Parigi, maggio 1968. La città insorge. Studenti e operai bloccano le vie e ostruiscono il passaggio alle forze dell’ordine, mettendo in crisi il progetto haussmaniano di città militarizzata, concentrazionale. Sampietrini, sedie, biciclette, cassoni dell’immondizia, spranghe, automobili, insegne: i manifestanti seppero utilizzare di tutto per ridisegnare l’architettura cittadina a proprio vantaggio, in vista degli scontri con la polizia. 

TAXONOMY OF THE BARRICADE by Wolfgang Scheppe is out now

An iconographic taxonomy—researched, conceived, and ideated by Wolfgang Scheppe, also author of the book’s final essay—that traces the state and police visual control through almost 500 images from the May 1968 police archives in Paris.

The pictorial order of a regime of surveillance applied during the last wide-ranging insurgence in Europe’s history surfaces from the analysis of this unique visual archive. Following the events happening at the Sorbonne in May 1968, alongside general strikes and nationwide factory occupations, France’s state of emergency becomes apparent through a specific iconography of visual control.

This critical moment in the development of governmental visualization strategies towards a totalitarian god’s perspective on the urban fabric has been researched and documented for the first time, by employing the vast photo archives of the Archives de la Préfecture de police de Paris. Among other characteristic typologies of authoritative monitoring aspects, the events in May ’68 marked the historic beginning of the deployment of helicopter based aerial photography as a means of governmental crowd control in a situation of escalating insurrection.

Check it out : https://www.neroeditions.com/product/taxonomy-of-the-barricade-image-acts-of-political-authority-in-may-1968/