WHO PUT THIS MACHINE HERE? A THESIS EXPLORING THE MECHANICS OF INTERIOR SPACE
WHAT HAPPENS IF WE CONSIDER THE INTERIOR AS A SET OF MECHANICAL RELATIONSHIPS AND SYSTEMS THAT CAN GENERATE EXPERIENCE? WHAT THEN, ARE THE IMPLICATIONS FOR THE SITE AS A ‘SPACE’ AND THE INTERIOR AS A ‘DESIGN[ER]’? A fundamental aspect of Interior Design is the production and construction of ‘experiences’. This thesis explores the idea that an interior is made up of a set of ‘machines’ – A machine being a set of automated relationships that occur within a space. How these interact with each other, are assembled – or ‘designed’ – form an experience. The body of research will examine the relational with respect to the systematic. It is this relationship – how we inhabit these mechanical systems – which I propose, is a way of understanding the interior. The research will be broken into initially two parts: the examination, definition and mapping of these relationships, how they occur, coupled with the exploration of how these spatial machines could be tweaked or inserted into existing spatial contexts to generate new experiences and interior spaces.
The site itself began to speak of forces beyond its physical barriers, of political, social and ephemeral A SYSTEMATIC UNDERSTANDING OF SPACE
characters that began to perform in front of me. Phones rang, iPods AN UNDERSTANDING OF SYSTEMATIC SPACE
formed bonds with strangers. Intimate moments within the performance on THE ‘EXPANDED SITE’
the platform suggested encounters that are acknowledged but never taken further.
Mapping of ‘Systematic Influences that make up the Richmond Railway Station Experience This project began as a photographic exploration into the way in which Spatial Systems/Machines are apparent within Richmond Railway Station. Through the filmic exercise - of which stills are the product - I was able to begin to identify the way in which these ‘systems’ or sets of relationships began to form the experience of being in the site. From there I began to deconstruct identify, and map different relations that were happening within the ‘barriers’ of the station.
… ‘it is not a matter of saying “the bicycle is…” –a machine, for instance, but rather the bicycle and the person riding it, the bicycle and the person, and the person mutually supporting one another’… — Gerald Raunig, A Thousand Machines
Photographic Study of Spatial Systems that Influence the Experience of Commuting
‘Chaos here may be understood not as absolute disorder but rather as a plethora of orders, forms, wills – CURATING THE EXPANDED SITE
forces that cannot be distinguished or differentiated from each other…’
— Elizabeth Grosz, Chaos, Territory, Art: Deleuze and the Framing of the Earth
Walk forwards towards the stairs
Climb them
Keep Going
Walk Around the Edge of the Room
STOP.
Meanjin, Next to the red book - turn to page twenty-nine
Audio guide Storyboard & Test
Move towards the room
Catalogue System
of Introduction
ments
Exterior Ele
Purp
ose o f Cat alo
Cata lo
gue is
gue S ystem al sic hy P s
e Sit
e at St
State Library Systems Before
Systems Augmentation Diagram The diagram shows the spatial relationship before and during the tour. The Audioscape upsets the existing relations of the space, and the hierarchy of how we engage with them
pted
y ar ibr
yA
r ra Lib
Disru
eL at St
State Library Systems After
As
P
al sic hy
e Sit
BLASTING THE SYSTEM —
‘You can be fun. You probably enjoy SUBVERSION & EXPLOITATION
life. But you’ve got some bad habits. AS TACTICS OF UNDERSTANDING THE MACHINE
You’re too fond of what you’ve been told to be fond of.’*
*Twenty-three Manifestoes of the DADA Movement
Details of responses from a trial of the guides
Desired Relationships
Environmental Relationships
Architectural Relationships
Socio- Behavioural Relationships
National Gallery of Victoria Spatial Systems Map National Gallery of Victoria Guidebook Project Map A diagram that displays the relationships that the guidebook project has with the spatial mapping that I completed for the NGV. It outlines the scope of the experiment.
NARRATIVES
What is the compromise between &
architecture, the inhabitant’s TERRITORIES
demands, and their own personal routine?
IN
How then, does this – their system INTERIOR SPACES
– manifest itself? How do they encounter and relate to their space?
Narrative Mappings Narrative Mappings: These are narrative Mappings of the ‘zones’ of occupation within the bedroom of the subject. The core goal of this project was asking ‘why’ things were the way that they were in order to unravel the relationships that made the space, and the machine that was Natasha’s bedroom.
