MERIDIANS
Projected routes of
energy
flow through
arteries of an
urban system
surging deep under
metropolitan life.
For a long time house and street fountains as well as wooden water pipes dominated the cityscape of Berlin. Completely inadequate hygiene conditions favoured the constant return of epidemics and epidemics. The functioning of the city was compromised, overcrowding put strain on old outdated systems. Left unhealed and unaddressed, the sickness of the urban environment gradually increased. The arteries were blocked the veins disrupted and within these embedded infrastructures: pollution flowed.
In traditional Chinese medicine, meridian lines play a specific and crucial role in the health of the entire body. If the energy flowing through a meridian is imbalanced in any way the system it fuels is jeopardised and disease may result. The pipes, engraved with acupuncture meridian lines, signify the treatment of the urban environment as a living organism in need of healing - a communal organ formed by many interrelating parts each vital, living and interconnected.
Along gutters’ shiny surfaces, numbered points and zigzagging pathways, acupuncture meridian lines are carved onto pipes projecting routes of energy flow onto access points for the arteries of a metropolitan sewer system.