Charlie Hailey, architecture professor, recently received a grant from the Graham Foundation to research Slab City, a place located in California’s desert that is often referred to as the “last free place in America.” Slab City’s 640 acres, however, are slated to be sold by the State of California after existing for more than 150 years as public land.
With help from Donovan Wylie, a lecturer in photography at Ulster University in Belfast, Hailey’s research presents an opportunity to study the relationship between adaptation and control in built environments and to further understand the relation of resistance to landscape. Through photographs, drawings and writing, this collaborative project continues research into how informal settlements relate to autonomy, necessity and control.
Additionally, Hailey was recently invited as a presenter and panelist at the Venice Biennale’s opening weekend. The Institute of Architecture at the University of Applied Arts Vienna organized the panel discussion titled “The Age of Geography: Population displacement and the fate of cosmopolitanism” in the Giardini Central Pavilion. Other panelists included Gerald Bast, Sanford Kwinter, Rachel Silvey and Eyal Weizman.