the architecture of vacuums a project by frank halmans

‘apartment building as a vacuum cleaner’

dutch artist frank halmans often explores the domestic world through his work, considering our homes as places where our lives transition between the public and private realm, and how we inhabit these two worlds of existence differently. his series of functioning vacuums which he has transformed into ‘works of architecture’ – representing our households and personal space – emphasize this theme, blurring the line between the interior and exterior. here, halman has taken an appliance which we use to clean and de-clutter our dwellings and has modified its role. instead now, dirt and the debris is purposely sucked into the domestic interior, within these imagined dwellings, standing as a metaphor for the things which we experience and collect mentally in our memory and physically in our lives .

debris is purposely sucked into frank halman’s interiors

‘full house’

each of halman’s works of art still function as vacuums

‘my studio as a vacuum cleaner’

interior of the studio

‘dust buster black & decker’

a bungalow dust buster

‘dust buster tomado working’