Temple of Holy Shit is a public waste installation, a kind of shit-recycling plant, which was installed during the Parckdesign 2014 festival in Brussels. For a period of 6 months the temple found its home in the centre of the park, serving as public toilet for its visitors. The waste is processed, stored, fermented and composted into terra preta, a highly fertile type of soil perfect for any vegetable garden. By drawing parallels with religion, Collective Disaster emphasizes the potentiality of bodily waste as a genuine alternative towards chemical fertilizers, elevating its status to a holy substance. This life-giving material we consider waste was expressively celebrated, not only by the installation itself but also through the numerous events and rituals, which took place throughout the summer. Apart from a compost toilet and terra preta production facility, the design includes a playground with slides and a stage for performances.

Collective Disaster developed a program over the course of the summer that is rendering the temple a social space, where the different local groups can meet and engage together in activities. The main goal of the installation is to educate, spark interest and raise new questions on how to deal with waste. Balancing on the lines between art, architecture, design, biology, ecology, sociology and many more, the installation has triggered interest in many of its users and will hopefully resurrect again in the future.

author

Collective Disaster is an international and multidisciplinary network that is looking for new forms of collaboration by engaging in & creating social and participatory situations. The network expands with different experts and friends in every project, however the core team is:

Andrea Sollazzo (IT) is an architect with international experience in several offices around Europe, mainly NL and BE, where he carried on successfully a wide range of projects in different domains (public, private, art, social, commercial). He is also assistant teacher at KULeuven/LUCA school of architecture in the department of mix media, where he is actively engaged both on pedagogic and research level.

Pieterjan Grandry (BE) is a visual artist, graphic designer, blogger and publisher. With his blog he documents contemporary counter-flows in visual culture. He initiated self-published projects using participation as a tool for self-funding, such as “The future of Architecture” and runs the graphic design studio MODEM.

Louisa Vermoere (BE) is an architect, designer & reusable material scout, currently a researcher at Strelka. She has been (co) developing several projects addressing public issues (in public space) with bottom up solutions & strategies such as DIY, participation & collaboration realised by reconnecting the life cycles of the used elements. She is the founder of Louisa Made.line & BXLswingsinthecracks.

Rosario Talevi (ARG) is an architect that has worked with different architecture collectives (a77, raumlaborberlin, and collective disaster) as well as editor and curator in the field. Her expertise includes an in-depth investigation of the different design strategies and spatial practices that have been transforming Berlin’s undervalued, transitional and forgotten spaces.  She also collaborates with Niche, a tour company that opens up new Berlin perspectives by presenting cutting­ edge art spaces and hard­ to ­find architecture gems.

Valentina Karga (GR) is an artist with a background in architecture. She has been fellow at the University of the Arts Berlin (UDK), Graduate school. Her work addresses issues such as autonomy, the DIY, the commons and the role of participation and collaboration in the contemporary society and the arts. Among her projects is the “Summer school for Applied Autonomy” in Berlin, while among the places where she has exhibited is the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Athens. 

collaborators

Dr. Haiko Pieplow and Ayumi Matsuzaka (Terra-preta expertise), Ayumi Matsuzaka (Collaboration on the Blue Responsibility Award study), Ane San Miguel (Graphic recording)

website

collectivedisaster.org, collectivedisaster.tumblr.com/temple-of-holy-shit

country

Belgium

year

2014