A Room of One’s Own This process of interviewing then transformed the space from being a bedroom into a series of ‘inhabitation territories.’ The space became divided, segmented, yet still remained layered and above all, fluid.
Area Dominated by Natural Light
Director Accounts
Creative Director Artistic Director
Freelance Desk
Photocopier
General Manager Restrooms
Graphic Designer Photocopier
Office Kitchen
Graphic Designer
Web Designer
Lounge Area
Web Designer Coat Rack
Entrance
Area Dominated by Artificial Light
Power Relations, Office Activity & Light Relationships Diagram
Area Dominated by Natural Light
Area Dominated by Natural Light
Area Dominated by Natural Light
Photocopier
General Manager
General Manager
Creative Director
Accounts Accounts
Lounge Area
General Manager
Creative Director
Web Designer
Web Designer
Graphic Designer Graphic Designer
Artistic Director
Lounge Area
Restrooms
Freelance Desk
Web Designer
Web Designer
Graphic Designer
Graphic Designer
Director Restrooms
Artistic Director
Office Kitchen
Graphic Designer
Artistic Director Creative Director
Photocopier
Director Office Kitchen
Director
Freelance Desk
Photocopier
Graphic Designer
Accounts
O
Freelance Desk
Web Designer
Web Designer Lounge Area
Photocopier
Accounts
Coat Rack Coat Rack
Lounge Area
Accounts
Creative Director Web Designer
Area Dominated by Artificial Light
Power Relations, Office Activity Entrance & Light Relationships Diagram Office Reshuffle 01
Area Dominated by Artificial Light
Entrance
Power Relations, Office Activity & Light Relationships Diagram Office Reshuffle 02
Entrance
Area Dominated by Artificial Light
Artistic Director
Kitchen
Accounts
General Manager
General Manager
Freelance Desk
Coat Rack
Coat Rack
Accounts
Freelance Desk
Graphic Designer
W Desi
Graphic Designer
W Desi
Accounts
Director Coat Rack Lounge Area Graphic Designer Web Designer
Lounge Area Office Kitchen
Freelance Desk
Graphic Designer Graphic Designer
Director
Freelance Desk
Web Designer
Creative Director
Freelance Desk
Accounts Lounge Area Accounts
Coat Rack
Power Relations, Office Activity & Light Relationships Diagram Open Office Project This project explored the dynamics of an Open Office Advertising Agency as a case study, and through the process ofOffice Reshuffle 04 Entrance
Graphic Designer
General Manager Artistic Director Director
Photocopier
Artistic Director
Creative Director
Kitchen
Power Relations, Office Activity & Light Relationships Diagram Office Reshuffle 06
Kitchen
Web Designer
graphic representation - diagrams, maps - developed a series of propositional power relationships based on viewpoints.
Coat Rack
Once realising that there was no real narrative, and letting go of any anticipation they had of something happening, they became selfDESIGNER
reflexive. Sounds moved from being MECHANIC
‘what they were’ to fusing with their AUDIENCE
minds. Both felt a kind of intimacy – APPARATUS
they began to sound like heartbeats aiding their emotive responses.
Augmented Apparatus The Augmented Apparatus was an experimental project that took the form of an abstracted audio-visual installation that explored the way in which I, as a designer, could create a spatial machine based on a hierarchy of viewpoints. The Installation was followed by an interview which explored the way in which the participants responded to the experience.
I Felt Like The darkness was there to eliminate visual stimulus and allow the people to focus on the sounds. It became quite a personal environment, and in many ways a kind of ceremony that inflated the importance of what I was doing. This was also fuelled by my not giving any information about what was going to happen at all – so as not to give any preconceived ideas as to how to interpret the test. I had initially asked them if they could ‘place’ the space, and how much time they spent trying. One of them wasn’t actually trying to necessarily ‘place’ it, but rather realised that the sounds were those of movement, and so the location was not a static one, but one of threshold – from inside to outside etc. to them, it was about where I [the sound] might be going, rather than where I was. The other participant took had a more empathetic experience. They recognised that it was recorded in Germany, but became involved in the sound, and at certain points interpreted a certain ‘nervous energy’ – which matched how I was feeling when I was recording the sound. For them, the environment became alive, but in a more emotional way. So there was no ‘site’ just the emotion of being in one.