proves not easy to track down an example I have heard of, here is in any case a good book on the subject related to a German conference. A most remarkable project which last September won South Africa's SAIA Award for Sustainable Architecture is the Dalton Trust Farm in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands designed by KOOP design of Durban. The project consists among others of making large parts of the farm accessible again, re-introducing traditional species in the area, token unnatural trees out and using the wood to build the houses and training for staff from local communities to work and build with the local materials. It has lead to both a functional farm as well as luxury accommodation for guests. The project won because the holistic way in which it has been developed is an almost paradigmatic shift in the way landscape and people, buildings and structure are perceived and approached.

6 The Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild and its gardens on Saint Jean Cap Ferrat are an excersize in opulence. The house and its 9 different themed gardens were created in 1905 by.Baroness Ephrussi de Rothschild. They are located on the highest point of the mountain ridge on of the most elegant peninsula's of the Cote d'Azur. Not much efforts were spared when developing this piece of lands. Japanese gardens flow over into a cactus garden. On the South side of the site an enormous rose bed covers the hill flank while huge ponts (with Las Vegas style musical fountain show, Yes even the Rotschilds move with their times) are the central element in front of the house.

7 The garden in Ryōan-ji Temple is one of the most famous Karesansui (dry landscape) Zen gardens of Japan. The 10 by 30 meter long garden sits in a beautiful temple complex and garden in Kyoto. It consists of 15 stones laid in such a manner that it is not possible to see all the stones at the same time. This makes it an ideal spot for contemplation and meditation. It is said that only very wise and spirited people can see the 15th stone. For an artist impression of the garden see an work of artist and friend Marc Schoneveld with whom I visited the garden in 2008. (second image from the top)

Image Credit: Thomas Jefferson Foundation

8 Thomas Jefferson, the first president of the United States founded his own private mini-utopia upon two hills: Monticello where he built his house and Montalto the next door hill. The site lays deep in Virginia landscape and breathes its historical roots. The house is kept in its original state, which make it interesting but also not uncomparable to other 'scenic' experiences. That cannot be said of the historic Monticello gardens

9 Singapore's Night Safari may be considered the odd one out in this list of landscaping. I would like to include it for several reasons. The zoo is only open after dark so you can see the animals when they are actually awake. Located at the back side of the little city state, it is one of its biggest attractions, (together with the Jurong Jurong bird's reserve). It quite successfully gives a natural jungle experience in the middle of the urban jungle that is Singapore. Although literally only miles apart from Orchard Road, it makes one forget that reality for a moment. It allows the visitor to keep the memory of, an awareness of and maybe even some hope for the tropical forest alive.

10 I conclude this list of Ooh la Landscaping with the gardens of El Generalife. The combination of a view onto the Islamic Alhambra on the opposite hill and over the city of Granada while being immersed in the richness of this wonderful lush garden made it one of my most memorable garden experiences. I was 19 when I visited the place and it made the same vivid impression that the gardens of Monet in Giverny made when I saw them as a kid.

So far for this garden list, I can really recommend the book of the FT's garden correspondent for over 40! years, Robin Lane Fox which recently came out. Since 1979 he has been Garden Master of the gardens at New College, Oxford where he is also Fellow and Tutor in Ancient History. What a life, and what writing indeed.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis November 2010

Shopping South America

2010-11-22T13:14:00.001+01:00

Sao Paulo Shopping in Jardins Europa

Here is a link to an article on the state of shopping centers in South America I just published in the latest issue of Shopping Center News (In Dutch only unfortunately). It offers a brief comparison of the historic, current and future developments of malls in Argentina, Brazil, Chili and Montevideo.

Revisiting the commons: externalities in the city.

2010-11-17T15:24:00.005+01:00

Lecture: Kai van Hasselt Date: 18.11.2010 Time: 18:00:00
To see a video of the talk on the AA website click here.

Kai van Hasselt will employ the concept of Reflexive Urbanism to analyse the theory and practice of dealing with externalities in the city. These external effects, namely the costs and benefits that are not recognised by traditional capitalist markets, are fundamental to the behaviour and structure of cities. The notion of Reflexive Urbanism builds upon Giddens’ concept of a reflexive modernity (1994). Using global examples and exemplary practices, the talk will speculate on the future of the city. It will suggest practical instruments for architects, developers and planners to value and stimulate positive externalities. Will the tragedy of the commons finally be overcome?

High & low brow FT inspiration on reputation and ethics

2010-11-10T18:10:00.000+01:00

And on top of it all, it folds into an air plane!

For one day, I convinced myself not to buy the FT. The day after, Yesterday, I was so happy to see and hear those pink crispy pages between my fingers again. Here some links to the more interesting articles including from the last two Weekend editions. A number of articles in one way or another dealt with reputation and ethics.

A Tuesday article looked at tax ethics: how companies that try to reduce ('optimize') tax payments are being attacked over their strategies. Than residential ethics; Edwin Heathcote discusses the effects of the upcoming Conservative cuts on London's low income population- As many as 82.000 could be forced out of the city-
He analyses London's and Paris' histories and make a quotes Jane Jacobs, who has overtime turned into the Godmother and consciousness of cities large and small.

Gideon Rachman had lunch with Bill Gates and talks worldly issues over a cheeseburger. Here is what they discussed. Frankly, we should be more focussed on what Angela Merkel, who overtime has turned into somewhat of a Grand Dame of Europe, has to say in her FT interview.
Simon Kuper offers the new president of Brazil a frank warning not to trust all those brass words about Soccer events really adding to urban and economic growth. He found out that for all its chutzpah, the World Cup delivered only so little to South Africa bottom line development. As he rightly remarks, when was the last time you threw an excellent birthday and made it into a big profit.

A weekend article looks at Paris most reputed artisan bakers. For once, Polaine is not on the list. On the back page an article tracks how Russian women increasingly favour local designers and reports on the Russian fashion week. interesting turn to coueur locale. Back to NY for a short interview with Phil Suarez the business partner of Jean Georges Vongerichten, whose latest restaurant venture ABC Kitchen on 35 East 18th does alot to trace the roots of the ingredients.

The weeks book review goes to Gideon Rachman's new book Zero Sum World which is reviewed by Lord Patten. Could be good reading for those interested in understanding the 'age of anxiety' and more important how on earth we get to a post-anxiety state again.

Finally some art.Ariella Budick reviews a show of the legendary Paul Thek at the Whitney. She points out how difficult it is to build a show around an artist of whom some of its biggest contributions had a more than ephemeral character. Now I am off to gets today's paper. If I am lucky, I will still find one at the local shop.

Mapping Gallery Maps: An Overview

2010-11-10T16:22:00.005+01:00

A collection of gallery maps

Here you can find a selection of various gallery maps from all over the world.updated April 2011

EUROPE

Amsterdam

Germany has three gallery maps:

Berlin

Hamburg

Cologne

As London is such a big and competitive city, it has three different gallery maps:

New Exhibitions

First Thursdays

Artupdate.com

Dublin- art map
Istanbul - Contemporary Art Map Istanbul

Zürich - The Zürich Galleries are mapped as well
Winterthur - Kultur Winterthur
Vienna - Die Galerien

Istanbul - Contemporary Art Map Istanbul

Zürich - The Zürich Galleries are mapped aswell

Edinburgh & Glasgow, Scotland - Artupdate.com

Vienna- Vienna Gallery Weekend
Antwerp - Antwerp Art Galleries
Paris

AFRICA

Cape Town - Open The City

ASIA

Tokyo - Tokyo's Art Map

Hong Kong - Hong Kong Galleries

AMERICA's

New York

The Chelsea Gallery Map

Artupdate.com/New York

Miami

Miami Art Galleries
Miami Art Guide

Houston

Houston Art Galleries

Houston Art Gallery

San Francisco

First Thursday Art

SFADA
Sao Paulo - Mapa das Artes Sao Paulo
Buenos Aires

Of course there are many more gallery maps around. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you want to suggest any.

Launch of Seattle Project website

2010-11-03T17:37:00.000+01:00

Today we launched the website for the Seattle Project. It is a joint research project into the role of externalities in the built environment and how both positive and negative externalities can be better valued, managed and traded. The project was started in Spring 2009 by Peter Robinett and myself to analyze the current state of affairs and to develop and share knowledge about externalities in both the urban and rural environments. Our aim is to transcend the current narrow fields of externality research and to develop broad principles. We do not want to confine ourselves to research alone and seek to put our knowledge into practice developing externalities markets. For more please have a look at the new site here which explains our research. It will be expanded in the coming months.

