Queering Space

CULTURAL DIVERSITY

QUEERING SPACES

Victoria
Di Gioia

How does a public space become territory?

I wanted to map a space that made me uncomfortable, so that I could question why.

The Wider Context

My Mapping

With my group (all female non-skaters) we noticed that one layer to make us feel like outsiders were the people (majority male/skilled skaters/”dress code”).

However, continuing as an individual project, i wanted to look at what else communicates this sense of closed & close community.

The Body Movements

July 9 2016, the whole park was officially opened.

“added value to the useability of the streetlife of the city centre of Rotterdam.”

The Spatial Setting

“A pedestrian walkpath paved in natural stone meanders through the skatepark, crosses it diagonally twice and slopes up and down with the skate obstacles, giving passers by a similar spatial experience as the skaters instead of keeping them on the side of the action.”

Conclusion

It was interesting to deconstruct such a central skatepark (within the scale of rotterdam). I was able to observe what is a skatepark without skaters, and question how it intimidates me.

I concluded that this subculture gathers in the territorial environment that is Westblaak Skatepark, an “Urban Island” with roads as rivers.

This idea is reinforced by the physical space through architecture, location, light & noise) but also by those that inhabit (their culture and behaviour).

Feedback

"Victoria, we appreciate the sensitive qualities of your mappings and drawing however they do not offer lot information regarding the social dynamic of the skatepark"

I think that for the second part of this project, I need to focus on the people/bodies that claim the spacce and go back to the group project.

IDEAS FOR SOCIAL DYNAMIC:

1- What is public for one ethnicity and not another? (Skating is considered a predominantly white boy sport... what bodied does it exclude?)

2- Are public spaces truly for everyone or is there male privatisation* that occures?

*Privatisation that is socially not economically... meaning public spacce can be captured by certain groups and so become private according to its user type.

Intervention

Exaggerate the "ruptures/breaches" of the territory with a social lens of gender.

Using the broken fence as inspiration of how to "filter"in female into the male environment with an installation.

Using crosswalk as inspiration for a performance that can intervene the male with the female.

How do I represent "female" without it being just feminin? How is feminine and masculine represented in the space for me to materialize?

when mapping I observed the space as an outsider. Which made me question if it would even be my place to make an artistic intervention.

Made me think of the work “Destroy My Face” by artist Erik Kessels. An intervention that clashed with the space and their values causing a lot of controversy.

Vanessa Beecroft interprets kappa 'omini' logo with 100 models.

This artistic intervention introduced different bodies in the space in a way that align better with the space.

Ideas

What defines a territory and how does it manifest in the skate park?

1- Bordered by existing bounderies
2- Markings
3- Behavioral
4- Useres norm "male/dress code"

- It is a built culture harvested in the infrustructure.
- When trespassing it becomes more visible.
- Playing with the confines of the urban logistics.

Push bounderies of exclusion by highlighting that it is a terriotry.

1

2

Include the excluded. Show everything thats absent in the space (elder,childer,women etc)

Nicole Wermers

Ernesto Neto