News
Issues Order
About Mailing
list Support Submit
Contact ©MONU
24-01-12 // DO WE SIMPLY HAVE TO STOP HAVING SEX...?
In August 2009 the editorial of MONU #11 on the topic of "Clean Urbanism"
started with the lines "Do we simply have to stop having sex to produce
Clean Urbanism - i.e. an urbanism that is dedicated to minimizing both the required
inputs of energy, water, and food for a city as well as its waste output of
heat, air pollution as CO2, methan, and water pollution, Samo Pedersen asks
in his piece “Sci-fi greenery..or just Responsibility?”. In fact Randall
Teal sees the growing world population frequently ignored in discussions on
sustainability, as he points out in his article “Coming Clean: Owning Up
to the Real Demands of a Sustainable Existence”. Fewer people spend less
energy, and as the gas and oil supply will come to an end sooner or later, saving
energy may be a cheaper and smarter solution for cities than depending on renewable
energies, as Gerd Hauser, one of the leading researchers on the implementation
of the EU Directive on Energy Performance of Buildings, explains in an interview
with us, entitled “Domes over Manhatten”..."
These lines
are now featured on a bag designed and produced by MONU Magazine. The bags were
produced in a limited edition of 50 pieces. To get a single bag for €10,00
+ shipping (NL €1,50; EU €2,55; WORLD €2,85) please e-mail your
order to bag@monu-magazine.com
. You will receive instructions and invoice through Paypal by e-mail. If
you prefer to pay without PayPal, please let us know.
16-01-12
// MONU IN ARCHIZINES CATALOGUE
MONU is featured in the Archizines
Catalogue published by Bedford
Press and edited by Elias
Redstone. This catalogue, accompanying an exhibition
curated by Elias Redstone for the Architectural
Association, explores the relationship between architecture and publishing.
Themes addressed in a series of new essays include the role of publishing in
academia and architectural practice, and the representation of architecture
in fictional writing, photography, magazines and fanzine culture.
02-01-12 // MONU MAGAZINE AVAILABLE IN INDIA
After already being available in bookshops in Europe, Australia, and North America,
MONU
Magazine is now available in Asia too. As of today, all available issues of
MONU can be purchased at Mumbai's Art
& Design Book Store. An almost complete list of bookshops that carry
MONU can be found in Order (scroll
down).
22-12-11 // INTERVIEW WITH BERND UPMEYER AT ARCHIZINES EXHIBITION
Curator Elias Redstone interviewed MONU's editor-in-chief Bernd Upmeyer for
the Archizines
Exhibition at London's Architectural
Association. The answers were screened at the exhibition.
Elias Redstone: What is the relationship between architecture and publishing?
Bernd Upmeyer: To a certain extent, both architecture and publishing can be
understood as processes of information production. Yet, neither architecture
nor publishing should be completely reduced to the production of information.
However, when I started publishing MONU magazine around seven years ago, after
having been trained first and foremost as an architect, the first printed issue
of MONU became in a way my first fully realized, or to put it more correctly,
my first fully built project under my own name. In this way, and from my point
of view, publishing and architecture were very closely related. Nevertheless,
in my experience, the production of architecture is a much more active and narcissistic
process, whilst the production of a publication is far more passive, more mediating
and collaborative.
ER: How do you ‘edit’ architecture?
Bernd Upmeyer: MONU magazine is first of all a magazine on urbanism that focuses
on cities in a broader sense, including their politics, economies, geographies,
their social aspects, but also their physical structures, the point where architecture
comes into play. In that sense architecture is only one field of many in the
magazine - fields which are all brought together under the umbrella term urbanism.
When editing the magazine, I of course always try to select those contributions
that are most relevant for the chosen topic for the particular issue in order
to come to conclusions regarding the problem under discussion. But what I find
actually more interesting about the question “how I edit architecture”
is the impact that MONU can have on cities and thus on the built environment
- the architecture. Because I believe that by putting certain topics on the
agenda, the magazine is actually able to modify and even correct, and therefore
“edit”, architecture by changing and manipulating the views and perspectives
of its readers in a positive way, which will eventually also influence the built
environments in our cities.
ER: What is the role of printed matter in the digital age?
