What protests and architecture have in common

A pyramid of sorts in the protest camp "Wüste" (or 'Desert' as seen in the image) became the symbol of the "Lobau-bleibt!" ('Lobau stays!') movement. The Lobau, a floodplain area near the city of Vienna that has been designated as worthy of protection, has long been threatened by the plans of Austria's transport policy. A tunnel is to be built here as part of the Vienna bypass highway.

Brown coal instead of forest: For years, climate activists have protested against the clearing of the Hambach Forest in western Germany. They built a tree house settlement with suspension bridges, solar panels and stoves. The protest camp on the edge of the Garzweiler II open pit coal mine was cleared in 2018, after which a new generation of interconnected tree houses was built on the same site.

This is also a form of — mobile — architecture: A barricade made of masks, helmets, wooden shields and umbrellas. This is how activists in Hong Kong protected themselves from tear gas and water cannon. Their motto: "Be Water" — or be as intangible as water. The protests for greater democracy were thus characterized by "fluid" tactics — in order to be able to react more quickly to police actions.

The protest camp "Povo sem Medo" ("People without Fear") in Sao Paulo, with 33,000 participants and over 12,000 shacks, was the best-known action of the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Sem Teto ("Homeless Workers Movement") and one of the largest in all of Latin America. The movement's goal is to make vacant buildings and spaces usable for the homeless and poor.

During the "Umbrella Revolution" in 2014, tens of thousands of people took to the streets in Hong Kong to demonstrate for more democracy. Here, a protest camp with more than 2,300 tents on an eight-lane road in the financial district. During the three-month occupation, the camp was equipped with WiFi, gas-powered generators and seminar rooms. The tents were rented out like hotel rooms.

People erected barricades made of pallets, bulky waste, car tires and ice to protect themselves from police attacks: This is what it looked like in Kyiv, Ukraine in December 2013. Initially, only a few protesters occupied the symbolic Maidan Nezalezhnosti ("Independence Square"), but a broad movement grew out of it. And at its center was the protest camp.

Another example of a protest village: In May 2013, demonstrations took place in Istanbul's Gezi Park against a planned construction project. The activists arrived with mattresses, colorful blankets, tarpaulins and hundreds of tents and stayed for weeks. The park thus became a symbol of civil society resistance.

From 2011 to 2013, Tahrir Square in central Cairo was repeatedly the scene of mass protests. Seen here is the protest camp on the otherwise busy traffic circle during Egypt's "January 25 Revolution," part of the larger Arab Spring wave of pro-democracy protests and uprisings against the region's authoritarian regimes that took place in the Middle East and North Africa beginning in 2010 and 2011.

The "Occupy" movement criticized the US American and global financial systems and social inequality. Protesters occupied Zuccotti Park in Manhattan's Financial District in New York for nine weeks, sparking the worldwide protest movement. The camp evolved from an open-air structure to a dense city of private tents.

An entire village of huts made of tree trunks and chipboard was built in May 1980 in the Flörsheim forest southwest of Frankfurt, Germany. The builders were protesting against the expansion of the international airport; their village blocked the construction site of the "Runway West." The protests were part of the growing environmental movement of the 1970s and 1980s.

On May 3, 1980, an initiative of the anti-nuclear movement proclaimed the "Republic of Free Wendland" near Gorleben, Germany. For one month, a village of huts stood in a forest clearing in the area of a planned repository for radioactive waste. On June 4, 1980, the village was evacuated by police and the Federal Border Guard. Seen here, are two of residents taking their Sunday bath.

Martin Luther King's "Poor People's Campaign" had taken up the cause that every person should have enough money for a dignified life. This included decent housing. As part of the campaign, a six-week protest camp was built on the National Mall in Washington in 1968. The "Protest and Architecture" show in Frankfurt runs from September 16, 2023 to January 14, 2024.