2005

Threshold, Passages, and Other Crossings

- Anne Carson, Eros the Bittersweet (1986)

From the ultimate passage between life and death to the more prosaic crossing from one place to another, the threshold is not only a powerful architectural device; it potentially encompasses the meaning of the suspended moment of fulfilment between two lovers, of our passing on the Earth, the final crossing. The threshold was the subject of reflection and investigation of this year studio project.

The first step consisted in identifying either an urban boundary in Montreal or a specific artefact that spoke of a liminal condition. The chosen sites of investigation were varied in scale and programmatic intention. They included a confessional in Notre-Dame Basilica; a phone booth; the concealed layout of the original city wall; an abandoned site at the heart of the city where Saint-Laurent Boulevard meets Sainte-Catherine Street; the reflective surface of water; the elusive passage between life and death as depicted in Holbein’s Danse macabre; Hejduk’s Stations of the Cross; the underground life of Viger Square; and the signs of the passage of time that ultimately frame our mortality.

A detailed survey of the chosen thresholds considered issues of ritual, marking, directionality, orientation, etc. The documentation techniques combined different media, and attempted to represent the thresholds without reducing them, but instead revealing one aspect that was not immediately visible to the eye.

The final project consisted in anchoring each threshold to a chosen site, either as a permanent renovation or as a portable device that could become a tool for orientation. Every renovation was meant to reveal the inherent nature of the sites by framing them through metaphoric thresholds.

Louise Pelletier
August 2, 2005

		The Re-Marking Engine: Re-Mapping the City Gates Orlando Barone
		An Architectural Liaison on the "Main": A Pedestrian, Eve, and the Doors of Perception Annabelle Beauchamp
		Square Viger: Flood/Light Lawrence Bird
		Dissolving Sergio Clavijo
		A Journey Through the Celebrations of Water and Light Negin Djavaherian
		Indeterminate Explorations Kurt Espersen-Peters
		Urban Confessional for Two Sinners Razan Francis
		The Thirteen Stations of the Passion of John Hejduk sur Mont-Royal David Leary
		House for the Dance of Death Peter Olshavsky