Interiority in the Urban Environment

This essay is best approached as an assemblage; a selection and arrangement of what can be said and seen. It has been important to think through how to approach writing about the concept of interiority as the lure to define/re-define interiority in its coupling with public—as public interiority—has the potential to catch one in a complicated terrain of competing theoretical arguments. ¹ Sidestepping this, the proposition of this essay is to select and arrange a series of encounters; and in the process, think with and through them to craft connections with concepts of “interiority,” “interior,” and “public interiority.” In some respects, this will be like a work of history—gathering existing examples to give an account of interiority in the urban environment. However, this essay does not aspire to a cohesive teleological narrative nor a survey of the topic. ² Instead, this is an assemblage composed of several encounters—Interior Cities, URBAN + INTERIOR, “The Public Interior and its Subjects,” “urban subjectivity,” and “urban interiority”—that provoke different ways of thinking and practicing interiority in the urban environment. This assemblage itself is situated in another assemblage—this book, composed of further encounters with chapters all addressing/contributing to the provocation of public interiority.