Conrad-bercah
Dystopic Town-lines
'A Nobel Project for Urbanity in the MMM'

Dystopic Town-lines is an app that will equip you with an unusual investigation of the geography of public space in the Third Millennium. It reads Havana’s urbanity against the background of the contemporary urban issues that Big Data has brought to the fore.

The app foreshadows the possibility of a new 'digitally driven' urban dystopia similar to the one described in 'Blade Runner' and 'Brazil.' The unveiling of PRISM has made one thing evident: just as limitless amounts of data can be used for distorted ends, the wild process of urbanization might create an environment that is anything but human friendly.

Through original comparisons, photo galleries and videos, the app describes the process of dystopic urbanization and how it might be 'tamed' through a 'Nobel project' of selective demolition. The app’s subtitle, A Nobel Project for Urbanity in the MMM, suggests (re)associating the name Nobel to its real scientific contribution: the invention of dynamite.

Dystopic Town-lines is the result of a protracted reflection upon these issues and is the second installment of a trilogy on urbanity that began with 'Archipelago Town-lines, Notes for a Bare Urbanism,' expanding upon the concept of the archipelago-town as a possible new model for urban growth AND de-growth.


Features:

- visual table of contents for easy navigation
- original video footage from the streets of Berlin, Beirut and Milan
- state-of-the-art interactive data visualizations
- rich visual content through slideshows and photo galleries