Squatting as heritage between destruction, adaptation and care

Research Seminar with Svava Riesto, University of Copenhagen

Aarhus University, Campus Moesgaard, Moesgaard Allé20, 8270 Højbjerg, Building 4206 –room 121

Squatting as heritage between destruction, adaptation and care

The polycrisis forces societies to rethink established practices of architecture and heritage management, and there is a raising awareness that simply tearing down old buildings and infrastructures and constructing new ones is resource-intense and unsustainable. Yet, how can we foster other, more caring ways of living with existing urban environments? The presentation discusses what insights can be gained from the controversies about urban renewal that surfaced in Denmark during the 1960s. This was a period of unprecedented construction and optimism, yet it was also a time when voices begun to criticise the resource consumption and demolition that were part and parcel of this building boom. The lecture considers Sofiegården – an area of old buildings in Copenhagen that had been deemed for demolition and was (more or less) illegally occupied by a group of young people between 1965 and 1969. While research on squatting often focusses on forms of activism and governmental issues, this lecture will study the squatting of Sofiegården as a socio-material heritage practice that involved specific ways of renovating and adapting seven 18^th century buildings and courtyards to a new living environment. Doing so, it will present squatting as a collective practice of care, while also asking how cultural capital, power and gender – as well as the materialities and spatial arrangements on site –  may operate in such a collective practice.

Svava Riesto is a landscape and architectural historian and professor at the University of Copenhagen. Her work explores the histories, legacies and possible futures of urban landscapes in relation to pressing urban and planetary issues. Doing so, she uses methods such as oral history, feminist archival research, fieldwork and workshops with local communities. She has published seven books, most recently the co-edited Women in Scandinavian Landscape Architecture. Building collaborative and transnational feminist histories. Svava currently leads the research project Stories from Sofiegården. Alternative forms of Living in Copenhagen as Cultural Heritage (supported by the Augustinus Foundation, co-led with Henriette Steiner) and is member of the Scientific Expert Group of the European Partnership Resilient Cultural Heritage (RCH).

The seminar will last from 1315 to 1500 and will be followed by a reception open to all. Students and staff are very welcome!