Bernd Upmeyer: I think that the role of printed matter in the digital age is
very much related to the costly, complicated and time-consuming way in which
printed publications are produced and distributed. Everybody who has ever produced
a printed publication knows what I am talking about. Even if you simply print
your magazine on an ink-jet printer in your kitchen and staple it together by
yourself, it still remains so much harder to do than publishing something online.
And once you have made that kind of effort, you are not going to waste it on
low-quality information. That fact alone secures a certain quality among printed
publications. Furthermore, I believe that a certain fascination with “materiality”,
with real and physical objects will never entirely disappear. Although MONU
magazine is already available digitally as well, I could not imagine producing
it only digitally at this moment. The idea that a magazine can be a physical
object of art and not only a transmitter of information always appealed to me.
ER: How are architectural publications changing?
Bernd Upmeyer: I would be tempted to say that the increased accessibility and
availability of information and the easier connectivity between people that
the internet provides today, can only be judged positively. But whether it works
for you as an advantage or disadvantage depends on your approach. The whole
situation offers both: great opportunities, but also great dangers of misuse.
Because what I see is that, especially over the last ten years, the situation
has impacted and changed architectural publications in a lot of negative ways.
The reality that producing a magazine became so much easier and faster than
twenty years ago, resulted in the fact that today the shelves of bookshops,
but also a huge number of internet websites, are groaning under the weight of
an ever-growing stack of rather uncritical, low-quality and image-oriented architectural
publications that will eventually hollow out the entire architectural profession.
19-12-11
// ACROBATIC NARRATIVES
Excerpts from the interview (MONU #15
) with Wouter Vanstiphout - member of Crimson
Architectural Historians in Rotterdam and professor of Design and Politics
at the Faculty of Architecture of Delft Technical University.
Beatriz Ramo: We would
like to discuss with you some delicate issues around the current understanding
of ideology, or better, the flexibility and malleability that “ideology”
has been put through until becoming a brand. From general, large-scale city
strategies to much smaller interventions in Rotterdam, examples of success as
branding operations but questionable in the transparency and honesty of its
message, which is heavily loaded with rhetoric about the public, the social,
the participatory, the creative…etc. We are confronted by plenty of these
ideologies which turn into highly hypocritical and unethical promotional strategies.
How does one judge that? Would you be able to justify them?
Wouter Vanstiphout:
What I find is that it is difficult to distinguish between authentic social
or ecological motivations, and motivations that are used as window dressing
or smokescreens for something else. Today, even the most hard-nosed developer,
corporate architect or neoliberal politician uses language of community and
sustainability to the extent that there is nothing on the surface you can disagree
with. (…)
BR: We see more and more
groups and collectives that call themselves ‘activists’ whose manifestoes
lay in the social, urban participation, social action, etc. Although conceived
with the best of intentions, often the results of their actions are closer to
a celebration of themselves as the protagonists of their activism rather than
a committed action with a serious outcome. What do you think about this urban
activism displayed all around Europe?
WV: There are offices that do it in an authentic way, out of a real feeling
of anger or commitment… and that is fantastic. And there are many offices
that are exactly as you said… There is a change in the cliché of
the figure of the architect. Twenty years ago the cliché was a bit Spanish-looking:
cultured, qualitative, formalist, intellectual…And then Rem [Koolhaas]
came and the architect became this ruthless robot man, destroying everything
we found comfortable; being awful to everyone… And everybody copied that
model, from Ben van Berkel to every single Swiss architect in the world under
50.
But now we have this third model: Alejandro Aravena, Alfredo Brillembourg, Alexander
Vollebregt, my colleague from Delft, switching easily from Haitian slums to
Lecture rooms, perfectly comfortable with UN Habitat and Worldbank bureaucrats,
dressing with a certain hippie-chic, adored by their students for their empathy,
approachability and enthusiasm, and most of all breathlessly admired for their
willingness to talk about helping the world, eradicating poverty, emancipating
the poor. (…)
BR: What I find distressing is how these architects or their actions are
being used by authorities or institutions; like marriages of convenience. This
profile: young + fresh + social activist has been fully institutionalized. (…)
WV: (…) This strange lightness of these groups of architects is not really
dangerous for society, it’s just useless for society… it is just dangerous
for themselves. That is why I am so fascinated with what many young offices
are doing, will they succumb to the comfort zone of the creative industry deal,
providing lightweight actions, that are really just designer objects, or will
they find their own position, their own discourse, shed their roles of bad boys
and girls in designer magazines and developer boardrooms?
