Project Proposal

Space of Therapy 

Project description

Are you happy? How many times do you feel lonely a week? Do you always worry about something? Are you struggling with your life? Here is space where you can have a rest, express your feelings, and face your problems in another perspective.

Space of Therapy is a pop-up mobile therapy venue with installation, workshop, and live performance. The project focuses on the mental issues of modern society, such as depression and anxiety. It is inspired by cognitive behavioral therapy and positive psychotherapy. This project’s goal is to provide a space and an experience to express their feelings and learn a new and positive perspective on their life and issues, but not to create an air bubble to escape. 

Why do I want to do this therapy project? One of my best friends has depression and struggle with it every day. Because of her parents’ over-strict early childhood education and bullying in elementary school, she finds it is even harder for her to face problems positively and make new friends. She keeps going to see the doctor and eat medicine, but she still doesn’t feel better. Although right now I am in Los Angeles and she is in Tokyo, we FaceTime and have phone call sometimes. I will be the consultant who hears her stories and gives her advice, and she feels that I help her to see things in new ways. Another friend at CalArts also have depression, and he suggests me to design a therapy space other than closed white walls. Therefore, I want to design this Space of Therapy as a gift for my friends at CalArts and people all over the world who are struggling with mental illness. 

Before learning how to draw and design, my very first dream was to become a psychologist. In my art practice, a big part of the design process is to discover the relationship between character, storyteller, and space. I always design a psycho space with storytelling and heavy emotional content. I have a certain style as dark, complex, and heavy, so for this project, I want to challenge myself with something very different.

Who is my audience?We call for people with different backgrounds to gather and share. People who have depression and anxiety or someone who just feel a lot of pressure from their lives. Many people have unease and difficulties with their lives, but they don’t want to commit that they have mental sickness and have to go to the hospital. I want to create this space with a casual feeling and welcome everyone. I may narrow the audience down to the youth or the young folk since this is an age range which I am familiar with. Our project will benefit the local people who struggle with everyday life; however, they don’t have the courage to go clinics and don’t want to be labeled as “someone mentally sick.”

Potential context?

The project includes three sections: an installation, a live performance, and a therapy workshop, which is a cycle of expressing, connecting and shifting perspectives. 

• Installation: The physical space design of the installation will use simple, organic and natural shapes. The color will be cool and calm. The gesture language will be stable and embrace. Space should make the audience feel safe and comfortable to express. The scenic designer will design and shape the space to guide the audience to interact with space. There will be stations where participants can have a place to rest and lie down, a place to hug and listen to calming music, and a place to write down their stories.    
  
• Live performance: Stories from the installation will be collected, and later performed by dancers through their body movements. The audience will sit in the installation device and look outside of the device. This is a site-specific project so the outside street or neighborhood will be used as performance space. Therefore, the site has to be chosen carefully with the local context. 
• Workshop or activities:  Only one-time installation or performance will not change much for our participants. Therefore, this process of practice should become a “flow” and help people to withdraw from directly being exposed to the negative emotion. We will use methods, such as horticultural therapy, hiking group, and ceramic practice, to take off the audience’s heavy emotion baggage temporarily and to let them face the problem itself calmly and critically. 

Location?

The pop-up installation will be moved through different neighborhoods with some radical and historical contents in Los Angeles, Cuba, and Shanghai. For this year, the project will first focus on Los Angeles.

Research that supports your project proposal?

List of research resources:

• psychodrama
• Behavioral Therapy and psycho analysis
• Space and happiness - Florence Williams
• Horticultural Therapy and Therapy Garden
• Book: Architecture of Happiness, The Nature Fix, The Rainbow of Desire.