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English Pages 220 Year 2021
From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture
Originally, the area of responsibility for landscape architecture was based on the premise that the planning and creating of open spaces such as parks and gardens was the business of garden artists. Today, the training of landscape architects and future challenges of the profession include the protection of natural resources and the environment, urban planning or tourism - to name but a few. The international symposium “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture - Traditions, Re-Evaluations, and Future Perspectives” addressed questions which, based on the idea of garden art,
should help to reconstruct its historical development but also discussed the notion and the relevance of “art” in everyday work. The contributions critically reflect on the professional self-image of landscape architects at the beginning of the 21st century. The symposium in September 2018 was co-organized by the City and State Capital of Hannover’s Herrenhausen Gardens Division, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gartenkunst und Landschaftsarchitekturt (DGGL), the Volkswagen Foundation and the Centre of Garden Art and Landscape Architecture (CGL) at Leibniz University Hannover.
Zusammenfassung Die Planung und Gestaltung von Gärten und Parks war ursprünglich der Aufgabenbereich von Gartenkünstlern. Heute umfasst das Aufgabenfeld der Landschaftsarchitektur unter anderem auch Naturschutz, Umweltplanung und Stadtplanung. Das internationale Symposium „From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture – Traditions, Re-Evaluations, and Future Perspectives“ behandelte Fragen, ausgehend vom Konzept der Gartenkunst, deren Beantwortung hilfreich sein sollte, die Geschichte der Landschaftsarchitektur zu erhellen, aber auch
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die aktuelle Bedeutung von „Kunst“ in der Landschaftsarchitektur zu hinterfragen. Die Beiträge sollen das Selbstverständnis der Profession zu Beginn des 21. Jahrhunderts kritisch reflektieren. Das Symposium im September 2018 wurde organisiert vom Fachbereich Herrenhausen der Landeshauptstadt Hannover, der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Gartenkunst und Landschaftskultur (DGGL), der VolkswagenStiftung und dem Zentrum für Gartenkunst und Landschaftsarchitektur (CGL) der Leibniz Universität Hannover.
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Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Ronald Clark (eds.) From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture Traditions, Re-Evaluations, and Future Perspectives
Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Ronald Clark (eds.)
Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Ronald Clark (eds.)
From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture
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16.03.2021 10:14:20
CGL-STUDIES 28
Edited by the Centre of Garden Art and Landscape Architecture of the Leibniz Universität Hannover
Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Ronald Clark (eds.)
From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture Traditions, Re-Evaluations, and Future Perspectives
Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über http://dnb.d-nb.de abrufbar. AVM – Akademische Verlagsgemeinschaft München 2021 © Thomas Martin Verlagsgesellschaft, München Umschlagabbildung: Water spouts near the entrance and the lagoon view of Xochimilco Ecological Park, Mexico City, 1993 (© Gabriel Figueroa) Alle Rechte vorbehalten. Dieses Werk einschließlich aller seiner Teile ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung außerhalb der Grenzen des Urhebergesetzes ohne schriftliche Zustimmung des Verlages ist unzulässig und strafbar. Das gilt insbesondere für Nachdruck, auch auszugsweise, Reproduktion, Vervielfältigung, Übersetzung, Mikroverfilmung sowie Digitalisierung oder Einspeicherung und Verarbeitung auf Tonträgern und in elektronischen Systemen aller Art. Alle Informationen in diesem Buch wurden mit größter Sorgfalt erarbeitet und geprüft. Weder Herausgeber, Autor noch Verlag können jedoch für Schäden haftbar gemacht werden, die in Zusammenhang mit der Verwendung dieses Buches stehen. e-ISBN (ePDF) 978-3-96091-573-7 ISBN (Print) 978-3-95477-125-7 Akademische Verlagsgemeinschaft München Schwanthalerstr. 81 D-80336 München www.avm-verlag.de
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Content
Welcome addresses Wilhelm Krull Welcome Address
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Christoph Strutz “Words of Welcome” by Vice President Strutz on behalf of the President of Leibniz University Hannover
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Ronald Clark Welcome19 Introduction Ronald Clark, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn Foreword25 Ronald Clark, Jens Spanjer, Anorthe Wetzel, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn Introduction “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture”
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Session I: Garden Art through the Ages Yichi Zhang China’s Vauxhall: Pleasure Gardens in Modern Shanghai
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Hubertus Fischer Garden Art – Changing Significance and Contemporary Requirements
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Sonja Dümpelmann “Landscape Architect better carries the Professional Idea”: On the Politics of Words in the Professionalization of Landscape Architecture in the United States
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Makoto Akasaka Professionalising Landscape Architecture in Japan: Are we Artists, Researchers, Planners, or Gardeners?
