Forensic Architecture

Forensic Architecture is a multidisciplinary research group based at the University of London that uses architectural techniques and technologies to investigate cases of state violence and violations of human rights around the world. The group is led by architect Eyal Weizman. Forensic Architecture is a multidisciplinary research group based at the University of London that uses architectural techniques and technologies to investigate cases of state violence and violations of human rights around the world. The group is led by architect Eyal Weizman. The agency develops new evidentiary techniques and undertakes advanced architectural and media research with and on behalf of communities affected by state violence, and routinely works in partnership with international prosecutors, human rights organisations and political and environmental justice groups. The agency is an interdisciplinary team of investigators including architects, scholars, artists, filmmakers, software developers, investigative journalists, archaeologists, lawyers, and scientists. It undertakes investigations in human rights violations by states or corporations, on behalf of civil society groups. The group uses advanced architectural and media techniques to investigate armed conflicts and environmental destruction, as well as to cross-reference a variety of evidence sources, such as new media, remote sensing, material analysis, and witness testimony. Forensic architecture is also an academic field and an emergent field of practice developed at the Centre for Research Architecture, at Goldsmiths, University of London. It refers to the production and presentation of architectural evidence, relating to buildings and urban environments and their media representations. Forensic Architecture was formed in 2010 as a research project within the Centre for Research Architecture at Goldsmiths, University of London. The project developed as a response to several converging phenomena, such as the urbanisation of warfare, the erosion of trust in evidence in relation to state crimes and human rights violations, the emergence and proliferation of open source media (or 'image flotsam'), the increased use of smartphone footage in documenting human rights violations in urban conflict, and the need for civil society to have its own means of evidence production for application in law, politics and advocacy. The first project undertaken by Forensic Architecture was an investigation into the killing of Bassem Abu Rahma in Bil’in, for human rights lawyer and activist Michael Sfard, which was eventually presented to the Supreme Court of Israel. In 2011, Forensic Architecture was awarded funding for four years by the European Research Council. Also that year, a team within Forensic Architecture began to conduct investigations into the policies of European national and international authorities in relation to migration across the Mediterranean. That team, called Forensic Oceanography, published its first report in 2012, investigating of the deaths of seventy-three migrants who were left drifting for two weeks within NATO’s maritime surveillance area. In 2012, Forensic Architecture presented a report to a meeting of states party to the UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons on the use of airburst white phosphorus munitions in urban environments, in regard to the Israeli attacks on Gaza in December 2008 and January 2009, known as ‘Operation Cast Lead’. The report eventually led Israel to admit for the first time the use of such munitions, and later to declare that the IDF would stop using white phosphorus munitions in populated areas. Also that year, the agency conducted an investigation with SITU Studio and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism titled ‘Where the Drones Strike’, on behalf of the UN Special Rapporteur on Counter Terrorism and Human Rights, Ben Emmerson.