Portable Indo Pacific

Fake Industries Architectural Agonism and UTS (Spain, Australia)

Galata Greek Primary School

“The 2013 Australian Defense White Paper entitled ‘Indo-Pacific Strategic Arc‘ formally shifted the country geopolitically from the Pacific to the Indo-Pacific Region. The new region… extends from the west coast of South America to the East coast of Africa and includes South East Asia and the Persian Gulf… The invention of the Indo-Pacific region was a twofold operation; both an act of naming and of storytelling. But while the geographical limits of the region were clearly stated in its name, the narratives that hold its geography together are barely in place… The establishment of a new global region is a rare event—even more so if not triggered by a violent episode. It radically reconfigures the shape, limits and relationships of a section of the world. It is the definitive design project, yet designers are rarely involved.” –CG, UG

Portable Indo Pacific explores what it means to design a whole geo-political region. It examines the invention of the Indo-Pacific, a new global region officially recognized by Australia in 2013. A series of wandering maps travelling through the exhibition on carts is accompanied by oral stories. They present the geographical, cultural and legal conflicts of this vast, fragmented and highly variable territory — as if architecture might or must address the missing narratives of the design.