(Exhibition Competition Design Kaskelkiez Berlin) 2003
In the two districts which directly border the individual bridges, I interviewed the local inhabitants regarding their feelings about neighborhood life. Enamel plates featuring statements taken from these interviews were fastened onto the bridges. The quotations for the first bridge originate from 13 interviews of people of varied backgrounds from both neighborhoods.
If we actually understand these five bridges as barriers that must be overcome, then this can only mean a kind of drawing together of the people who live in and around Kaskelkiez. In the interviews I have conducted up to the present with residents from Kaskelkiez and from the district of Frankfurter Allee Süd, it became evident that the various groups are characterized by the most divergent interests and needs. Such a coming together cannot mean that the residents start resembling one another. Instead, I understand the idea of the competition "Overcoming Barriers" in terms of the setting-into-motion of a process of mutual recognition.
Judith Siegmund
