Contested spaces as spectacles

This article discusses the role of scenographic methodologies in revisiting spaces associated with political conflict and trauma. In doing so, the author presents her artistic research and design process behind the art installation 'Spectators in a Ghost City', the exhibition of the Cyprus National participation in the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space 2023 which places the occupied city of Famagusta, abandoned since 1974, as a contested-space-becoming-spectacle. The author describes how analysing the space through a scenographic lens allows a close examination of the city's materiality and how this, in turn, becomes the source for artistic creation. Focusing on the scenographic process of scaling down, sculptural maquettes and portable models in walking practices are approached as symbolic objects for communicating issues on displacement, space politics, surveillance and agency. In that sense, scenographic methodologies are discussed as thinking processes, a political act of resistance, and a tool for negotiating artistic practices and real spaces of conflict. This process is defined as 'scenography reversed', where a real place becomes a dramatised scene, allowing alternative understandings that expand beyond hegemonic narratives. The article places Famagusta as a paradigm of contested spaces and questions whether scenographic methodologies can be a possible approach to reconciliation and conflict resolution.