Reclaiming the Street – Showroom MAMA

“Reclaiming the Street” is an open-submission competition aimed at established and emerging artists, architects and skateboarders who have or wish to establish a relationship with skateboard culture. “Reclaiming the Street” is looking for unpublished and unrealised concepts for the (re)organisation of urban public spaces in order to create a place for multiple user groups including skateboarders.

“Reclaiming the Street” takes the idea of skateboard culture as “homo ludens” as its starting point for building bridges between the all those who make use of the public realm.

Introduction

MAMA is a platform for visual art and youth culture, based in Rotterdam. Alongside exhibitions in its own gallery space, MAMA organises projects on location in Rotterdam and further afield. MAMA offers an extensive programme of educational and supplementary projects. MAMA also undertakes research and develops new methods for reaching a broad public via art and culture.

Objective

Send a design sketch for an urban intervention, environment, object or piece of street furniture that can be used by skaters and which will also stimulate use by other members of the community, thus improving the quality of a particular public space.

Prizes

A jury will nominate five of the submitted ideas for further development, from which a winner will be selected. The five nominees will be given three weeks to develop their ideas into feasible designs with the help of recommendations in the jury report. For this stage, a production budget limit will be set. Each of the nominees will receive a fee of €2000 excluding VAT for the further development of the ideas, also to be included in the publication.

All the submissions will be included in a short-term exhibition and accompanying publication.

Rules

• This contest is open to emerging artists, architects and skateboarders who have or wish to establish a relationship with skateboard culture.
• Only one submission per entrant is allowed.
• Submissions will be judged anonymously. Do not put your name on the submitted materials.

How to enter?

Please submit the following:

• design sketches showing the proposal in a minimum of two different existing inner-city public spaces.
• a bi-lingual concept plan in Dutch and English of maximum 500 words (per language).
• optional: three-dimensional sketches (models) or other materials such as videos, collages, etc.

You may also include supporting materials in other media. The submitted materials must not exceed 30 x 30 x 42 cm. If you only submit two dimensional materials this must not exceed 4 x A3 sheets/boards.

The submission must include two letters:

• a name letter: a sealed envelope marked with the title of the design and the words ‘name letter’, enclosing:
  • name, postal address, email address and telephone number of the entrant/contact person,
  • a declaration that the design is your intellectual property.
• an address letter: a sealed envelope marked with the title of the design and the words ‘address letter’, enclosing: an address for correspondence:
  • name, postal address, email address, telephone number (this must not be the address of the person submitting the entry).

Submissions received after 31 May 2010 will be returned unopened to the sender.

Send your two-dimensional materials to:

Postbus 23070,
3001 KB Rotterdam

Send your three-dimensional materials to:

Kromme
Elleboog 35,
3012 VM Rotterdam