Still Life With Chair, Shirt, Jacket, Shoes and Umbrella

Journal of aging studies, 2014

The article explores how old people who live in their ordinary home, reason and act regarding their 'material room' (technical objects, such as household appliances, communication tools and things, such as furniture, personal belongings, gadgets, books, paintings, and memorabilia). The interest is in how they, as a consequence of their aging, look at acquiring new objects and phasing out older objects from the home. This is a broader approach than in most other studies of how old people relate to materiality in which attention is mostly paid either to adjustments to the physical environment or to the importance of personal possessions. In the latter cases, the focus is on downsizing processes (e.g. household disbandment or casser maison) in connection with a move to smaller accommodation or to a nursing home. The article is based on a study in which thirteen older people (median age 87), living in a Swedish town of medium size were interviewed (2012) for a third time. The qu...

The objective of this paper is to explore the different value(s) that are prioritized and delegated by their users in a thing under their possession. The seating furniture at home was taken as the subject to study where users see it as an extension of their being. Using a method pivoting around Grounded Theory and Observation, it gathers meaningful data, process it through coding and memo writing and achieves a range of categories after a theoretical saturation. The paper attempts to borrow the classical rigour of Grounded Theory to come up with a Design Research Methodology for studying Design and its consumption.

The Exhibitionist: A journal of reflective practice National Association for Museum Exhibitions

Sitting too much is unhealthy, but a widespread habit in many societies. Realizing behavioral change in this area is hard. Our societies promote being seated via the way its places are structured: they are filled with chairs for example. How can we make healthier environments that invite people to move around more? This article shows how philosophical research in the area of embodied/enactive cognitive science let to a built vision for the office of the future, of 2025. Multidisciplinary studio RAAAF [Rietveld Architecture-Art-Affordances] and visual artist Barbara Visser built this world without chairs, titled The End of Sitting. This large rock-like landscape integrates many affordances for standing. Affordances are the possibilities for action provided by the environment. This landscape of standing affordances allows people to work standing while being supported by the material structure of the environment. This unorthodox working landscape is both an enactive art installation and the materialization of a philosophical worldview that understands people as embodied minds situated in a landscape of affordances. It stimulates reflection on the way built environments can naturally invite more active and healthy behavior. Key Points In our many societies almost the entirety of our surroundings have been designed for sitting, while evidence from medical research suggests that too much sitting has adverse health effects. The philosophy of embodied cognitive science suggests that the possibilities for action provided by the material environment structure our behavior. People can generate behavioral change by radically changing these environmental affordances in the places they spend their lives. The architectural art installation The End of Sitting presents a thinking model for living without chairs: a landscape of possibilities for supported standing that increases bodily activity and well being.

One of the opportunities of ubiquitous computing is to provide information in new ways in our everyday environments. In this paper we explore novel display opportunities in everyday situations with the design and study of the Hanger Display -a system for ambiently conveying information embedded in a wardrobe. We have built a working prototype of this display and explored it with users in a formative study. The results of the study show that this display is useful and appealing to people. Our experience creating and evaluating the Hanger Display also provided interesting insights for future work in embedding technology in everyday objects. In particular, we saw that such technology is beneficial because it provides information in places where it is useful, taking advantage of the established meaning of artifacts and places, and seamlessly supporting activities that occur in these places. In addition, we learned that such embodied interfaces could lead to new interaction possibilities, doing more than simply displaying peripheral information.

The ComforTable is an all-in-one interactive tabletop system with integrated seats and a camera based user tracking system. It allows groups of users relaxed interactions with the interface and was designed for and tested in museums and exhibitions. Applications allow competitive play for up to six players. The tracking system tracks tabletop users to offer them information in their proximity.

Emotion, Space and Society, 2017

This article considers the role of souvenirs within domestic spaces. Souvenirs are ambivalent objects; at the same time the very epitome of tourism kitsch and personal objects for which the owner holds significant affection. Rather than pre-framing these objects either as 'touristic signifiers' or as personal memory objects, this article reflects on the roles they take as material and embodied co-habitants in domestic space, living-and communicating e with their owners. Hence, this paper departs from 'humanistic' accounts of cohabiting people and things and instead attempts to put human and non-human agents on an equal footing. It does so, by discussing the 'magical capabilities' of everyday objects that enable these to enchant the lives of their human cohabitants; animating them with affects and emotions, feelings of remembrance, affection, appreciation and loss. By drawing inspiration from autoethnography and in particular its potentials for interrogating objects, the author explores the 'souvenirish' qualities of five homely objects; using this exploration to enter into a dialogue with objects as well as theories and studies of objects. Considering the many faces of the souvenir-as utility item, mediator, fetish, tuner and artwork-the article suggests an opening for more imaginative thinking and explorations of how we live with objects in everyday life.

Cabinet of Curiosities is the public outcome of a research project funded by the Wellcome Trust into how museums of science and medicine interpret disability. The show was performed live at museum venues across the UK during 2014, and at the Museums Association Conference in Cardiff. Mat Fraser won the Observer Ethical Award for Arts and Culture in 2014 for the piece. Personal, but based on research evidence, and combining myriad performance pieces within the format of a lecture, Cabinet of Curiosities offers a kaleidoscope of experiences and perspectives and, beyond the traditional role of a cabinet of curiosities, asks focused questions about some hard and conflicting truths. Developed by actor and musician Mat Fraser, in collaboration with Jocelyn Dodd and Richard Sandell at the Research Centre for Museums and Galleries at the University of Leicester, and with the involvement of an authoritative array of museums of science and medicine,

2016

oordinating Editor: Judith M olka-D anielsen ISSN 1891-9863 ISBN 978-82-321-0406-2

Brochure to the exhibition "Bigger than a wardrobe" Salon Academy Gallery of the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, March 2-23, 2018 Artists: Paweł Bołtryk Heban, Maciek Duchowski, Arkadiusz Karapuda, Janusz Oskar Knorowski, Tomasz Milanowski, Jan Mioduszewski