Architecture, Urban Planning and Collective Identity: Bilbao as a Case Study

The emergence of a collective identity, a complex social and psychological process, may be linked to a specific place and a particular urban layout. Architecture demarcates interior and exterior spaces that not only frame our relationships but can also generate a mirror image of the internal world....

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The American journal of psychoanalysis 2020-12, Vol.80 (4), p.383-394
Main Authors: Gonzalez-Torres, Miguel, Angel, Fernandez-Rivas, Aranzazu
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Behavioral Science and Psychology
Clinical Psychology
Psychoanalysis
Psychology
Psychotherapy
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Summary:The emergence of a collective identity, a complex social and psychological process, may be linked to a specific place and a particular urban layout. Architecture demarcates interior and exterior spaces that not only frame our relationships but can also generate a mirror image of the internal world. The authors examine relevant contributions from the sparse psychoanalytic literature on this subject, to support their hypothesis that changes to a city’s landscape, design, or architecture, when wholeheartedly embraced by its citizens, can serve to forge a new collective identity that helps to deal with absence, pain, and loss. They present the city of Bilbao, Spain, as a case study. This once thriving industrial city had collapsed into economic ruin, rife with social conflict, but since the 1990s, in an urban renewal, has emerged as a unique tourist destination. It has become a modern art and cultural center, symbolized by its most famous piece of contemporary architecture.
ISSN:0002-9548
1573-6741
DOI:10.1057/s11231-020-09265-9