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05/26/2023 | Campus-Meldung

Searching for traces - urban nature and urban climate in Kassel

The hot summers of recent years have heightened awareness of climate and nature in the city. But which planning measures can prevent overheating and make the city climatically livable? These questions are not new to the Department of Architecture - Urban Planning - Landscape Planning. An exhibition on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of ASL is looking for clues.

Image: Margarete Arnold.

The Department of Architecture - Urban Planning - Landscape Planning at the University of Kassel has a long tradition of dealing with the topics of urban nature and urban climate. Be it the alternative handling of spontaneous vegetation by the Kassel School, the urban climate analyses in Kassel at the Department of Environmental Meteorology, the interdisciplinary discussion on the social value of urban nature or even the appropriation of open spaces.

"With the exhibition, we are drawing connecting lines from Kassel's urban nature and urban climate debates of the last 50 years to today's issues in the context of climate change and transport transition," explains Prof. Dr. Britta Jänicke from the Department of Environmental Meteorology. "We ask: Can traces of the projects and approaches initiated in Kassel still be found today? Are earlier considerations still relevant or even more relevant today than decades ago? Do they need to be critically questioned?"

The exhibition is a collaboration of the departments of Environmental Meteorology and Open Space Planning in the Institute of Landscape Architecture and Landscape Planning. Margarete Arnold and Franziska Bernstein curated it together with students. Together they developed the content in the winter semester 2022/23 in the student projects "Back to future Kassel" and "Stadtnatur Kassel - Lessons Learned?". The exhibition was then implemented by students in the summer semester of 2023 as part of the seminar "Spurensuche - Stadtklima und Stadtnatur Kassel".

"The exhibition content was created on the basis of intensive research by the students in the doku:lab, the documentation and media workshop for student work of the ASL department. Without this extensive fund of project, study, and graduation work from the last 50 years, the search for traces would probably have quickly come to nothing," says Margarete Arnold about the work in the seminar, and Franziska Bernstein adds: "Over the past decades, former students have always come up with great ideas for certain places that are still recognizable in Kassel today. For us, that's what a search for traces is all about." The research once again underscored the great relevance of urban nature and urban climate, as Franziska Bernstein notes: "It's amazing what a wealth of topics have already been discussed in the past that are particularly pressing today in times of climate crisis."

The exhibition is accompanied by an extensive supporting program. In addition to the exhibition opening and a finissage, an event with keynote speeches and a fishbowl discussion on "The Future of Urban Nature and Urban Climate in Research, Teaching and Practice" will take place on June 7. Invited are Andreas Christian Braun (Institute for Sustainability, Uni Kassel), Initiative Less:on (FB ASL, Uni Kassel), Stefanie Hennecke (Senate Berlin), Anja Starick (City of Kassel).

Prof. Dr. Britta Jänicke will give her inaugural lecture at the University of Kassel on the topic "From the urban heat island to the climate change-adapted city" as part of the FUSION lecture series. In two walks on June 7 and 14 across the Holländischer Platz campus and through the Nordstadt district, Frank Lorberg will go in search of traces in the tradition of walk science, trace ASL stories and make the invisible visible by means of a joint perception experiment.

"Spurensuche - Stadtnatur und Stadtklima in Kassel" is one of ten anniversary exhibitions in the series "The Kassel Model 1973-2023. 50 Years of Architecture - Urban Planning - Landscape Planning at the University of Kassel." These present the history and profile of the department and map the focus of teaching, learning and research in the three institutes of Architecture, Urban Developments and Landscape Architecture and Planning. They are organized and curated by various departments in collaboration with students. The exhibition series will continue through the summer semester of 2024.

 

Anniversary exhibition
Spurensuche - Stadtnatur und Stadtklima in Kassel
Mon. June 5 -  Thu. June 15, 2023
Monday - Friday 8 a.m. - 8 p.m.

Foyer of the ASL new building
Universitätsplatz 9
34127 Kassel

Accompanying events:

Mon 5.6.23, 5pm
Opening of the exhibition
Foyer ASL New Building, Universitätsplatz 9

Wed 7.6.23, 13:30 - 16 h
The future of urban nature and urban climate in research, teaching and practice
With Andreas Christian Braun (Institute for Sustainability, Uni Kassel), Initiative Less:on (FB ASL, Uni Kassel), Stefanie Hennecke (Senate Berlin), Anja Starick (City of Kassel)
ASL-Neubau, Universitätsplatz 9, EG, Raum 105

Wed 7.6.23, 16 - 18 h
Places and stories - walk across the "Hopla" with Frank Lorberg
Meeting point: Foyer ASL-Neubau, Universitätsplatz 9

Wed 7.6.23, 7pm
As part of the FUSION lecture series:
From urban heat island to climate change adapted city
Inaugural lecture Prof. Dr. Britta Jänicke
ASL-Neubau, Universitätsplatz 9, EG, Raum 105 und 106

Wed 14.6.23, 16 - 18 h
Making visible - walk through the Nordstadt with Frank Lorberg
Meeting point: Foyer ASL-Neubau, Universitätsplatz 9
Thu 15.6.23, 18 h

Finissage
Foyer ASL-Neubau, Universitätsplatz 9

Further information on the exhibitions and other anniversary activities: http://www.uni-kassel.de/go/jubilaeumASL

For the supporting program, please register at klima[at]uni-kassel[dot]de.