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NORDIC LIGHT & COLOUR
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emerges out of the activities of living and is shaped by the ne-
gotiation between our experiential accounts and our performa-
tive engagement.
Thinking of architecture as an artistic composition of physical
appearance that shapes the conditions for our living, we need
to include an “understanding [of] man and his surroundings
as flows that constantly interact and transform each other”
(Jensen 2010:84). In this understanding architecture deals
with experiential processes and situations in which also social
spheres are at play, and space appears as an emerging phe-
nomenon that is constituted in the instantaneous experience
of it. The suggestion is to arrange staging devises as rehearsal
machines for extra daily and pre-expressive capacities.
Thinking of architecture as a staging devise that maintains
a particular time and space form, a firmness in the world to
relate to, a context for presence and directions, opens for a
method of staging experiences using architectural elements,
which “frames, halts, strengthens and focuses our thoughts,
and prevents them from getting lost” (Pallasmaa 2005:45).
To situate experience as a critical medium in architectural
processes means working with the production of experiential
forms of material evidence, which could be pursued through
the staging of specific experiential situations.
Staging improvisation in exercise machines
As discussed, the training of pre-expressivity in staged situa-
tions develops a certain heightened self-reflectivity, a “tech-
nique of acculturation [that] artificializes […] the performer’s
behaviour” (Barba 2007:257) and builds an ability to observe
action and observe observation while in action, an extra-daily
mode of attention and action. The stagings work as ‘exercise
machines’ that “put the [participant] to the test through a
series of obstacles [and] allows the [participant] to know […]
herself through an encounter” (Barba 1995:101), where the
staging devise situates a specific focus on an aspect of herself
as a performing entity, and in this way situates an analytic site
for advanced self-reflection on pre-expressive capacities as a
distinct extra-daily behaviour.
The pre-expressive preparedness facilitates a qualified situa-
tion for improvisation in a staged event, an elaborate mode of
extra-daily behaviour that skilfully allows the participant to ar-
ticulate through formal pre-expressive activities. This architec-
tural staging effects the situation as a habitat for the architect
to improvise extra-daily behaviour. (Fig 09 and 10)
The staging can be considered as an ‘exercise machine’ that
makes improvisation possible by its contextualising framework,
as an open possibility for engagement, and at the same time
directs a particular condition for the improvisation activities,
specifying how to engage.
The frame-object combined with light-zones
The staged investigations use a simplified spatial object: a
frame object the size of a wall. Placed in the theatrical black-
box environment, the light formation is a simple design of light-
zones with theatre luminaires on each side of the frame-object.
The frame is a simple architectural object, which divides the
space in two identical mirrored areas, and is designed to stage
an external exercise machine. The frame-object is even sized
horizontally and vertically, 230x230 cm, with a boarder size of
35x35 cm. The hole in the frame-object situates the viewing of
humans in full size on the other side. Two identical light-zones,
one on each side of the frame-object, produce an even place-
ness characteristic on both sides of the frame-object.
The frame-object introduces a distinction that separates
space in two sides and arranges for human relations to be
explored. According to Grosz, the staging of a wall generates
this distinction, and “constitutes the possibility of an inside
and an outside, dividing the inhabitable from the natural. […]
The wall divides us from the world, on one side, and creates
another world, a constructed and framed world, on its other
side” (Grosz 2008:14). The staging of the frame and light-zones
enable investigation into how the spatial configuration instanti-
ate high-order relationships among people, and how the light
setting promotes performative engagement.
The distinction generated by the frame-object marks certain
relational possibilities, and “provides new connections, new
relations, social and interpersonal relations, with those on its
other side” (Grosz 2008:14). The frame-object allows people to
be confronted, and enables a symmetrical relationship between
the sides of the frame-object. The frame-object can be passed
and is therefore simultaneously abstract and concrete, a
separator and a passage, and it stages a social agreement on a
certain set of social framing operations.
Dynamism originating from the light design
The design of the light-zones indicates enclosed areas, with
diffusion on the border between light-zone and dark-zone,
and with the priority of a higher lit area central to the framed
perspective. These priorities of light are further arranged in a
way that produces a varied pattern in the light, not dissimilar to
an everyday daylight experience.
The dynamic transformational aspect of daylight consequently
evokes a varied spatial experience. In the frame-object the vari-