Public installations or how to reclaim our rights as citizens

Abstract

This article focuses on the importance of reclaiming our rights as citizens and our public spaces by documenting two different public installations/performances that took place in Beirut. The first took place in Spring 2018 and was organized by BePublic Lab at the American University of Beirut, and the second was the Architectural Association Visiting School that took place in Beirut in Summer 2019. Both installations led to a series of interventions on the stretch between Gemmayzeh and Mar Mikhael, an area that has been witnessing gentrification in recent years. Both projects aim to trigger political engagement and raise public awareness in the face of the lack of public space, especially for the youth, in a city that is gradually moving towards a near total privatization of its public places. They emerged as a response to the sociopolitical strategies of depriving the citizens of their basic needs by privatizing what was once everyone’s. This article argues that urban interventions are an opportunity to address sociopolitical issues through spatial and temporal public installations. These installations, tailored to a human scale and anchored in the city as both art and architecture, reflect on the power of public interventions as urban catalytic tactics that engage with the people and challenge the blasé attitude of the citizens, pushing them to claim their rights to the city. © 2020 Intellect Ltd Article. English language.