Title: Occupied Spaces
Photographer(s): Ben Roberts
Writer(s): Naomi Colvin
Designer(s):
Publisher(s): Self-publishing, England, London
Year: 2012
Print run: 250
Language(s): English
Pages: 28
Size: 21 x 29 cm
Binding: Elastic cord loose leaf document binding
Edition: 2014, 100 copies
Print: Here press, London, England
Nation(s) and year(s) of Protest: England, 2011
ISBN: 978–0–9574724–3–3
On the 15th October 2011, protestors representing the global Occupy movement set up a semi-permanent camp outside St. Paul’s Cathedral in central London. The aim of the protest was to encourage discourse and raise awareness of social and economic inequalities.
On 25 October, several UK newspapers and media outlets ran stories claiming that ‘thermal imaging’ proved that only 10% of the 250 tents in St. Paul’s Square were being inhabited overnight. I was immediately sceptical of these claims.
This series of photographs catalogues some of the communal and private spaces that were installed in the St. Paul’s and Finsbury Square camps. The traces of activity and inhabitance serve as a clear document of the utilisation of a limited space by a large number of permanent and temporary residents.