Case for the defence

摘要

'Do you mind never mentioning the word 'aesthetics' on the witness stand?' Forensic Architecture's Eyal Weizman was given this advice by leading human rights QC Ben Em-merson. You can see Emmerson's point; aesthetics means subjectivity and the whole thrust of Forensic Architecture has been to uncover injustice by analysing in forensic detail the marks of violence on the world, establishing the objective factual evidence. An independent research agency rather than an architecture practice, the team of architects, journalists and lawyers that Weizman has assembled at Goldsmiths, University of London, deconstructs places and events before reassembling constituent parts through 3D digital models, physical models and photo-grammetry to piece together a true picture of what has occurred at a site. It challenges the state and other actors in the name of the ordinary citizen's human rights, and clients include Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the Israeli rights NGO B'Tselem,the Red Cross and the United Nations.