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Al Riyadh
Yazid Anani and Emily Jacir
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Emily Jacir and Yazid Anani present “Al Riyadh” a series of public interventions which explore
the rapid transformation of the urban fabric of Ramallah. Ramallah is becoming a city of grey
concrete towers with skeletons of half-finished high-rises everywhere. It seems that there is
a construction site on every corner with new high-rise buildings replacing old buildings and
wiping out the city’s architectural heritage. With a neoliberal economy that is still in the process
of spatial appropriation, urban spaces in Ramallah are on a trajectory of accommodating
global processes despite the fact that they exist under Israeli occupation. The influx of
new global telecommunication technology, transnational politics, and global economy has
caused a turbulent shift; the landscape is being destroyed, there is a proliferation of gated
communities, growing social segregation, continued destruction of the rural agro-economy,
and an ever increasing obsession with consumerism. Much of the architecture of the gated
communities is a reproduction of the colonial imagery. “Al Riyadh” the promise of a paradise is
an attempt to create moments of criticality in the transition and collision between locality and
neoliberalism. It questions the correlation of the decline of the Palestinian collective political
project and its resistance to colonialism with the emergence of a city entrapped by neoliberal
politics, neo-capitalist structures and a complete isolation from the Palestinian community
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Location : ramallah
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Date of work : 2010
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