New Urban Conditions

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As Strelka Institute marks its 10th anniversary and concludes The New Normal speculative urbanism think-tank this year, it is transforming the English version of Strelka Mag into an open publishing platform for experimental, interdisciplinary research.

The open call welcomes contributors from across a wide spectrum of disciplines – architects, designers, artists, writers, philosophers, economists, programmers, etc. Submit your essays, projects, or films that touch upon one of the following three thematic strands:

AI at Urban Scale

As synthetic sensing and intelligence gradually permeate cities, we are interested in the new urban conditions formed by machine learning. We look at how we sense the city and how the city senses us, and itself, and how each one “makes sense” of the other. What are the futures promised by algorithmic governance and machine vision? And how can we speculate beyond the binary of utopia vs. dystopia, the sleek smart city vs. the Orwellian surveillance state?

Automated Landscapes

We also look at the emergence of a new architectural typology, one that caters to the machine and shifts away from the human. Assembly lines, data centers, automated ports, and warehouses are becoming less dependent on us and are turning into spaces where humans and robots are kept safe from one another, creating “human exclusion zones.” What are the challenges posed by this post-anthropocentric condition? How should we design, study, and engage with this complex new typology?

Alliances for the Post-Anthropocene

Anthropogenic climate change, increasing resource disparity, and the rise of ethno-nationalism demand articulation of a collective purpose, and finding new ways of cross-communal action. How do we build alliances that are not bound by familiarity? How do we obtain traction and political mobility, and plan in the face of future risks and indeterminacy? And how do we find a means of survival in the face of the threats posed by the Anthropocene?

We encourage researchers to shift the perspective of human-centrism and challenge the notions of Western universality, seeking to explore the assemblages of human and non-human polyphonic interactions on the planetary scale.

Send a short pitch (up to 250 words) and a brief bio by May 10, 2019.
Applicants will be contacted within two weeks of submission.
Selected participants will receive an honorarium of €100.

Submit your proposal at: opencall@strelka.com