Feb 27 '06 - 2207 W, 2 I - Vote Good + 24 :: Bad - 17 New Work Gives a Birds Eye View of Amsterdam Cyclists
Published February 26, 2006 by C.I.C.L.E.
Contributed by Liz Elliott
-- Jan Derk Domela Nieuwenhuis, Amsterdam
"Sometimes you need somebody else to show you the things you are most familiar with."
Artist Laura Domela has an great compositional eye when it comes to
painting, or her favorite medium photography. Her latest book of
photos FIETSEN is sure to thrill cyclists of all pedals of life. In our interview with
Laura she thoughtfully discusses her views on Amsterdam, the
U.S., and the concept of ‘cycling culture’.
Originally from Anchorage Alaska, she has spent the majority of
her youth living by the beaches of Southern California, where the
bicycle plays a prominent part within the ‘beach culture.’ Laura also
has many relatives in Holland giving her easy access to the cycling
utopia of Amsterdam, which became the focus of her latest work. She now
resides in one of the U.S.’s most notorious cycling cities, Portland,
OR., where she continues to build her body of work.
Q: You sent us the quote underneath the above photo from your
relative in Holland discussing your book with you; what touches you
about this comment?
A: This
sentiment reflected and reinforced the notion that cycling in Amsterdam
and the Netherlands is not a movement, a cause, or a culture. It
is built directly into the fabric of daily life. Do we have a
“pedestrian culture” in the U.S.?
Q: When I was
viewing the photographs in The Amsterdam Project series, what
immediately struck me was the seemingly laid back or just everyday
approach to bicycling. I mean, for the most part, there seemed to be no
apparent preparation or use of cycling-specific gear when bicycling. We
see women in heels and in flip flops, men in business suits, and so
on...Then there are the bikes... almost all of them are upright, and
what we in the U.S. might consider clunkers, outfitted with racks,
crates, fenders, etc... Almost no where to be found is the SPD cycling
shoe, Lycra outfit, or bike that emphasizes speed or performance rather
than comfort and utility. Is this selection of photographs truly
representative of the Amsterdam cycling culture at large? If so, what
do you think accounts for this difference between U.S. and Amsterdam
cycling culture?
A: Yes, the selection of photographs is absolutely
representative of Amsterdam cyclists. (In the entire 1600
photographs that I took, there were only three people in “bike gear”
and wearing helmets.) One thing I missed though was several days
earlier while it was raining--people were riding bikes while holding
opened umbrellas (sometimes also talking on cell phones!)
There are technical reasons for the equipment and style of
cycling. The Netherlands is flat. With no hills, you don’t
need gears. You don’t need an ultra lightweight bike. You
don’t really care about an aerodynamic riding position when you’re
riding around town, a block at a time from stoplight to
stoplight. (And you certainly wouldn’t want clipless pedals!)
There
are also practical considerations. Bike theft is a problem.
Most bikes have two locks, and expensive bikes and components would
just be more attractive targets for thieves. Racks are important
because of the role of the bicycle in daily life, transporting far more
than just the riders (as you can see in the photographs). Also,
the bikes often have wild paint jobs and other customizations to make
them easier to spot in a bike rack or garage that could potentially
contain thousands of bikes.
Check out these photos of the bike parking garage near Central Station: Photo 1 Photo 2
Cycling
in Amsterdam is not a specialized activity. It’s a daily mode of
transportation. People don’t dress special to ride their bike any
more than we dress special to drive our car to the grocery store.
They are wearing business suits and high heels because they’re on their
way to work and that’s what they wear to do those activities.
When you drive to the store you don’t think “I’m going for a drive;”
you think “I’m going to the store”…or to work, or to the park, or
wherever. Culturally it’s a reflection of cycling not being an
activity in and unto itself, but an enabler of daily life.