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Session II: Researcher’s Fair – Visions and New Research Projects Christian Werthmann Researcher’s Fair – Visions and New Research Projects
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Lightning Talks by Early Career Scientists Nayla M. Al-Akl Redefining the Values of Beauty in Landscape Architecture: The Challenge of an Emerging Field in the Urban Context
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Camilla Jane Allen Three Cathedrals of Trees: From Allegory to Architecture
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Ana Catarina Antunes, Teresa Portela Marques, Teresa Andresen The German Influence in the Genesis of Landscape Architecture in Portugal
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Michelle Knopf Witness of unique Garden History in deep Slumber – A Conservation Management Plan for the Neunhof Castle Garden near Nuremberg
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Verena Zapf Student Competition: Fürst Pückler in Branitz
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Karin Seeber From Palimpsest to Hypertext: reading Garden Historiography
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Myungjin Shin, Jeong-Hann Pae Aesthetic Experience of Urban Agricultural Landscape in Post-Industrial Seoul
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New Projects from two University Teams Jasmin Laske, Ben Jamin Grau Designing Public Spaces from a Night Perspective
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Anet Scherling, Christoph Pelka and Jakob Hüppauff Why Landscape Architecture must find its own Role: Reflections on the State of Landscape Architecture
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Session III: Future Challenges for Landscape Architects Bianca Maria Rinaldi The Future of Landscape Architecture Education
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Karsten Jørgensen From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture
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Stefanie Hennecke Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019, with Reference to the Bologna Process
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Philip Belesky Park, Process, and Parameter
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Session IV: Contemporary Reflections on Art and Garden Art Hartmut Troll What is Art, what is Garden Art, today?
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Michaela Ott Contemporary Art and Landscape Architecture
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Udo Weilacher The Risk of Anaesthetic Landscapes
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Session V: (Garden-)Artist, Designer or Both – Self Reflections on the Work and the Profession by Renowned Landscape Architects Jörg Rekittke Preferred Situations
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Monika Gora Garden or Art or Both?
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Kamel Louafi Art in Public Space
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Mario Schjetnan Art and Landscape
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Welcome addresses
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Wilhelm Krull
Welcome Address Dear Vice-President Strutz, Dear Ronald Clark, Distinguished Colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen, First of all, let me extend a very warm welcome to all of you to this symposium „From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture”. I am delighted to see so many guests from all over the world here in Hanover, and I am especially glad to welcome the very distinguished speakers as well as the junior researchers who received travel grants to attend this conference. It is a great pleasure to have you all here at Herrenhausen Palace! And since we have so many guests from various parts of the world at this conference, please, allow me to also make a few remarks about the Volkswagen Foundation. Some of you may have asked yourself: “Why does a car manufacturer support research about landscape?” Well, the Volkswagen Foundation is not directly affiliated to the car manufacturer of the same name – which is particularly important to mention in view of the so-called “Diesel Affair” or the recent scandal concerning experiments forcing monkeys to breathe diesel fumes. It owes its existence as well as its name to a contractual agreement between the Federal Government and the State of Lower Saxony. Following lengthy discussions, it was decided in the late 1950s to transform the Volkswagenwerk GmbH to a widely dispersed private ownership by issuing so-called ‘people’s shares’ and use the proceeds from the sale of these shares to establish the Stiftung Volkswagenwerk, as it was called until 1989. The Foundation’s purpose is to support higher education and research; its aim is both to identify new and significant areas of investigation as well as to make contributions toward resolving societal issues. I should also briefly introduce Herrenhausen Palace and the Gardens, the venue of this conference, which takes place right in the middle of Hanover’s beautiful Herrenhausen Gardens, a world famous cultural heritage that could not have been more appropriate for this conference. The Herrenhausen Gardens are one of those gardens which were originally built in the Baroque and were then primarily serving one goal: The demonstration of absolutistic power within the realm of nature – as another example one might think of the famous gardens of Versailles. But at the same time, they might be understood as a kind of greenhouse not only for plants and flowers, but ideas as well. The exceptional status of the gardens has been emphasized by the Berlin arthisto-
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Welcome Address
rian – and former trustee of the Volkswagen Foundation – Horst Bredekamp who argued in his book “Leibniz and the Revolution of Garden Art” that contrary to the received view the difference of formalized baroque gardens and the later English landscape gardens is not an antithesis of restriction and freedom. According to Bredekamp, baroque gardens like the Great Garden of Herrenhausen are actually incarnations of freedom, namely the freedom of thought that is at the centre of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz’ rationalistic philosophy. Not only Gardens but also castles and palaces can be places of freedom and creative thinking. It was very much in this spirit that the Volkswagen Foundation initiated and financed the rebuilding of Herrenhausen Palace which was destroyed during an allied air raid in October 1943. The Palace was rebuilt in its former splendor true to the neoclassical design of Georg Ludwig Laves, an architect who shaped Hanover’s architecture to quite some extent (including the Opera House, and the Palace that hosts the State Parliament of Lower Saxony). For us it was an investment in a