The metropolis as a space-a kind of sensory experience

Abstract

The sensory experience of the metropolis analyzed by Georg Simmel in the late nineteenth century represents a way to characterize the modern culture. Describing the various facets of the city, he founded a sensible theory of modernity, constructed from the awareness of a spatial reconfiguration that corresponds to new forms of social relations and collective existence. This point of view opens a perspective for urban studies based on the sensitivity and subjectivity. The aim of this paper is to revisit Simmel’s analysis of metropolis as a proposition for an aesthetic approach of socio-spatial manifestations in urban space, from which we could envision contemporary metropolis transformations.