Window shopping
format: installation
iOM! presents an architectural experiment on street level, carried out as a 1:1 public piece.
How does a classic shop window shape our behavior?
What happens when a shop closes and the content is absent?
What is left? Architecture without a function? An unfulfilled desire?
And how does architecture influence capitalism and vice versa?
Through deconstruction, distortion, and displacement of retail store architecture, the project deals with concepts such as expectation, commercialization, and abandoned architecture. iOM! distorts what’s normal and turns the inside out and the outside in for a street exhibition. It reaches out, and weathers into reflections around the empty shops of the city.
Why is shopping the primary activity in the city center? Does the city close with its shops? What if shops were not located in the center? Then what were you supposed to do in the city?
“Window shopping (“browsing”)”
When you examine a shop’s goods from the street without the intention of buying. Maybe as an amusement, maybe as a pastime?
The phenomenon arises in 19th-century Europe - the glass industry’s development, shopping arcades, and promenades. Again more widespread activity in the 20th century with the rise of the middle class, and a more commercial shoppingculture. Online shopping offers the same activity, as you scroll down the screen, fill in the ‘shopping basket’, but miss the checkout (on purpose).
The exhibition was supported by Dreyers Fond and the Danish Arts Foundation.
Kredsløb, Silas Johnsen, Magnus Kring Schmidt
Aarhus Scooter
