Ethereal

14 WEEKS | INDIVIDUAL PROJECT | 2020

Inspired by Chinese landscape painting, when there is a connection between people and the work of art; the atmosphere around them creates an imaginary space that allows the users to escape from reality.

I designed this project to include rich interactivity between objects and users. Enhancing the user experience by creating a poetic connection between them.

Ethereal is a space divider with movable features that allow users to hang outerwear on the three-dimensional elements playfully. A person's clothing is part of their identity. By hanging clothing on the divider, you are incorporating a part of yourself into the object. Through this interaction, art and life become one.

Unlike a regular furniture design that focuses mainly on form and function, Ethereal successfully demonstrates its uniqueness and different design approach. It's not just the design of a piece of furniture, but also the space and the aura it creates, and more how it attracts people.

Taking Ad-HOC Design to a Re-HOC Solution

I walked around Taiwan's neighborhood, watching people and noticing interesting Ad-HOC designs that people come up with. I discovered that people like hanging things on trees. All sorts of things can be hung from its branches, from clothes to umbrellas to lights to clocks. Trees serve as public hangers. People's interaction with nature and desire to incorporate nature into their lives fascinated me.

Observing this Ad-HOC design inspired me to include the Biliphia concept in my own design. Particularly during COVID, people have a harder time going out. My design was a response to the desire to be able to bring nature into the home and interact with it.

In my design, I want something unique instead of something found a lot on the market. Therefore, I thought about combining traditional Chinese landscape painting with my design.

In Chinese landscape painting, the artists do not aspire to recreate mountains or how the landscape looks realistically. It is more about expressing the inner landscape and the connection between the painting and its viewer. To evoke their audiences' feelings, artists paint with their soul and spirit. Mountains, water, and trees all have multiple meanings in the painting rather than being mere representations of nature. Mountains and water may have different characteristics, such as their hardness versus their softness. Or mountains may be real, while water is virtual. They are complementary like Ying and Yang. In addition, trees personify courage, honesty, and strength. There are many philosophical aspects to Chinese landscape painting. It's an artwork that needs to be felt by the heart, cultivating an imaginary world and atmosphere for both the creators as well as the viewers.