Upcoming November events: radio de Avonden, ADHD & AA

2010-11-03T13:40:00.000+01:00

Upcoming events this November are two talks, in The Hague and London and 5 short interviews on the VPRO radio program De Avonden the first week of November. A link to the program, the items mostly start 5 minutes after the beginning of the program. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th evening.

Externalities stock exchange, Lok Jansen 2007

Revisiting the commons: externalities in the city

Date: 18.11.2010, Public Occasion Agency; Architectural Association London

Kai van Hasselt will employ the concept of Reflexive Urbanism to analyse the theory and practice of dealing with externalities in the city. These external effects, namely the costs and benefits that are not recognised by traditional capitalist markets, are fundamental to the behavior and structure of cities. The notion of Reflexive Urbanism builds upon Giddens’ concept of a reflexive modernity (1994). Using global examples and exemplary practices, the talk will speculate on the future of the city. It will suggest practical instruments for architects, developers and planners to value and stimulate positive externalities. Will the tragedy of the commons finally be overcome?

In relation to this topic is an advice I give on November 9 at ADHD (Actueel Den Haag Debat)
to The Hague's new head of urban planning, Erik Pasveer on how the city could make more use of externalities when developing the city:

ADHD III: Ongevraagd Advies/ In gesprek met Erik Pasveer, hoofd Stedenbouw, DSO Den Haag

Dinsdag 9 november 2010, 20.00 uur Locatie: ANNA@KV20 / Voormalige AXAgebouw, Korte Voorhout 20, Den Haag,Toegang gratis Aanmelden verplicht i.v.m. zaalcapaciteit: info@stroom.nl of reserveringsformulier onderaan deze pagina

De afdeling Stedenbouw van de Dienst Ruimtelijke Ontwikkeling van de gemeente Den Haag heeft per 1 oktober 2010 een nieuw hoofd: Erik Pasveer. Voor ADHD aanleiding om kennis te maken. Dat gebeurt aan de hand van drie ongevraagde adviezen over de toekomst van de stad en stedenbouw.

Net als in andere steden wordt in Den Haag flink bezuinigd, ook op de ruimtelijke ontwikkeling van de stad. Prioriteit ligt bij projecten die bijdragen aan stedelijke economie en bereikbaarheid. Bij grootschalige gebiedsontwikkelingen als de Binckhorst of Kijkduin speelt de gemeente voorlopig geen actief ontwikkelende rol. Gelukkig biedt deze tijd ook alle aanleiding om na te denken over alternatieve manieren om de stad in beweging te houden.

ADHD nodigt vier spelers in het veld uit, die daarover op eigen wijze DSO adviseren: onderzoeker Beitske Boonstra (TNO Bouw en Ondergrond / Universiteit van Utrecht) spreekt over zelforganisatie in stedelijke ontwikkeling, architect/ontwikkelaar Cihan Bugdaci en architect/publicist Iris Schutten adviseren over het hergebruiken van de lege stad, econoom Kai van Hasselt (Shinsekai) gaat in op externe effecten van stedenbouw en presenteert een aantal instrumenten om daarop te sturen. Onder leiding van moderator JaapJan Berg vindt het debat plaats tussen de drie adviseurs, Erik Pasveer en het aanwezige publiek. Columnist Marcel Verreck zal de avond op passende wijze afsluiten.

Erik Pasveer was afgelopen jaren hoofd vakteam Ruimtelijke Ordening bij de gemeente Delft. Daarnaast heeft hij als stedenbouwkundige onder meer gewerkt bij BVR, DRO Amsterdam, gemeente Rotterdam, TU Delft en Academies van Bouwkunst in Amsterdam en Rotterdam.

Kai van Hasselt (1981) is the founder of Shinsekai Analysis, a research-based advisory practice in Amsterdam. Clients, ranging from (landscape) architecture firms to real estate developers, cultural institutions and governments, are provided with cultural intelligence and urban strategies. He studied economics at the University of Amsterdam and worked for a leading Dutch trend analyst from 2000 to 2003 and for OMA’s think tank AMO in 2006.

AZA 2010: Cultural institutions as urban catalysts

2010-10-25T14:49:00.001+02:00

Report on AZA 2010 workshop by Kai van Hasselt

Student workshop September 25& 26, 2010 @ University of Johannesburg

Downtown Johannesburg

The aim:
The aim of the Reflexive Urbanism workshop was to make the workshop participants, students from different South African architecture schools, more familiar with the effects of externalities in the city and the organization of collective action. In the two day program we looked at these topics through the notion of ‘reflexive urbanism’; how cities in late-modernity are being regenerated and developed in a highly strategic and reflexive manner and how that process works out in practice. In particular we focused on the important function cultural institutions, art spaces and temporary events can have in urban transformations.

Main street Life- site visit

The input:
The 35 participants started the workshop by each mentioning their favorite cultural and urban space- many of them squares and open spaces that play a pivotal role in the functioning of open cities and societies. On Sunday morning we visited Arts on Main and Main Street Life, a mixed use hub of art, cultural and fashion spaces, creative studio’s, small hotel and residential apartments in the middle of down town Johannesburg. Mila Bolon of Daffonchio and Associates, the project’s architects, spoke on the development. There after we had a panel discussion with artists and urban theorists Bronwyn Lace and Joseph Gaylard, Mila Bolon and the workshop participants. Next to practical questions of how to get a project of that magnitude going and in what way a project can actually influence its urban surroundings, we also discussed to what extend this and other such projects are inclusive or exclusive to local residents and stakeholders.

Sunday morning panel @ Arts on Main

The results:
The six student groups presented their ideas in an initial and final phase on the basis of two lectures by Kai van Hasselt on Reflexive Urbanism and on a global comparison of art and cultural spaces, the site visit and the panel discussion with invited guests. The discussion in class after presentation was highly engaged and critical, without precedent. We ended the workshop with six interesting proposals to transform different sites in Johannesburg and Durban. The presentations made clear the necessity to further invest in South Africa’s inner cities and the downtown Johannesburg in particular. The students in their presentations dealt with the informal and the formal, the need to be inclusive and for accessible pedestrian spaces, the value of positive externalities and the crucial role cultural spaces can play as a catalyst for urban regeneration.

AZA 2010 Main conference

Background Kai van Hasselt Kai van Hasselt (1981) started Shinsekai Analysis in 2004. It is an urban strategy advisory boutique in Amsterdam the Netherlands. It provides clients with cultural intelligence, and offers them urban strategies and concepts on the basis of the best global examples. The company works for clients on a boardroom level in among others (retail) real estate, architecture, government and cultural institutions. Shinsekai develops propriety research on subjects like the luxury industry, externalities trading and urbanization in emerging markets. The company's work field stretches Europe, the America's, Africa and Asia.

final presentations @ the Grove the new hotspot in Braamfontein

Cut the ideology from the cutting and build resilient and open cities!

2010-10-20T20:05:00.002+02:00

Since I have returned from a three week trip in Africa at the end of September, the news has been filled with blood red headlines about government cuts from anything like Dutch and UK arts budgets, French pension reforms to the massive UK Defense cuts announced today. For many people it was, and still is a time of great debate. I must admit I cannot recall ever to have experienced such hard debates among friends, colleagues and possible a passerby here and there, on the meaning and necessity of these cuts.
In the UK, the Netherlands and quite possible Sweden new conservative (plus a bit economic-liberal here and there) governments have taken seat in the office. The cuts are drastic and tough. They reflect the general sense that there is less money available in society, and that because of the Government funded banking bail-outs government debts are high again. The Euro-style response seems to be very different from the US response. While the United States worked along a budget stimulus for the past two years to get the banking system and the economy going again, the freshly chosen governments have chosen budget restraints in response to the severe deficits faced by a number of European governments.

The aim in the UK is to bring the budget back to normality by 2015 and thus to keep financial markets calm, which would save the country tones of money on interest rates and creates monetary and stability. These are painful cuts and the UK conservative government is aware that the burden should be carried by all and spread even. As one anonymous UK government person was quoted saying in Wednesday's in FT: 'If everyone hates us, that's a good thing.'

The pity on the Dutch side of the North Sea is that the necessary cuts are mixed with an agenda that is both anti-foreigner, anti-Islam and populist and pushes things from an ideological point of view that not necessarily help make the country a more efficient, resilient, welcoming and forward-looking nation. On the first day of the new government in power, the ANWB, the car-owners federation criticized the new-born government's plans to increase the maximum speed to 130 KmH because it would undo the environmental gains booked in recent years. If even the car-lobby thinks it is not good idea to increase the maximum speed, maybe it needs a rethink?

