The Rite, Time and Living Space: History of a Pandemic Interval

Abstract

Living is a verb that takes shape in space. It is, moreover, contrary to what is thought, an experience linked to movement. This movement is made up of gestures, through which the dialectic between the “inside” and the “outside” is always staged. The mechanics of the ritual of living space passes through a path that goes from a relationship with the other that defines exteriority to a relationship with oneself that corresponds to the interior. The threshold definition was abruptly questioned with the pandemic interval. The rituality that defined spaces, the ergonomics of movement, the difference between public and private, have been radically diluted in an amalgam that forces us to review the concept of living inside a house but also “living ourselves”. The purpose of this paper is to analyze some of the consequences of the pandemic on the spatial and relational dynamics of living, on the concept of interior and exterior, on the idea of time and duration associated with living spaces.