Clashes Over Soviet Legacy in Vilnius

Artistic Activism and the Making of Public Space

Resumo

In this essay I will analyse two cases of urban resistance in Vilnius: Pro-test Lab project from 2005 against demolition of the Lietuva Cinema, and the activism against reconstruction plans of the Reformist Square from 2018. Despite the big time gap, the two cases relate to each other in several aspects, which are in focus here: 1) both of them were protests against tearing down architectural structures from Soviet times, and as such they may represent the broader wave of the late post-Soviet revisionism related to infrastructural changes in cities; 2) because they fought not only for material legacy, but also for public spaces which had a certain history of urban practices, these cases show the development of ‘public space’ and ‘public interest’ concepts within public discourse, and also how these very concept were embodied in the activist actions themselves; 3) as cases of activism, which involved many cultural professionals and artists among them, they are productive ground to start with when researching ways cultural professionals engage in social movements.