Even though the museum is a solicitous host, who takes good care of its objects, it is different, when it comes to vital processes. What happens, if the museum attempts to host and nourish life? The Living Room is an experimenting project, where we explore the different life stages of objects – from hibernation to accelerated decay.

You can visit The Living Room by appointment only. Please contact Martin Grünfeld by e-mail: martin.grunfeld@sund.ku.dk.

Here you can read articles and blogs on The Living Room.

Even though the museum is a solicitous host, who takes good care of its objects, it is different, when it comes to vital processes. What happens, if the museum attempts to host and nourish life?

The Living Room is an experimental project at Medical Museion, where we try to host life. Life is characterized by cycles and material exchanges – rhythmic processes and aging.  By engaging in the metabolic aspect of things across the organic/inorganic divide, we attempt to make the invisible preservation practices visible, palpable and audible – and to approach them with a curious mix of questioning and jesting. In the project, we explore decay by exposing objects to influences from their surroundings such as humidity, temperature and light as well as funghi, bacteria and moths, which altogether reshape The Living Room to a metabolic time machine. A basic idea behind the project is that decomposition and decay doesn’t necessarily lead to loss, as the surrounding life cycles convert death to life. Heat, light and microbes play decisive roles in the continuous becoming of the world.

In The Living Room we also develop multi-sensorial methods to explore decay such as time-lapse and sound art. In that way, the seeming functions of things become multiplied and unfold new ways of being, which transgress their isolated status as objects, as they e.g. also function as nourishment, habitat, sound, picture, text, even an aesthetic incarnation of the ravages of time

This is a transdisciplinary project, which is undergoing constant transformations. Explore our website to experience the different digital materialities we have developed in the encounter between preservation, artistic practice and humanistic research. Keep an eye on future events as well, such as special guided tours in The Living Room, artistic performances, presentations and much more. If your curiosity has been awakened and questions have arisen, you can contact Martin Grünfeld for more information at e-mail: martin.grunfeld@sund.ku.dk.

Curator, Ph.D. in philosophy: Martin Grünfeld
Assistant Professor, Medical Museion and the Center for Basic Metabolic Research
martin.grunfeld@sund.ku.dk / +45 2619 3946