World in Progress: The dark side of Cape Town s construction boom
But from apartheid-era South Africa to Rohingya refugees in 21st century Bangladesh, humans have repeatedly used design, construction and city planning to literally cement their prejudices, expelling the oppressed to the fringes of society. And the US is, of course, no exception.
Sekou Cooke, one of the ten artists shown at the Reconstructions exhibition, says that (f)rom slave quarters and farm settlements in the American South to post-migration urban ghettos and slums in the Northeast to public housing projects throughout American cities, the predominant spaces of Black inhabitation in this country have been leftover, disposable, and characterless environments.
MoMA examines role of architecture in systemic racism msn.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from msn.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
IMAGE: Felecia Davis
In order to demonstrate her research, Davis created a quilt to connect with residents of the Hill District in Pittsburgh. Each panel on the quilt reflects a different image of importance in the history of the Hill District, which is a grouping of historically African American neighborhoods in the city. When the copper fabric on the quilt is touched, sensors activate the narration of the panel story which plays through a small speaker that is incorporated at the bottom of the quilt. District residents will be able to add their own panels and stories to the quilt over time. The quilt is part of a duo transmitting/receiving textile installation that will be shown in the MoMA gallery.
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The Harvard Graduate School of Design (Harvard GSD) will no longer refer to a private residence at 9 Ash Street in Cambridge as the “Philip Johnson Thesis House.” Moving forward, the home, designed by and inhabited by Johnson while enrolled at the Harvard GSD in the 1940s, will now be known solely by its physical street address.
The move, announced by Harvard GSD dean Sarah M. Whiting in a December 5 letter, comes days after the Johnston Study Group, a largely anonymous collective dedicated to examining Johnson’s known racism and collaborative efforts with the Nazi Party, issued a public letter to both Harvard and the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), two institutions with deep ties to Johnson. The November 27 letter, which was initially signed by over 30 architects, designs, artists, and educators, called upon both MoMA and Harvard to strike Johnson’s name from all titles and spaces due to the architect’s “widely documented white supremacist views and activities.”