WORKING WITH/IN THE GAP (2017 - 2021) is a research project conducted in collaboration with the Radical Materiality Research Group at KULeuven, Belgium. In this practice-based research architectural habit(at)s that approach space in terms of objects are recast through the lens of Japanese architecture. In contrast to an conceptualization of architecture as material and constructive, Japanese architects foreground movement and performativity. Space does not figure as empty distance between objects, but is experienced and understood as a sensorially charged field that emerges from and within movement. Such ‘full emptiness’ is articulated through the Japanese concept of ma.

At heart this project presents a collection of close ‘encounters with ma’. Based on re-enactment of the exhibition Ma: Space-Time in Japan, designed by Japanese architect Arata Isozaki in 1978, the pratice of ma is studied in the context of and through the moving body. Shifting focus from an architecture of objects to an architecture of reciprocity, this project explores the potential of a cross-pollinated spatial habitus in which the focus on the architectural object; material and construction goes hand in hand with a focus on space; performativity and movement.