BMW Guggenheim Lab Mumbai announces initial program details and satellites.

Mumbai. From December 9, 2012 through January 20, 2013, the BMW Guggenheim Lab Mumbai in collaboration with the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum will present a broad range of free public programs and projects in the city of Mumbai under the theme ME=WE. Balancing individual (“me”) and community (“we”) interests, the ME=WE program is developed to offer new insights for Mumbai and, potentially, cities around the world.

Lab programs, initiated by the Mumbai Lab Team and developed by local programs consultants and Guggenheim curators, will explore challenges and opportunities related to public space and the choices Mumbaikars make to balance individual and community needs in this bustling metropolitan area of more than 20 million people. The programs will be presented at the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum in Byculla for six continuous weeks, with additional activities at satellite locations throughout Mumbai.

Satellite Locations

To reach many audiences and neighborhoods, a traveling satellite Lab will present free programs for the public in the following five locations: 

• Horniman Circle (Fort): December 13-17
• Sambhaji Park (Mulund East): December 20-24
• Priyadarshini Park (Malabar Hill): December 27-30
• Batliboy Compound (Mill Worker Colony): January 3-7
• Mahim Beach (Mahim): January 10-13

Mumbai Programming

Programs and events for the Lab are presented in six series—some highly professional, some highly entertaining: 

• Meet in the Middle brings together public and private stakeholders, from grassroots thinkers to city officials. Conversations, panel discussions and offsite visits will address and connect six themes: transportation, space, housing, environment, investment, and participatory urban planning.
• Bridging encourages people with an interest in the same field, ranging from sports to cooking, from professional experts to laypersons, to share knowledge and interact with each other through playful workshops and games.
• City Dreams, presented by the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum and located at the museum and satellite locations, offers interactive family events on the historic development of the cultural landscape of Mumbai and creative hands-on activities reflecting the artistic vision of Mumbai’s youth and a future urban landscape.
• Film Screenings offer classic and contemporary Bollywood favorites, documentaries, animation, and experimental works paired with related discussions about topics such as the search for individual space in an intense-urban environment.
• Food for Thought uses food and drink as a catalyst for conversation about the cultures reflected on the tables and streets of Mumbai, addressing local and global issues of nutrition, food production, food security, and safety.
• Unwrapping Mumbai offers new insights about how Mumbaikars adapt to their surroundings through high-energy, interactive variety shows and party sessions that combine talks, music, theatre, storytelling, and tours to explore the city’s kaleidoscope of perspectives.

Projects

The Lab has begun a series of participatory research studies and city design projects throughout the city of Mumbai to inform future urban designs in the city and elsewhere. They include the following, as well as others to be announced: 

• Your Place, My Place, or Our Public Space? Privacy and Spaces in Mumbai (research project) asks Mumbaikars to contribute to an ongoing research project to reveal how the community perceives privacy. This study, which began during the summer of 2012, is conducted with Partners for Urban Knowledge, Action and Research (PUKAR), an independent Mumbai research collective.
• Your Place, My Place, or Our Public Space? Privacy and Spaces in Mumbai, a Visual Survey (research project) investigates through participatory mapping and photography tours where Mumbaikars find or create personal space. This project is conducted with the Design Cell at the Kamla Raheja Vidyanidji Institute for Architecture and Environmental Studies (KRVIA).
• Kala Nagar Traffic Junction Competition (design project), held in collaboration with the Mumbai Environmental Social Network (MESN) and administered by Lord Cultural Resources, asks students and professionals to re-imagine one of the city’s busiest transportation hubs.
• Land Link (design project) explores ways to refit Mumbai’s existing water pipe infrastructure as a new auto rickshaw highway and a pedestrian bridge between different neighborhoods, creating a large public domain.
• Mumbai Stacked City (research project) introduces the Stacked Population Index (SPI) as an accurate depiction of Mumbai’s density, precisely where it occurs, and how it reflects living conditions.
• Transformers invites the public to adorn the Lab at the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum site each week using traditional and contemporary Indian artistry and craft.
• Testing, Testing! Mumbai (research project),a series of tours developed by Colin Ellard of the University of Waterloo and also run at the New York and Berlin Labs, explores the psychological effects of urban spaces near the Lab at the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum site. 

Mumbai Programming Team

Beyond the Mumbai Lab Team of Aisha Dasgupta, Neville Mars, Trupti Amritwar Vaitla, and Hector Zamora, the BMW Guggenheim Lab Mumbai is working with programs consultants Sourav Biswas, Vikram Doctor, Naresh Fernandes, Ammar Mahimwalla, Aaron Pereira, Alisha Sadikot, Swati Sanghavi, Surabhi Sharma, and Pooja Warier. The Mumbai Lab is curated by David van der Leer and Stephanie Kwai. 

