432

Arte Útil archive nr:

432

Initiator:

Critical Art Ensemble

Location:

Germany

Category:

scientific, economy, environment, social

Users:

CAE (Steve Kurtz, Lucia Sommer and Steve Barnes), Inhabitants.

Maintained by:

Exhibition ‘Natur/Kultur’, curated by Anke Haarmann and Harald Lemke

Certification:

implemented

Duration:

2008

Critical Art Ensemble
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Peep Under the Elbe

Description:

The group Critical Art Ensemble (CAE), through a series of mobile performances, has been working with the inhabitants of Wilhelmsburg – an island neighbourhood mainly populated by immigrants and German working poor. The project called Peep Under the Elbe, aimed to provide the inhabitants of the area with water testing kits, for analysing the canal water in order to discover safe swimming and fishing areas (which is often the only places where some people can afford to get fish).

Goals:

Try to encourage populations who use the canals for recreation to move around a bit, finding where the safest places were for the popular activities of swimming and fishing.

Beneficial Outcomes:

It empowered people with tools, CAE tested the quality of the local water, and gave the inhabitants water testing kits to monitor their own environments.

Images: