Project

What can an ageing block of flats tell us about welfare provisioning, austerity and inequality? In the wake of the Grenfell Tower disaster in London and the increase in other housing incidents around the world, pressing questions have been raised about the role of the state in caring for its citizens by providing housing that is safe, comfortable and affordable.

My research addresses these questions by analysing how Romanian inhabitants are involved in the care and refurbishment of their building, when the state has retreated from those responsibilities. It examines the inhabitants’ capacity for self-organization, with a focus on the daily life of a block administrator overseeing the maintenance and repair of his ageing building. In doing so, it explores how inhabitants come to terms with the uncertainties of a rapidly changing society – one caught between the vulnerabilities of both socialism and capitalism.

Throughout the project, I have used diverse visual methods to explore the infrastructure and material culture inside the building. On the one hand, collaborations with architects have resulted in a unique set of innovative visuals for the thesis. On the other hand, my training as a photographer and a filmmaker has allowed film and photography to occupy a particular place in the project: the award-winning documentary film Blocul (The Block), currently distributed by the Royal Anthropological Institute in the UK, is an original addition to the thesis, as it is part and parcel of the research process.

The research builds on long-term fieldwork in Piatra-Neamt that started in September 2015 with one year of fieldwork and continued with yearly visits to this day. This involved a visual ethnography within the block of flats, as well as throughout the city at large. By taking the unusual step of focusing on just one building, I was able to shed light on the way in which buildings are objects through which the social order is maintained. This focus allowed me to: (1) critically examine the common resources that a community needs to collectively keep their homes in good order and (2) problematize the issue of scale by relating individual apartments with the larger infrastructure of the city.

Architectural illustrations by arch. Irina Elena Nicolescu