(…)
Bernd Upmeyer: In this a-critical moment, do these tricky and popular “ideologies”
offer a great chance to designers and urban planners, who in the name of the
social or the green can act with more freedom?
WVS: Yes, but look at the roots of the a-critical attitude of present-day architects.
Don’t you agree that the preachings of Rem Koolhaas of the early 1990s,
against a critical attitude towards the mega-urbanization in Asia, was a pioneering
moment in this a-critical attitude? Critics of the autocratic regimes in Singapore,
China, later the Arab states, were being castigated and silenced for being arrogant
and neo-colonial. I always found this an exasperating rhetorical trick; especially
because you could not help thinking that it was self-serving, because the direction
of this a-criticality always moved in the same direction as the offices portfolio.
So you always got the feeling, that not the country’s government was being
shielded, but the ethics of the office itself. (…)
BU: With what kind of
urban ideologies do you think we are dealing at the moment? How do they relate
to urban ideologies of the past?
WV: I continuously go back to 1980s and 1990s. Embracing monster capitalist
machines was kind of sexy, attractive. Today cities are looked at as products
that have to compete on a global level and they are manipulated by people that
operate at that global level, from the outside. I started losing my belief in
this metropolitanism. (…)
BU: Once we accept the failure and impossibility of true ideologies, how
do you see the tendency of borrowing the esthetics and imagery of brilliant
past ideologies and stripping them from their meaning and turning them into
current dogmas?
BR: For example, the
fascination with the images from Superstudio’s Monumento Continuo, which
were made to fiercely criticize capitalism, globalization, and the last Modern
Movement of the sixties, but now these images are taken almost as real architecture
proposals because of their striking beauty and monumentality. Isn’t it
a little awkward the usage of images without regard their initial meaning?
WsV: I agree with this.
But I even think that there is something more desperate about it. What you see
is that ideology has become esthetics itself. It is something that you can buy
into …(…)
You also see this with some of the neo-neorationalist architectural hypes being
taught at the AA, Harvard, and the Berlage Institute, this armchair flirting
with communism and socialism, without any real political engagement. Within
the world of architecture, dead and buried ideologies are being used as designer
objects, attributes or talisman, that get you access to tenure tracks, magazines
and conferences.
I find it extremely perverse because it creates this jargon problem, this extremely
incomprehensible elitist language. The language of architecture theory has becomes
so convoluted, so obtuse, so…. That even the dumbest person can use it,
because it just does not make any sense anyway. (…)
08-12-11
// ARTIST NO MORE
MONU's editor-in-chief Bernd Upmeyer has been interviewed by the Milan-based
magazine "STUDIO".
STUDIO: Officially today we live in an urbanized world. More than 50% of
humanity live in urban contexts. Is this the age of urbanity or the age of the
crises complexity?
Bernd Upmeyer: If you ask me like that I would rather say that it is the age
of urbanity, because crises always happened. It is not that we are just now
having a lot of crises and we never had them before. But I also don't see exactly
the relation between the age of urbanity and the crises we are facing at moment.
First of all you have to define what kind of crises you're talking about. Today
we are dealing for example with three main crises: the financial crisis, the
climate crisis, but also the geo-political crisis.
STUDIO: So this is not an urban topic?
BU: That depends on what crisis you are talking about. The current financial
crisis, for example, has of course an impact on cities, but cities did not produce
the financial crisis to begin with. If you wish to talk about the relation of
the climate crisis to cities, then you can of course also say that the recent
enormous population growths of cities did not make the situation easier. However,
we can speak of an urban age, mainly because of the vast movements of people
from the countryside to the cities, which happened especially in Asia - a tendency
that does not happen so much in the Western world, where cities are rather shrinking.
...continue reading the entire interview here.
30-11-11 // MONU AT MELANCHOTOPIA
MONU Magazine is currently part of the Melanchotopia
exhibition at Rotterdam's Witte
de With Gallery. For the duration of Melanchotopia, Witte de With is home
to Pro qm
from Berlin. Their owners have curated a special selection of titles to further
explore the themes of Melanchotopia and include these together with books of
the artists represented in the exhibition.
