Publication
Title
Performing the flat of abstract painter Jozef Peeters : an exhibition design as a design-based research
Author
Abstract
Jozef Peeters (1895-1960), a pioneer of abstract painting in Belgium, designed a remarkable flat interior in a social housing estate designed by Antwerp city architect Emiel van Averbeke. From the mid 1920s, it served as both a studio and family home for himself, his ailing wife and their two children. While living, working and educating his children there, the avant-garde painter experimented in his home with the spatial use of colour. The interior design resulted in a modernist Gesamtkunstwerk where walls merge both into one another and with the furniture. Today, the studio preserves the legacy of Peeters' theoretical development and his practice. Since the site is closed to the public, ways of conveying the spatial experiences of the flat and its underlying concepts were sought. This paper discusses the process of unfolding this flat interior through literature study, site visits, architectural analyses of the interior spaces and corresponding colours, a scenography design for an exhibition and finally, the model construction. The exhibition offered visitors a twofold embodied experience of the flat, albeit one that differs from the original experience. New insights became visible through the act of (un)folding Peeters' interior through space, object and body.
Language
English
Source (journal)
SAJ - Serbian architectural journal
Publication
2022
DOI
10.5937/SAJ2203311G
Volume/pages
14 :3 (2022) , p. 311-336
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (open access)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Publication type
Subject
Art 
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Record
Identifier
Creation 17.01.2024
Last edited 18.01.2024
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