In a related field, the big Dutch cities are now again forced to privatize their, municipal owned public transportation companies as a way to cut costs. Public transportation privatizations, until very recently, were seen as some of the most flawed privatizations from the 80's and 90's. It seems no time to celebrate Thatcher's measures from the 80's. Yes, it created an economic more liberal and flexible system but it was very unequal in the distribution of the gains and costs of those liberalizations. The UK railway system has never really recovered and had by the end of the 90's turned into a nightmare for both its employees and users alike.

Public transportation, and the decision how to price access to that infrastructure is a key measure to distribute the wealth of/in cities and to seduce car users into public transit modes. To privatize public transport will in most cases imply, parting with the ability to decide over and manage the enormous external costs and benefits that public transportation brings with it. If conservative government wants individual users to pay for more or the full cost of public transportation, it should find real measures to price the external effects that come with all modes of transportation. Killing the idea of pay-per-use externalities car-use pricing, and insisting of pay-per-use accountability when it comes to public transportation, fails to take the future of our cities, country and planet serious.

Cities in Europe and elsewhere need density (and diversity!) to perform best. It allows for the most efficient, equal and accessible distribution of collective services (through government and or private parties) to people. The enormous task that lies ahead for the European continent, and its individual members states, cities, companies, organizations and citizens to compete globally and to live in a manner that is more at peace with the environment that we inhabit, does not fare well with the current populist ideological agenda.

So please, no cutting for the sake of cutting. An enormous political tone setting and fanfare has been created about issues that are really not that much of an issue any more. If you cut, cut everywhere, including metaphorically and fiscally your own house. Don't spare the vested interests, just because you also own a house and you afraid to sell the political message. If Dutch society and its government are really so poor as its current government states, 'swallow the hottest potato' of them all, our system of mortgage subsidies and deal with that too.

Cut the ideology from the cutting, be pragmatic at all times, and lets foster a resilience that is not based upon a fake sense of security by higher fences and traditional retrenching gestures, but a resilience that builds open societies, dense cities, excellent education and a green infrastructure that is accessible to as many as possible.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/Shinsekai Analysis October 20, 2010

FT best of Fall: Luxury & Fashion

2010-10-11T12:19:00.001+02:00

The fashion machine is in full swing. In Milan, NY and Paris one girl is entering the catwalk after the other, while the business side of the industry is also setting important steps in the recovery. In the investment-world some analysts spoke about the new-normal, where other risk and reward parameters guide there investment expectations. What would be the new normal in the luxury industry?

Is it Louis Vuitton's decision to close three of its Paris shops one hour earlier each day to save stock for Christmas or Chanel's 20% price rise for their classic leather bag? On the other hand a Beverly Hills site was sold for a third of the Boom time value. That stands in sharp contrast to the successful E. 240 million sale of a Monaco apartment by the same seller as from the Beverly Hills site, brother-developers Candy & Candy. The buyer? A group of wealthy Asian families represented by Joint Treasure International.the FT reports.

Prada too is betting on Asian buyers in a big way: First of all it is expanding in China and Asia in a rapid way, and it plans to pay for that through a Hong Kong listing. It hopes to seduce Asian investors into owning Prada stocks as well as stockings. Would it work? The Prada IPO plan is as old as a classic Prada black jacket design. Just look a good designer focussing on its vintage designs, Prada tooks out the IPO plan every few years. CEO Bertolli talks to the FT about it. Fake Chinese products took on a new meaning, as their apparently are also fake Chinese company buyers. The FT writes about a phenomenon in which Western media and executives find it so difficult to seperate reality from fantasy when it comes to Chinese buying power, that some totally unknown Chinese buyer are able to convince international media that they own (parts of Prada) or a serious bidder for the likes of Liverpool FC. We hope for Prada that there will be no Chinese ghost buyers for the bags and shares.

On the hotel front, Tom Robbins takes a look at newly reopened London's Savoy Hotel, while Tyler Brule gets his mind behind the reasons why so many hotels gets the time to age gracefully. So long for the Grand Hotel to come of age, when all the interiors and furniture get a revamp every 2 to 4 years. A complete waste and yes, that is also unsustainable from an environmental perspective.

(c) KvH/ Shinsekai Analysis October 2010

FT Best of fall: Politics, finance and changing global realities.

2010-10-10T14:58:00.005+02:00

Beginning of September I listed a number of FT articles that as a group made an interesting agenda for the topics that could potentially structure the upcoming 2010-2011 season. Continuing along that line, here one will find interesting articles that also point to some of these trending or upcoming themes. In this blog entry I focus on articles on finance, politics and all those things that accompany the changing global landscape. This continues to be one of the most fascinating mega trends that keeps surprising us: either in its reality over or under performing our expectations of it or just by the sheer number of Neue Kombinationen, new combinations and unknown-knowns that its present to the curious reader. Globalization, and in particular the present rise of the Global South seem to me that gem of a multifaceted diamond that continuous to sparkle and offer previously undiscovered perspectives on life in the 21st century.
What better or worse; We start with the man who for a serious part of time co-shaped recent world events, Tony Blair. Over at London's Locanda Locatelli the FT's Philip Stevens takes him out for lunch to talk about his book and the human side of politicians.
Than over to the controversy around the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi. Roger Blitz looks at the high stakes poke game cities and states play to host world-class sports events here. How does the future of Brazil look like as it is getting a new president? The country looks to be on a winning strike recently, Rathbone and Wheatley report on its prospects.
In finance, Goldman Sachs is cashing on mr. O' Neill's cachet and promotes the famed head or its research desk and inventor of the word BRIC to head up GSAM, its global asset management team. Read it here.
The FT reports on research by Edmond de Rotschild group on the 10 best ever performing hedge fund ever.
Over in the book corner three reviews on Climatopolis-how our cities will thrive in the hotter future, on Panda Politics, and a review by Paul Collier on Arrival City: how the largest migration is reshaping our world make good reading.

More on FT fashion and luxury articles here.

(c) K v H/ Shinsekai analysis, October 2010

What's on Frieze 2010?: Action Attraction

2010-10-06T14:46:00.001+02:00

Next week is the Frieze art fair in London's Regent Park, the closest thing to real world art buying frenzy. Has the art market picked up already? Who knows and more importantly who will tell you in all truth?Next to the Frieze art fair, here are 10 shows and art spaces that top my list of high expectations. Frieze 2010: Action & fatal attraction here we go!
1 Serpentine Gallery always worth the detour: Next week is a grand finnisage to the bonbon-like glittering red Summer Pavilion by Jean Nouvel, which will host this year's Map Marathan. I think this could be a particular good marathan this year, but how in the world can one grasp the immensity of such a 50 persons- 2 day project, with so much other stuff around. Problem..

2 Whitechapel in the East end of London shows Walid Raad, who wasn't so much in the spotlight for the past 5 years. Curious what he will show and has to say this time. On Friday the 15th at 3pm you will have the opportunity to hear it live at his artist talk. Furthermore if in London on November 5th, why not sign up for How to .. understand the art world in one day. 125 pounds seems a bargain for all that knowlegde. By the way there restaurant is excellent for lunch. Sober sophistication. When in the neighborhood, definitively go to

3 Raven Row, the 3 year old private art space that continuous to bring a string of non-mainstream well chosen solo and group shows. This time is is showing ‘Polytechnic’: 'an exhibition of video, installation and tape/slideworks made between the late seventies and early eighties by a number ofartists in the UK who were developing new relationships between‘experimental’ media and ideas of narrative. The complex and hybridworks in the exhibition talk about autobiography, television, diaries,lost histories, sexuality, the communist bloc, popular culture,fictions, soap operas and murder.' I couldn't say it any shorter but the combination of topics could make for an intriguing show.

4 Than, take the Metropolitan line to see the show of Rene Daniels, the grand master of Dutch Painting in the Camden Arts Center.

5 the Bloomberg Space will show Adrian Paci and Julian Bismuth from October 13th. Could be really interesting and you could see for yourself how the bankers are doing in the middle of the London Zoo, sorry I mean, London City.

6 Down South, quite a long travel, but totally worth it is the South London Gallery who consistenly show good artists and are responsive to the area they are in. This time they show French artist Tatiana Trouve, a kind of conceptual sculpteror and Polish artist Michael Budny. Furthermore it is a good excuse to see their year old redevelopment which was done by 6A architects (who also did Raven Row)

7 From there take bus 36 or 436 westwards to the Tate Britain to see this year's Turner Prize nominations:

Dexter Dalwood, Angela de la Cruz, Susan Philipsz, The Otolith Group.

