Tuesday 15 Jul 2008

19.00-21.00, ICR/Romanian Cultural Institute London, 1 Belgrave Square, London SW1X 8PH
Admission is free but places are limited. Please reserve your seats at Tel. 020 7752 0134

This debate brings together three distinct perspectives on totalitarian space and its often problematic post-totalitarian uses. It proceeds from a look at strategies employed by contemporary artists in order to repossess the space colonized by ideology; then it engages the contorted metaphysics at the foundation of the House of the People in Bucharest, second largest edifice in the world, fusing the functions of mausoleum and citadel; and finally it discusses the makeshift architecture improvised on the streets by those dispossessed of their homes, as a result of changing ideas of ownership in contemporary Romania.

The debate will be chaired by Daniel Serafimovski, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Architecture and Spatial Design, Metropolitan University London.

Programme: ‘Occupying the Totalitarian Imagination’ by Malcolm Quinn, ‘Architecture and Politics at the Foundation of Foundation’ by Jonathan Lahey Dronsfield, and ‘Evicting the Ghost’ by Alex Axinte and Cristi Borcan (studiobasar).

The event is part of the New Bucharest Market project presented by the Romanian Cultural Institute, with the support of the Embassy of Romania, at the London Festival of Architecture 2008

Details on www.icr-london.co.uk .