Brief Encounters

“...we live in a world that we have not yet learned to look at. We have to relearn to think about space.”

—Marc Augé, Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity (1995)

Elevators are part of everyday life, but they're also strange. They bring people together briefly, enforcing an unspoken order: avoid eye contact, maintain a neutral facial expression, and face the door. These micro performances are repeated every day but rarely get noticed. In this project, I use the elevator as an entry point for examining spatial silence and institutional logic through a four-part journey: entering, coexisting, ascending/descending, and exiting.

The exhibition space is enclosed by foam core boards and projections that create a temporary and shared environment shaped by nonverbal exchange. The accompanying publication collects fragments: buttons, signs, surfaces, and markings that trace the human presence within standardized systems.

What remains unheard in a space this quiet?

Design here does not provide an answer, but serves as a way to break the silence: to provoke, to observe, to perceive, and to question the rituals we perform each day.