Promenading living room in public

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.

Art as the Decomposer: Conflating Natural Life Cycles to the Life Cycles of Cities

When thinking about roles art can play in cities, the idea of cyclical cities, which refers to how cities have life cycles of their own that mimic natural life cycles, offers guidance. While naturally, life cycles flow up the food chain to eventually return to its primitive beginnings; cities use competitive advantages to grow until said advantages are overpowered by others, leaving these cities less apt to prevent general decline.

This is the story of several post-Industrial, rust-belt cities including Buffalo, where educator and artist Dennis Maher has set up his artistic practice. His work is primarily concerned with bringing new life to the material excess of Buffalo’s past. Fargo House, perhaps Maher’s most well-known project, saw him explore the nuances of domesticity through the lens of reclamatory art. What I found the most interesting about Maher’s work was how he took the fragments of the past and gave them new value through art. In this manner, art can be used as decomposer to breed new life in cities that are seemingly past their prime.

Fig. 1 The exterior of Fargo House. Source: Dennis Maher’s Assembled Cities Fragments website.

Fig. 2 The interior of Fargo House. Source: Dennis Maher’s Assembled Cities Fragments website.

What do you see in Yellow?

In her essay, Lewis (2010) addresses the “Yellow Town” landscape phenomenon in Lexington, KY in which a massing of yellow signage colour codes the poorest parts of the city with a vivid wash of bright yellow (p.184). While this bright, shiny, primarily-yellow coloured signage associates with the poorest areas of the city, in “nicer” parts of the city more understated blues, greens or greys are seen.

Fig. 1 Yellowtown Collage. Image source: Lewis, 2010.

These colours—specifically yellow and grey—make me think of the colours of the year. Last December the Pantone Colour Institute revealed two hues for its colour of the year 2021: the neutral Ultimate Gray (Pantone 17-5104) and vibrant yellow Illuminating (Pantone 13-0647). In the year with undercurrents of uncertainty—owing to the global pandemic—Pantone wants to highlight how different elements, in this case the two extremely independent colours, come together to express the message of strength and hopefulness.

Fig. 2 Colour of the Year 2021. It is the first time an achromatic colour (grey) has been selected. Image source: https://www.cnn.com/style/article/pantone-color-of-the-year-2021/index.html Retrieved on February 1, 2021.

Fig. 3 The aspirational combination of colours. Image source: https://www.pantone.com/color-of-the-year-2021  Retrieved on February 1, 2021.

From this perspective, the bright, highlighter-yellow colour signifies the light at the end of the tunnel, the sun rising over a dark landscape, and even the dawning of hope that comes with the vaccines. The yellow here stands in sharp contrast with the yellow in Lexington and many other cities with the “Yellow Town” landscape. If put outside of the context of a town or signages, does yellow naturally mean vibrancy and hope? If colours are intrinsically linked with psychological associations, why do yellow signs inadvertently receive complaints (Lewis, 2010)? Does colour change its meanings (if it ever has a predetermined, set meaning) with the materiality they radiate through?

The Prenez Place! installation project in downtown Montreal reflects the Pantone colours of the year. Designed and first installed in the summer of 2020, the project was conceived to safely accommodate and attract Montrealers to reappropriate this public space (located at the Hydro-Quebec park at Quartier des Spectacles) while respecting the sanitary regulations. A 100 meter “urban table”, in bright yellow colour, was implanted between the existing furniture and trees. Visitors were invited to discover the full length of the table, find their place at the table while maintaining social distancing measures, and enjoy the colourful and vivacious atmosphere.

Fig. 4 The Prenez Place! Installation in Montreal. Image source: Judy Chen. Montreal, 2021.

The bright yellow installation was joined by a palette of grey—the concrete pavement, the poles, and the fixed sitting furniture. ADHOC architectes, the team behind this installation, used bright yellow to brighten up the environment and to create optimism and fortitude following the difficult pandemic time. Yellow in this urban installation hence represents hope and joy.

This installation was a temporary festive public space and it was removed in October 2020. Earlier this month, the urban table is brought back again and this time with 200 meters of length. I was both surprised and pleased to see the urban table again. Temporary urban public spaces are constantly in the cycle of being produced, consumed, circulated and destroyed. The brightly-coloured yellow table is back into the urban cycle; it has not yet been destroyed and the stories it carries go on. It is this process that generates spontaneity and improvisation of urban space and hence creates rhythms to the urban life.

Fig. 5 The urban table is back this year, starting in July 2021. The extended urban table runs through the Hydro-Québec Park, down Clark Street to Sainte-Catherine Street. Image source: Judy Chen. Montreal, 2021.  

Yellow may code poorer parts of the city. Yellow may represent hope and aspiration. What do you see in yellow?