With(in) is a multi-stage project that includes an exhibit, installation, qualitative exploration, and visual storytelling.
This is a story about connection. The MIT Media Lab City Science group presents an immersive view into the worlds of three women in three settlements: Eva in Guadalajara, Mexico; Gihan in Cairo, Egypt; and MamaG in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. Through visual storytelling we experience activities from the mundane to the surreal, from the deeply meaningful to the inconsequential. We visit the fringe neighbourhoods and community centers of Guadalajara, the vertical slums and bustling streets of Cairo, and the tiny homes and crowded markets of Port Harcourt. In the lives of each individual, we examine the micro and the macro, from the gentle care of fixing one’s hair each morning to the cultural swells of holidays, religious ceremonies, and funerals. In these places, far from our own, we learn and inquire, we gather and we listen, in the hope of better understanding the complexity of the world around us and new possibilities for how we will live together in the future.
As extreme urbanisation unfolds a… View full description
With(in) is a multi-stage project that includes an exhibit, installation, qualitative exploration, and visual storytelling.
This is a story about connection. The MIT Media Lab City Science group presents an immersive view into the worlds of three women in three settlements: Eva in Guadalajara, Mexico; Gihan in Cairo, Egypt; and MamaG in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. Through visual storytelling we experience activities from the mundane to the surreal, from the deeply meaningful to the inconsequential. We visit the fringe neighbourhoods and community centers of Guadalajara, the vertical slums and bustling streets of Cairo, and the tiny homes and crowded markets of Port Harcourt. In the lives of each individual, we examine the micro and the macro, from the gentle care of fixing one’s hair each morning to the cultural swells of holidays, religious ceremonies, and funerals. In these places, far from our own, we learn and inquire, we gather and we listen, in the hope of better understanding the complexity of the world around us and new possibilities for how we will live together in the future.
As extreme urbanisation unfolds at an astounding pace, all three locations reflect the chaos and the importance of community. One woman’s journey can be both individual and global when viewed in the context of the others. We ask ourselves: how does rapid urbanisation impact the community we seek, and how do intimate domestic activities such as food preparation and celebration reflect a larger cultural context?