Tools for (accessing) action

Actions: What You Can Do With the City Canadian Centre for Architecture Actions: What You Can Do With the City presents 99 actions that instigate positive change in contemporary cities around the world.

Actions: What You Can Do With the City Canadian Centre for Architecture Actions: What You Can Do With the City presents 99 actions that instigate positive change in contemporary cities around the world.

I didn’t see the exhibition but part of what caught my attention is the symmetry between the web interface and the proposed/enacted actions in the city, which is nevertheless not merely literal. Clicking on the ball identifies 5 actions from #79 Paint Grows Soccer Field to #48 Ping Pong Connects Neighbors.

Football Field 1. Maider López. Sharjah Art Museum, United Arab Emirates, 2007. © Maider López

Football Field 1. Maider López. Sharjah Art Museum, United Arab Emirates, 2007. © Maider López

You can combine tools as well, so that the coveralls link to 8 actions from #61. Bicycle Plants Wartime Gardens
(Futurefarmers’ Victory Garden project) to #40 Wheels Give Superpowers. But if you add a bench to your toolset, you get Foamy Velour Suits Challenge Authority.

The integration of interface and concept may or may not change the world, but it’s refreshing to see a site that still tries to be an experience for the experience, and the projects are great to browse through. I’m thinking of taking up #41 Guns Seed Vacant Lots this spring.

Plant the Piece is a symbolic seed-bomb production project.

Plant the Piece is a symbolic seed-bomb production project.