8 At the Tate Modern my pick would be film and installation based artist Rosa Barber's show, whose video of the solar panels in the desert still swarms in my subconsciousness after seeing it two years ago at the Turino Triennale.

on view at Parasol Unit

9 Adel Abdessemed's show at Parasol Unit could be interesting, certainly in combination with next door's fire work at Victoria Miro gallery: filmmaker Isaac Julien, Japanese Yayoi Kusama and Miami painter Hernan Bas.

10 The collectors couple Hugo and Carla Brown will show parts of their collection during the Frieze art fair at the Dutch cultural Pop Up Space.

Agenda: events and lectures Fall/Winter 2010

2010-10-04T21:34:00.001+02:00

Sun set over Johannesburg at UJ campus

August

Attending the opening of the Venice Architecture Biennale, August 25-29; See a review in two articles here and here.
Workshop for De Baak At FOAM, Amsterdam on the theory and practice of analysing urban trends and transformation, August 30th

September

'In search of the Miraculous’, Guest lecture at AMFI, the Amsterdam Fashion Institute on Radical Unorthodoxy in contemporary art, branding and fashion, September 2nd .
Participation at YURPS workshop on the temporary redevelopment of the Hospital Den Bosch Area, September 8th

Entebbe Airport

Africa R&D trip; Visit to Kampala, Uganda, Sept 10-14th. See blog article for more.
Paper presentation at the 46th ISOCARP Conference on Innovative Urban Finance Instruments, a research paper written together with Peter Robinett as part of the ongoing Seattle Project. For the paper click here.
Participant in the Young Planners Program on the Kibera informal Settlement in Nairobi, September 15-22nd, see ISOCARP site soon for outcome and presentations

Migration patters discussed at ISOCARP/UN Habitat

Gave a talk at AZA 2010, thepremier South African urban cultural festival and a one and a half day workshop for South African architecture students. Both dealt with Reflexive Urbanism and the possibilities of art and culture lead urban transformation projects. Sept 23 to 27th .

Johannesburg roads

Attended the FT Commercial Property Conference. September 29th.

Inspiration lecture on 10 examples of innovative urban interactions and a workshop with Fabrique for Alderman Alexandra van Huffelen and 25 influential Rotterdam citizens.

October

Discussion with the curators of De Appel Curatorial Program on collecting, October 12th.
Visit to the Frieze art fair October 13 to 17.

November

AA Talk as part of the Public Occasion Agency, lecture program at the Architectural Association in London, November 23rd

December

Visit to the Art Basel Miami Beach for the art fair and for the yearly Dawn Town architectural competition focusing on innovative ideas for Down Town Miami.
Philosophy for Retail Designers; teaching 5 evening classes at the Piet Zwart Institute for the Master for retail and interior designers.

2011

Attending the ULI Trends conference Paris, February 8-9 2011

Reading East Africa

2010-10-01T23:16:00.003+02:00

East Africa, the group of African countries compromising of Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Rwanda is booming. It is not without challenges. The lives of the people are often difficult, but it is also buzzing of energy and news. The leading regional newspaper is the East African. It gives political and economic news for the region and affairs from other areas that affect the group of four. The newspaper is part of the Nation Media Group which was founded by the Aga Khan is appreciated for its independence.
Reading that past three issues, plus some back issues from earlier this year gives a glance into the minds and deals that are transforming East Africa. Investment-wise it has been one of the best areas to have invested for the past half year. Its stock markets have far outpaced the recovery of Western and established markets. The downside is low liquidity and relatively low diversification possibilities, especially in Uganda which has very few listed companies. But if you would compare it to the far larger economy of, for example, Nigeria and the difficulties that stock exchange faces, I think the region looks favorable.

But before looking at the investment and economic climate, there are many more political and cultural issues that deserve to be discovered and nowhere better to start than reading the best from the East African. In the coming time, I will add some links to this page, in the hope of giving some links to in dept articles that make one reconsider or form a perception on East Africa.

Some highlights; an article on an American living in one of Africa's largest informal settlements Kibera in Western Nairobi. an artikcle on the top 25 African writers or an article and interview on Why Coca Cola is planning to invest $12bn in Africa by 2020

Mo Ibrahim, the founder of a price for democratic statesman who voluntarily step down when time is due and leave their country in good health, has just released a series of very interesting maps and data sets on corruption and governance in Africa. Fascinating statistics. Very happy that a private indivual is tracking. Is Mo Ibrahim slowly turning into the George Soros of the African continent. They for sure seem to share and hands-on mentatlity to good things getting done.
Here are the indexes.

(c) Kai van Hasselt / Shinsekai Analysis October 2010

Kampala. On the road between potholes and progress.

2010-09-13T14:12:00.002+02:00

Morning traffic in Kampala

After having spent 4 days in Kampala, I have gotten a good first impression of the capital of Uganda. What comes to your attention when submerging in Kampala life for a long weekend?

Media
Coming here, I was interested to learn more about the state of the economy and to see how the urbanization of Kampala takes place. I started reading some of the local newspapers and magazines to get an idea how things are. The weekly East African newspaper that serves Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania is by far the best publication when it comes to politics and economic analysis. It probably helps its independent status, that the newspaper is focused on the whole region and is therefore more difficult to influence by politicians and businesses than one-country newspapers and magazines. Furthermore I bought the Independent, a local business and politics magazine and the African Woman, a well designed fashion and lifestyle magazine run by Sylvia Owori, Uganda’s most well known fashion designer. It reminded me of the model of Oprah (Winfrey) magazine, Martha Stewart Living, or for Dutch readers Linda, the magazine. Celebrity culture has not (yet) developed to such a height here and for now, many more women are interested to learn about the latest trends for the African Woman, than to learn about the ins and outs of Sylvia Owori’s lifestyle.

Then there is the Africa Report, one of the internationally distributed publications that gives excellent coverage of African issues in business and politics. Locally in Kampala expats probably want to get a hold on the latest issue of the The Eye magazine, the insider’s Guide to Uganda which has all the addresses for an expat or tourist purposes.

houses painted as part of cell phone campaigns

Wireless world
The first thing I was impressed by coming from the airport were the beautifully painted shops, that are part of the different mobile phone companies advertisement campaigns. South African owned MTN Uganda is the market leader, and Warid has in the past two years overtaken Zain as the number two cell phone carrier. There is a fierce competition among the providers and the cell phone companies are among the biggest and most profitable in the country. Zain’s African were recently bought by Indian provider Bharti Airtel and so, Zain Uganda will to be soon rebranded as Airtel. That will probably mean that a lot of shops have to be repainted. Cell phones are crucial to the public and private life and the economy. They are being used in many un-orthodox ways and create, for example, a new kind of price transparency for farmers, but are evenly used as means to organize protests and riots.

Most people have a pre-paid phone and MTN has developed a system to use and transfer phone-credit as a kind micro-currency for all kind of transactions. This system is developing all over Africa and its has the potential to revolutionize credit and banking in the developing world. Cell phones are a potential and powerful source of social change. The NGO Text to Change, for example, develops health-education programs and games to educate company employees and other people of health issues. These kind of text message systems combined with the right ICT infrastructure resemble a kind of Twitter without internet and allow two way communication and interaction.

Boda-Boda's bringing people to work

Transportation and infrastructure.
The roads are full of enormous pot holes and driving along the roads even in a 4x4 feels like a theme park ride with sudden drops in height and changes in direction to avoid the deepest holes. There are hardly traffic lights in the city but traffic finds its way through town fairly well, on the basis of the bigger is better principle. Large cargo trucks rule the way, followed by 4x4’s and SUV’s, smaller cars, motorcycles and bikes and pedestrians. Such is the food chain of the Ugandan roads. If you don’t have a car, as is most people’s reality, there are other ways to transport yourself. Boda-Boda’s, motorcycle or bicycle cabs are dangerous but cheep. They are often owned by politicians or rich business men. Unfortunately, the cost of a motorcycle is too high for most drivers to own them themselves. One step more comfort provide the special rent car cabs, or one step down the collective transport provided by the minibuses that are a phenomenon across Africa. A lot of people walk to work too, as even the cost of a minibus ride can be relatively high if many depend on one person’s income.

advertisement murals

The Informal and the formal city
Kampala is a mix of informal settlements, small houses, apartment blocks, large stand alone villa’s and a few new shiny offices, some built by Chinese construction companies. Residential, industrial and commercial zones sit next to each other, spread out over the hills of Kampala. Between the most structured city and buildings, the informal city houses where the living conditions are far, far from easy. It seems, without wanting to oversimplify or understate the situation and the difficulty of the living conditions of those residents, that the city has a kind of upbeat attitude. The process of development is long and has a far from clear or uniform direction. Here is an excellent article by the East African newspaper on the enormous difficulties facing African cities in their development

After the bomb attacks in Kampala during the Soccer Championship in July, the number of security guards has exploded. The guards wear all kinds of colorful uniforms and carry the most deadly shot guns, most without proper training how to use them. One hopes it is the lesser of the two evils.
The city is full of beautifully painted mural advertisement. They are a delight to the eye and refreshing attitude towards, and way of advertising compared to most Western and Asian cities that are so cramped with slick photo-shopped ads. My favorites are the wall covered with giant beer cans and the mobile phone ads earlier described.

