the weather garden


François Perrin


12.11.04 - 06.05.05



The weather garden investigates architecture’s invisible elements: space, ambiance, atmosphere and how people experience them. The place itself is an urban void, an empty stage. The events that will activate this space are an integral part of the project. A weather forecast will announce the program (film screening, lecture, musical performance, party, reading …) using a silver screen facing the street as a billboard. What does it mean to generate a climate, to build with the air, to create space? When we inhabit a place, we do not live inside the concrete, the glass or the wood, but in the space that they surround. The project is an "inverted architecture" , it reveals the condition of the air, the effects of the material, the light. It is more specifically a garden of air; the climate ( light, water, occurrences…) is generated, preserved or avoided. It can function as a greenhouse, a plant park, a public stage, a winter garden, a café… The house extends itself into an outdoor living room as the street extends itself into the courtyard to become a public space open to everyone. Like the medieval pleasure gardens or ladies gardens, it becomes a place to find shade, smells and sounds. Conceptual art fought against the preeminence of vision. The weather garden is an environment built around senses and organs other than the eye, around the invisible layers that create a space and our perception of them.

Architect

François Perrin is an architect who lives and works in Los Angeles. During the time of this installation, he taught at Art Center School of Design and had a concurrent exhibition at the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York City.