Erfolgreiche ePaper selbst erstellen
Machen Sie aus Ihren PDF Publikationen ein blätterbares Flipbook mit unserer einzigartigen Google optimierten e-Paper Software.
The consolidation phase of Platform3 was<br />
characterised by some friction between different<br />
contexts that slowly came together: Art,<br />
social aspects and economy. These frictions<br />
resulted in new energies.<br />
A first step to get things started was<br />
renting a factory floor in Munich’s South. In<br />
the middle of a hardly developed urban area<br />
between the extremely rich south and in a<br />
quirky location between bare fields, offices,<br />
factories and flats, something new could grow.<br />
An inner-city location would have been simply<br />
too expensive for such a big enterprise. Cultural<br />
wasteland was entered, easily reachable<br />
by underground from the city centre. In the<br />
beginning it was too far away from the locations<br />
of art in Munich. Step by step new individuals<br />
where involved as well as the initiators<br />
and organisers; the factory floor was done<br />
up by “Lernen am Bau”, a qualification program<br />
of Wohnforum München. I joined the project as<br />
artistic leader with the job of developing a<br />
concept for content and organisation and providing<br />
a profile and face. Achim Sauter, a young<br />
art agent, joined as an intern. In autumn 2008<br />
the artist studios were announced by an advisory<br />
board. The members of this board are<br />
protagonists in Munich’s cultural landscape 2 .<br />
Besides the high quality of the artistic works,<br />
the multi-faceted approach was important:<br />
The ability to work in a team and the commitment<br />
to the model of collaboration.<br />
“The project Platform3 emphasises openness.<br />
Because of its character it isn’t a hermetically<br />
closed-off space. It’s special because<br />
of its solid infrastructure and openness towards<br />
the outside. A major part is the service agency<br />
which organises and advises and is available<br />
for artists at all times. It’s not an isolated art<br />
island.”<br />
In January <strong>2009</strong>, in the middle of the building<br />
site, interviews took place for cultural<br />
managers who wanted to complete a year’s<br />
traineeship. The building site was buzzing and<br />
the talk was already about visions, the ideas<br />
of young cultural managers, their imaginations<br />
of cultural work and ways of working which<br />
would develop into a then-imaginary space.<br />
Bright, inviting, communicative and open is what<br />
those rooms in a former 70s factory would become.<br />
They would be an expression of what<br />
was to be developed here; a new forum for<br />
artistic work, mediation and cultural discourse,<br />
a forum where different areas could connect<br />
and positively support each other. A cultural<br />
format where new things could be tested –<br />
that relies on collaboration as well as the<br />
precise identification of individual ideas.<br />
“This forum is all about the dialogue of<br />
different people and exchange on culture. It is<br />
central as cultural production always needs<br />
the public and is the core area in the education<br />
of cultural managers and the sponsorship of<br />
artists. The work happening in the context<br />
of Platform3 needs to prove itself to the public.<br />
Every cultural practice aims at the public.”<br />
Continuity is important for the public perception<br />
and the profile of a new institution as<br />
well as a clear curatorial backbone. The latter<br />
additionally has to take into consideration the<br />
individuality of the cultural managers. Different<br />
parts needed to be developed to show the<br />
public the special nature of the project: The<br />
program should be versatile and contain different<br />
formats such as exhibitions, symposia,<br />
lectures, performances and concerts and<br />
develop co-operations and branching out.<br />
The emphasis should be on topics which<br />
are especially relevant in terms of sponsoring<br />
and developing the contemporary art landscape<br />
of Munich and that are internationally<br />
relevant. Platform3 sees itself as a forum for<br />
projects that aren’t firmly built into the cultural<br />
sector institutionally.<br />
“Our program is connected directly to topics<br />
which are inherent with the location and<br />
its responsibilities: responsibilities, possibilities<br />
and visions of cultural work, questions of<br />
cultural economy, the relationship between<br />
local actions and global thinking, questions of<br />
education in the area of culture, the creation<br />
of regional and international networks.”<br />
The character of Platform3 is shaped by<br />
the individuals who work there. The program<br />
is a result of the interaction between different<br />
individuals in front of a basic canvas. Together<br />
with me as the generator and mentor, five<br />
summary<br />
206 | 207