Sermon on the Train: the second testament

The Second Testament took place on the 13th of August 2009. The crowd that had gethered bought their tickets at parkstation and headed down to platform 1 to catch the train. The throng of people on the platform made it difficult to find space to stand. Each train that came before our own was packed, and people pushed and shoved to get on or off the train before it set off again.When our train to Vereeniging eventually arrived we jostled to claim our space on the train and to make sure we weren't left behind. After some mic difficulties, the lecture started.

Kirsten Doermann, lecturer at Wits University School of Architecture and Planning and one half of the collective, Black Lines on White Paper, read from Elia Zenghelis' Seminal lecture "The 'immeuble-cité' a strategy for Architecture ". See http://www.iabr.nl/2007/PowerNotes_06/top/140 for the original lecture.Zenghelis' lecture presented challenging and controversial critiques on pluralism and democracy, urbanisation and the city and architecture's role in constructing futures within current globalised, market driven and individualist anxieties. Kirsten's choice of text is particularly interesting in relation to The Sermon, which largely denies the principles of Form set out in Zenghelis' lecture and provides a challenge (though focused on architecture) to all creative and intellectual post-modern practices.

Zenghelis states,
"Meanwhile the fate of cities today, is in the hands of those who maintain that our current status (Liberal Democracy) is the end-of-(city)-history and who claim that this hybrid process has finally had the conclusiveness of reconciling the individual with the collective, arguing that what works for one person works for everybody: a process where anything goes and where the possibility of judgment is denied."

The Sermon stopped off at Orlando Station, were we set back on the train to Parkstation, Johannesburg. An particularly engaged and critical discussion took place on the journey back, with input from students, lecturers and member's of the public alike. This was particularly exciting for the artists as it made evident the discourse that such a work can encourage. Soon after the discussion ended, a group of Zulu Dance performers took to the 'stage' til the train stopped. "I'm too sexy for my Beshu!"Thank you to Blacklinesonwhitepaper and to everyone for attending. A big thank you and much respect to Andrew Bells who took some incredible photographs!