Reclaiming the city? An exploration of urban art in Birmingham, UK and Barcelona, Spain

This thesis explores the idea of reclaiming the city in Barcelona, Spain and Birmingham, UK. Building on Lefebvre’s (1996) idea of the right to the city and Harvey’s (2012) concept of the urban commons, it considers this struggle in a new context addressing the question of how public space is contested and used. The lens through which this is explored is through urban art. It takes the stand point that urban art is part of the multitude of symbols and meanings that urban space feeds to its inhabitants, and in turn, a medium that inhabitants utilise to ascribe meaning to space.

Power has previously been ascribed to urban art in two ways. On the one hand in regards to its ability to act as a means of disseminating a range of perspectives, ideas and opinions via its huge public reach. On the other hand its mere existence has been seen as a mechanism to democratize city streets, providing citizens with a means to reclaim space by altering city aesthetics. However, these qualities are somewhat questionable in the current climate, where cultural and artistic practices are appropriated for capital. Whereas urban art has traditionally been used as a tool of the people, it is now frequently utilised to benefit structures of power.

This thesis explores this juxtaposition by focusing on two cities which have undergone substantial changes in regards to their relationship with urban art and urban space in general. It does this by employing a qualitative approach to investigate three frames of investigation- the public, the artists and the general urban art landscape. In doing so, it analyses the extent to which urban art continues to act as a tool of resistance, its ability to reclaim the city and the extent to which its function has now changed.