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Cities on the Edge
Cities on the Edge
Official website of Liverpool 2008: http://www.liverpool08.com/exploring/cote/
Cities on the Edge (CoTE) is a project which Liverpool 2008 initiated with the advise of Franco Bianchini after the monitoring committee pointed out in the cultural programme for 2008 was missing the European dimension. Consequently six European cities, all of the port cities, were invited to work together: Liverpool, Bremen, Gdansk, Istanbul, Marseilles and Naples.
Franco Bianchini's proposal rests on the key term "intercultural exchange" believed to exist in multi-ethnic cities, and which gives it a unique cultural, social and economic dynamism. (1)
Of interest is that Stavanger was in the same year as Liverpool ECoC; Istanbul became ECoC in 2010, Marseille in 2013 while Bremen and Gdansk did not make it (Gdansk for 2016 with Wroclaw getting the designation instead.)
It is a major strand of our cultural celebrations during Liverpool's year as European Capital of Culture and our major translational project.
The purpose of the project was to let these six cities explore together "their roles as historic ports and their sense of themselves as city-states, as islands within their nation." Being rebellious and spaces for migrants but also crime, they spell unrest for the rest of the country and therefore not liked very much. Hence the term 'edge' (not border city) was used even though in the modern terminology there is as well talk about the 'cutting edge' of success and failure.
In the official text, it is stated in order "to explore these edgy and creative characteristics, Liverpool is welcoming hundreds of European artists, professionals, and young people to share and exchange ideas and experiences throughout 2008." Whether hundreds of artists came together over the stretch of the entire year needs to be verified. There was a special photo exhibition held to show different perceptions according to each city, but some of the photos tended to be orientated towards typical elements e.g. in Gdansk the gate to the wherft where Solidarnosc was created.
One critical article points out, Liverpool 2008 was (like Thessaloniki 1997) a missed opportunity:
"The Capital of Culture year in this sense was a missed opportunity that could have been used to draw on the values and resources of the grassroots communities and creators and to find creative solutions to the endemic problem of the city. If the CotE network or similar project will be adopted in the mega-event there will be real possibilities that practices and ideas based on creativity and informal spaces will become a ground for a culture-led renewal of the city." (2)
This is being said by defining culture at the beginning in following way:
"Culture is ... a multidimensional task and it is closely related to the definition of our identity. In the notion of culture several perspectives and multiple values are at least potentially in conflict and have to be defined. It is the setting condition where mediation and relation are reachable. However lately this mediation has been used in a strategic way to support an “official” cultural space that often doesn’t match with the chaotic milieu that has made a city as creative.(Jones,Wilks-Hegg, 2006)." (3)
1. Cities of Culture - Leeds Beckett University
2. Francesca Battistoni (2011) „Liverpool 2008 : capital of whose culture? The cities on the edge project“ Tafterjournal n. 42 - dicembre 2011 -numero speciale
3. op. cit.
Note: for an epistemological critique of the term 'edge':
"...when I did an online search for the programme, it brought up material on . . . Croydon. Croydon? I am sure the London borough has qualities that belie David Bowie's description of it as a "complete concrete hell", but a rollicking seaport it is not.
No, Croydon is not a city on the edge, it is an "edge city" - a hub of offices, shops and places of entertainment on the outskirts of a larger city. The idea is American. Americans call almost everywhere a city. In the UK, you have to have a letter patent from the Queen, issued on the recommendation of the lord chancellor. Croydon, to its chagrin, does not yet have one.
Tom Wolfe first used the term "edge city" in his 1968 novel, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, but the main populariser was Joel Garreau, who published a book called Edge City in 1991. Typically they were new settlements that grew around motorway intersections or airports. In the US, they have run into trouble - lack of room to grow, little public transport or pedestrian access - but new ones are emerging in countries such as China, India and the United Arab Emirates.
I am not sure how far Croydon fits the bill but, ever looking to improve itself, it formed a European Edge Cities Network in 1996.
Liverpool, Croydon - these places have one thing in common. Both have had an image problem and have been the butt of jokes (in the case of Liverpudlians, mostly their own). A calendar entitled Rare Roundabouts of Croydon was a surprise hit in 2003.
Now Croydon is trying to shed its image of failed postwar modernism. It has a multibillion pound regeneration plan, overseen by the architect Will Alsop, which includes a 30-storey greenhouse with "sky gardens", pod-shaped buildings on stilts, an "emerald necklace" of green spaces, fewer car parks and a main road reduced from eight lanes to two.
It already has arts venues such as the Fairfield Halls and a thriving rock music scene. It is (so I read) the centre of dubstep, a genre rooted in dub, garage and drum and bass. If only it could get that letter patent, perhaps Croydon could be a future European Capital of Culture."
Brian Groom (2008) „Cities on the edge of – where?“ Financial Times, January 8, 2008
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/535f3bd0-bd8c-11dc-b7e6-0000779fd2ac.html#axzz3IDZW1fJJ
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