Melanchotopia is an exhibition that invites more than forty international artists
to work with different venues in the city-center of Rotterdam – places
where people live and work – and to activate their potential as spaces
for ideas, discourse and invention. From large-scale interventions to very simple
gestures, Melanchotopia supports a range of artistic practices that go beyond
the classical approach to displaying art in public space. Working with the existing
dynamics of the city, Witte de With’s intention is to bring forward the
diverse layers of daily life in Rotterdam, creating a rich framework for subjective
encounters. It is an exhibition about the reality of Rotterdam. Today, Rotterdam
seems to be on hold between its past and its future: filled with nostalgia for
the pre-WWII city and in wait for the utopian future, which is perpetually stalled
in unfinished developments and reconstructions. Projections about yesterday
and tomorrow drive the image of the city, that seems to lack a present. Melanchotopia
performs the present of the city through the specific practice of each artist.
Over the course of the exhibition (and remaining active until 31 December 2011)
Witte de With’s galleries is reconfigured to become the epicenter of Melanchotopia.
The projects, which spread throughout Rotterdam’s center, are brought together
via a graphic mapping. Several art works and installations are also on show
inside the epicenter and it is the site for numerous events. (description
from Witte
de With's website)
21-11-11
// MONU #15 ON POST-IDEOLOGICAL URBANISM RELEASED
This new MONU issue on the topic of Post-Ideological Urbanism
probably touches on one of the most fascinating and biggest issues of our time
and in our culture, or what is left of it: the non-ideological - or better post-ideological
- conditions of our society when it comes to cities. Today, ideology appears
to have become, and to have been reduced to, something merely aesthetic, something
you can buy yourself into as Wouter Vanstiphout explains in an
interview with us entitled "Acrobatic Narratives". In that
sense cities have become suspicious territories where hypocrisy and fakery prevail
when it comes to urban ideologies and one wishes to have some kind of optical
device that detects all the lies, similar to a kind of night vision infrared
technology that Thomas Ruff used in his "Nacht Series"
applying the same technology that was used during the Gulf War...continue
reading in Issues.
To get a printed copy of this new issue, please e-mail your order to order@monu-magazine.com.
The digital version can be downloaded on iTunes
and Pocket
Mags...more information can be found in Order
.
07-11-11
// ARCHIZINES EXHIBITION OPENED IN LONDON
The ARCHIZINES
exhibition opened successfully on 5 November in the Front
Members' Room at the AA School, 36 Bedford Square, London. The exhibition
features MONU's issue #14 together with 59 other international
magazines and runs until 14 December 2011.
MONU #14 is the most recent issue of the magazine, which illustrates very well
where we stand at the moment. It displays its mature status and its achievement
in surviving and prospering over the years. This issue is important because
it shows how the magazine has developed since its foundation more than seven
years ago from a very small, stapled together, black and white publication to
one of the most relevant and one of the main independent publications focused
exclusively on urbanism. Ever since the summer of 2004, when MONU's first issue
on the topic of "Paid Urbanism" appeared, two issues were released
regularly every year. This current issue of MONU shows more than ever that even
in market-driven and post-critical times, a non-conformist niche publication
such as MONU magazine, that collects critical articles, images, concepts, and
urban theories from architects, urbanists and theorists from around the world,
can exist and find its place of pride without bowing to "market forces".
(Bernd Upmeyer's answer to Archizine's question "Why this issue is important
and why it was selected for the exhibition?")
(Image 1+2: Valerie Bennett; Image 3: Sue Barr)
01-11-11
// NEW CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS FOR MONU #16 - NON-URBANISM
(Image: "Jeffrey returns to his home town from College to visit his
father in hospital. On his way back from the hospital he happens to find a severed
ear in the overgrown fields behind his home." Blue Velvet (1986), David
Lynch. @De Laurentiis Entertainment Group)
Some six years ago and in one of our first issues - MONU #4 - one of the
contributors explained "how suburbs destroy democracy"
when people live in high degree of residential and cultural isolation and individualism.
By that time he could not have forecasted that...continue reading in
Submit.
28-09-11 // MONU #14 AT FUTUR CULTUR FESTIVAL IN TOKYO
During the
summer MONU's issue #14 has been exhibited in Tokyo as part of the Futur
Cultur Festival. The event was dedicated to those in the Tohoku region who
lost their homes in the aftermath of the march 11th earthquake and tsunami.
A short video of the event can be found on vimeo
and a photo report on Designboom.
14-09-11
// MONU AT THE AA IN LONDON
The
Architectural Association in London is hosting an ARCHIZINES
exhibition in London from 5 November to 14 December 2011. MONU will be
showcased together with 59 other architectural magazines, fanzines and journals
from 20 countries around the world and include video interviews with their creators.
Launched by Elias
Redstone as an online research project in January 2011, with art direction
by Folch Studio, Archizines celebrates and promotes a recent resurgence of alternative
and independent architectural publishing. From the photocopied newsletter to
beautifully bound magazines, each fanzine is a creative platform for the subject
and the author. Together they provide a rich and unique window into how people
relate to the spaces we inhabit. Across the world, publications are cultivating
architectural commentary, criticism and research. Bucking the current trend
for digital media, architects, artists and academics are producing printed matter
that adds a dynamic, and often radical, voice to architectural discourse. Each
magazine will be on show, while their authors will be represented in video interviews
talking about their work.
08-07-11
// MONU #7 REPRINTED
After being sold out for about three years, MONU #7 on the topic of 2nd Rate
Urbanism has been reprinted and is now available. To give a few examples, MONU
#7 featured an interview with Floris
Alkemade/OMA entitled "Dumped in Almere"; "I ROTterdam"
by Charles Bessard
and Nanne de Ru/ Powerhouse Company; and the "The Re-Creation of the
European City" by Beatriz
Ramo/ STAR. Browse the entire reprinted issue #7 on YouTube here.
In an increasingly connected world the economic realities are precarious
for most 2nd rate cities. In the competition for jobs and an ever expanding
tax base, 2nd rate cities are in a squeeze between the suburbs where land is
even cheaper and even more accessible by car on the one side, and the real attractive
1st rate urban areas that draw the highly educated and the creative on the other
side. And since planning ‘down’ to a suburb is not an option that
is considered by most cities, the fight for the survival of 2nd rate cities
is to attract more urban assets...continue
reading here.
07-06-11
// MONU IS AVAILABLE DIGITALLY
As of today,
MONU Magazine on Urbanism is available digitally as an IPAD Application for
Magazines using Apples' iPad, iPhone and MAC products. At the moment the available
issues include MONU #8, #9, #10, #11, #12, and #13. They can be downloaded on
iTunes
and Pocket
Mags.
17-05-11 // MONU #13 IS EXHIBITED IN PRAGUE
MONU's issue #13 is currently exhibited at the Czech
Design Gallery in Prague. The exhibition is entitled "We
are closing in 21 days" and runs from May 9 until May 30, 2011. The
event is organized by Oldschool
- a group project of three designers from Prague working in the field of visual
communication, graphic design and fashion. The aim of the event is, apart from
presenting fashion, to introduce foreign independent publishing to a wider czech
audience.
02-05-11
// NEW CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS FOR MONU #15 - POST-IDEOLOGICAL URBANISM
Today we find ourselves in a jealous mood, yet at the same time disillusioned,
looking back to the times when revolutionary urban ideologies
were not only conceived but actually, unlike today, also truly believed in.
Just think about the passionate ideas of the Situationist International, ...read
the rest of the new call for submissions in Submit
(Image: Dexter, ready to kill. ©Showtime)
18-04-11 // MONU #14 - EDITING URBANISM RELEASED
Despite the current urgency to deal with the enormous potential of the already
existing urban material as Urban Editors, there seems still to
be an enormous lack of interest in topics such as urban and architectural restoration,
preservation, renovation, redevelopment, renewal or adaptive reuse of old structures
among architects and urban designers. But ignorance in this matter can only
be dismissed as socially irresponsible and economically and culturally unacceptable.
But what might be the reason for the prevailing ignorance? Who is to blame?
Why is Urban Editing considered to be so utterly unattractive?...continue
reading here
12-04-11 // MONU AT MILAN DESIGN WEEK
MONU magazine
will be exhibited and presented at the Milan
Design Week 2011 from April 12 - 17. Bernd Upmeyer will speak about MONU
on Friday, April 15 at 6pm at
the Chiedi
alla Polvere, via Cola Montano 24, Milan. MONU will be part of the Green
Island. (Image:
Vessel One by Adam Farlie, photo ©Adam Farlie, Milan Design Week 2009)
21-03-11 // MONU IS EXHIBITED IN ARANJUEZ, SPAIN
MONU is exhibited
in the Espacio
para el Arte y la Cultura (Espacio para el Arte y la Cultura, C/ San
Antonio, 49, 28300 Aranjuez, Spain) in Aranjuez, a town located 48km south of
Madrid. The exhibition opens on March 22 at 19:00 with a music
session by the Sindicalistas / Autoplacer and runs until May 22, 2011.
