Selen Çatalyürekli

This is the poetry of placemaking practices of a temporary migrant in London between the dates 13th of May and 15th of June in 2018. It is a trial to deconstruct the directives that affected her behaviors both inner and physical spaces.

The story was about 'placemaking on personal space’ and 'analyzing the what public space tells to its users' and letting 'the visible and invisible traces’ to regulate her behaviors.

The matter was about listening the things that the city had been telling to its residents and perceiving the physicalities that effects the behaviors.

The journey was about, to be able to recognize her personal reflexes to deal with a new city, in a new country.

The struggle was about being open to change, adapt, resist not to change and make a place for her own at a new social and physical environment.

It was about living in a city that has been leading its users on where to look, defining their behavioral speed, telling where to stand, encouraging what to fink on, warning that their behaviors have been watched out. It can be in a form of uplifting black humor like the one with ’smile, you are on cctv’.

The question was about ‘Who is the director of the public spaces, what is the directives and in which forms they can appear and how they can reallocated to make a space yours?’

Another question was about ‘How the public spaces are shaped with the different forms of construction elements by bureaucratic power holders for controlling the public sphere and their perceptions on ideal urban imagery?

So here we are collectively reconstructing a new meaning out of them by a new poetic, customizable, inclusive, negotiable directives.

Hope to follow your own poets at the next platforms.