Solar power & Firefly’s
My reason for visiting Kampala was seeing a friend, Boldewijn Sloet,who works as an entrepreneur to sell a range of small solar panels andLED lights to the rural and urban population of Uganda. The product iscalled Firefly and it is sold to individuals, organizations andcompanies through dealerships and individual vendors. (article)Vendors buy a small inventory and sell it in far-off villages throughout thecountry. The LED lights replace kerosene lights that easily can causefire and are stable source of light. The solar panels in the newFirefly models can also charge a cell phone and thus can save or even earn people money. It alternatively costs 500 shilling to charge yourphone if you don’t have access to the electricity net yourself. Whetherit is to read a book or study in the evening, keep your shop longeropen at night, or simply provide your household with light and chargeyour phone, Firefly’s enable people to achieve more. Moreover, peoplepay for it themselves and the product thus it interferes less with thereal economy than the often free aid-development products and servicesdo. It is a fascinating business and it is great to get glimpse of itsdevelopment.

Downtown Kampala shops

Shops and places to go to.
What is a city without shops? The city center has streets full of commerce, with stores selling all kind of things. The craft market sells nice paper made beets and fabrics with marvelous patterns. Outside the city center a number of smaller and larger shopping centers have opened. The Garden City complex is the largest of its kind. Behind the complex and right in the middle of the city is a giant golf course. Inequality is still one of the dominant games in town.

Kampala has a lot of nice restaurants and places to eat. Some for locals, some for expats and luckily some where the two groups mix. Public life starts behind a fence, I was told. And indeed, one could not expect some of the wonders one finds upon entering through fences, parking lots and doors. My first lunch was in an Indian restaurant overseeing the cricket fields. It was housed under a beautiful roof structure.

Cayenne

The current weekend hot-spot is Cayenne founded by Mario. He started out as a hairdresser and build his salon into a huge open air mini resort, with a club, pool, and restaurant. It would not do badly around the Cote d’Azur. The city provides excellent night life. Places without exotic names like La Fontaine and Latino’s keep the night going for Ugandans and expats in search of action.

the garden around the Serena

I was very excited when we entered the Serena hotel. It is part of the Serena hotel chain which is (part?) owned by the business holdings of the Aga Khan, the spiritual and worldly leader of the Ismaili Muslims. There are many high end business hotels in Kampala but the Serena stands out. It was constructed a few years ago and looks much more elegant than the neighboring Sheraton, which is the traditional NGO and embassy event go-to place.
The Serena is surrounded by a beautiful parkland right in the middle of town. Inside, the lobby is divided by wall structures made of cut stones. It continues the hotels almost rural and natural atmosphere and contrasts sharply with the very urban surrounding outside the hotels gates. I had never seen an inner-city hotel that provided this kind of elegant and luxurious lodging feeling in the middle of the city.

Expat life & the role of Europeans, Indians and the Chinese
Expat life. Most people have some kind of expectation of it, or experienced it themselves. Having had only a brief glimpse of its current reality is still bewildering strange. One night I was at a party frequented mostly by expats from the German speaking world. It took me a while to adjust to that world. It continues with big embassies, NGO compounds and not to forget the giant houses of some ambassadors and the top NGO employees. I don’t know the details of development aid, but from talking and reading a bit about it, I would argue that the combination of well intended development aid with not so well intended massive corruption has lead to some good results but also has had many, many unintended consequences. (article Marcia Luyten in the NRC, in Dutch only)

The efforts of some Western donor-countries are impressive. The Nordic and German speaking European countries and American religious driven groups seem most active in Uganda. They have set up large organizations to help with water-management, all kinds of professionalization, good governance and peace-building programs. The different churches and religious groups use some of the most active marketing tactics around.

The Indians and more recently the Chinese have taken a different path. Many Indians own shops, restaurants and other (trading) companies in Kampala and throughout the country. They run it with a kind of professionalism and work ethos that is not often met in Kampala and sometimes is met with envy of the local Ugandans. In the 1972 it went so far that dictator Idi Amin forced all Indians to leave the country. That is not the case right now and the Indian population and trade are vital to the success of the Ugandan economy.
Over the past years China has emerged as one of the most important foreign direct investors in Uganda, this year topping the list above Kenya. (article) Chinese investments are partly mineral and commodity export related, but in return bring construction and technology products and investments. The Chinese firm Huawei installed fixed line fiber optical internet cables with a mixed success and was ordered by the government to fix the problems. (article)

Beautiful money but where is going?

Corruption and eating the road.
Corruption is deeply interwoven in the system. So deep that one can easily say corruption is the system. Agreeing that it is deeply detrimental to the success of a country is one thing, but changing the structure is a second and very, very complex. Locally people use the expression that people ‘have eaten’ away something to make clear when for example a road deteriorates without being fixed properly or a project is not maintained as was due, to say that politicians, government officers or company directors have taken money that was meant for something else. It is a long road ahead and the roads of Uganda are still filled with pot holes and other obstacles, but slowly things seen to be moving forward.

(c) Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis September 2010

artist performance to levitate the Frankfurt Stock Exchange

2010-09-06T09:37:00.002+02:00

As part of the exhibition Playing the city 2, by the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, artist Annika Lundgren is planning a levitation of the Old Frankfurt Stock Exchange through collective singing and meditation.
The projects is partly an hommage to Abbie Hoffman, who in 1967 together with 50.000 did a levitation of the Pentagon building. The project's website explains the aims clearly and it will be one of those moments, where the expectations of the performance, is almost more stimulating than the action is self. That is, unless the building will indeed levitate. Reality and our expectations of it, are deeply intertwined as George Soros theorizes with the concept of 'reflexity". See also my earlier blog entry on Soros here.
From the website of the stock exchange levitation the text below. Now we can only wait, meditate and see!

"The Stock Is Rising! Join the crusade and help us levitatethe Old Frankfurt Stock Exchange to drive out evil spirits. OnSeptember 21st between 15:00 and 17:35 (3 PM and 5.35 PM), you can takepart in the live event in front of the building at Börsenplatz indowntown Frankfurt. Or you can contribute in front of your computerthrough our communal online-meditation - starting now.

TheStock Is Rising works with the notions of collective willpower and howfaith creates reality. The financial sector’s use of, and faith in theindex graph undeniably creates an economic reality for everyone, butthe faith of a determined community of levitationists using a differentset of values can also create an ethical and political reality.
Onthe one hand; stock brokers frantically preoccupied with stocks,options and funds representing only a fictitious value. One the other;a group of people focusing their mental powers to challenge the waythis system affects democracy. Which, after all - is the more absurdidea?
This project is also a tribute to Abbie Hoffman and hisPentagon-levitation during the Vietnam protest in 1967. You find a moreextensive account of this on our Hoffman Page.'

the week in review: interesting FT reflections on Asian Business, hedge-funds, retail goes online, luxury & Asia

2010-09-05T13:18:00.002+02:00

Empty chairs and back to work!

As the season starts again, whether you are in business, the arts, in school or university, there is much to read and to consider. There are big un-answered questions for the state of the economy and what kind of recovery we are seeing if any. Than there is the underlying debate weather saying 'there is no doubble-dip recession' would actually help to achieve that goal. In this case, I doubt one is able to create a self-fulfilling prophecy.
On the business level, it was a pretty interesting week, if I consider the stuff I read in the Financial Times. Below you will find links to the articles and columns that made me thinking. As I spend my last weekend in Venice, I'll start with Edwin Heathcote's review of the Venice Architecture Biennale on Monday.

