Δάφνη Δραγώνα
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New Babylon Revisited
Participatory actions and drifts for the post-digial city
Keywords networks, commons, athens, goethe,

OCTO-APPS. With the Telekommunisten, in collaboration with Errands. As part of the New Babylon Revisited, Athens, 5–8.11.2014. Photo: Fake Office. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

OCTO-APPS. With the Telekommunisten, in collaboration with Errands. As part of the New Babylon Revisited, Athens, 5–8.11.2014. Photo: Fake Office. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

OCTO-APPS. With the Telekommunisten, in collaboration with Errands. Photo: Fake Office. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

OCTO-APPS. With the Telekommunisten, in collaboration with Errands. As part of the New Babylon Revisited, Athens, 5–8.11.2014. Photo: Fake Office CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

OCTO-APPS. With the Telekommunisten, in collaboration with Errands. As part of the New Babylon Revisited, Athens, 5–8.11.2014. Photo: Fake Office CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

BABYLON RADIO. With Daniel Kemeny, Chrysanthi Koumianaki, Kosmas Nikolaou, Andreas Sell, Paky Vlassopoulou. As part of the New Babylon Revisited. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

BABYLON RADIO. Ephemeral radio network in 3 137. With Daniel Kemeny, Chrysanthi Koumianaki, Kosmas Nikolaou, Andreas Sell, Paky Vlassopoulou. As part of the New Babylon Revisited. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

BABYLON RADIO. With Daniel Kemeny, Chrysanthi Koumianaki, Kosmas Nikolaou, Andreas Sell, Paky Vlassopoulou. As part of the New Babylon Revisited. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

BABYLON RADIO. Ephemeral radio network in 3 137. With Daniel Kemeny, Chrysanthi Koumianaki, Kosmas Nikolaou, Andreas Sell, Paky Vlassopoulou.CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

RESTREET / ENCLOSURES OF NEW ATHENS. With Oliver Lerone Schultz, Adnan Hadzi, James Stevens and Antonis Galanopoulos.Photo: Fake Office. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

RESTREET / ENCLOSURES OF NEW ATHENS. With Oliver Lerone Schultz, Adnan Hadzi, James Stevens and Antonis Galanopoulos.Photo: Fake Office. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

RESTREET / ENCLOSURES OF NEW ATHENS. With Oliver Lerone Schultz, Adnan Hadzi, James Stevens and Antonis Galanopoulos.Photo: Fake Office. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

Athens Conference for Utopian Technologies Etc. With Christina Kral / YKON & Angela Jerardi.
Photo: Christina Kral. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

"Athens Conference for Utopian Technologies Etc.". With Christina Kral / YKON & Angela Jerardi. As part of the New Babylon Revisited, Athens, 7–9.11.2014. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

ACUTE. With Christina Kral / YKON & Angela Jerardi. As part of the New Babylon Revisited. 7–9.11.2014. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

ACUTE. With Christina Kral / YKON & Angela Jerardi. As part of the New Babylon Revisited, Athens, 7–9.11.2014. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

ACUTE. With Christina Kral / YKON & Angela Jerardi. Photo: Christina Kral. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

A project by Goethe-Institut Athen

With Telekommunisten (Baruch Gottlieb, Jeff Mann) in collaboration with Errands, Jeff Mann, reSync (Adnan Hadzi, James Stevens), Antonios Galanopoulos, Oliver Lerone Schultz, YKON (Christina Kral), Angela Jerardi, Paky Vlassopoulou, Daniel Kemeny, Chrysanthi Koumianaki, Kosmas Nikolaou, Andreas Sell

In collaboration with the Circuits and Currents project space and the Careers Office of the Athens School of Fine Arts, the Common Media Lab of the Center for Digital Cultures of the University of Leuphana, the artists’ run space 3 137, the Independent Center for Research SPACE UNDER, and the Athens Wireless Metropolitan Network.

New Babylon was a model of an utopian city of the architect Constant. It was based on the idea of a constantly developing network of units that can allow dynamic and playful interactions among the city and its inhabitants. Although the New Babylon was a city that was never built, a part of Constant’s thought seems to have been now realised in the most contradictory way. Life in the “smart cities” seems to have an open, participatory and playful character aiming for the constant optimisation, normalisation and predictability of urban everyday life. Constant connectivity and the continuous aggregation and use of urban data can not leave much of a space for unpredictable, ephemeral and free forms of communication and interaction. And while in the post-digital era the romanticised idea of the connected city seems to be left behind, the urge once again appears for the location and redefinition of the elements that can offer opportunities for unitary thought and collective action.

The project New Babylon Revisited invited to Athens artists and theorists who through their workshops and actions proposed new architectures of connectivity and re-examined the city’s infrastructures. As part of the overall project, the studios and offices of a building in Praxitelous street was connected through a pneumatic network of tubes; a city drift invited visitors to a free exchange of files; a discussion around the enclosures of the Athenian commons was hosted in an offline sharing network; a parasitic micro-conference on the move re-approached Athens and an ephemeral radio station at Mavromichali street ran as an open and accessible network, addressing a call for discussions and actions.

For more information on the four different projects:

OCTO-APPS

Athens, Conference for Utopian Technologies etc

Restreet, Enclosures of New Athens

Babylon Radio

Photo Documentation:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/newbabylonrevisited/albums/with/72157649082001719