this floating house forms a temporary architecture of dreams

participatory installation by Jisoo Yoo explores dreams

Artist Jisoo Yoo presents Dream House, a participatory performance installation unveiled as part of (F)ESTIVALES at Les Tanneries – Centre d’art contemporain in France. Inviting members of the public to write and draw their dreams and wishes onto garments, the project transforms these personal expressions into the structural framework of a floating house. Rising and falling in response to the collective contributions, the temporary architecture explores how individual desires come together to shape—and continually reshape—the worlds we inhabit.

The project begins with a simple question. As Yoo explains, ‘how do the dreams and desires we carry shape the landscape of the world we inhabit?’ While dreams often feel deeply personal, the artist argues that they are inseparable from the social conditions, values, absences, and possibilities that surround us. In Dream House, these private reflections are transformed into a shared architectural experience, revealing how collective desires can momentarily bring a world into being.

all images courtesy of Jisoo Yoo

garments become the structure of a temporary floating house

Each participant contributes a garment marked with handwritten texts and drawings, turning everyday clothing into both a personal archive and a structural element. Together, the garments support a suspended roof whose movement responds to the accumulated presence of people’s wishes, dreams, and needs. Rather than functioning as a static building, the house exists only through collective participation, appearing and disappearing as an ephemeral form.

Built from people’s dreams, Dream House imagines architecture as something fragile, emotional, and continually negotiated. The installation proposes that a home is not simply constructed from physical materials, but from shared aspirations that require ongoing care and participation to remain alive.

the floating structure embodies both the creative force of desire and the fleeting nature of existence

jisoo yoo reflects on desire and impermanence

For Yoo, the floating structure embodies both the creative force of desire and the fleeting nature of existence.’The house briefly emerges through people’s dreams, rises and falls, and eventually disappears again,’ the artist says. ‘For me, this floating house represents both the power of desire to bring a world into being and the impermanence of life—the understanding that no form can remain fixed or endure forever.’

By allowing the architecture to remain in constant motion, Dream House resists permanence in favor of transformation, suggesting that the worlds we inhabit are continuously shaped—and reshaped—through our shared dreams.

dream house resists permanence in favor of transformation