This discussion of space and place begins with an appraisal of how these terms are
defined. It then considers how the emergence of each term in language reveals
something about its ontological and experiential nature, analysing and comparing space
in three modes before introducing the concept of place. Through this discussion I
observe how definitions of space and place hint at their entanglement with the intent to
articulate space’s dialectical interrelation with place.
In the following section, I reflect on the work of geographer Yi-Fu Tuan, whose writing
on spatial experience, and on the relation of place to space has informed my own. Of
particular interest is the way Tuan describes places as “centers of value” which afford
undifferentiated, “blurred” space the structure required if it is to be meaningfully
experienced. I compare Tuan's discussion of space and the body to themes present in
the phenomenological philosophies of Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, and Maurice
Merleau-Ponty. To unpack the political stakes which lurk amidst the tension between
space and place, I then explore relevant themes present in the works of architectural
theorist, Christian Norberg-Schulz, and urban planner, Kevin Lynch, whose works
emphasise the value of imageability in spatial experience.
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Following this, I anaylse space and place as appear to us in lived experience, defining
several characteristics in relation to movement and fixity. I discuss the origins of these
qualities with reference to the figure/ground relation of space/place alluded to by
Norberg-Schulz and Lynch, attempting to understand the co-dependence of the two
terms in greater detail. I eventually arrive at a point where textual research is no longer
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effective. From this point onward my investigation continues in a more poetic manner
with the aim of teasing out points of departure, return and interrelation. With hindsight,
arriving at this point seems inevitable, and it marks where my thinking about the tangled
relation of space to place carries over into an artistic methodology informed by psychoacoustic research and the phenomenological method.
My speculative, poetic conclusions are reapplied throughout an evaluation of my
recording and installation work, The St. James Theatre Resonance Project. In
describing the relationship between my written and applied research, I consider how our
aural faculties provide us with an auditory spatial awareness, and offer a theoretical
and historical lens through which the applied component of this project can be
understood. Finally, I discuss the processes and considerations which inform and
constitute my art practice, describing the recording process enacted at the St. James
Theatre, the subsequent editing process, and the considerations which informed my
installation at Elam's Projectspace Gallery with reference to the themes of project as a
whole.
