PM / YASUAKI ONISHI

SUSPENDED SPACES

This project is for an artist to have a live-work space wherein they can display and create art in the comfort of their own home. It is located in Fremont, Seattle. The design is inspired by Yasuaki Onishi’s installations where he makes use of hot glue gun and plastic sheeting to sculpt the void or emptiness and redefine what positive and negative space is. The main takeaway I took is the idea of suspension and how I translated it is through these series of platforms suspended from the roof and come together in a way that everything is connected.

The work space is located in the basement that has access to the street, the living spaces are located on the highest platforms looking out to the water, and the gallery is in the middle that can be accessed from the Burke-Gilman trail, Northlake Place, and Northlake Way. The platforms are engaged in a way that everything is connected. Some platforms act as a stairway that leads to work or living spaces while others can also serve as a seating area where one can contemplate. The façade is a perforated screen that plays with how light enters through the space but also contains big cutouts to provide moments of clarity. Experientially, the viewers in the gallery looking down to see the artist working creates this feeling of weightlessness while the viewers from below looking above feel this sense of relief.

PM / YASUAKI ONISHI