Constructing human-architectural interactions : intersubjective inscription through affordances in site-specific dance

Abstract

This dissertation seeks to explore the human-architectural interactions in public environments, especially during site-specific performances. Drawing from theoretical concepts of Merleau-Ponty’s ‘intersubjectivity’ and ‘flesh’, Foucault’s ‘inscription’ and Gibson’s ‘affordance’, I analyse both everyday site-user interactions in architectural public spaces through the ‘inscribing architecture’, and site-user interactions in site-specific performance, eventually generating the concept of ‘intersubjective inscription through affordance’. This new concept highlights the very nature of the site-users interaction, which in reality lies in the relational essence of theoretical concepts of affordance, intersubjectivity, and flesh. Different ways to interact with the site will eventually emerge, once applying those theoretical concepts to the notions of ‘place’ and ‘space’. Through case studies of Dialoge 09 – Neues Museum by Sasha Waltz and Bodies in Urban Spaces by Willi Dorner, I discuss how the site can be approached – as place or space – and how it can challenge conventional behaviours in public environments and generate fresh interactions with both artists and spectators.