The DA! collective was an art collective who squatted a townhouse at in Mayfair, Westminster, Greater London in October 2008. The property, at 18 Upper Grosvenor Street, is a 30-room grade II-listed 1730s mansion worth an estimated £6.25 million pounds owned by the billionaire Duke of Westminster, Britain's wealthiest private landlord. The collective changed the locks on the property.
In a statement delivered from the balcony (bedecked with a blacked-out tattered Union Jack), Stephanie Smith (in a mask and a ragged miniskirt) declared:
| “ | Who we are is not important. As a collective we have 'squatted' an empty, dilapidated building in Mayfair ... We are making this place live through the exchange of knowledge and ideas. | ” |
The Da! collective is made up of a dozen teenagers, students, and artists. They have been acclaimed as winners of "the National Squattery" by The Sun. The collective claim a squatters' portfolio worth over £100 million.
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Famous quotes containing the word collective:
“The last man of the world-city no longer wants to live—he may cling to life as an individual, but as a type, as an aggregate, no, for it is a characteristic of this collective existence that it eliminates the terror of death.”
—Oswald Spengler (1880–1936)