01-03-11
// MONU WILL BE PRESENTED AT BASEL'S YOUNG ART FAIR
MONU will be presented at Basel's Young Art Fair entitled LISTE
from June 14 - 19, 2011. LISTE
is the discoverer fair for young galleries and young art. Every year since its
opening in 1996, the LISTE has presented new and important galleries and highly
contemporary young art. The LISTE's concept of introducing galleries in general
no more than 5 years old and artists under 40 has been at the heart of its being
one of the most important fairs for young art and still being considered one
of the art world’s most important discoverer fair. (Image 1and 3: Daniel
Spehr, photographer; Image 2: Courtesy LABOR, Mexico D.F)
14-02-11
// SUCCESSFUL MOST VALUABLE URBANISM DEBATE
MONU's Most Valuable Urbanism Debate was a great success. The main statements
of the presentations and the debate of Piet Vollaard, Floris Alkemade,
Jaap van den Bout, Adriaan Geuze and MONU's editor in chief
Bernd Upmeyer will be published in MONU's coming issue on the topic of "Editing
Urbanism" by the beginning of April.
09-02-11 // MONU #11 REPRINTED
After being
sold out for a couple of months, MONU
#11 on Clean Urbanism has been reprinted and is available again. To get
a single printed copy of MONU #11, please e-mail your order to publishers@b-o-a-r-d.nl.
Do we simply have to stop having sex to produce Clean Urbanism - i.e. an
urbanism that is dedicated to minimizing both the required inputs of energy,
water, and food for a city as well as its waste output of heat, air pollution
as CO2, methan, and water pollution, Samo Pedersen asks in his piece “Sci-fi
greenery..or just Responsibility?”...
04-02-11 // MONU MAGAZINE IS DISPLAYED AT ARCHIZINES
ARCHI ZINES
is a showcase of new fanzines, journals and magazines from around the world
that provide an alternative discourse to the established architectural press.
Launched by Elias
Redstone, with art direction by Folch
Studio, the project celebrates and promotes publishing as an arena for
architectural commentary, criticism and research, and as a creative platform
for new photography, illustration and design.
Alternative
and independent publishing has had a dynamic and important relationship with
architecture over the years, with prolific moments in the 1960s, 1970s and 1990s.
A recent resurgence has seen new titles emerging in many countries, from Argentina,
Belgium and Chile to the UK and USA. ARCHI ZINES brings together this international
collection of publications for the first time as an important resource for architects,
designers, critics, photographers and anyone interested in discussing the buildings
and spaces we inhabit.
ARCHI ZINES
is an expanding archive of the best publications from 2000s to the latest releases,
and is growing as new titles and issues are acquired. The publications themselves
vary in style (from photocopied zines to professionally printed and bound magazines)
and content (from architectural research to personal narratives about buildings
and cities). The commonality is a shared interest in documenting and discussing
the spaces we occupy in ways that more mainstream or professional publications
do not. As well as adding to architectural discourse, they are lovingly made
objects to hold and to keep.
24-01-11
// MONU IS EXHIBITED AT THE "ESPACIO PARA EL ARTE"
IN ZARAGOZA
After the success of the "De
Zines" exhibition at "la
casa encendida" in Madrid, Spain, the show opens its doors again
in Zaragoza in the "Espacio
para el Arte". More than 400 independent international publications
(magazines, fanzines, artbooks and others) will be shown. The opening will be
on Tuesday, January 25 at 19:00. The exhibition will run until March 13.
03-01-11
// MOST VALUABLE URBANISM DEBATE
MONU - magazine on urbanism is organizing a public debate on the topic of its
last issue: MONU #13 - Most Valuable Urbanism on Thursday, February 10, 2011
at 7:00 p.m. in "De
Machinist" in Rotterdam.