Than over to the comments and columns. I liked Sebastian Mallaby's 'Capitalism and its divided critics' as well as John Gapper's well sounded defense of Obama's policy change on taxing carried interest. It should indeed be better taxed and some hedge fund manager's comparison of the president' taxing with Hitler's attack on Poland, just shows how out of touch, and how greedy some of the people still are.
The next battle field will probably be about high-frequency trading.The FT's Jeremy Grant gives an overview of the current state of thingsin a page long article. Proponents argue its serves liquidity, while the oppositionthinks liquidity is not perse a beneficial thing and the largest H-Ftraders operate larger under under-regulated territory. After anintense Summer discussion with a technology provider to HFT'ers I comesacross to me as a all too club like atmosphere, where the level ofinvestments hinder barriers to enter. Special attention needs to beplaces on the differences between European and American stock exchangerules. The European rules favour the whole trade only to those whooffer the fastest quote. Speed is nice, but in this case, I wonder ifthose rules and HFT in its current form should follow the example ofthe Concorde and stay on the ground.

Than over to business, the articles that struck me most, but one exeption dealt with the rise and transformation of Asian businesses. Lindsay Whipp is looking at 'Japan's collaborative investors' and takes the example of how Asuka Asset Management invests in and advises the companies it holds stakes in to grow.

Over in China, Kathrin Hille profiles the current work and research at Chinese internet company Baidu. It is good to keep track of the the fast rising Chinese internet stars. For readers who want a more indept look at the history of one of China's other internet stars, last year Liu Shiying and Martha Avery wrote 'Alibaba, the inside story behind Jack Ma and the creation of the world's biggest online marketplace.' published by Collins Business. I haven't read it yet, but I am attracted to it because there are far less company biography on the new breed of Chinese IT and internet entrepreneurs than on their American and Western counterparts. Recently I read with considerable pleasure Ronald Cohen's autobiographical account on the rise of venture capital and private equity invester APAP Partners, 'The second bounce of the ball', Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2007. The book is clearly written and published pre-crisis and it is overly comfortable with and trustworthy of capitalism as the means to solve most ends, yet is also offers an intrigiung and first hand account of the changes that European, American and global capitalism underwent during the past four decades. It is precisely this kind of cultural and economic back ground that I hope Alibaba's book provides on the circumstances under which Jack Ma could grow that company.

Over on the retail side of business two articles should be noticed.Henny Sender and Vanessa Friedman's account of the changes the luxurygoods sector undergoes as the Asian middle class trades up, and the change ofownership of (Western) brands that accompanies that, is worth the reading. Sois, Mark Mulligan's article on Intidex online move, what is one of Europe'sfasted retailer up to in the online domain? read it here.

Venice Arch Biennale2: Post-rendered storytelling or the difficulty of curating a national pavilion.

2010-08-29T10:10:00.000+02:00

The Anglo-Saxon world has lost, so did much of the former-East Europe. It seems very difficult to curate a good country pavilion at the 12th Venice architecture Biennale. One needs to strike exactly the right kind of balance between image and language, between a compounding model and a striking concept. Somehow many pavilions did not live up to the expectations.

As I think over the country pavilions I liked most, I come to three groups that were most appealing. They are:
1) The art-aesthetics pavilion
2) The insightful model pavilion and finally
3) The Post-rendered storytelling pavilion
Before I discuss the three successful models, I would like to spend some time on the possible reasons many country pavilions have disappointed. My guess is that it’s a cultural phenomenon, but I don’t know whether it is the culture of the pavilion-maker or the viewer that is causing the problem here.

If I look at the British, the American and the Australian pavilion, three of the world most profound capitalist countries, I think they all overshoot in telling their story. The US pavilion, curated by the High Museum in Atlanta shows five or six different architectural projects, mostly social- or community-based urban experiments with a fairly high urgency. It looks too much like a clean version of two years ago. The pavilion seems aware of all the problems that exist in the country, but can’t, for reasons of politics, put the finger on the really sour spot. The pavilion is famously underfunded by the US Government as the Congress and the American people don’t want Government to be involved in culture. So, the private sector has to pay for it. I would argue that they will only do so, if there is something to sell or at stake. How should we interpret the uber-slick hallucinating promotion of the Portman architect-developer office buildings in downtown Atlanta on view in the pavilion? They are being promoted as a kind of community-development but I think that is only one side of the project and they are a bit out of touch with the rest of the practices on view.

The British pavilion certainly doesn’t want to sell anything. It makes the viewer aware of many things, among them the fight for women’s rights, but the relationship to architecture seems vague.

The Australians have discovered 3D glasses. 3D has made an enormous come back recently, among others in US cinema’s which have been retrofitted en masse for 3D films. You can also find 3D glasses and images in the current September issues of Vogue Italia, and the first 3D porn film has just been released. It is a nice way to look at images of the Australian cities and landscapes, but also has a strong ‘Back to the future’ feeling.

the Egyptian pavilion

I can’t get a grip on, or much sympathy I am afraid, for many of the pavilions on the back row of the Guardini. – think along the lines of Egypt, Greece and others. They are dealing with tradition and traditional materials a lot, and whilst it is certainly there good right to do so, it doesn’t help to create a very attractive pavilion. Modernity is modernizing the world at both different paces and in different phases. As a result some countries face a different kind of modernity, you could argue that you can see that well in the pavilions. I imagine that the national politics of choosing a commissioner, who again chooses an architect in these cases favors the conservative or a at least a kind of traditionalism that is difficult to fully appreciate or understand from a Western-European perspective, in which the architecture debate tends to embrace more (the longing for) the progressive.

Now, let me come to the three categories that I like most. The first is the art-aesthetics pavilion. This is closely related to the trend which also prevailed in the Arsenale and in the Italian Pavilion, in which many of the artist-produced or artist-collaborated projects made strong impressions. The Belgium pavilion which shows how building materials and elements; especially floors, carpets and staircases have behaved over the years of use, will be a favorite of the contemporary art minded viewer. It looks great! While it is probably not intended in that way it looks like a highly conceptual piece by the likes of US artist Gedi Sibony. See for more on Sibony the gallery or an article in Frieze magazine

The German pavilion titled Sehnsucht, looks at the architectural desire displayed through architect’s drawings. I can’t stop but also seeing it in the context of the artists that exhibited in the German pavilion at recent art biennales. Liam Gillick who filled it with wooden IKEA kitchen cabinets and a dead cat with a letter in its mouth. The pressure to come up with something new, something in relation to, or totally free from the burden of, all its predecessors must be very high.

The Dutch pavilion can also be seen through the concept of its artistic aesthetics: Its emptiness, the blue foam above your head, the lines connecting the dots on the walls, then if you are upstairs, suddenly this overview. It is just as much an excellent example of good storytelling, where the pavilion is being used to get one message across.

the French pavilion

Some pavilions excel at a classic architectural or urban planning model type exhibition. Here, I think the French pavilion excels in telling the story of the French metropolitan areas. Without using much text, they succeed well in informing the viewer of the history, issues and future of the greater metropolitan areas of France. Film and repetition, partly to mirrors, partly by showing the narrative in a semi-random pattern, through the different rooms helps to get the message across. Another good pavilion showing pure models, with an educational –inspirational flair to it is the Portuguese pavilion near Ca Rezzonica on the Grand Canale. For each of the four architects and building-model on view, a video was made to show how the buildings behave and are being used. Together with the models and the simple- elegant exhibition design that works convincing.

Than we come the last category the Post-render storytelling pavilion. This I find the most complex assignment and if executed well, the most rewarding.
Storytelling, the art of the narrative is of course as old as humanity. It came before writing and was the way in which illiterate societies kept good stories going/ alive. More recently, it also became en vogue in the branding and marketing community. I would argue that in real estate and architecture it has become one of the best ways to brand a development or an area. Almost any successful development has a good (his)story to it, and the art to articulate and communicate that well is where the master of the trade defines himself. Good storytelling has also become more difficult. Because of its success, it has attracted many fake storytellers and the most strange strategies have been used to get messages across. A battalion of PR firms is only the beginning. Convincing images, the more realistic, the better, also helped to tickle the imagination of the client and the audience. Architects have come a long way since those sweet early master plan drawings and they have gone nowhere further than in that heaven, or hell depending on your perspective, of imagined urbanization; Dubai and the wider Gulf area. The reality and perception of desert dunes had to be overcome in anticipation of all those great cities that should arise in the Middle East. Masdar city, OMA’s plans for RAK, Abu Dhabi Cultural District, almost the whole of Dubai, they exist for mostly as almost picture perfect renderings. Volume + C-LAB + AMO’s Al Manakh 1 and 2 have documented the process well.

