ABSTRACT
In an era when architecture and cultural experiences often occur in virtual sites, Zenovia Toloudi’s Yellow + Blue is conceived as a labyrinth experienced in a public space. It is presented through its life at the campus of Carleton University in Ottawa, as well as theoretically through a glossary of terms defining architectural apparatuses. An architectural apparatus can be an individual element with various forms, materials, textures and perforations, an opening and a threshold, a design of scales, geometries, proportions and dimensions or a strategic positioning of a building to produce an effect in the eyes of the beholders. Architectural apparatuses intervene in buildings to transmit light or re-create an image interrupting and revealing hidden or overlooked nuances of daily routine through the production of ever-changing phenomena or to produce an illusion of infinity in an interactive futuristic model. Through experiment and experience, certain ideas prevail about architectural apparatuses: they are non-representational artifacts; they become portals for phantasmagoria; they disrupt spatial homogeneity; they recalibrate the senses and cognitive abilities of viewers; they displace temporarily one’s image in relation to the surroundings; they are theatrical, literal and temporal; they become transitional objects or communicative devices; and they become co-producers of space.