In
the U.S. we have a “hiking culture” – people who have trail maps,
Gore-Tex, special boots, trekking poles, GPS, etc. Then there’s
the guy who is walking down the street to get from the bus stop to the
mall. He’s more analogous to the cyclists I photographed in
Amsterdam. I met a couple of “serious cyclists” while in the
Netherlands. They ride expensive bikes and evidently often travel
to the one hill in the country to train. The “serious cyclists” I
met seemed to have a fairly active disdain for the commuter cyclists
because of their clunky bikes and passive attitude towards cycling.
Another
cultural difference is the role in the U.S. of the car as a fashion
accessory and status symbol. Because of the culture and political
climate in the Netherlands, there seems to be almost an “anti-status”
vibe. It’s not necessarily cool or hip to have lots of money and
certainly not to flaunt it. In the U.S., status still has some
perceived importance. People evidently feel better about
themselves driving around town in a fancy car, and there may be some
perception that getting around on a bike is for kids or for people
without enough money to buy a car. Cycling in Amsterdam is a
great equalizer.
Q: What also stands out to me is the lack of
helmets. In the U.S., for example, there seems to be a preoccupation
about the dangers of street riding, which might have something to do
with the emphasis on safety and helmet use within most segments of the
cycling community. Does the typical person in Amsterdam relate to
cycling as being an inherently dangerous activity? If not, what do you
think contributes to this sense of safety while riding?
A: In
the Netherlands, cycling is not considered a dangerous activity.
Lack of hills, lower speeds, and a network of bike paths (separated
from car traffic), with safety and traffic controls, all help to create
a safer cycling environment. People in cars in Amsterdam are
accustomed to sharing the road with cyclists (and most of them also
ride bikes). Also, bike handling skills are generally excellent,
developed over a lifetime of daily use for transportation. You
can see evidence of this in the photographs, with people’s comfort
level doing various activities while cycling (dialing cell phones,
holding dogs on leashes, carrying all kinds of cargo…).
Niels
Domela [lives in Gouda] (an “average biking Dutchman”), said “Biking is
as walking. Pedestrians don’t wear helmets and bikers
neither.” He said that parents sometimes give their children
helmets to wear, but that when the kids grow up they mostly don’t wear
them, and adults wear them only for bike racing.
Q: What are
the primary differences between the city infrastructure in Amsterdam
and, say, Portland which has been deemed the second most sustainable
city in America?
A: Amsterdam is a very old city, far predating
the automobile. Even today, the streets, parking, and other
infrastructure are fairly poor for automobile traffic (compared to any
U.S. city, really). There simply isn’t enough parking and roadway
capacity in the city center to handle any reasonable percentage of the
traffic that has to flow through it. Cycling and mass transit are
the only viable options for getting around.
Like most American
cities, Portland has been architected and rearchitected since the rise
of the automobile as the primary means of personal transportation in
the U.S. While Portland is more bike-friendly than most cities,
it still has the capacity to handle a great deal of automobile traffic,
so Portland has the luxury to be bike-friendly, while Amsterdam is
forced to be more bike-dependent.
Q: You chose to represent 118 out of the over 1600 bicyclists that you
photographed over the course of 4 and 1/2 days. Aside from the obvious
technical, or perhaps compositional considerations, what factors
influenced the selection process?
A: The composition is the
same in every photo, and that’s on purpose. By making the
composition consistent, the focus becomes the individual. My goal
while narrowing down was to come up with a high-quality, interesting,
and accurate representation of my experience. When I took the
photos, often the shots were as close as one second apart. So
there’s only a tiny slice of time I got to see each rider. “Whoa,
that was a ladder!” “She had three kids on there.” “Wait,
was that a vacuum?” What happened for me afterwards while going
through the selection process was unexpected. I suddenly had
unlimited time to study each rider and what they were doing. I
noticed I’d caught several of the same people on different days,
dressed differently (or the same). I noticed details I would
never catch watching the rider pass by in real time. I noticed
that I was making connections based on similarities and differences and
many of the photos developed into pairs of photos, creating another
level of dialogue.
