Living Room

in collaboration with
openhousenewyork
October 4 & 5, 2008

Flux Factory has invited ten artists to transform strangers’ homes into sites for interactive works. Domestic or historic locations throughout New York City will become arenas for exploring what it means to inhabit a space, to make it one’s own. In conjunction with openhousenewyork, Living Room locations range from private living rooms to historical sites throughout Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens.

Explore a wall of secrets, a room-cum-optical-device, and go rooftop camping, and other exciting projects!

Living Room is a continuation of Flux Factory’s interest in the urban experience, in New York history, and in the overlap between private and public space. As a live/work collective, we are fascinated by what it means to make a space one’s own. While satisfying our voyeur desires, this project is also an opportunity for the public to peek into private sites normally off limits.

Works will be on view throughout the 6th Annual OHNY Weekend on October 4 & 5, 2008 from 11:00 €“ 6:00 unless otherwise noted.

A free, 20 person shuttle will leave the Center for Architecture on Saturday and Sunday at 12pm to transport visitors to the sites.

openhousenewyork is a non-profit organization celebrating New York City’s architecture and design, culminating in America’s largest event of its kind, the annual OHNY Weekend.

Participating Artists: Emily Clark, Rodney Dickson, Kim Holleman, Prem Krishnamurthy, John Monteith, Jo Q. Nelson, Trong Gia Nguyen, Douglas Paulson, Tattfoo Tan, Lauren Wilcox

Curated by Chen Tamir

click images to view maps.
	Emily Clark Teacher’s Lounge at P35M–Manhattan High School 317 W. 52nd Street between 9th and 10th Aves, Hell’s Kitchen In the mind of every kid in school is a secret place sparking rumors and gossip. Clark has turned the abandoned teacher’s lounge at P35M into a functioning one, playing on the tropes of its assumed uses: relaxation, anger, frustration, gossip, lunchtime, union meetings, refrigerators, and (at one time) smoking.
	Rodney Dickson Romper Room Public Toilets, 2nd floor of the Crane Street Studios, 46-23 Crane Street, LIC, Queens Romper Room evokes a torture chamber, in which victims are held hostage, tortured, interrogated, and often brutally killed. This work alludes also to methods of interrogation currently used by the US government in the War on Terror. The title was taken from a popular children’s’ TV program in Northern Ireland during the 1970s, which terrorists adopted as a name for a room in which they tortured and executed victims during the worst days of conflict in Ireland.
	Prem Krishnamurthy Berlin/New York 772 Washington Ave, Apt #2, Prospect Heights, Brooklyn This projected slide installation concerns doppelganger cities, parallel interiors, and the unreliability of travel narrative.
	John Monteith Hide and Go Seek The Arsenal, 830 Fifth Ave/ E 64th St, New York (Entrance on Central Park) Sat €“ Sun, 2:45 pm Participants will play Hide and Go Seek as a way of exploring the Arsenal and experimenting in new social settings. To participate, please RSVP to John Monteith at john@johnmonteith.com
	Jo Q. Nelson Softbox 38-09 43rd Ave 3rd Floor, Sunnyside, Queens Softbox is a completely malleable space where rooms are on wheels and entire environments can be changed around. The flexibility of this live/work warehouse space is due to its role as a testing ground for sculptural and interior architecture projects by Nelson and visiting artists. Focused on hosting, Softbox is both a laboratory and a social space where interactive programming takes place including screenings and performances. This will be its inaugural open house.
	Trong Gia Nguyen “The DUMBO Debates” (formerly known as “A View to a Thrill”) Barrack Obama and John McCain spend a weekend together on a secret roof deck Garden of Eden in DUMBO.  They talk taboo politics, drink Bloody Marys, eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and leave all inhibitions behind.
	Douglas Paulson Urban Examination Initiative, Roofs Department Locations TBA Saturday night This project is an open invitation to engage the city and OHNY from the outside. You are invited to join a group that will travel through sites by day, and camp on a rooftop by night. Participants are invited to join or leave at anytime. For more information and to RSVP to this urban adventure please RSVP to doug@douglaspaulson.com
	Tattfoo Tan Open Secret 393 17th Street #2A, Brooklyn Open Secret is an intervention between the artist, Tattfoo Tan, a home owner, and the public. Open Secret investigates the junction between private and public by using invisible paint and black lights to reveal secrets in the privacy of a home.
	Lauren Wilcox An Instrument for Viewing the Contents of a Room 213 Montrose Apt 2 (2nd floor) Brooklyn, 11206 (Crossstreet Bushwick Ave.) Sat 11 am – 6 pm, Sun 11 – 4pm To paint perspective during the Renaissance artists used Alberti’s Grid, a device which projects a scene onto a flat screen. This installation is a version of that device, a box that captures a room’s elements, both actual and unseen, and translates them, inside, into objects both literal and abstract.
	Kim Holleman Trailer Park Foley Square Sat and Sun: 10-8pm This mobile living park, converted from a 14′ x 8′ x 7′ standard aluminum trailer, is an oasis surrounded by the bustling sights and sounds of the city.

Living Room is made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, and Queens Council on the Arts, as well as generous support from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts,
and Carnegie Corporation of New York.