About the BMW Guggenheim Lab

The BMW Guggenheim Lab is a co-initiative of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and the BMW Group. The BMW Guggenheim Lab is curated by David van der Leer and Maria Nicanor of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Part urban think tank, part community center and public gathering space, the BMW Guggenheim Lab is a pioneering global initiative aimed at raising awareness of important urban challenges and inspiring an ongoing conversation in cities around the world. In addition to participating in programs at the Lab sites, the public is invited to visit the website, join the dedicated online social communities on Twitter (@BMWGuggLab and #BGLab), Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, and Foursquare, and to subscribe to the Lab's e-newsletter for the latest project updates.

About the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation

Founded in 1937, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation is dedicated to promoting the understanding and appreciation of art, primarily of the modern and contemporary periods, through exhibitions, education programs, research initiatives, and publications. The global network that began in the 1970s when the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, was joined by the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, has expanded to include the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (opened 1997), the Deutsche Guggenheim in Berlin (1997-2013), and the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi currently under development. Looking to the future, the Guggenheim Foundation continues to forge international collaborations that take contemporary art, architecture, and design beyond the walls of the museum. More information about the foundation can be found at guggenheim.org.

About the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum

The Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum is Mumbai’s oldest Museum, established in 1872 as the Victoria & Albert Museum, Bombay. The collection showcases the history and cultural development of Mumbai City. The Museum’s collection of fine and decorative arts are exemplary examples of the early modern art practice and craftsmanship. The Museum’s restoration project supported by the Jamnalal Bajaj Foundation and completed by INTACH, won UNESCO’s highest award of Excellence for Cultural Heritage Conservation in 2005. The Museum has launched an extensive exhibition program which showcases major Indian artists and collaborates with international institutions to bring contemporary art into Mumbai’s public spaces. These exhibitions are part of the Museum’s initiative of creating a public forum for dialogue on contemporary urban issues. For more information, visit bdlmuseum.org.   

About BMW’s Cultural Commitment

For more than 40 years now, the BMW Group has initiated and engaged in over 100 cultural cooperations worldwide. The company places the main focus of its long-term commitment on modern and contemporary art, jazz and classical music as well as architecture and design. In 1972, three large-scale paintings were created by the artist Gerhard Richter specifically for the foyer of the BMW Group's Munich headquarters. Since then, artists such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Olafur Eliasson, Jeff Koons, Zubin Metha, Daniel Barenboim and Anna Netrebko have co-operated with BMW. The company has also commissioned famous architects such as Karl Schwanzer, Zaha Hadid and Coop Himmelb(l)au to design important corporate buildings and plants. In 2011, the BMW Guggenheim Lab, a global initiative of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, the Guggenheim Museum and the BMW Group celebrated its world premiere in New York. The BMW Group takes absolute creative freedom in all the cultural activities it is involved in for granted – as this is just as essential for groundbreaking artistic work as it is for major innovations in a successful business.

Further information: www.bmwgroup.com/culture and www.bmwgroup.com/culture/overview 

The BMW Group

The BMW Group is one of the most successful manufacturers of automobiles and motorcycles in the world with its BMW, MINI, Husqvarna Motorcycles  and Rolls-Royce brands. As a global company, the BMW Group operates 29 production and assembly facilities in 14 countries and has a global sales network in more than 140 countries.

In 2011, the BMW Group sold about 1.67 million cars and more than 113,000 motorcycles worldwide. The profit before tax for the financial year 2011 was euro 7.38 billion on revenues amounting to euro 68.82 billion. At 31 December 2011, the BMW Group had a workforce of approximately 100,000 employees.

The success of the BMW Group has always been built on long-term thinking and responsible action. The company has therefore established ecological and social sustainability throughout the value chain, comprehensive product responsibility and a clear commitment to conserving resources as an integral part of its strategy. As a result of its efforts, the BMW Group has been ranked industry leader in the Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes for the last eight years.

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For questions please contact:

Dr. Thomas Girst

BMW Group Corporate and Intergovernmental Affairs

Head of Cultural Engagement

Telephone: +49 89-382-24753, Fax: +49 89-382-10881

Leonie Laskowski

BMW Group Corporate and Intergovernmental Affairs

Cultural Engagement

Telephone: +49 89-382-45382, Fax: +49 89-382-10881 

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E-mail: presse@bmw.de