New
Babylon in The Hague
In recent decades, many architects, urban planners,
artists and particularly manga and comic artists have shaped their dreams
of future cities. Sometimes these dreams take on megalomaniac traits. In
this regard the Japanese Metabolists unfold their more than ambitious plans
for the rebuilding and simultaneously enormous expansion of Tokyo. Renowned
architects such as Kenzo Tango are not afraid to draw a large urban expansion
in Tokyo Bay. Tango even presented his design on national television in
1961. At the same time, the Dutch artist Constant is working on his New
Babylon project, interpreted here with a series of images that are critically
translated into drawings of a manga or comic strip.
Uncomfortably,
the new residents of The Hague entered the huge square. According
to their designer, they would feel free and go wherever they wanted.
They should be playing people (homo ludens). But now they wander
desperately through urban spaces in the shadows of megastructures.
What on earth had they ended up in?
They
couldn't believe their eyes, because the gigantic buildings overshadowed
not only the old Schilderswijk, but also nearby neighbourhoods
such as Transvaal. Further on, important roads such as the Utrechtsebaan
turned out to be completely hidden under buildings with extreme density.
And at the coast not much was left of the seaside resort of Scheveningen.
The megastructures had completely overgrown the city of The Hague.
There
was no end to it. Closer by, the structures seemed even larger. Unapproachable
architecture had permeated the city. Entrances were
hard to find. But the worst was yet to come, because no way out was
found. Slowly, stories came through from urban areas in the surrounding
region and the rest of the country where the megastructures were
designed and rolled out in a similar way.
Source:
RVDB
Urban Planning (Amsterdam, August 2021).
Type:
Obscure cities.
Copyright:
Rob van der Bijl / Favas.net (Amsterdam, 2021).
The images
shown here (including texts) have been produced on the basis of our
own photos and (annotations) of material at exhibitions about the work
of Constant in the Netherlands – Amstelveen (July 2016) and The
Hague (August 2016). They are part of the manga project 'Tokyo 'Scape'
and the accompanying manga 'Tokyo Dreams. The story of megalomaniac
megastructures’. The project and the manga are now at an advanced
stage, including exhibitions in Rotterdam and Amsterdam.
Download the brochure here … (Tokyo ‘Scape
2020): https://rvdb.favas.net/tokyoscape/TokyoScapeBrochure.pdf
The
prologue to this manga story was published on the site of Blauwe
Kamer in 2020 - see the
extended version of At that moment, in Paris
.....
See also
the project website https://rvdb.favas.net/tokyoscape/ |