Now much of the Dubai bubble has burst and Dubai World, the state holding company, debt is being restructured. In this post-Dubai era, the time has also come to reconsider (the virtues of all those) high-end rendering that architects, their clients and its audience got so attached to.

Post-Dubai heralds Post-rendering and vice versa just as the Post-leverage era marks the end of the financial bubble. The process of de-leveraging, to get rid of all the debt from the system is very painful, and had a huge impact on the valuation of companies and the availability of capital. Except for those specialized rendering agencies, I think the process of de-rendering is a lot less painful, but I can be wrong. Rendering is an art in self, but like any art, it is best appreciated under the right doses.

the Russian Pavilion

Post-rendering storytelling happens in those national pavilions where a clear and convincing story gets told without making use of the traditional advanced renderings that we had become so used to. My favorite example is the Russian Pavilion in which three rooms document the life and coming transformation of a former industrial small town. In the first room, one is shown a beautiful fictional film about life in this city, than one walks into a very well painted 360 degrees panorama (Think of the Mesdag panorama for those who are familiar with it.) of this town with its historic buildings and its planned additions, and then in the third room, one gets the traditional architects renderings and drawings. It is not the last part that interests me co much, but the first two rooms especially together, are such a strong way to inspire and to create an appetite and curiosity for the reality to come in that city. Lastly, they have their topic right. Just like OMA and Ronald Rietveld (see article before on this blog) they are researching the meaning and purpose of the buildings that already exist, and of which the reality- shrinking cities, a declining population and economics- is a life threatening issue. To illustrate that point in such a beautiful manner, without over simplifying it to a hyper-realistic rendered future is a grand gesture. Za Rasiu! Cheers to Russia!

(Re-)considering the 12th Venice Biennale of Architecture.

2010-08-26T21:32:00.000+02:00

installation Transsolar + Tetsuo Kondo architects.

The 12th International exhibition of architecture in Venice opens this week and will last until the 21st of November. So far, it seems a good show. The Arsenale, one of the two main exhibition spaces offers a less bombastic view of architecture that it did last year. There are less projects in total than at the last biennale two years ago and what is on show mostly is more modest. At the same time, the word ‘crisis’ is not used it in the official discourse on the biennale and architecture. Yet on the streets there are other sounds: When in a late night bar discussion one architect asked another one, whether he knew any architecture firms in London that would hire a part-time research student. The firm answer was than in the world of UK architecture practices there were none of such firms. They were either building very hard and very commercial, or the office would merely consist of a partner and a secretary. Many architects have had to retrain themselves into other trades.

In the opening speech the president of the biennale discussed one of the important goals of the Biennale ‘to always consider what an architecture biennial is, can be and should be; and that it should not limit itself to the manner art is shown, in the way that architecture presents itself. It should speak to all the senses. Yet in this biennial, under the guidance of Kazuyo Sejima, one of the tow partners of the very successful Japanese architecture practice SANAA, the installations and rooms that often work best, are precisely those that speak the language of art or art made by artists or architect-artist collaborations.

Most memorable for me was the model for a house created Caruso St. John and Thomas Demand in the largest room of the Italian Pavilion in the Giardini. The House itself is a model of, and monument for the Nail-house, that became world-famous when its owners did not give in to Chinese real estate developers and did not gave in to pressure to surrender their house to the ongoing redevelopment. A house for this house is now planned under a railroad crossing in Zurich. It is noble that the Swiss take on the suffering of and memory for this house, but it too seems to have a hard time in conservative Switzerland where it has to face NIMBY (Not in My Back Yard) protests from the neighborhood.

Another room that worked well in his lightness and funny glance on the current state of architecture, was a room filled with works by artist Tom Sachs dedicated to the legacy of Le Corbusier. Most of the works on display where already from 2002-2003, but the perfectly showed the frustrated relationship between Le Corbusier’s masterpieces and modernity and that other modernity in which landed full of capitalism, Mcdrives and a heightened state of security. Fear seems everywhere and the systems are unable to find each other in a meaning full way.

The installation of Korean artist and architect brothers Do ho Suh + Suh architects performed well, although this time it could indeed easily have been that we were in a contemporary art exhibition.

Looking back and analyzing the work of older architects, not anymore present among us, was a successful exercise, with Hans Ulrich Obrist and others looking at the legacy of Cedric Price and the SANAA practice building a scale model of Brazilian architects Lina Bo Bardi’s SESC, Fabrica de Pompeia project from 1977 in Sao Paulo. Its playful utopia-style seems somewhat dated in time, but not often improved and just as much needed now.

photo Lina Bo Bardi/ SESC 1977

Were people looking for a direction? They were certainly looking for Rem Koolhaas, who together with his firm OMA seemed to be omnipresent at this Biennale. Koolhaas was present at more than one debate, moving from the Strelka ( a new Russian architecture school) talk to the more interesting Ecological Urbanism debate presented by Harvard’s GSD. The firm’s own presentation on preservation was impressive. While not a single architecture model was presented, and while their source material was once already presented at an earlier Venice art biennale, they seemed to get their message right across that the architecture community and other stakeholders at large must get argument and understanding together of what preservation means for us today. Is it a luxury we can still afford tomorrow? Will old buildings have to be re-conceptualized, just like ‘second hand’ clothing became ‘vintage’? And crucially are we willing and able to pay for that?

The Golden Lion that will be given to Rem Koolhaas this Biennale seems well placed, as he steers the debate from the new to the re-thinking of the old. His younger countryman, Ronald Rietveld together with a collaborative team of artists and thinkers seem to have taken that same theme to a more practical and just as important level and offer the audience an atlas of, and another perspective on all the empty Dutch government buildings.

If the Arsenale and Italian Pavilion offer any lessons this year, they are possible that those who have the responsibility over the built environment should look at that through the eyes of artists and reconsider the old before venturing into the new. The architect has (home)work to do, if that is indeed the case.

© Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis, August 2010

The Truman Show: waking up in UNESCO city Amsterdam

2010-08-02T22:56:00.002+02:00

Yesterday morning, waking up in Amsterdam and reading about the news that Amsterdam will be a UNESCO world heritage site (AT5, http://at5.nl/s/bRG for example), I suddenly felt like being Truman Burbank in the 1998 film The Truman Show. The protagonist of the film discovers he lives in a constructed reality soap opera, televised across the world 24/7.

The Truman Show was shot in the master-planned community of Seaside. This is one of the first and most famous examples of the New Urbanist movement, an urban and architectural movement lead amongst others by architects Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk. While New Urbanism focuses on pedestrian access, mixed use, and relative high density, it comes with a love for the traditional and a serious disregard of modern(ist) architecture.

Another rather famous and intriguing New Urbanist creation is the city of Celebration (official site and wikipedia entry) in Florida. This master-planned community was founded by the Disney company and is within closed proximity to the Walt Disney World resort. The town has around 9000 residents and some years ago was sold by the Disney company. Its online notice board is worth a look! For example, a passholder (aka. resident) can bring no more than four non-resident guests at any time, except for when you have a pre-scheduled event. Link here. Celebration is your chance to live the picture perfect life developed by a and in great proximity to the Disney theme park. If the link between entertainment companies and urban development is so close, why don't we take it one step further?

Next stop: Let's sell the Amsterdam historical innercity to Merlin Entertainments, the company that also owns Legoland, Madam Tussaud's and the Sea Life Centers to name but a few. Thus, the city can better compete with the Efteling themepark which recently added some new attractions. According to their website, 'Merlin Entertainments is a leading name in location based, family entertainment.' I think that would make them an ideal party to take over the inner city of Amsterdam which already hosts attractive events like the Gay Parade, Queensday, the Uitmarkt, the old boat festival SAIL. Merlin Entertainment is privately owned by the Blackstone Group; Kirkby, the investment vehicle of the family behind LEGO, and Dubai International Capital. FT link The innercity of Amsterdam would be a great buy for Merlin and an addition to their existing portfolio. They will no doubt they offer some excellent incentives to make sure that Amsterdam's latest underground ride, mysteriously called the North South Axis will be finished as soon as possible. Because a good entertainment park/city is only as good as its latest ride.

They are other examples where large parts of the city are owned by one private company. The city of London offers many. Not only the large swaths of land owned by the different estates the like the Great Portland Estate and the Grosvenor Estate, but also a more modern version. A real estate company named Shaftesbury (company site) owns large parts of the London Chinatown, Covent Garden and neighboring streets. It collaborates with the city to run and develop Chinatown and its other properties in the best way possible, for example through the use of Business Improvement Districts.

