THE HYPERLIEU
URBAN INFORMALITY & SPACES OF EXCEPTION
URBAN INFORMALITY & SPACES OF EXCEPTION
In the increasingly congested, and overlaying flat spaces of the city, whether it be one of economic production, social interaction, cultural engagement or in relation to a global financial market; it seems that if one is not incorporated into these structured, formal systems,state technologies and ‘finite urban ecologies,’ that the potentiality for successfully practicing through the above would be largely limited. The result is fluxes of internal displacement within the metropolis; an urban phenomenon occurring across an international plane. It is at this intersection, and through a series of instances in cities of the global south and the post-colonies, that this project operates. It exposes the [problematic] ability for achieving successful social ‘being’ in an efficient urban ‘community.’
The displaced citizen continually falls towards and beyond the fringe of the registered community,into a zone of banishment; yet aside from these visible structured systems, life continuesto be sustained and appropriated through necessity, in a ‘state of exception;’ a space where necessity has no law. Through (and in symbiosis with) the resultant expulsion, it turns into a tool for the exposure of new axes of practice and community. Here, it is in alignmentwith Jean-Luc Nancy’s notion of an infinite/ differential nature of community that comes into being through the existence of finite, singular beings [and things], exposed in relation to one another. These are the dimensions of interest, and the new ecologies which develop through them the matter of concern; aimed to generate urban tools for socio-economic sustainability. These deep spaces of informal modes of practice in the city tend to be mobileand transient in nature, coming into existence through the space-times that host their genesis whilst attempting their banishment. It is a highly charged space of conflict and exchange; instances of which are investigated through the project. It is the ‘Hyperlieu, ’ a zoneon the fringe of residence, commerce, banishment and waste; conjoining notions of the Hypermarché & the Banlieu; and the moment of exposure that creates it, the ‘Ereignis.’
The displaced citizen continually falls towards and beyond the fringe of the registered community,into a zone of banishment; yet aside from these visible structured systems, life continuesto be sustained and appropriated through necessity, in a ‘state of exception;’ a space where necessity has no law. Through (and in symbiosis with) the resultant expulsion, it turns into a tool for the exposure of new axes of practice and community. Here, it is in alignmentwith Jean-Luc Nancy’s notion of an infinite/ differential nature of community that comes into being through the existence of finite, singular beings [and things], exposed in relation to one another. These are the dimensions of interest, and the new ecologies which develop through them the matter of concern; aimed to generate urban tools for socio-economic sustainability. These deep spaces of informal modes of practice in the city tend to be mobileand transient in nature, coming into existence through the space-times that host their genesis whilst attempting their banishment. It is a highly charged space of conflict and exchange; instances of which are investigated through the project. It is the ‘Hyperlieu, ’ a zoneon the fringe of residence, commerce, banishment and waste; conjoining notions of the Hypermarché & the Banlieu; and the moment of exposure that creates it, the ‘Ereignis.’
[Ereignis is translated often as “an event,” but is better understood in terms of something“coming into view.” Hubert Dreyfus defined the term as “things coming into themselves bybelonging together.”] The deep space of exception that is of concern is exposed, forming multi- axial communities through momentary occurrences of the ‘Ereignes.’ This notion serves as a vital tool to aid the study of symbiotic, urban hyperlieus and in turn enables theturning of the situational apparatus that facilitate some important informal practices and cooperative economies. Catalysed through a coexistential analytic, and with the aim of exposing the potential of deep spaces of exception, the project deconstructs the originary notion of community through extrapolating the structures of literary/sonic communism and acollection of conversations. Through this investigation of transient urban spaces, exposing themselves by following notions of displacement, mobility and flexible citizenship, it opensthe possible turning of its exceptional and resilient tools to inform spaces of exchange and cooperative urban communities.
