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Press Release | 10 10 2003
Public Netbase
Nike Square: Art Intervention in Urban Space
Excitement and Controversy Around A Project Of 01001011110101101.ORG
An alleged plan to re-name the historic Karlsplatz square in central
Vienna to "Nike Square" has generated a great deal of excitement since
early October. A two-storey pavilion located on the square offers
information on the plans of the transnational sportswear company. The
suggested re-design of the square is centered around a 36 meters tall
sculpture of the company’s logo.
The glass pavilion is manned by cheerful young staff who guide visitors
around the exhibition. The nikeground website offers background
information and details of an international campaign of establishing
Nike Squares all over the world.
The structure, visible from afar, triggered off strong reactions on the
part of the public, many of whom sent complaints to the city government
and the media. Newspaper reports appeared across Austria concerning the
"tremendous excitement" around the alleged sale of Karlsplatz square.
But now the confusion around this urban hallucination has come to an
end. The project "nikeground.com – rethinking space" is the product of
the "hardly believable nikeplatz trick" of the art group
0100101110101101.ORG, who developed the project in cooperation with the
net culture institution Public Netbase. As a spokeswoman of the art
group explained: "Our intention was to turn the city into the stage of a
play and to transform the perception of the city by a hyper-real
mis-en-scene." The activists, reputed for their spectacular net art
projects, combine the artistic tradition of mythopoesis with global
information infrastructure.
Konrad Becker: "Our motivation is to stimulate a debate on the tensions
between public interest and the commercialization of all realms of life,
and to expand the spheres of action in urban and media space." Nike
corporation has already announced that it will file a lawsuit against
the art project. To Konrad Becker, this does not come as a surprise: "It
will have to be decided whether a large corporation is in fact able to
prevent art and culture from addressing the omnipresent symbols of
everyday culture. This would mean that cultural production is only
possible in dependence on economic interests", Becker concluded.
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