In the essay “Plants are not Bricks”, I reflects on my arrival in Zurich, the Swiss landscape, invasive species, urban maintenance, hierarchies of beings, spaces, and labour.
A gardener once told me, “ there are no bad plants, just plants in the wrong place ”. It seems quite impossible to imagine a functioning city immersed in uncontrolled vegetation. For nature to be an element of urbanity, it has to be policed. Cities ingest nature in all its forms before redistributing it with a defined purpose. Plants are not bricks, but vegetal forms play a structuring role in spatial organisation, and what we call pest species are largely unwanted. Controlling the urban space is a way of controlling society. One of the most famous examples of urban restructuration in the modern age is the redesign of Paris by Baron Haussmann in the mid-19th-century, when large boulevards replaced small streets, driving away disruptive elements, keeping the city in order and under control. The development of technology and the introduction of asphalt and pesticides have been instrumental in containing weeds within the urban environment. But of course, it is impossible to stop weeds from growing in cities completely. For they always find cracks, wastelands, forgotten spaces where they can thrive. This is also the case for many subcultures and minorities. Those not invited to the table create their own space within the frames and the gaps they can find or invent. p168
My arrival in Zurich coincided with the passing of the popular federal initiative “Against mass immigration ” when more than 50% of voters approved an initiative by the rightwing Swiss People’s Party against immigration which specified that Switzerland should “autonomously manage the immigration of foreigners ” by reintroducing “ ceilings and annual quotas ”. According to polls, the growing urbanisation of the Swiss landscape was one of the factors fuelling the desire to manage both the territory and the population. The issues of urban sprawl and the disappearance of the countryside have been hot topics in Switzerland in recent years, and fast urbanisation has affected the countryside and the alpine landscape. And while the country may seem like a natural paradise to outsiders such as myself, a lack of urban planning over many decades, increased demand for housing and infrastructures due to a rapidly growing population, and high property speculation have raised fears among the Swiss population that the country was about to turn into one large suburb. The countryside, or rather the idea of it, as a bucolic retreat with traditional wooden chalets, lush green grass, grazing cows and sublime snowy peaks, is an integral component of a promotional and national sense of self. p.169
As refugees became an administrative category, a separation between nomads and political refugees, a sort of hierarchy of dignity, appeared. The definition of a successful integration depends on the identity of a place and on who is speaking. Inherited systems of categories and hierarchies generally determine who and what has the right to be where, following complex dynamics aiming to preserve a certain civic, ecological identity and cohesion. Our attitude to weeds illustrates a system of categories and hierarchies, the ideas of space, home and territory that we have created for ourselves to administer our lives. p.170
In 2018 I joined the interdisciplinary study group TETI, initiated and coordinates the TETI Baustelle und Botanik think tank, which originates from my field research and artistic practice on construction sites and industrial wastelands. Mobile Soils by TETI Press, explores the transformation of our bounds to the ground in the early 21st century through a range of personal reflections, in which authors revisit their practice in the light of earthly attachments and ecological pressure.
With contributions by Paloma Ayala, Kenza Benabderrazik, Jose Caceres Mardones, Laurie Dall'Ava, Nikos Doulos, Errol Reuben Fernandes, Anne-Laure Franchette, Gabriel N.Gee, Brack Hale / Moriah Simonds, Monica Ursina Jäger, Elise Lammer, Gnanli Landrou, Maria Joao Matos, Uriel Orlow, Jan Van Oordt, Grit Ruhland, Caroline Wiedmer & Rafael Newman, Huhtamaki Wab.