Q: Does it surprise you that the city of Los Angeles, one of your former haunts, is developing a thriving bike scene?
A: No
it doesn’t surprise me. L.A. has good weather, lots of
good’n’flat terrain, and a huge automobile traffic problem. Those
seem to be the necessary ingredients for a thriving bike scene to
emerge.
Q: Also since moving to Portland, how has it changed and
developed over the last several years? Do you think it could become an
American version of Amsterdam?
A: Over the past few years,
Portland has added more infrastructure (bike lanes, etc.), and people
seem to be becoming generally more bike-aware and bike-friendly.
(I would expect that after being named one of the most bike-friendly
cities, people are more inclined and encouraged to live up to that.)
While
Portland is considered bike-friendly for a U.S. city, my house is about
one mile from downtown and 1000 feet higher. The road from my
house to downtown has no shoulder or bike lane and, in fact, drops off
sharply into a ditch or steep slope on either side of the road.
It’s also a very high traffic, 45 mph. winding route up the hill.
It’s just not smart or feasible for me to ever ride my bike into town
to pick up something from the store.
Given the difficulties
imposed by the local terrain and weather, and the adequacy of alternate
means of transportation such as cars and mass transit, Portland will
probably never become an American version of Amsterdam.
Q: Think you’ll do any other bicycle related projects in the future?
A: Maybe.
I love to cycle, but the inspiration for my artwork comes from a
different place. This was an interesting project because of the
intersection of both elements.
Cycling in Amsterdam made me miss
how cycling felt as a kid. As a kid, you just hop on and go--to
the store, to a friend’s house, to school, to the beach, wherever.
After
coming home from Amsterdam, my husband and I went for some rides on our
tandem with a different style. Instead of spending 20 minutes
before the ride putting on bike shorts, Lycra jerseys, SPD shoes,
heart-rate monitors, cycling gloves, helmets, sunglasses, energy bars,
and water, we just hopped on the bike and went. I was wearing a
skirt, a t-shirt, and flip flops, and he had on jeans, a t-shirt, and
sandals. My hair kept blowing into my face and my mouth. We
probably averaged 10mph slower than usual. We stopped several
times to look at wildlife. We coasted a lot. It was awesome!
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This is wonderful. Great interview! I’m ready to go out and buy the book. I especially like the last line about a whole new outlook on how to ride the tandem.
Scott Mizee
Portland, Oregon USA
http://www.npgreenway.org
Scott Mizee (Email) (URL) - March 12 '06 - 16:38
I especially enjoyed hearing about this book, since I have been to Amsterdam and have seen all the bikers that ride in all kinds of clothes, holding cell phones, and other things while biking. I was amazed that the bikers sort of “waltz” with the cars – they dance around each other and by each other with no trouble at all. No one wears helmets there. There are huge bike parking garages. It was like I was in Bike Heaven!! I loved it. I’d love to live there. I wish the U.S. would be more like Amsterdam….but Americans are in love with their cars and are lazy!! God forbid that they walk a few feet, let alone get on a bike and bike more than a block. How sad…. Oh well, I can always hope!!charmaine (Email) - March 22 '06 - 11:26
A great article and I am to quote some of this in relation to a paper I am writing on the paradox of cycling- why is recreational cycling and sport cycling so popular yet cycling for transport is not.How refreshing this piece is. Yes I would go to Holland for the cycling. I am sure there economy and health of the nation is a 100x better for it.
Allan Brown (Email) - May 20 '06 - 03:17
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Sales & Marketing Manager
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Design Engineering, Prototyping & Manufacturing
e- nloetfering@davert.org
w- http://www.davert.org
t- 905-353-0531 X 34
f- 905-353-8669
5676 Progress Street,
Niagara Falls, Ontario
L2E 6X8
Nancy Loetfering (Email) (URL) - June 26 '08 - 07:57