Beyond Minimum

Description:

Beyond Minimum was a series by collective Urban Subjects presented as part of Urgent Imagination: Art and Urban Development, Part 1. The project explored three examples of alternative housing from the late 1920s to modern day: a one-room apartment designed in 1929 by Grete Schütte-Lihotzky for a “new independent” woman; Jean Prouvé’s prefabricated buildings Maison des Jours Meilleurs (A House for Better Days) designed as a solution for a housing crisis in Paris, France in the mid-1950s; and the Alt-Erlaa Social Housing Estate, a non-municipal housing development in Vienna, Austria conceived by Harry Glück & Partners. Beginning with the German concept of Existenzminimum (minimal dwelling), Urban Subjects’ series proposed “beyond minimum” housing as a return to housing for use value rather than exchange value. 

Urgent Imagination: Art and Urban Development was a two-part project that proposed creative alternatives to developer-driven architecture and urban planning in Vancouver. The project generated events, artworks, conferences, and an online platform for critical inquiry into issues concerning urban development, spatial justice, and critical theory.

Curated by Caitlin Jones.

Documents:

• Urban Subjects, Beyond Minimum, brochure (2015).