The debate will be moderated by Piet
Vollaard and the panel will include four people with four different
ideological backgrounds in order to discuss the topic in a rich and diverse
way and to provoke a lively and productive clash of ideas and opinions. The
panel members are: Floris
Alkemade, Ashok
Bhalotra, Jaap
van den Bout, and Adriaan
Geuze. The entire event will be in English.
The topic "Most Valuable Urbanism" will be used as the starting point
for the debate, but with a focus on the Dutch context and Dutch cities. The
aim of the debate is to discuss the topic "Most Valuable Urbanism"
among the Dutch public and to critically reflect on traditional Dutch city values.
The main questions of the debate will be: What
is a good and what is a bad city? How should we evaluate cities in this day
and age? Which city might be the most valuable, producing the most valuable
urbanism and what kind of criteria should be applied to define valuable urbanism?
What role do architects and urban designers play in the production of valuable
urbanism?
Location:
De Machinist
Willem Buytewechstraat 45
3024 BK Rotterdam
Date:
10.02.2011, 7:00 p.m.
Tickets:
The
debate is sold
out
13-12-10
// MONU IS SHOWCASED IN A NEWLY LAUNCHED DIGITAL LIBRARY
FOR INDEPENDENT PUBLISHERS
MONU has been invited to be part of the collection of the newly launched digital
library No Layout
. No Layout is an online library for independent publishers, focusing on art
books and fashion magazines. It is meant as a support for printed publications,
allowing users to flip through full content on any screen without downloads
or apps. A promotional and archive tool.
Three issues
of MONU are currently showcased: MONU #5 - Brutal Urbanism; MONU
#10 - Holy Urbanism; and MONU #12 - Real Urbanism.
The following articles are fully readable on any screen for free:
#5:
The Return of the Repressed by Loïc Wacquant; The Evil
Architects Do by Eyal Weizman; Preventing Brutal Urbanism - Interview
with the Director of the Security Task Force for the 2006 World Cup by
Bernd Upmeyer; Terrorists Love Density by STAR
#10:
The Sacred and the Holy: Transient Urban Spaces by Colin Davies;
Peace Through Superior Horsepower by Speedism; The Mormon Church's
Infrastructure of Salvation by Jesse LeCavalier
#12:
Real Creativity: A Case for Ethical Freedom in Architecture by
Randall Teal; Life without Architects - Interview with Magriet Smit
by Bernd Upmeyer; Market Value(s) by STAR; Rotterdam
is a Whore - Interview with Andre Kempe by Beatriz Ramo and Bernd Upmeyer
06-12-10
// MONU'S CHRISTMAS OFFER 2010
From December 6 until December 31 MONU offers:
1. A 1 year subscription (2 issues) for only €20 instead
of €22,50 (saving 20% on cover price instead of 10%) + shipping.
2. A 2 year subscription (4 issues) for only €35 instead
of €40 (saving 30% on cover price instead of 20%) + shipping.
3. A 50% discount on one copy if 2 issues of any # are purchased
at once.
4. A 25% discount on each copy if 3 issues of any # are purchased
at once.
If you are
interested, please
e-mail your order to christmasoffer@monu-magazine.com.
01-11-10 // NEW CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS FOR MONU #14:
EDITING URBANISM
These days, the need for new buildings or entire city quarters is decreasing
or even ceasing to exist altogether - at least in the Western world - due to
the demographic changes and financially difficult times. Ever since, architects
and urban designers, who were trained by schools that focused their education
first of all on the past and mainly taught urban and architectural restoration,
preservation, renovation, redevelopment, or adaptive reuse of old structures
might be best prepared for a future, in which cities will be edited rather than
extended or even newly designed.
In such a future, which has become reality in most Western cities of this
day and age, architects and urban planners will become urban editors...read
the rest of the new call for submissions in Submit
29-10-10 // MONU IS COOL AND
STRANGE
MONU magazine has been featured as "cool & strange" in the
issue #6 2010 of the Korean
edition of ELLEgirl.
05-10-10 // MONU #13 ON "MOST VALUABLE URBANISM"
RELEASED
When John Lennon was photographed by the legendary rock 'n' roll photographer
Bob Gruen, wearing a New York City T-shirt in the year 1974, he proudly expressed
his love for the city of New York. For Lennon, although born in Liverpool, New
York City was without doubt the most valuable city...continue
reading here.