Now that the city of Amsterdam has achieved its much wanted position of UNESCO World heritage site and celebrates its glorious past, lets hope that they will not forget about the future. Just as Truman Burbank realised the limitations of the world he once considered real, lets hope the City of Amsterdam will also fully embrace the reality of the 21st century, and the unorthodoxy that may come with that!

Kai van Hasselt August, 2nd 2010

The Role of Culture for the Dutch Business Climate

2010-07-27T14:00:00.000+02:00

Dutch culture non plus ultra: standing in line for the Mattheus Passion

For Dutch business magazine Management Scope I wrote for their Summer issue on the role of culture for the Dutch business, investment and location climate. The topic is dear to me and in an interview for NICIS in 2008 I touched upon it as well.
Two years later the Dutch situation has probably become worse. Although there is certainly a rich and fertile socio-cultural climate, the Dutch position as a location for new corporate headquarters, talent migration, and investment is far from secured. More over, it is coming under great pressure after years of inward political focus and the populist, anti-foreign and xenophobic tone of debate stimulated by the likes of Geert Wilders and Rita Verdonk.

Zaandam traditional houses re-edited by WAM architecten

The Dutch reputation for being open minded, culturally laissez-faire, and a high trust society is taking a beating and this has not stayed unnoticed by foreign newspapers and in corporate board rooms. Hopefully we will be able to reverse the trend and become socio-culturally attractive to foreign people and companies again.

De Keukenhof, massively popular in season

We should embrace the new reality of the global networks of China towns, come up with new concepts like a BRIC-district, focus on fostering existing historical paths and (Could we renew trading relationships with the Superpower to be Indonesia again?) strengthen immigrant communities to set up trading and knowledge networks and open our mind sets and cities up for Sloterdijk' Homo LuLu, the Homo Ludens Luxurians.

So long Calvin, here comes Lulu!

You can find the full article (for now only in Dutch, sorry) here.

tradition as inspiration, for designers Victor & Rolf

Catering to the expectations at de Keukenhof, lets aim beyond the expected!

Kai van Hasselt/ Shinsekai Analysis (c) May- July 2010

Shopping Centers in South Africa

2010-07-27T12:41:00.000+02:00

Century City Food Court

For the Dutch shopping center industry magazine Shopping Center News I wrote an article on shopping centers in Cape Town and Johannesburg in South Africa. The article deals with the trends in the field of retail and shopping center developments in the two cities.

Sandton City

Whether it is Johannesburg's Sandton City, one of the largest retail, entertainment and hotel clusters of Sub-Saharan Africa, the massive Victoria & Albert Waterfront development, the American style Century City Mall, or more alternative spaces like Cape Town's Old Biscuit Mill or the Arts on Main development in downtown Johannesburg, South Africa has an interesting and highly developed retail and mixed use scene. Furthermore it is developing interesting local brands like the wonderful Black Coffee fashion label and Sun Goddess, once described as the Afri-Gucci brand by the Sud Deutsche newspaper.

Here you will find the full article in Dutch at Shopping Center News online edition.


Victoria & Albert Waterfront

the Old Biscuit Mill

Arts on Main

the Spirit of Capitalism and the ethics of reselling your attention

2010-07-23T14:06:00.001+02:00

The show must go on. The expansion and concentration of capital:

It radiates like nuclear fusion, It contracts lack an octopus who caught something and pulls it in.

Growth of the economy: Growth is the economy?What else?

I think of the "Chance the Gardener" in Being There who offers words of wisdom The economy is like a garden, and thus cyclical. The cyclical part, we got that in the last 3 years.

We are just waiting for the up term. We are reconsidering risk.We are re-pricing assets, yes even CMBS teams are being put together again.

We learned that the emerging markets found their path to growth much sooner than the West.And so people are again buying into Asian, Latin American and even African assets and commodities.

But, the question remains; why does the show must go on?

Is there another way around growth, another way to consider how capital works, how capital guides us?

100 years ago Max Weber wrote The Protestant Ethics and the Spirit of Capitalism.

Now the Protestant is out, the Ethics is almost out, what remains is the Spirit of Capitalism.

With the Protestantism and capitalism, the bookkeeping attitude rose and created the bourgeoisie.

Like capital needs free labor to expand, media-advertising capitalism needs our attention, our eyeballs, our minds: A continuous momentum, traction they call it I guess.

The Net Present Value of all our future attention sold like a CDO or CMBS, repackaged like a bundle of mortgages, equals the Price Earnings ratio of Google.

Sophisticated algorithms enable computers to predict better and better what we might want. And at the same time almost everybody, but certainly in the financial markets was kind of loose on the ethics part. A client is now a counterparty as many banker alike phrased it, with which one ‘interacts’ instead of whom you serve. And this online ‘counterpart interaction’ is being resold. It is the online advertising industry and it grows very, very fast.

When search become a noun, and Google a verb, your attention, became the ‘new’ free labor, the oxygen that Capital loves so much.

That is the current Spirit of Capitalism and the ethics of reselling your attention.

The rise of the Global South.

2010-06-29T21:40:00.001+02:00

The Global South is a concept that describes the nations of Africa, Central and Latin America, and most of Asia, roughly but certainly not perfectly South of the equator. The countries often share a less stabile political and economic situation, a former colonial history but also rich cultures, and knowledge bases, access to resources and commodities and an enormous potential for economic growth and a rising socio-economic and geo-political influence.

The notion of the Global South breaks the traditional division between the West and the Rest, or the West and the East, broadly think East Asia. The rise of the Global South is a term just as wide and all encompassing as the notion of the decline of the West is. With all the mistakes that come when using such a container concept, I still like the idea for its grand and bold direction and description. The BRICS’s only talk of four countries, while the NEXT 11, both © Goldman Sachs descriptions, look at the economics and demographics of eleven countries of lesser size but with a equal potential for growing wealth and economic development.
The rise of Global South describes in a broader way the socio-cultural, political and economic impact these countries will have on global development, cultural phenomena and geo-strategic politics. If there is one thing sure, it is that the Global South is here to stay, and that the West has to factor in and adjust to this new status quo. That means reconsidering the use of and access to resources, the ‘just’ resource base per person and a re-calibration of international relations. It makes sense to not just look at the numbers that these countries present, but just as much at the history, culture, myth, icons, art, fashion, celebrities, sports , food, landscapes, cities and media that represent them. They tell a truer story and make for a rounder character. So, the BRICS should be accompanied by their BRIC-SAGA’s and the performance of the Next 11’s should be measured at the Olympics and World Championship.
Just as the Uruguayan artist Torres Garcia in 1943 painted the map of South America with the South pole on top, so too does the world map deserves to be shown more often in other context, upside-down that is, to those who are focused on the North pole as the true North. Although the equator is still the great divider the rest of the picture is, to the inhabitants of the Global South and to the rest of the world, less certain than it used to be.

(c) Shinsekai Analysis/ Kai van Hasselt, June 2010

America del Sur: the world upside down.

2010-06-29T17:54:00.003+02:00

Last TEFAF art fair I was made aware of the work of the Uruguayan artist Joaquin Torres Garcia (28 July 1874 – 8 August 1949). I was not actively aware of his work, but now traveling through Buenos Aires we saw excellent works of him in the MALBA museum. Now we are in Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay. Here one can not miss him, and rightly so. In 1943, the same year as he founded the Taller del Sur, 'workshop of the South', he made the above map of South America with the South pole on top. He got himself on a bank note for making it. This article from the Arte Mercusor website describes the impact Torres Garcia's thinking and actions had on his generation and those after him. It proved very influential for the way South America sees itself and its role in the world.

Traveling through the region we are confronted with a number of artists, designers, architects and thinkers, past and present that offer inspiration and this other perspective.

The first thing we walked into when we stepped outside from our hotel was this amazing building, which since two years houses an evenly amazing bookshop, the libreria Puro Verso. After posting the image on Facebook a friend luckily made me aware on what other treasures there are to be found around Montevideo, namely those of the Uruguay architect and engineer Eladio Dieste. He has proved truly marvelous works, but is relatively little none. This blog, Morphocode gives a good overview of Dieste's work and thinking.

A current architect-thinker who is receiving attention and appreciation around the world is Alejandro Arevana. He setup the so-called do-tank Elemental in cooperation with Chilean oil company COPEC and the local university. Next to their thinking they also get things done and were given a number of awards for their social housing projects. Britisch ICON magazine did a good article on him here.

More will follow from America del Sur on innovative thinkers and artists, on Buenos Aires and the Arte BA art fair in the coming days.

(c) Shinsekai Analysis/ Kai van Hasselt, June 2010