Next sofa talk will take the form of a ‘guided visit’ with Tom Lootens to the expo ‘Verbeelding aan de macht – 50 jaar BRAL’ (All Power to the Imagination – 50 years of BRAL’ in the AMVB building. BRAL stands for ‘Brusselse Raad voor de Leefomgeving’ (Brussels Council for the Living Environment) – today using the underline ‘Citizen Action Brussels’. Since the start in 1973, the citizen council has been organizing counter-power against demolition of heritage, real estate speculation and social disintegration – i.e., the process known as ‘Brusselization’. The council has also been instigator of many counter-projects that were later adopted by the local or regional government, the pedestrian zone at Anspach Boulevard as perhaps the most visible one. Part of the action was the stirring of counter-narratives that introduce new discourse and gives way to different desires lines in the city. The exhibition presents a selection of documents from the archives and traces a line through the history. We will discuss with Tom Lootens, president of BRAL, the universe behind the traces from so many years of urban activism.
https://bral.brussels/nl/kalender-item/50-jaar-bral-vernissage-expo
https://www.instagram.com/bral.brussels/
Date: Thursday 14 November 2024, 6pm
Venue: AMVB, Arduinkaai 28
The sofa-talk program is part of the Architecture & Activism seminar organized by Gideon Boie and Lieven De Cauter. Poster by Sherman Lam.
https://www.instagram.com/architectureactivism_kul/
https://www.instagram.com/arch_kuleuven/