Nicosia buffer zone

Surface semiotic fragments from the buffer zone in Nicosia, a stretch of land of varying breadths that separates the North side of Cyprus (ie the Turkish, occupied side) from the South, Greek side. The buffer zone (or green line) has been under UN control since the Turkish invasion in 1974, and is a collection of walls, barriers, and indeed signs that remind one of the military conflict, while also becoming normalised and receding into the background of urban experience.

Panos Leventis has done extensive work on Nicosia, and Christina Economides, one of my architectural theory students at The Bartlett, wrote an excellent dissertation about the semiotics of the buffer zone in 2020. There is of course plenty more research on this…

Weaponised surfaces, resistance surfaces, trauma surfaces.