Power & Public Space

Memes are increasingly permeating architectural discourse, with Instagram accounts like Dank Lloyd Wright “holding models of power to account, especially when power manifests as aesthetics.”The meme itself, in Dank Lloyd Wright’s hands, is a sophisticated visual tool, with its own codes, styles and languages that mirror the ever-shifting currents of internet culture. DLW’s critiques and the debates around them take place almost exclusively online, and in the comments section of their instagram account in particular, in an era where public life itself need not extend beyond the screen. Meme space, as the anonymous Instagram collective Dank Lloyd Wright explains, “has the potential to showcase what criticism could be when it is detached from the profit motives of advertising, self promotion, and clout chasing.” In this episode DLW discuss what ‘meme space’ means to them, and the kind of virtual public forums it fosters.Power & Public Space is a co-production of Drawing Matter & the Architecture Foundation Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Markus Lateenmaaki’s research explores, in part, how architecture became instrumental in the societal and cultural transformations that took place in revolutionary Russia. It’s worth noting this episode was recorded in early 2022, before the Russian invasion of Ukraine; in fact the discussion doesn’t focus on contemporary Russian politics and culture, but instead reflects on the aftermath of the Russian Revolution of 1917, and the ways in which Russian people altered and re-framed the imperialist monuments and public spaces around them as power was ceded from the monarchy and aristocracy and taken up by the Bolshevik party. Parallels are also drawn to contemporary debates on how to contend with retrograde monuments still standing in public spaces.  Lateenmaaki also unpacks the motivations behind Lev Rudnev’s monument to the Victims of the Revolution, erected in the field of Mars in st petersburg, which eschewed the traditional gathering place and conduit for public movements across the field through the streets, recasting the city itself as a monument to collective life.Power & Public Space is a co-production of Drawing Matter & the Architecture Foundation Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Parc de la Villette was emblematic of the strong ties made between the disciplines of architecture and philosophy in the1980's, where “Deconstructivism” in particular became a theoretical framework through which buildings and landscapes were both designed and interpreted. Visual fragmentation and conceptual links to semiotic analysis characterised this period of architecture, and originating in projects such as Chora L. Works. A collaboration between Peter Eisenman and Jaques Derrida, the unrealised Chora project was intended to stand within the Parc de la Villette complex as an ode to a dialogue between architecture and philosophy. In light of such pressing issues as climate change, decolonisation and spatial inequality, the formal experimentation and philosophical inquiry of Chora L Works can appear abstract and disengaged; In this episode Andre Patrao reflects on this period of recent architectural history and what can we learn from it.Power & Public Space is a co-production of Drawing Matter & the Architecture Foundation Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When we think about public space, we tend to consider the street, the plaza, the park or the square - urban spaces for people to engage in civic life. In this episode Jonas Žukauskas discusses his consideration of the forest as a space of social engagement, in relation to the project “Forest Parts”. Initiated in 2019 in collaboration with Jurga Daubaraitė, Forest Parts is ongoing project that, as Žukauskas and Daubaraitė explain, “offers to perceive the forest as an infrastructure formed by civic consensus. The unique cultural landscape of the Curonian Spit and the forestation process initiated in the 19th century serve as a case study of forest management works in this complex space to interrelate a series of ecological, recreational, representational, and industrial narratives.”In this episode Žukauskas discusses architecture as a cultural practice, which, in the case of the Forest Parts project, is deemed capable of “enhancing the optics through which society senses a forest.” He also expands on the novel forms of drawing and representation deployed to bring the public to a more intimate understanding of the forest itself. Power & Public Space is a co-production of Drawing Matter & the Architecture Foundation Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The concrete-lined LA River was built on top of a sprawling floodplain, which the land artist Lauren Bon seeks to reveal through a large-scale infrastructural project called “Bending the River Back to the City”. By diverting a small amount of water from the river, lifting it, cleansing it, and spreading it to a network of public parks, (its former floodplain), she renders the utilitarian water management system as an accessory of public delight and education, and begins the long process of restoring the floodplain to its natural state. Much of Bon’s artwork is focused on closing the gap between the natural world and public life, and in this conversation she discusses the role of the artist in translating the abstraction of both natural systems and human infrastructure into experiences that are tangible and culturally meaningful. Bon also discusses her earlier work “Not a Cornfield” - in many ways a precursor to Bending the River - which aimed to transform a derelict industrial site “back into a public space — a commons — creat[ing] the possibility for a deeper public consciousness and a sense of shared ownership of LA’s historic floodplain.”Power & Public Space is a co-production of Drawing Matter & the Architecture Foundation Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Life is more virtual than ever, but in this intensely divided moment, it's arguably our streets, squares, plazas and monuments where power remains most contested. How does a garden become an act of resistance against gentrification? How can an urban park expose a pre-colonial landscape? What are the boundaries of protest in public space? And what role does architecture play in the the stories we tell ourselves about our collective histories, hopes and dreams?Coming soon from Drawing Matter and the Architecture Foundation: a new series on Power & Public Space.Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.