orae

If metropolises were the 20th century's favorite playground, borders are the laboratory for globalized phenomena in the 21st century. Hot spots for migrants, barbed wire, green borders, checkpoints, slow crossings for cross-border workers, cryptocurrency mining farms, casinos, brothels, tax havens, condominiums, principalities, white elephants, and more: such places, residues of nation states, are all found on borders. Border inhabitants are often left to their own devices. To date, borders lack a political project. To realize this project, the editors have worked in situ with those living in border regions in Switzerland, France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Liechtenstein, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Eritrea. They have started to imagine, describe, and model the real territory and a potential project for it. A collective intelligence - a res publica - is taking form. Oræ, the plural of the Latin noun ora, translates as 'borders' in English. Figuratively speaking, it signifies 'the beginning of something.' Oræ is a project of a territory, whose setting is its borders and whose authors are its inhabitants. Its political and poetic program consists of experiencing the world from its margins. This guide invites readers to an unplanned journey inside Oræ. It is a non-hierarchical succession of fragmentary narratives coming from borders and the imaginations of those living in their vicinity. The project 'Oræ - Experiences on the Border' was conceived as Switzerland's nominated National Participation in the 17th Venice Architecture Biennial, commissioned by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia.