THE SLEEPING BEAUTY - BIOPOLITICS AND ARCHITECTURE

"THE SLEEPING BEAUTY" is an interdisciplinary and transnational research project that deals with the relations between architecture and society in the context of conservation programs. It focuses particularly on changes and interdependencies between the built environment individual houses and settlements and local socio-cultural factors. Asmara contains one of the largest, enclosed ensembles of Modern architecture and might therefore gain the status of a "World Heritage Site". The project illuminates the urban transfiguration of the colonial dilemma and thus that of the European city. The project, however, develops a new central claim: Asmara has not only perserved an architecture with prominent cases of modernism, but also a "modernist program", which is generally seen as emancipatory developement, a move toward social equality in an new society. In contrast the state of Eritrea today intervenes in the most intimate sphere of its citizens, in the name of progress and national sovereignty, biopolitical strategies are used to the "nation-building project". Architecture is no longer seen as a representation (the result would be an autistic "Historical Perimeter") but as an ordering technique connected to a new dispositive. In general, how can urban concepts and architecture, originally used as an instrument to establish a certain political and social order, be accepted and transformed into another political system? The state of Eritrea currently uses the architecture of Asmara applying the rhetoric of the coloners and thus displays the "World Heritage" in a completely new light. We aim to summarize the most important conservation issues focusing on the historic centre of Asmara, regarding both, urban space and singles buildings. Furthermore, we investigate how these refer to themselves as well as to the context of an integrated strategic plan for expanding the city ("Greater Asmara") taking in account population growth, migration from the rural to the urban area etc. The difference between the idea of urbanism and architecture is crucial here. The assymmetry between the scale of architecture and the overwhelming urban scale makes the "iconic buildings" not to be a general rule, but an example for the city. In each case we emphazize how the architectural form is at once an act of radical autonomy from and a radical engagement with the forces of urbanization and at the same time it includes the possibility of making and the possibility of understanding the city. Following this line of thinking, the project developes then the theory of the city as an "urban archipelago". Shrinking the city to its significant parts, the result are always "iconic buildings" as typically singular landmarks. But they are inscribed entirely within the logic of (african) urbanisation. The posture of "biopolitics" permits an "analysis of the present", it provides "the crossing of the present, by means of history" (FONTANA) and allows a "sarcastic reading" (AURELI) of the "matrix in which we live" (AGAMBEN). We focus on multiple strategies of changing appropriation ("conquest and re-conquest") of the built environment. The "Historic Perimeter" is not interpreted as a timeless solitaire, but as an event that is subject to the "everyday`s urbanism" of the city dwellers. The strategies of appropriation occur in "micro- scenarios" of a dynamic urbanism. The space of that quotidian urbanism is a rich and complex amalgam, as a product of the intricate social, political, economic, and aesthetic forces in contemporary Asmara. Everyday space can be spirited, spontaneous, ignored by city planners, and disregarded by critics. The research team combines expertise with innovative ideas and cultural sensitivity, allowing new knowledge to be generated in an area beyond the academic interest, questions of great social relevance and urgency.

Asmara, the capital of Eritrea, is a city with one of the largest ensembles of Italiancolonial modernist architecture in the world. In 1889 it was occupied by Italy, in 1897 it was made capital of its province and in the late 1930s, under Mussolini, it was radically developed according to the fascist architectural principles of the time. From 1941 to 1952, Asmara was under British occupation, after which Eritrea was joined in a federation with Ethiopia. In 1991, after a long battle for independence, Asmara became capital of the now independent state of Eritrea again. Therefore, we consider Asmara as a territorial palimpsest, as an ongoing process of stratification and layering. In our research we have used a mixture of empirical methods and theoretical bombardments.It is no question however, that in this palimpsest the ensemble produced under Italian fascist reign between 1935 and 1941 holds a special position, as it has defined Asmara in the most sustained way. Today, this heritage has become crucial for the identity of the city. It is protected under the CARP (Cultural Assets Rehabilitation Project) and in this or in a different constellation candidate to become UNESCO World Heritage.Because of this candidacy, a cooperation became possible with the city authorities. Dr. Volgger arranged with the vice rector for research of the University of Innsbruck to install a large format Bookeye scanner as well as a regular scanner for smaller formats. A local team from Asmara Heritage Projects started scanning documents from the city archive. The University of Innsbruck would have the first right to use these scans in publications. As Internet is extremely slow in Eritrea and the political situation extremely problematic, these documents are transported per hard disk. We received a first selection of scans already but have to wait for more. The collaboration with the authorities, and notably with individuals in the organisation like Mr. Medhanie Teklemariam, an urban planner, coordinator of the Asmara Heritage Program and head of the Department of Infrastructural Services Zoba Maekel in Asmara, caused a change of direction of the research in the service of Asmaras strive to become UNESCO World Heritage. Most texts of the research team you find on the websites txt.architecturaltheory.eu and txt.architekturtheorie.eu under The Sleeping Beauty und Die Schlafende Schöne. The participation in a book project by Philipp Meuser, Adil Dalbai and Ingrid Stegmann of DOM Publishers, for an architectural guide for Sub-Saharan Africa, offered the opportunity to publish a series of texts on Asmara and Massawa. This book will come out in 2016.