Art-based heuristics for spatial inquiry and design: Insights from The Sensitive City project

This paper explores the use of art as a heuristic tool for understanding and designing urban spaces, drawing on sensory and phenomenological insights in urban studies. The main research question of the paper is: How can the arts contribute to developing a new “sensitive approach” that enhances current practices of spatial enquiry and place-making? Methodologically, the paper is based on a critical review of the literature and empirical investigations. In particular, it focuses on the project The Sensitive City, an initiative linked to an architectural residency hosted by the research centre ARCAM, in Amsterdam. In this context, artistic practices were employed as exploratory and interpretive tools to reveal non-immediate qualities of two distinct urban places: Havenstad, a transforming harbour in the northern area of the city, and Mercatorplein, a socially vibrant urban plaza. The discussion highlights how the arts can reintroduce creative thinking and innovation in a non-instrumental way. Rather than prescribing specific aesthetic canons or serving the targeted aims of civic or cooperative place-making, and in contrast to dominant data-oriented approaches to spatial enquiry, the arts offer a means of engaging with urban space through open-ended, sensorial, and imaginative processes.