Does heritage protection align with the common good? Are the aesthetic or historical values of buildings private or public matters? Who has the right to the White City? How do the citizens of the city perceive their connection and responsibility to historic buildings and to the urban environment? What are the relations between the various stakeholders? Is the nomination of the White City as a World Heritage Site a blessing or a burden?

 

Liebling Haus invites local and international creatives from various disciplines to apply for our residency program centered on the topic of heritage protection and the common good – between public and private interests. The program serves as a platform for artistic investigation and action, and active critical commentary on processes the city is undergoing. The program intends to examine the challenges posed by political decisions regarding heritage sites, especially those that UNESCO (The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) declared as World Heritage Sites. The residency offers an opportunity for participants to consider how the built space and the local community are affected by policies and  regulation that were approved following the UNESCO nomination of Tel Aviv as a World Heritage Site (The White City).

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The project is a collaboration with the Planning Policy Lab at the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, and is accompanied by academic research on the conflicts and challenges associated with world heritage protection. This comparative analysis centers on two case studies: Tel Aviv and Vienna and examines three scales – supra-national, national and local, testing the link between the application of international norms (commitment to preservation) and changes occurring in political and local arenas. The research addresses questions such as: How does the acceptance of international norms influence the various stakeholders – property owners, entrepreneurs, city residents and visitors? How do they feel about preservation and how do they deal with the various conflicts and challenges it brings about?

 

Creatives are invited to examine the link between the common good and private interests in the White City, while referring to the conservation of buildings, the spaces in between buildings, and the public space. The program seeks to broaden the view and to examine the tensions and challenges that exist on site, fourteen years after the initiation of Tel Aviv’s Heritage Preservation Plan, published after the UNESCO declaration.