MONU - magazine on urbanism is a unique bi-annual international forum for artists, writers and designers that are working on topics of urban culture, development and politics. Each issue collects essays, projects and photographs from contributors from all over the world to a given topic. Thus MONU examines topics that are important to the future of our cities and urban regions from a variety of perspectives. MONU provides a platform for comparative analysis. For example in one of the last issues authors contributed from places as different as Tokyo, Thailand, Detroit, Los Angeles and London. The different viewpoints, contexts and methods of analysis allows to explore topics in a rich fashion. The combination of the writings and projects created in different cultures and with different backgrounds allows to generate new insights in complex phenomena of our cities. For example in the first issue entitled `Paid Urbanism` essays about the ways European government subsidies and tax policies shape urban form and urban life gave a great contrast to articles that analyzed farm subsidies and housing policies in the US. Or in the issue 5 on `Brutal Urbanism` articles from places as Korea, Jerusalem or London all illustrated unique perspectives and reflections on the relationship between violence, upheaval and urban life. MONU has been recognized already as one of the most innovative and progressive magazines in its field and has been part of an open workspace at the documenta 12 - one of the world`s most important exhibitions of modern and contemporary art last summer. MONU was invited by Arch+, a German architectural publication that was organizing the workspace as part of the documenta`s magazines project. MONU is produced and published by the Rotterdam based Bureau of Architecture, Research and Design {www.b-o-a-r-d.nl}, headed by Bernd Upmeyer.
www.monu-magazine.com/