Shrinking Cities>>> Press Release/December 2005---------------------------------------------------------------------------EXHIBITION “SHRINKING CITIES - INTERVENTIONS”
IN LEIPZIG--------------------------------------------------------------------------The situation is dramatic: 1.3 million apartments in eastern Germany areuntenanted. In the year 2030, the figure is expected to increase to 2
million. The unemployment rate is 20 percent. More than a million residents
have left the new states of the former East Germany. Young, well-educatedpeople in particular are turning their backs on their home regions for theWest in pursuit of jobs or apprenticeships, which are currently rare even
there. The prognosis is that the population of eastern Germany will behalved by 2050 – also because of demographic trends.
The exhibition, "Shrinking Cities –Interventions", in the Galerie fürzeitgenoessische Kunst (Gallery forContemporary Art) in Leipzig/Germany from
November 25, 2005 until January 29, 2006,presents strategies for action andinterventions for shrinking cities, witha focus on eastern Germany. Along withmore than 30 newly developed projects,
materials on existing practices reveal
possibilities in five areas of activity: “Negotiating Inequality”;“Governing Oneself”; “Making Pictures”; “Organizing Retreat”; and“Occupying Spaces”. The projects of the international artists, architects,
and researchers thereby range from artistic interventions and selfempowerment projects through architectural, landscape, and media
interventions to new legal regulations and utopian visions.
To initiate strategies for action, thearchitectural magazine "archplus" staged
an idea competition, while the Bauhaus
Dessau Foundation made directcommissions and the Gallery forContemporary Art Leipzig awarded workstipends. The majority of the projects
were developed in close cooperation withcitizens, local groups, andinstitutions.
Among the participants are the artists
and architects Kees Christiaanse,
Wolfgang Engler, Anke Haarmann, KristianLeko, Joost Meuwissen, Dan Petermann,
Christoph Schäfer, Andreas Siekmann,
Superflex und Heimo Zobernig.
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Accompanying Program and Publications
A broad program of events with film screenings, concerts, performances,discussions, talks with artists,
workshops, city tours, and much more inHalle, Leipzig, and Dessau accompany thetwo exhibitions. For Exhibition 1, thepublication Shrinking Cities. Volume 1:
International Investigation appearedwith the publishing house Verlag HatjeCantz. The second volume, Shrinking
Cities. Volume 2: Concepts for Action,
will appear in German for the opening of-- 2 --

the exhibition at the end of November, also with Verlag Hatje Cantz.
Information on other publications of the project can be found atwww.shrinkingcities.com.
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Exhibition 2
Shrinking Cities – Interventions
Galerie für zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig (GfZK)
Karl-Tauchnitz-Straße 11, 04107 Leipzig, www.gfzk.de
November 26, 2005 to January 29, 2006
Opening hours: Tues-Sat 2-7 p.m., Sun noon-7 p.m., closed on holidays.........................................................................
Chief Curator ///Philipp Oswalt (architect/journalist, Berlin)
Curatorial Team ///Walter Prigge (Bauhaus Dessau Foundation)
Barbara Steiner (Museum of Contemporary Art Leipzig)
Kyong Park (International Center for Urban Ecology, Detroit)
Nikolaus Kuhnert (magazine archplus, Berlin).........................................................................
Shrinking Cities
Shrinking Cities is an initiative project of Germany’s Federal Cultural
Foundation in cooperation with the project office Philipp Oswalt, theGalerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig, the Bauhaus Foundation Dessau,
and the magazine archplus. In three years of work with the participation of
more than 100 artists, architects, researchers, and local initiatives, theproject has investigated the worldwide phenomenon of processes of urban
shrinkage and has developed suggestions for interventions.
Whether in Germany, the USA, Russia, China, South Africa, Finland, orKazakhstan – cities are shrinking all over the world. Losses of populationand jobs are convulsing the regions and contradicting the image, accustomed
since the Industrial Revolution, of “boomtowns”, big cities characterizedby continuous economic and demographic growth. Shrinking Cities seeks totrigger a rethinking of traditional ideas of the city as well as of thefuture development of urbanism. The far-reaching changes caused byshrinking present not only an economic and social, but also a culturalchallenge.
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For additional information on the exhibitions and the entire project,please contact:
Achim Klapp // Press Office and Public Relations
Schrumpfende Städte – Shrinking Cities
Eisenacher Straße 74, 10823 Berlin
Tel.: +49 (30) 81 82 19-06
press@shrinkingcities.com, www.shrinkingcities.com