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Noord Publiek Event, Amsterdam

Amsterdam Exhibition + symposium, The Netherlands City Proposals News

1 Sep 2010

Noord Publiek

Proposals for an undivided city
Exhibition and symposium

20 Sep – 17 Oct 2010
Open: Monday to Sunday 11am – 7pm
Free entry

picture by the architects

Symposium and opening of the exhibition: Monday 20 September 2010

Tickets symposium € 50/ students and residents of Amsterdam Noord € 7.50 (including coffee, small lunch and drinks)

Reservations: info@noord.nl or facsimile +31 (0)20 419 04 45

Location: Kromhouthal, Amsterdam Noord (entrance Gedempt Hamerkanaal 79-83)

In combining architecture, urbanism, visual arts and film, the exhibition Noord Publiek – Proposals for an undivided city offers a kaleidoscopic perspective of Amsterdam Noord, the area of the Dutch capital north of the IJ. Partly as a consequence of the projected North South underground line offering a new link with the city centre, the district has over a number of years attracted the increased attention of politicians, administrators and developers. Yet, in order to realise the full potential of Amsterdam Noord as part of the city, other, new connections will have to be made. Public spaces and public functions will have to play an essential role in this.

The exhibition Noord Publiek focesses on the role of public spaces in the transformation process of Amsterdam Noord. During a period of four years 120 young future architects from TU Delft have worked intensively on Amsterdam Noord. The designers researched the existing but often invisible qualities of the district and developed concrete proposals for the transformation of a variety of sites, inserting public programmes such as polyvalent schools or a dance and theatre institute in these locations.

In the Kromhouthal, an industrial monument (2400 m2) thirty of these design projects will be exhibited and presented with large models, plans and background information. The selection offers a range of strategies for using public and collective spaces in the future process of urban renewal in Amsterdam Noord, as well as showing how architectural interventions provide new impulses for the district. The projects are shown in their respective urban contexts and against the background of the plans which have been developed by the projectbureau Noordwaarts and the council of Amsterdam Noord.

The work of visual artists offer a complementary, poetic perspective on Amsterdam Noord and the changes that the district is undergoing. Based on a one-year research the project Vergeten Veldjes (Forgotten Fields) shows nine different places in the city, which have been somehow escaped from the stream of continuous building and planning in Amsterdam. The documentary film 0.5 km2 Noord shows the process of demolition of a neighbourhood in Noord, including interviews with residents affected by the project – a sober and all the more impressive account of their changing lives and realities.

Symposium

The symposium focuses on the recent and current developments, projects and debates about the transformation of Amsterdam Noord. The overarching theme of the day is the role of public spaces and public programmes in this process. The local and global perspectives of the symposium are reflected in the two parts of the agenda: Dutch speaking in the morning session, English speaking in the afternoon.

In the morning session a variety of speakers will examine the preception of Noord within the Amsterdam urban region. Which qualities and problems have been identified by politician and urban planners? Which are the future visions and expectations for the area and what do the residents what? Speakers in the morning session include: Peter Klomp (Supervisor Buiksloterham and NDSM-terrein, Urban Planning Department DRO Amsterdam), Kees Diepeveen (Councillor for uban development, Amsterdam Noord district council) and Prof. Tjeerd Dijkstra (Architect and urban planner, former Dutch state architect and member of the Amsterdam Council of Urban Development).

The afternoon session puts the developments in Noord in an international perspective and presents a variety of leading academics in the field of urban planning, design and history, offering critical reflections on the transformation process and its social, cultural and economic effects. What, for example, will happen in the intermediate period, while the plans are being executed – especially at a time that many developments are being delayed as a consequence of the present financial and economic difficulties?

In this situation neighbourhood are threatened by being caught in a period of passiveness and stagnation. Can temporary and small-scale interventions in public spaces provide solution, by ‘charging’ them with activity and stimulating future development? Three speakers who have been involved in urban transformation processes in the Ruhr area, London and Medellin (Colombia) will position the developments in Amsterdam in an international perspective.

Please find the full programme of the symposium in the attached invitation.

Noord Publiek – Proposals for an undivided city has been organised and curated by LÖHMANN’S · Architecture Urban + Industrial Design in collaboration with the chair of Architectural Design/ Interiors at the Faculty of Architecture, TU Delft and has been kindly supported by the Department of Architecture, TU Delft, Amsterdam Noord district council, The Netherlands Architecture Fund, Deutscher Werkbund, Shell Nederland, Eigen Haard, Wijngaarde bv and ‘t Idee communicatieprojecten bv.

For additional information and visual material: www.noordpubliek.nl / info@noordpubliek.nl

Noord Publiek Amsterdam Symposium images / information from Loehmann

Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands, western Europe