Atmosphere (architecture and spatial design)

In architecture, spatial design, literary theory, and film theory—affective atmosphere (colloquially called atmosphere) refers to the mood, situation, or sensorial qualities of a space.^[1] Spaces containing atmosphere are shaped through subjective and intersubjective interactions with the qualia of the architecture.^[2] Atmosphere (or projected affect) is linked with anthropology, architectural theory, critical theory, cultural geography, phenomenology of architecture, and pragmatism.^[3]^[4]

^ Gandy, Matthew (2017). "Urban atmospheres". Cultural Geographies. 24 (3): 353–374. Retrieved 2022-02-21. From the early 19th century onwards, the use of the word 'atmosphere'...can refer to the prevailing mood of a place, situation, or cultural representation such as the feeling evoked by a film or a novel. ... The understanding of atmospheres as a distinctive kind of 'mood' or 'situation' has become a focal point for emerging interest in 'affective atmospheres'.
^ Gandy, Matthew (2017). "Urban atmospheres". Cultural Geographies. 24 (3): 353–374. Retrieved 2022-02-21. The word 'atmosphere' can simultaneously evoke both a body of air, or even simply space, along with its prevailing affective characteristics. ... space and subjectivity. The meaning can oscillate between, for example, the latent atmosphere of a room or the complex interplay between multiple subjects in crowd-like situations.
^ Mead, George Herbert (2015) [1934]. Mind, Self & Society. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. pp. 166, 184. doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226112879.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-226-11273-2. Occasionally we have experiences which we say belong to the atmosphere. The whole world seems to be depressed, the sky is dark, the weather is unpleasant, values that we are interested in are sinking. We do not necessarily identify such a situation with the self; we simply feel a certain atmosphere about us. ...There are other experiences which we may at all times identify with selves. We can distinguish, I think, very clearly between certain types of experience, which we call subjective because we alone have access to them, and that experience which we call reflective. ...The physical object is an abstraction which we make from the social response to nature. We talk to nature; we address the clouds, the sea, the tree, and objects about us. We later abstract from that type of response because of what we come to know of such objects. The immediate response is, however, social; where we carry over a thinking process into nature[,] we are making nature rational.
^ Gandy, Matthew (2017). "Urban atmospheres". Cultural Geographies. 24 (3): 353–374. Retrieved 2022-02-21. As early as 1998, for example, the German philosopher Jens Soentgen refers to an 'atmospheric turn' within European phenomenology and reference to 'affective atmospheres' has become more frequent within fields such as anthropology, architectural theory, and cultural geography. ... [Ben] Anderson acknowledges that we are dealing with an 'odd archive' comprising a heterogeneous array of perspectives drawn from disparate fields such as anthropology, critical theory, phenomenology, and other disciplines.

[1] Gandy, Matthew (2017). "Urban atmospheres". Cultural Geographies. 24 (3): 353–374. Retrieved 2022-02-21. From the early 19th century onwards, the use of the word 'atmosphere'...can refer to the prevailing mood of a place, situation, or cultural representation such as the feeling evoked by a film or a novel. ... The understanding of atmospheres as a distinctive kind of 'mood' or 'situation' has become a focal point for emerging interest in 'affective atmospheres'.

[2] Gandy, Matthew (2017). "Urban atmospheres". Cultural Geographies. 24 (3): 353–374. Retrieved 2022-02-21. The word 'atmosphere' can simultaneously evoke both a body of air, or even simply space, along with its prevailing affective characteristics. ... space and subjectivity. The meaning can oscillate between, for example, the latent atmosphere of a room or the complex interplay between multiple subjects in crowd-like situations.

[3] Mead, George Herbert (2015) [1934]. Mind, Self & Society. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. pp. 166, 184. doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226112879.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-226-11273-2. Occasionally we have experiences which we say belong to the atmosphere. The whole world seems to be depressed, the sky is dark, the weather is unpleasant, values that we are interested in are sinking. We do not necessarily identify such a situation with the self; we simply feel a certain atmosphere about us. ...There are other experiences which we may at all times identify with selves. We can distinguish, I think, very clearly between certain types of experience, which we call subjective because we alone have access to them, and that experience which we call reflective. ...The physical object is an abstraction which we make from the social response to nature. We talk to nature; we address the clouds, the sea, the tree, and objects about us. We later abstract from that type of response because of what we come to know of such objects. The immediate response is, however, social; where we carry over a thinking process into nature[,] we are making nature rational.

[4] Gandy, Matthew (2017). "Urban atmospheres". Cultural Geographies. 24 (3): 353–374. Retrieved 2022-02-21. As early as 1998, for example, the German philosopher Jens Soentgen refers to an 'atmospheric turn' within European phenomenology and reference to 'affective atmospheres' has become more frequent within fields such as anthropology, architectural theory, and cultural geography. ... [Ben] Anderson acknowledges that we are dealing with an 'odd archive' comprising a heterogeneous array of perspectives drawn from disparate fields such as anthropology, critical theory, phenomenology, and other disciplines.

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