Project Description

‘Planning for Protest’ is an exhibition, publication and associated project of the 2013 Lisbon Architecture Triennale, ‘Close Closer’.

Working collaboratively with architects John McLaughlin and Peter Tansey, and fellow architecture graduates Ronan O’ Boyle and Caoimhe Merrick, Culturstruction were one of twelve international architecture and design studios to contribute to ‘Planning for Protest’.

In light of the current global financial crisis, ‘Planning for Protest’ invited architectural offices witnessing these events first-hand to provide case studies and project proposals for contested spaces within their own cities. ‘Hiding in Plain Sight: A new Route for Civic Dissent in Dublin’ proposes a new ‘Route of Civic Dissent’ to make visible the connections between state and marketplace. It also addresses Ireland’s most recent history of corrupt banks, market driven policies, and the entanglement of governance and private capital in Ireland’s route from boom to bust.

The proposed ‘Route of Civic Dissent’ takes the concrete carcass of the intended headquarters of Anglo Irish Bank as a starting point for enquiry. Looming on the Liffey Quays at the eastern fringe of the IFSC this half-built bank is an icon of the brash lending that led to the country’s economic crash. In 2011 the Central Bank of Ireland (Ireland’s financial regulator) purchased the unfinished building and announced their intention to relocate from their city centre headquarters to the IFSC.

We have re-imagined the Central Bank at the Anglo building to include a place of public assembly, public discussion rooms, workshop facilities and a freedom of information library. Together these spaces facilitate popular education and transparency of information, creating opportunities for citizens to peacefully and actively participate in power. We propose that the new Central Bank location could be very important for its potential to offer a foothold for the Irish public in the realm of globalised capital that is the IFSC.

Link to our full contribution here.

Planning for Protest was organised by Ben Allen, James Bae and Ricardo Gomes of kwy, Shannon Harvey of Public Address, and Adam Michaels of Project Projects.

Contributors: Antonas Office (Athens); Studio Miessen (Berlin); studioBasar (Bucharest); Cluster (Cairo); Culturstruction (Jo Anne Butler, Tara Kennedy) with John McLaughlin, Caoimhe Merrick, Ronan O’Boyle and Peter Tansey (Dublin); Superpool (Istanbul); ateliermob (Lisbon); public works with Isaac Marrero-Guillamón (London); Ecosistema Urbano (Madrid); Srdjan Jovanovic Weiss / NAO (New York); PioveneFabi with 2A+P/A (Rome); and Vapor 324 (São Paulo).

The exhibition opened September 12th, 2013 in the Praça da Figueira in Lisbon, and will remain open daily through the duration of the Triennale, closing December 15, 2013.