Abstract

Placemaking interventions typically emerge at the interface of several disciplines, drawing insights, inspiration, and techniques from intellectual and aesthetic traditions ranging from the social sciences to social practice. In this two-part interview, an artist and an anthropologist consider their own experiences and encounters with projects unfolding under the banner of placemaking. They pay close attention to how these encounters tease out the contradictions and complexities facing the field at large. Starting out in 2015 with a dialogue focused on their recent experiences in Chicago and broadening in 2020 to include reference points in Philadelphia and New York City, this interview considers developments in the critical literature of Placemaking as well as a number of specific case studies including Rebuild Foundation and the Village of Arts & Humanities. They take up several notable developments, including placemaking's professionalization and the standardization of familiar tools and techniques, like storytelling. What, they ask, can such developments tell us about how placemaking projects address or might be better positioned to address ongoing equity issues at a contemporary moment?