Reiko Goto and Tim Collins for a group Exhibition –
Natural Realities, Ludwig Forum,
Aachen, Germany,
1998
From a historical, but above all from an ecological point of view, water is a special factor of Aachen. This is a fact of which only few people are aware. A historic map of Aachen, revealing two streams (in blue color), the Paubach and the Johannisbach now buried beneath the streets of the city. With “Watermark”, Tim and I take up this gap and deal with the altered relation of nature and culture in urban space, especially the shift of significant that water has gone through in the course of time. Our concerns are aimed at sensitizing the citizens for the subterranean rivers of Aachen.
In 1997 Curator Heike Strelow asked Collins and Goto to explore the historic city of Aachen Germany for he potential of creating a temporary public artwork. The project was developed over three years, working with experts at the university and in Aachen City Planning
In the town center, lines(1.7 km) made of gold leaf mark the courses of the rivers Pau and Johannisbach, both of which supplied drinking water in former times. Today they are canalized and covered, no longer visible or present. In another place, willow saplings surround three fountains, Golden-Frau, Baukha, and Fischpuddelchen, referring to the underground water courses. The willow, being a native plant of river regions, is opposed by a cultural artifact -a fountain- in the urban landscape. The project searches for and needs dialogue. The place of the discourse was in the museum. Laymen, scientists, artists, ecologists, town planners and geologist, and commissioners for the environment are requested to sit together, in the true sense of the world.
The project statement is below:
Aachen Water Mark (1999)
A Temporary Ecological Interface to the Lost Streams of Aachen
Background: Our work embraces the techniques and concepts of creative inquiry, social-systems intervention and discursive democracy; our area of inquiry is spatially defined by the post-industrial public realm. Our subject matter is ecological restoration and the transformation of culture from a rationalist Cartesian paradigm of control and mastery over nature to an integrated caring relationship with nature[i]. Without nature, there is no culture. We believe that the process of urban ecological restoration offers a natural context for the reconsideration of the form and unction of the post-industrial public realm. The application and value of our practice in the area of art and restoration ecology is not found in a renewed landscape or an expanded body of knowledge. We have a broader intellectual agenda a generalist’s critical engagement targeting human values and relationship to nature. Beyond this platform of eco-art, we are committed to a cultural dialogue We focus on the discursive public realm[ii] by which individuals, communities and societies begin to rethink the perception and values of nature within the legacy of post-industrial society. With our production of images and symbols we endeavour to create a discourse of curiosity, care and involvement in the changing meaning, form and function of nature within the public realm of cities.
The goal of Water – Mark is to create a dialogue between the experts and citizens of the city on the subject of urban streams, thermal waters and urban ecological restoration. On the walls of the museum and on the streets of Aachen you will find symbols and images, which we have created with the help and guidance of the people and experts that know Aachen. Our work has taken on five ephemeral forms.
1) A dialogue with both experts and citizens of the City of Aachen.
2) A golden line marking the ancient streambeds of the inner city.
3) A natural intervention using native willows in Three City fountains.
4) A museum presentation that is a public forum for lost streams.
5) Public tours replicating our research to reveals Aachen’s lost streams.
Water – Mark is a cultural platform to discus the ecological and cultural restoration of the waters of Bad-Aachen. Aachen has the geology and hydrology to be a spa town but has lost the air quality, the ecology and cultural values that define such places. Like every city around the world, Aachen has turned ecosystems into infrastructure. Living stream channels have been replaced with underground canals and the thermal springs have piped and managed, then built upon to create a technological network of thermal flows delivers the raw water to a commercial interest. When we arrived in Aachen in 1997 we met with Professor Dr. Horst Robert Langguth a hydro-geologis at RTWH University, Herr Stolz of the Aachen City Engineering, Dr Vankann of Aachen City and Urban Planning, Dr Karl Josef Strank a botanist and ecologist Dr Manfred Vigener of Okologie Aachen. It is through meeting these people that we began to realize tha Bad-Aachen has begun its restoration transformation, it is attending to attend to air quality and is caring for streams beyond the edges of the city. Aachen has the vision, the expert knowledge and the funding support of the national government to realize a radical change in urban landscape, ecosystems and hydrology. The question we were left with as artists and cultural practitioners was how to reveal these ideas in a cultural context and in turn brings these ideas into the centre, to the very heart of the city for public discussion. In the resurgence of a spa town sustainable culture, economy and ecology will come together and Kaiserbrunnen AG will find new commercial vigour and value.
Lost Streams of Aachen
Johanisbach, Kannegie…b/s…. erbach, Klotzweiderbah, Paubach, Goldbach, Predigerbach, Wurmbach, Kupferbach, Gillesbach, Beverbach, Hitfelderbach.
Under the streets of Aachen exist canals with these names printed on brass plaques on the walls. The men that work under the streets know the names of these streams and their relationship to the Watershed of Aachen. There are no brass plaques for the citizens of Aachen to consider these streams and their relationship to the topography of the city.
Lost Hot Springs of Bad Aachen
Elisenbrunnen, Kaiserbrunnen (AG), Nikolaus Quelle, The Grosser Monarch Quelle
(at parking space 38), Rosen Quelle (Lust for Life AG), Karlsbrunnen
Under the stress and commercial buildings of Aachen lie the geologic fissures, which once defined a place known as bad Aachen. Kaiserbrunnen AG markets the lost water and culture of Bad Aachen. The spatial and geological relationship to the thermal waters of Aachen is at best remembered, replicated and represented by commercial product and at its worst is simply a simulacrum of what ‘is’ no longer.