MODEM - Space for Contemporary Music and Arts, Berlin
Redevelopment / transformation of the vast former 'Kraftwerk Mitte', designed in the 1960ties, into a new type of art space.

Commissioned by: Dimitri Hegeman / Tresor Berlin GmbH
Concept by Markus Richter / European Art Projects
and Ari Benjamin Meyers / Redux Orchestra

In many respects the concept is an offspring of the European Art Projects research on Megastructure and Unitary urbanism / Situationism. As it seems, the concept will hardly be implemented, however it is worthwhile to be remembered:

“The power station is not another typical industrial ruin demanding to undergo cultural transformation; more than this, it is an empty container full of potential where the activities of Berlin’s creative scene can be brought together, a space for the unexpected: a situation. It is a sequence of tall, open halls, surprising vistas, bunker-like passages and sudden chasms, an 'imagination machine', generating the power to explore possibilities.

We aim to shape these qualities, but also to preserve them. We do not want a sterile arts center over-sanitized to death, nor another multifunctional complex with all possible technical refinements; we want a place as playful, agile, and anarchic as the city’s creative scene with intelligent and flexible lo-tech architecture."

[concept in english] [konzept auf deutsch]