Miscellaneous

Body and City

Transversal Territory

It's a truism that our environment is not around us, but within and with us. In our heads. But how does this awareness find its way into the body? How can environmental sensitivity be fostered? And how can we cultivate our environmental sensitivity so that we experience the place we inhabit anew? This is what physician and choreographer Mansoureh Aalaii and architect and visual artist Antoine de Perrot, aka Onzgi, are investigating in their research project Transversal Territory at the Accademia di Architettura of the Università della Svizzera italiana (USI) in Mendrisio. The project links physical, health, and artistic issues with ecological and urban planning topics. Annual workshops between students and residents aim to deepen the understanding of urban space through dance, installation, and architecture.

The first workshop in 2022 was dedicated to Mendrisio's Rime and Brecch districts, a randomly assembled landscape of apartment blocks, industrial buildings, warehouses, gas stations, parking lots, and shopping centers, the kind one sees on the outskirts of every Swiss city — or perhaps not, because one doesn't want to look. The work is documented in the book Transversal Territory: squares, hills, and houses were transformed through interventions and made accessible in a different way. A helipad was planted to create a small forest — an island of warning. An installation of thirty cubes made of crushed plastic bottles was set up next to an abandoned and weathered billboard, entering into a dialogue with the defaced valley. They hoped the book would be a source of inspiration for urban planners, architects, researchers, dance artists, and students, write Aalaii and de Perrot. Francesca Luisoni, Deputy Mayor of Mendrisio, found the project very stimulating, as she writes in the foreword — Rime and Brecch are to be redesigned.

Lilo Weber

Mansoureh Aalaii, Antoine de Perrot aka Onzgi: Transversal Territory. A Transdisciplinary and Participatory Approach in Urban Research, Park Books 2024; www.park-books.com