​​​When we describe our cities through familiar words, we often rely on nouns: places and things that take on an object-like quality in our imaginations. Houses, streets, buses, parks, and even the term ‘city’ itself become already created artifacts handed down to us. However, in an era of societal and technological change, the idea of what defines a city is in flux. Can we now rethink its very notion as a set of transformative active processes? And as inhabitants take on a more integrated role in the creation of the city, can we now think of it as a place of citizen action?

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The "City as a Verb" exhibition takes the common terminology used to describe our urban environments and simply changes them into actions. This seemingly simple conceptual shift has deep consequences. For instance, instead of naming the common urban structure as ‘street,’ it is described through the verb ‘moving.’ The former is administered by a centralized power structure, the latter acknowledges that citizens actively and creatively move through their environment rather than passively participating in it. Highlighting 17 cities that reflect how urbanism is transforming into active processes, six verbs (sustaining, moving, mixing, regenerating, participating, and layering) describe both the potential (and problems) facing today’s metropolitan regions. Spanning 5 continents, each city in this exhibition reflects a global perspective that is also in local conversation with the city of Seoul, inspiring us to reimagine the daily ways we can actively engage in the formation and practice of our city.

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Our research project Los Angeles: Towards an Automated Transitopia was selected to be exhibited and curated to represent the verb 'Moving'.​​ Where the noun forms of transport and infrastructure imply heavy, immutable systems that re-quire centralized control to implement, the verb ‘Moving’ implies a sense of lightness where citizens can choose of even hack multiple modes of transport. In Los Angeles, our graphic novel depicts how everyday Angelenos could experience new forms of automated public transport in a city where congested transit is currently a daily challenge.​

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Displayed from 7/14/20 to 9/20/20 at the Seoul Hall of Architecture & Urbanism in Seoul, South Korea.