Curated for 2022 X-site: Blue House, Blue House Study is composed of five sessions of experience and a continuous game, aims to look back upon the original understanding of the five senses and to regain, by physical practices, the instinctive approach to collect information in the world, including Blue Ears: Space（ ）Sound, Blue Eyes: Inner Landscape, Blue Nose: Being There, Blue Body: Spirit Song Over the Waters, Blue Mind: Melt in Sleep, Bluetext.
Blue Nose: Being There
Smell Design: CANJUNE
Date/Time: 6/14 (Tue.) - 6/28 (Tue.) constant happening 9:30 - 17:30
Venue: Blue House
Visitor: general public
Participation: no reservation required, free for all, with a limit of 30 persons/session.
We breathe 24,000 times a day, and even in our sleep, the sense of smell keeps working. If smells are used to describe emotions and situations, how can smells be captured? And how can they be recorded?
Replacing the space with smells, blurring the boundary between reality and illusion, and reshaping the aura in Blue House–will we find ourselves in the sea or in a cave?
Travel by smells to heal, to dialogue with, and to know thyself.
In the invisible and untouchable June, smelling is knowing.
Smell 1: a chilly, neat ocean, a structural mechanics without dimension
Smell 2: the ardent empathy within 30 rain drops, a cave containing the stars
About Public Program
Blue House Study
Text / Lydia Ya Chu Chang
“Prometheus stole the fire of wisdom for human beings, and they began to pursue the greatness of knowledge. Over the years, they have been educated, trained and expected to become Homo Legens (reading man), but gradually start to forget how Homo Sapiens (wise man) make the most of the primitive instinct of animal perceptions for living and learn by hard practice to perceive everything in nature.”1 Between reality and imagination we roam in Blue House: echoing sounds know directions and dimensions; in the air permeates an aura of love and danger we search for; the smell of woods triggers imaginatively a primordial mountain forest, and through the light wells, the stars and moon in the night sky reveal the working of time and universe.
Blue House is not a multifunctional space with a specific purpose, but it may be a container full of events, an entrance to a boundless ocean or forest, and an intimate public building. What Blue House counts most concerns a multiple reading of immediacy; it is about ambiguity–accurately manipulated, utterly authentic and intangible.
The last passage in City of Jade said, “Everyone says to be rational. Reason is only one-twentieth of the organic faculties in our life, and what reason knows is merely what it has learned. There are some things that we could never possibly learn. Human nature is a whole, and it has to act as a whole, consciously.”2 Ephemeral and yet eternal, every moment of life is the evidence of the coexistence of past, present and future. Therefore, the significance of architecture does not lie in physics, but in the infinite différance of abstract references, changing and floating at any time, beyond definite dimensions and materials. The original intention of Blue House Study is to unearth a convergence and fluidity which are closer to the consciousness and perception among individuals. The architecture as such will gradually grow into a unique experience of the body, and continue to develop and evolve in various shapes in the world. The power of space is initiated by individuals, and progressively extends into collective consciousness and empathy.
Curated by the team Blue House, Blue House Study, composed of five sessions of experience and a continuous game, aims to look back upon the original understanding of the five senses and to regain, by physical practices, the instinctive approach to collect information in the world. Through sounds, Blue Ears: Space（ ）Sound embodies a relationship between body and space’s boundary, orientation, dimension and material, and delineates the shape of Blue House. Blue Eyes: Inner Landscape interrogates if we read without vision, then what is blue? What is the image of home? What will be the shape of Blue House? In the sensory dialogues in darkness, Blue House will be built in the collective imagination. Blue Nose: Being There replaces the space with smells, escaping the physical boundary of Blue House by the individual imagination of smells. Between the tangible and intangible, Blue Body: Spirit Song Over the Waters animates authentic interactions of improvisation for all who meet in Blue House: existence is participation. In Blue Mind: Melt in Sleep, each participant has an ice cube in the shape of Blue House in the mouth as a starting point of sleep, and feel the body integrated with the architectural space in the public space, dreaming together. Bluetext designs a hidden mission in Blue House. Each participant’s body is a detector, with which s/he can try to measure the space.
A man’s life is composed of a series of events. By creating events, we’ve participated in each other’s lives, expecting to bring about together in daily life a little improvisation, a little romance, and adapting ourselves to ambiguities where dialogues are not necessarily to be dialogued. We believe that all elements will find in harmony a place of their own.
- Weltschmerz (2011), Weltschmerz, https://tzaralin.me/2011/07/13/. 卡爾維諾《在美洲虎太陽下》、味覺、聽覺、嗅覺 . ( accessed: 5/4/2022)
- City of Jade (2016) Directed by Midi Z(feature film). Seashore Image Productions.
Visiting reminder
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It is recommended to wear smart casual, for the movements like body stretches and sitting on the ground will be required in experiencing the work and during the sessions.
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To respect the epidemic precautionary measures for a pleasant visit, please wear a mask and maintain social distancing while entering the venue.
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According to the preparation of the sessions, Blue House will be closed for an hour before and after each session (flexible adjustments depend on the announcement in the venue) and please feel free to rearrange your visiting schedule.
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The organisation, postponement or cancellation of public events will follow the epidemic precautionary measures of the government. Please check the official website of TFAM before participating.