INDEPENDENT ALGERIA – Art, Architecture and Ideology in the Postcolony (March 5-6, 2026)
Organized by Dominique Lounés Laleg, University of Zürich
Thursday March 5: Space, Power, and the Colonial Legacy (online)
This day investigates the built environment and urban heritage as critical tools for nation-building, focusing on how architectural production and the management of historic urban cores functioned as sites for ideological self-representation and the materialization of state sovereignty in post-independence Algeria.
Friday, March 6: Postcolonial Imaginaries: Institutions, Networks, and Contested Identities (online)
This day analyzes the development of the visual arts and the formalization of national cultural institutions as primary sites for identity construction, exploring the persistent negotiations and tensions that emerged between revolutionary state ideology and indigenous cultural resistance.
Participants:
Asma Hadjilah (EPAU Alger), Sidi Mohammed el Habib Benkoula (Département d’architecture d’Oran), Ramy Benaferi (École Nationale Supérieure d'Architecture de Paris-Belleville), Magda Maaoui (Harvard Graduate School of Design), Marisa García Vergara (University of Girona), Shivani Shedde (Princeton University/Pratt Institute in New York), Susan Slyomovics (University of California), Lydia Hamiti (Université de Poitiers), Katarzyna Falecka (Newcastle University), Camille Kaiser (Genève), Youri Hammache-Sigour (Université Paris Nanterre/Università La Sapienza di Roma), Connie Sjӧdin (University of Oxford), Abdelkrim Boukachabia (Université de Genève), Julian Volz (Leuphana University Lüneburg), Lydia Haddag (Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne), Hannah Feldman (University of Pennsylvania), Cynthia Becker (Boston University), Arianna Desideri (Università La Sapienza di Roma).