room_to_speak
MIT (2015)
[installation][digital_fabrication]
“Room to Speak” is an installation that explores the spatial hierarchies of speaking. A central space is evacuated for a single inhabitant. The object becomes a mask anonymizing the user, modulating their exposure to the environment they are part of, emboldening them to speak in places in which they may not otherwise.
Each external face of the object expresses a spatial orientation of different forms of speech. The subtractions from each face represent an abstraction of the orientation of the head in plan and section. These voids represent four different engagements of speaking to the occupant, while the steps combined with the height of the carvings and the level of connection to the inner void represent the subtle hierarchy’s that are associated with each interaction.
The project was installed on two sites. The first, the Rotch Library at MIT, is a site in which conversations are deliberate and careful engagements. In this environment, the ‘room’ explored the response of a user conscious of the volume of their speech, to consider the spacial components of conversation.
The second site was the lobby of Building 7 at MIT. In this highly trafficked site the ‘room’ formed a refuge space, curating deliberate conversation in a context of highly public space and emboldening the user through anonymization.
The object is made from CNC-milled blue construction foam. The layering of 2 inch layers of the foam allowed for the fabrication of the complex curvatures of the voids preserving the fine edge conditions that mark the intersections of the different carvings. These features were vital for the reading of the subtle hierarchy’s that individualized each of the interactions.
