“Shrinking Cities” debuts in Detroit, Michigan

Saturday, February 3, 2007

The Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit and Cranbrook Art Museum debut Shrinking Cities. The project, which examines urban decline in cities across the globe is sponsored by Germany’s Federal Cultural Foundation.

Shrinking Cities includes contributions from more than 200 artists, architects, researchers, filmmakers, journalists, culture experts, and sociologists aimed not only at showing the effects of this global phenomenon but also exploring how to deal with it.

The project, which began in 2002, involves local teams from four cities: Detroit, USA, Manchester/Liverpool, Britain, Ivanavo, Russia and Halle/Leipzig, Germany. The teams examined the negatives and the positives of urban decline. Along with the exhibit contribution of the team and international idea competition was launched.

Shrinking Cities premiered in Berlin in 2004 and later traveled to Halle and Leipzig Germany. In Detroit it will run from 3 February until 1 April. Cranbrook Art Museum and the newly founded Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit will cohost the exhibit, with buses running in between the two.