Matthew Mazzotta Playful wondrous public spaces built for community and possibility TED Fellows
[SHAPE YOUR FUTURE]
For me, public space is political.
I work with communities around the world,
and as we know,
every community has problems.
Some of these problems are solved
through the ballot box
or city hall meetings
or community efforts, like bike lanes
and potholes and school budgets.
But some problems are beyond
the reach of these structures,
like food deserts,
community well-being
and the loss of cultural identity.
These problems cannot be solved
with the existing tool sets.
I believe that public space is the most
potent place to discuss these issues,
because it contains the richest
diversity of perspectives.
And that’s what makes it so powerful.
The existing parks, town squares
and sidewalks are not enough, though,
which is why I’m interested in creating
a new type of public space,
one that’s built by the community
and designed specifically for their needs.
I start by listening
and by setting up
actual outdoor living rooms,
complete with couches, tables,
chairs, rugs and lamps,
as a way of holding meetings
to learn about the issues
directly from the community.
I use this technique to capture
the voices and ideas of people
that might not have time or feel
comfortable in more formal meetings.
So why get someone to sit in a love seat
in the middle of the street?
In York, Alabama,
the residents bear witness
to the abandoned houses
that cover the town,
which are a constant reminder
of the white flight that took place
after segregation ended,
when white homeowners left the area
and let their houses fall into disrepair.
Teaming up with the people of York,
we transformed an iconic, pink-sided,
blighted property in the middle of town
into a new house, called “Open House.”
However, this house has a secret.
It physically transforms into a 100-seat
open-air theater for plays, movies, music
or whatever the community
would like to experience.
And when it folds back up
into the shape of a house,
the image of the reclaimed pink siding
reminds people of the past.
After its opening, the mayor saw
the potential in Open House
and held the next town hall meeting there.
The excitement of this unique
gathering space brought new energy
and gave a fresh viewpoint to collectively
discuss the future of the town.
In Cambridge, Massachusetts,
to highlight the issues of energy,
waste and climate change,
we replaced a garbage can in a park
with an anaerobic digester
to transform dog waste
into usable methane gas.
Burning this methane lights the park
and reduces greenhouse gases.
By slightly changing an everyday
experience in public space,
the Park Spark Project
provokes neighbors to have conversations
about the natural and built
systems around them
and their connection to the environment.
In Lyons, Nebraska, residents
spoke about the loss of social life
as downtown storefronts began
to shutter their doors,
a result of the slow violence
of disinvestment,
which has left many rural downtowns empty.
To address this loss of human connection,
we used an abandoned storefront
to turn Main Street into a movie theater.
The storefront wall is modified
with hydraulics
so that the awning and false front
fold down over the sidewalk
with the push of a button,
providing seating for 100.
As the community came together
to build a storefront theater,
an eccentric postman who makes
sci-fi movies starring his cat
proposed to make a documentary
for the debut.
And so that summer, we turned
downtown into a movie set
and the townspeople into actors
to create the movie “Decades,”
a history of Lyons downtown
from its founding to the present moment.
On opening night, the main street,
which is usually empty after dark,
filled with people to watch
the story of their town,
leaving locals to question:
How will we write
the next chapter of Lyons?
Well, the next chapter started
with a series of movie screenings,
public events and international musicians,
as well as a low-budget film community
that has blossomed in Lyons,
bringing in people from all over the world
and a permanent art gallery
that has opened next door.
My work harnesses the power
of the built environment
to focus on issues that communities
and local governments
have failed to address themselves,
by creating projects so custom fit
that the community naturally
makes it their own.
When people from all walks of life
have a shared experience in these spaces,
it can lead to a paradigm shift
in how we see our home,
our community and the world.
For me, public space is political
and becomes powerful when it sparks
people’s imagination to envision
a new future.
And although every place
I’ve worked is unique,
it all boils down to one thing:
if people can sit together,
they can dream together.
Thank you.