Michael Wolf, whose photographic works captured the architecture of high-density megacities, has passed

2019-04-26T17:16:00-04:00

Michael Wolf, a German photographer whose work showed how people live in major cities such as Hong Kong, Tokyo, Chicago and Paris, died this week at the age of 64. He is best known for his 2003-2014 series, Architecture of Density, which captured the repetitive architectural patterns of Hong Kong's massive tower blocks.

Born in Germany in 1954, Wolf moved to Hong Kong in 1994, where he worked as a photojournalist. In an interview with the New Republic, he said it was there that he became interested in architecture, and the larger umbrella topic of "life in cities."

Over the course his career, his work has captured rush hours in Japan (Tokyo Compression), the back alleys of Hong Kong (Informal Solutions), the Blade Runner-like scenes of Chicago's downtown (Transparent City), and quirk scenes discovered via Google Street view (A Series of Unfortunate Events). His latest project, Cheung Chau Sunrises, is a compilation of photos of sunrises taken between 5:30 AM and 7:30 AM each mornin...

Off-centred Considerations in the Urban Age: Review of MONU #26 by Federico Ortiz

2017-06-01T14:02:00-04:00

Since 2004, MONU has been working towards the disentanglement and collective understanding of the process of global urbanization. With its latest issue, the magazine seems to demonstrate, and at the same time question, the nature of this process, characterizing it primarily as one of decentralizing urbanization. By Federico Ortiz

In a world undergoing a process of constant urbanization, which appears to cover the entirety of our planet’s surface, we have become familiar with the idea of living in the “Urban Age” and with statistics that predict, for example, that by 2030 60% of the world’s population will live in cities. Since 2004, MONU has been working towards the disentanglement and collective understanding of the process of global urbanization. With its latest issue, the magazine seems to demonstrate, and at the same time question, the nature of this process, characterizing it primarily as one of decentralizing urbanization.

With as many diverse perspectives as collaborators, MONU #26 DECENTRALISED URBANISM probably originated in a triggering question: Are cities like London, New York and Paris, with their centralizing power, the ones to blame for Brexit, Trump, and Marine Le Pen? These elections revealed the power of the underestimated peripheral (suburban, rurban and rural) populations, as well as expos...

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Michael Wolf, whose photographic works captured the architecture of high-density megacities, has passed

Off-centred Considerations in the Urban Age: Review of MONU #26 by Federico Ortiz