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Urban Lab Conversations
07 November 2025, 4:15 pm–6:00 pm
Join the Urban Lab Conversations, this time on 'Extractive Infrastructures and Spatial Justice'
This event is free.
Event Information
Open to
- All
Availability
- Yes
Cost
- Free
Organiser
-
Nishat Awan, UCL Urban Laboratory
Location
-
IAS Common Ground, G11Gower StreetLondonWC1E 6BTUnited Kingdom
What is the role of research collectives in resisting extractive infrastructures in (post)conflict situations? Abir Saksouk (Public Works Studio) and Pelin Tan (Arazi Assembly) will share the research and activities of their collectives and discuss the role of research/solidarity in redefining spatial and ecological justice in a more-than-human world. Nishat Awan from the UCL Urban Laboratory will moderate.
Public Works Studio is a multidisciplinary research and design studio that engages critically and creatively with a number of urban and public issues in Lebanon. Their projects aim to forge possibilities that make urban planning a democratic process where ordinary citizens can understand, judge and take decisions to make interesting, viable and just spaces.
Arazi Assembly considers collective research as a form of knowledge production of decolonization, care and solidarity. Consisting of urban and architectural researchers, they work together at different spatial scales focusing on the southeast region of Turkiye. Arazi Assembly aims to understand and develop uncommon methodologies of architecture, urbanism and territorial research.
About the Speakers
Abir Saksouk
Co-founder at Public Works Studio
Abir Saksouk graduated as an architect in 2005 and later completed her master's in Urban Development Planning. She is the co-founder of Public Works Studio. Her primary focus includes urbanism and law, property and shared space, and the right to the city of marginalized communities. She is active in exploring how local organizing can be used to shape the future of cities. Abir is also a member of the Legal Agenda and a co-founder of Dictaphone Group.
More about Abir SaksoukPelin Tan
Pelin Tan is a sociologist, a professor, and the head of the Film Department and the Cultural Studies Master's Program at Batman University, Turkiye. She is the 6th recipient of the Keith Haring Art and Activism (2019). Tan is a member of Arazi Assembly, a collective of artists, planners, activists, and architects working especially in the south-east of Turkey and neighbouring countries. Tan is also a member of the Research Steering Network Committee of Canadian Centre for Architecture Montreal. Her book, Forms of Non-Belonging, is published by eflux books, Sterberg Press and MIT Press.
More about Pelin Tan