Project with Lights was a strategy for catalyzing community interest in a piece of land that had been approved for development without much consultation. Fourteen neighbours and friends wore backpacks fitted with two 40-watt fluorescent bulbs. Members of the group were attached to each other by a long extension cord; moving the group necessitated finding new sources of energy, so neighbours were invited to donate minutes of energy for the twenty-eight lights, involving them in the discussion around the event.
The group “traced” four different development proposals by standing in representative formations, illuminating the plans at 1:1 scale for the neighbourhood.
Santiago Cirugeda is an architect based in Seville who has proposed semi-legal strategies for housing and urban renovation under the name Recetas Urbanas, or “urban prescriptions,” since 1996. He inhabits gaps between laws, exploiting overlap and oversight to practice autonomous architecture.