The Living Room is a public art installation located in front of the City Hall in Ottawa, Ontario. Urban Keios, an architectural design firm based in Ottawa, invites people into this living room in public and, “as visitors walk around and through The Living Room, a relationship between the participant’s body and each object at the site begins.”
Figure 1. The Living Room. The living room has a doorway, some chairs, a window and a television. Image source: Judy Chen. Ottawa, 2021.
Taking on the advantage of the setting, I entered the room through two different means—through the doorway as well as through the window. This experiment allowed me to experience promenade architecturale, a concept developed by Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier. Promenade architecturale emphasises on movement and stresses that as one follows an itinerary of a built space, images (not just fixed objects) unfold and the views develop. By promenading the space and with what I saw along my path in and through the room I created a relationship with the objects. I was intrigued by learning the different relationship I created with the objects and hence the changes in my practices. When I entered the space through the doorway, I saw the chairs and the TV and their relational position; I saw an event unfolding in front of me—that I was invited to sit, relax and watch the television. However, when I entered through the window and as I walked, the view changed—it was as if I was trespassing and I had this curiosity to keep walking and exploring around the room.
This type of private-space-in-the-public is very interesting. This living room in Ottawa inhabits a space that is neither inside nor outside, public nor private. Perhaps it is this indefinite feature that gives urban space its fluidity and imagination.
Figure 2. Doorway or window? Which itinerary would you follow? Image source: Judy Chen. Ottawa, 2021.
Figure 3. Promenading to, and later through, the living room. I stumbled across this living room as I was promenading through the City Hall while taking a short cut. Image source: Judy Chen. Ottawa, 2021.
