'Everybody Looks for a Place to Dance'

"Cities have their function, their typical characteristics - their social, political and economic (and last but not least ) their aesthetic qualities. I perceive and take hold of the reality, examining space and architectonic facts. A certain confrontation of space with art. I take space as the starting point and return to it. Space limits me but also offers me much else. 

The title of the project 'Everybody Looks for a Place to Dance' is a metaphor relating to the way to (and the way I) perceive space - especially the urban environment. The city, architecture, space, everyday life – these are the most important points of interest with numerous overlappings and intersections. 

Anything may replace the word 'dance', because all of us move 'somewhere', look for 'something', are "addressed" by a number of things, and 'perceive' any number of things. Not only positives but also negatives. Not only experiencing, but also criticising. We perceive architecture – space - with all our senses. I find a great cohesion between architecture and music / sound. 

Architecture should create an environment that reminds us of our function in the world. Perceiving the environment by all senses is useful for remembering a place or space. The present-day confused, consumer-oriented and accelerated way of life leads us to understand conscience, intellect and emotions as something strictly separated from our senses and sensuality ...

If we are to perceive the world by means of our senses, we must no longer see them as passive receptors of external stimuli. We cannot get into the situation in which we are manipulated by commerce and brainless entertainment, and where it is not easy to protect the autonomy of individual experience. 

"I confront the city with my body; my legs measure the length of the arcade and the width of the square, my gaze unconsciously projects my body onto the facade, where it roams over the mouldings and contours, sensing the size of recesses and projections; my body weight meets the mass of the door, and my hand grasps the door pull as I enter the dark void behind. I experience myself in the city, and the city exists through my embodied experience. The city and my body supplement and define each other. I dwell in the city and the city dwells in me" 

(Juhani Pallasmaa) 

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