Above photo: An interactive component in Palestine Collective’s exhibition at the London Festival of Architecture. Palestine Collective.
As architecture students in the U.K., we believe it’s past time to break the Palestine taboo.
And admit that architecture is inherently political.
One year ago this month, Palestine Collective was born.
We’re a group of more than 50 creatives in the U.K. who have the primary goal of normalizing support for Palestine in architectural and design circles, both in the academic and practitioner space. We came together in response to the censorship we were facing in our places of work and study when speaking on the human rights and spatial injustices faced by Palestinians.
We have seen censorship of Palestine across top cultural institutions. London’s Barbican Centre, a prominent performing arts venue, backed out of hosting a London Review of Books lecture series over a talk called “The Shoah after Gaza.” The Royal Academy of Arts recently pulled pieces of artwork condemning Israel’s genocide. The university ETH Zurich canceled a lecture for architecture students titled “Weaponized Architecture: Settler Colonialism and the Built Environment in Palestine.” The University of Manchester censored part of an exhibition by the research group Forensic Architecture, which examined how air pollution has been weaponized in Palestine and beyond.
The reluctance to discuss Palestine within the architectural industry is particularly concerning given architecture’s historic relationship with colonialism. “Architecture was one of the principal means used by colonisers to impose a new social and political order,” Felipe Hernandez, lecturer in architectural design, history and theory at Cambridge University has stated.
Indeed, architecture and urban planning have enabled Israeli settler colonialism and apartheid, from illegal settlements to segregated infrastructure to evictions and mass displacement.
This harsh reality makes it imperative that contemporary designers at the very least discuss and challenge the systems and structures they operate in. Yet leading organizations continue to insist that architecture is not political, and that any mention of Palestine – or any critique of Israel – is therefore misplaced and irrelevant.
Our mission over the past year has been to challenge that. And the support we have received makes it clear: Palestine is an architecture topic, and architects want to talk about it.
At the London School of Architecture, we gathered more than 100 architects, creatives and students to begin this work together. Zain Al-Sharaf, a designer working at an architectural practice in London, joined us to discuss her efforts to create an alternative archive for Palestinian objects. Architecture, she explained, can be used to resist the colonial erasure taking place in Palestine: Just as the tools of architecture and design can be used to subjugate, they can be used to dismantle the systems and structures of oppression.
In the months since, we’ve continued to hold events at architectural institutions including Royal College of Art and the London School of Architecture, to share our message – that Palestine can and should take up space within architectural discourse.
During these programs, we learned from academic researcher Hazem Jamjoum, who highlighted the spatial acts of colonial erasure affecting roads, spaces, neighborhoods, city infrastructure, homes buildings and other developments in Palestine. These elements are undeniably architectural, the design and construction of which are part of an architect’s job. London-based architect and activist Sofia Karim took us through her project Architects for Palestine: She invites practitioners to work on projects as intimate as designing joinery, with the proceeds going toward Palestinian charities.
We learned that architecture, the study and practice of designing spatial interventions, is undeniably political. But it can also be humanitarian and altruistic.
At the 20th anniversary of the London Festival of Architecture, we held an exhibition titled “Reconstructing Palestinian Domesticity.” At this key event in the international architectural calendar, thousands of architects and designers celebrate the richness of the industry through talks, walking tours and exhibitions.
As part of the spectacle, we brought forward an exhibition by Palestinian artists, who created a spatial recreation of a Palestinian living space. We saw approximately 300 visitors over two days, including key architectural figures, and our work was covered by influential industry voices.
The attendees for this program, like all our events, were not majority Arab, Muslim or even people of color. The support we have received from students and professionals of diverse socio-ethnic backgrounds as we worm our way into mainstream architectural spaces shows the widespread desire to speak about Palestine openly.
Many of us growing up have heard horror stories of people losing their jobs just for talking about Palestine. As a collective, we aim to build a strong community that allows us to become each other’s safety net: When so many architects are attending mainstream events in support of Palestine, an employer has a much weaker argument to reprimand or fire an employee for attending a march or supporting Palestinian rights.
The taboo on discussing and supporting Palestine must be broken. Not only is it pertinent for architects, designers and urban planners to discuss – it’s our moral responsibility.