[Re]collection : surfaces, bodies, and the dispersed home

Abstract

This thesis seeks to identify notions of comfort and domestic habitation within the public spaces of Manhattan using a series of [re]collective practices. [My definition of] home is found along the surfaces of the city and within the body of its urban inhabitant. By reading the traces found between skin and surface, qualities of this dispersed home [and its user] within the urban landscape are identified. Using casting as a primary method -- a [re]collective practice -- home is identified and obtained [physically] along surfaces within the city. Sites identified between user and landscape will be tested for their specificity in an effort to prove that the dispersed home is reliant upon both subject and place. The posture of the body specific to occupation within/along a site, and the interaction of the specificity of the surfaces in contact define the space of the "release agent". Through the design of memory devices and a proposal for street furniture, produced in response to traditional domestic furniture, pose and texture are retained outside of both site and body.