18-08-10 // MONU MAGAZINE IS DISPLAYED
AT THE BALTIMORE BOOK FESTIVAL
MONU magazine on urbanism has been invited to be on display at the Baltimore
Book Festival in Maryland, USA from September 24-26, 2010. The
festival took place in the historic and picturesque Mount Vernon Place. MONU
was part of an exhibition called “Creative Control”, a collection
of zines, self-published and independent art books and magazines.
29-06-10 // MONU #12 EXHIBITED AT "LA CASA ENCENDIDA"
IN MADRID
MONU magazine on urbanism #12 on "Real Urbanism" is being exhibited
at "la casa
encendida" in Madrid, Spain. The exhibition entitled "de zines",
curated by Roberto Vidal and Oscar Martín, features independent publications
(magazines, fanzines, artbooks and others). Around 400 international works are
shown from June 29th, 2010 throughout all the summer.
31-03-10// MONU AT NEXT ART FAIR IN CHICAGO
MONU magazine on urbanism is being exhibited as part of a "research
library" and magazine show during the NEXT
art fair in Chicago from April 30 to May 3, 2010.
11-03-10 // MONU #12 ON REAL URBANISM RELEASED
Just like
the "Ideal Woman" on the cover of this issue on Real Urbanism
- a sculpture by the Brooklyn based artist Tony Matelli - most of our
cities are shaped by a particular set of values... read
more here!
25-02-10// MONU AT THE "BOOKMARK NAGOYA"
MONU magazine
will be exhibited during the "Bookmark
Nagoya" event in the city of Nagoya, Japan. The exhibition will
take place from March 20th to April 20th 2010. More than 50 organizations
will exhibit rare publications, vintage books, magazines, picture books from
around the world. Various conferences with editors and writers take place, as
well as temporary book making workshops among others are offered for all generations.
20-11-09// MONU'S CHRISTMAS OFFER
From November 20 until December 31 MONU offers a 50% discount on
the issues MONU #5 - BRUTAL URBANISM and MONU #6 - BEAUTIFUL URBANISM.
To get a single copy of #5 or #6 (Soft cover; Black/White; 84 pages; 27 x 20
cm) for €5 (+ NL €1,76 EU €2,96 Non-EU €5,70 shipping
+ ~4% PayPal fees), please e-mail your order to christmasoffer@monu-magazine.com.
19-10-09// MONU AT TOKYO DESIGN WEEK
MONU magazine on urbanism will be exhibited during the TOKYO
DESIGN WEEK from October 30th to November 3rd 2009 inside the main venue
of the 100% DESIGN TOKYO hall. The Magazine Library space
will be in the center of the main venue.
17-07-09 // MONU MAGAZINE ON URBANISM WILL BE EXHIBITED
AT THE "A FEW ZINES" EXHIBITION IN LOS ANGELES FROM AUGUST 14 TO 16
The A Few Zines show has been in New York and Boston, and is now coming
to Los Angeles. The LA Forum hosts the insta-show for three days on Hollywood
Blvd. The festivities kick off Friday, August 14 with a panel discussion and
opening party. (photos taken by Bryan Jackson and John Southern)
08-05-09 // MONU MAGAZINE ON URBANISM WILL BE EXHIBITED AT THE SPACE ROCKET
IN HARAJUKU, TOKYO
The exhibition will take place from May 22 to June 2 with daily opening
times from 12:00-19:30.
20-04-09 // MONU MAGAZINE ON URBANISM WILL BE PRESENTED ON THE YOUNG ART
FAIR IN BASEL
- LISTE
09 FROM JUNE 9 - 14
Every year
since its opening in 1996, the LISTE - the Young Art Fair in Basel has presented
new and important galleries and highly contemporary young art. The LISTE, by
introducing galleries in general that are no more than 5 years old and artists
under 40, is considered as one of the most important fairs for young art and
one of the art world’s most important discoverer fair.
29-01-09 // MONU HAS BEEN SELECTED TO BE PART OF THE MOOH EVENT IN TOKYO
MONU - magazine
on urbanism has been selected from magazines around the world to be exhibited
from March 5 to March 14 2009 in a temporary magazine library in the Omotesando
Hills building complex in Tokyo,
Japan. MONU will be part of the MOOH event: "The
Magazine of Omotesando Hills Library".