Vernissage Sun 12.12.21 14:00 – 15:00

Multimedia Installation, 2021

Selin Civi, Carolina Palos Mas und Sofia Uribe Gomez

“The old industrial building Oerlikon Nord A, better known as ONA is the home of parts of the Department of Architecture D-ARCH at ETH Zurich. The facility functions also as the Logistic Center of ETH, responsable for coordinating the post service and storing office materials of the whole university. The four-story building hosts other non-university related offices, like caterings and travel agencies. A multi-layer environment is created through its very different users and time presences.” (excerpt of the booklet «ONA Afterhours»)

«ONA Afterhours» is a semester project by the ETH students Selin Civi, Carolina Palos Mas and Sofia Uribe Gomez developed as part of the Design in Dialog Lab of the Architecture department.

«ONA Afterhours» is a pointed and consequential examination of the cleaning staff’s invisibility at the ETH’s ONA building in Oerlikon. It leads the students to consider a series of spatial interventions and practices onsite as “a collection of attempts to provoke a better work environment for everybody.”

“In our engagement to start a relationship with the cleaning staff we became aware of the symbiotic relationship between us. Neither of the groups could use the building without the other. We benefit and can learn from each other. However, the fragility of the social structure and the working time differences hide this work and its workers.” (excerpt of the booklet «ONA Afterhours»)

One such practice consists in inviting students to place their chair on their desk table at the end of the day, enabling the cleaning staff to move more freely and perform their job more easily. The aim is to make the practice a habit of the buildings users that exceed the duration and scope of a semester project.

The proposed interventions and practices, as well as the views of the cleaning staff back onto the students’ usage are documented and gathered in a book. For the exhibition at Shedhalle, the three students expand «ONA Afterhours» into a multimedia installation involving the said practice, the mentioned book and a short video documentation.