About

Public spaces and their design plays a key part in how we engage and move through society. We are interested in the tension between the public space and the individual and how we can find new ways of seeing our cities.

Part street art, placemaking, hardware hacking and advocacy, our goal is to improve the social equality of our cities by challenging their current design. Making visible the invisible micro-aggressions of unaccessible design and behaviour

Micro-aggressions

I want to scream and shout but I keep quiet and move around another undipped curb, parked car, blocked pavement or some other micro-aggression of access. Another stupid city that tells me I do not belong and forces me to endanger my safety or to not participate.

The layers of micro-aggressions slowly accrue, the friction of moving through public spaces increases. Every new journey carries an increasing weight and eventually that weight starts to affect the willingness to engage in society.

Changing the build environments of our cities is a massive problem. Its nothing new, we know some of the answers:

• 2019 The Transport Committee on pavement parking.
• 2017 Building for Equality: Disability and the built environment

What can we do? This project is about driving changes but most importantly we want a shield to tackle the reality of living with micro-aggressions.

To listen and to shout, LOUDLY and together.

Opportunities

• Call for proposals: Blocked micro-grant [Closed].

  We are looking for artists who identify as disabled and have experiences of difficulty navigating through public space due to mobility issues, and related experiences of social isolation.

  "The feeling of not belonging because of poor design when journeying through public space. The feeling of having to risk personal safety to participate. A sense of friction or weight left in the mind that affects the desire to move through public space."

Previous Workshops

• 2nd March 2020 / Bath Spa, UK

  Drop in session exploring access of Bath, UK. Running 10:30am-1pm at Bath Spa Innovation building

  Also running remote sessions and phone calls for anyone unable to attend physically. Email: info@stupidcities.com

• 9th March 2020 / Bristol, UK

  Drop in session exploring access of Bristol, UK. Running 10:30am-1pm at Downstairs @ Watershed Bristol.

  Also running remote sessions and phone calls for anyone unable to attend physically. Email: info@stupidcities.com

Visiblity

Tweets by stupid_cities

Contact

Supported by Bristol+Bath Creative R+D and the South West Creative Network

Email: joe@josephwilk.net

Twitter: https://twitter.com/stupid_cities