Darkening Cities: Practices, Perspectives, Principles

The nocturnal city is often subject to conventional and regulated forms of illumination. This session will explore the potential for how the multiple relationships between light and urban space might be more creatively deployed to promote a wider array of atmospheres at night. Between planning agendas and nightly claims on urban space, tensions arise but so do opportunities for alternate solutions, adapted to the needs and well-being of nocturnal populations, human and non-human. As cities across the planet work to reduce global warming and light pollution, what practices, principles and perspectives can help shape the potential of dark atmospheres? In endeavouring to build an inter-disciplinary field of inquiry into darkening cities, this session aims to bring together engagements with the urban night from a variety of backgrounds and theoretical orientations.