Raluca NAGY and Neil MACLEAN - Le Canal

Brussels has its river, the Senne / Zenne, as the majority of important cities. But unlike these, the Senne is not visible. In the centre of Brussels, the infectious river was completely covered up to reduce the foul smell and major boulevards were built over top in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The Senne is still visible in the outskirts of Brussels.

The only “river” somehow crossing Brussels remains le Canal, officially called the Brussels-Charleroi Canal since it runs from the South of Charleroi to the North of Brussels. The Canal is part of a North-South axis of water transport in Belgium and the North of France. This main purpose of the Canal as part of a water transport network seems to have decreased during the last years, together with the deindustrialisation.

The Brussels bit of the Canal and the gentrification around it, in the area closer to the center, are fascinating.

The Northern area of the Canal still feels industrial, whereas the South one, towards Charleroi, is more “homey”. Walking or biking South along the Canal reveals calmer outskirts with funny street art, strange galleries with giant Buddha-s and people living on houseboats.

When arriving in Ruisbroek, a village outside Brussels, one can be rewarded after a long trip along the Canal with a beer and a cozy atmosphere at the local bar near the train station.

Further South, the Ronquières inclined plane, lifting boats through almost 68 m vertically, is another remarkable feature of the Canal, looking like a big achievement of the glorious industrial seventies which lost its shimmer.

Paula MUHR - Sentimental Journey

The series is a very personal account of my travels through the Balkans, a visual archive of fleeting encounters and nostalgic metaphors. I refuse to take an objective stance or to tell a straight-forward story which would comply with the clichés related to the Balkans as a politically tumultuous region. Instead, I aim to capture simple almost banal everyday experiences in order to reflect on previously unobserved shades and values of this region in transition. I am constructing a kaleidoscope of everyday fragments which reverberate with childhood memories, histories of migration, different religious traditions or bear residues of the communist era. The emphasis is on registering the cultural density around objects and practices that evoke something which could be termed as cultural unconscious.
By collecting and montaging “impressionistic” records of various urban scenes, I am mapping this heterogeneous, multifaceted and complex region marked by an unstable balance between the old traditional values and modern Western influences. The selected everyday occurrences offer insight into larger social issues, as they are symbolically charged inscenations and ritualised collective constructions. The images have an almost idyllic, utopian value as they represent phenomena which are soon to disappear in the process of modernisation. Yet they are also invested with irony and humour as they testify to irruptions, oddities, and personal inventiveness as a response to the limitations of circumstances present in each particular case.

European City Seminars 2010 – Postindustrial Urban Space

It has been argued that there is something distinctive about a European City when compared to, for instance, an American city. The ´European City´ as a sociological concept relies on the idea that cities in Europe have demonstrated their power and willingness to make interventions for the prevention of social conflict and the good of it inhabitants. Often, these interventions took place against the strict financial logic or current global trends. In the 19th century, sewage systems and street lighting were first installed into the poor neighbourhoods and local councils choose to house people who weren't able to afford buying or renting property. The rise of the national (welfare) state to its strongest position somewhat reduced the power of cities, as many of the social institutions were transferred to the state.

However, today, with pan-continental institutions and global economic forces coming to the fore, national governments have been weakened to a certain extent. The partial withdrawal of the welfare state again leaves local decision makers in an interesting position. What can and what will they do? How large is the space for independent policies? Are they forced to restructure the European City according to market principles, or will it become a corrective counter-force, which seeks to maintain social cohesion in places where the social fabric has been destroyed by economic changes?