twofold sense. On the one hand we consider it as a sustainable financial investment. On the other hand we will use the conference facilities of the palace to promote scientific and scholarly exchange as well as public participation in research. On about 100 days per year the Volkswagen Foundation gathers leading researchers from all over the world at Herrenhausen Palace for conferences and workshops, or for public events that aim at engaging the general public in pertinent research issues and important challenges facing society. The two museum wings are showing an exhibition capturing the intellectual tradition of Herrenhausen, first and foremost embodied in the already mentioned universal scholar and philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. Leibniz spent almost 40 years of his life in Hanover, and quite frequently visited the palace of Herrenhausen and the garden next to it. But Herrenhausen Palace is much more than just a conference centre and museum. Rebuilding it restored the architectural centre of the garden ensemble at Herrenhausen and the Great Garden’s original point of reference, thus emphasizing the cultural-historical significance of the place. Keeping this in mind, I am confident that this setting will be very stimulating for a conference, which revolves around the notions of garden art and landscape architecture and – among others – the question of whether a contemporary garden art actually exists. But of course, it is no mere coincidence that we are having this conference at this very place: Being situated in Hanover, the issues mentioned are of recurring interest to the VolkswagenFoundation, which is why this symposium stands in a line with quite a few other conferences on gardens and landscape architecture. In 2001 the VolkswagenFoundation supported a conference entitled “Project Herrenhausen – International Workshop for the Conceptualisation of a Centre for Garden Art and Landscape Architecture”, which resulted in the development of a conceptual framework for this very centre. It was eventually
Wilhelm Krull
established in 2002 and I am very glad that by now it is firmly settled within the academic and civic landscape of Hanover and intimately involved in the organization of this symposium. Likewise, I am very glad to see Professor Christophe Girot and Annette Freytag among the speakers at this symposium. In 2012, the VolkswagenFoundation supported their project which aimed at the development of a new theoretical position in landscape architecture by using the concept of topology to cross borders between disciplines and methodologies. In the course of the project two conferences were held, „Topology – On Designing Landscape Today“ in 2012 and “Thinking the Contemporary Landscape. Positions and Oppositions” in 2013, and a book by the title “Topology” was published in 2014. But why is it that your field seems so fruitful when encountering our Foundation? Well, the area of garden art and landscape architecture is indeed a very special one, bridging various disciplines as well as merging economical, ecological, and aesthetic factors. As such it is a very fitting one for the strategy of the Volks wagen Foundation to encourage research focused on new, high-risk areas, and to transcend boundaries – whether between research and practice, between specific professional cultures, or between different countries. Likewise, gardens are quite often places of great cultural importance for the citizenry in which they are situated – as exemplified by the Herrenhausen Gardens. This Sunday we will host a so-called Herrenhausen Matinee for the wider public, which will address the role of gardens and landscape for human health. Your field can thus not only build bridges across various disciplines, but as well the gap between theory and practice, and through its objects of study and practice also the gap between scholarship and the society at large. It is thus no surprise that the participants of this conference are to a large number academics and practitioners, and not only in landscape architecture but also in related disciplines. I am sure that this will foster an inter-, and transdisciplinary dialogue which will be very enriching for all of us. Having said this, we invite you to do the same, to take some time to walk around in the gardens yourself, and see its green houses, to visit the museum, and to enjoy the unique setting of this conference centre. Additionally, let me point out the very fortunate timing of this symposium with another event taking place in the gardens tomorrow: Every year, the Herrenhausen Gardens host the international fireworks competition, which this year takes place for the 28th time. Tomorrow evening, a team from New Zealand will showcase its skills and illuminate the sky. If you are interested in experiencing the gardens in this very special atmosphere, you can purchase tickets in the coffee break tomorrow. This conference would not have been possible without various people, who were essential in developing its rationale. Please, join me in thanking Professor Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn and Sabine Albersmeier from the Centre of Garden
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Welcome Address
Art and Landscape Architecture at the Leibniz University Hannover, Jens Spanjer, president of the German Association of Garden Art and Landscape Culture (DGGL), Ronald Clark, the director of the Herrenhausen Gardens, as well as Anorthe Wetzel from the VolkswagenFoundation. And together with Celina Adrion, Anorthe Wetzel organized this Herrenhausen Symposium on behalf of the Volks wagen Foundation. Although we are still at an early stage, I hope you all agree with me that they deserve a warm hand of applause. And now I would like to pass the floor to Dr. Strutz who is the Vice-President of the Leibniz University Hannover, and thus has probably already had plenty of time experiencing and enjoying the gardens of Herrenhausen. Thank you very much for your attention!
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Christoph Strutz
“Words of Welcome” by Vice President Strutz on behalf of the President of Leibniz University Hannover Dear Mr. Krull, dear Mr. Clark, ladies and gentlemen, dear participants of the international Herrenhausen Symposium “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture”, As Vice-President of Leibniz University and on behalf of the entire Presidency, I am very pleased to welcome you to two days of exchange and insights on Garden Art and Landscape Architecture here at the Herrenhausen Palace, a place which, as I think you will all agree, is both most convenient and suitable for reflecting on and discussing the topic of this conference. As Vice-President of Leibniz University I am particularly proud that our university hosts this symposium and welcomes guests from all over the world. I am very pleased to learn that a fascinating collaboration has been established for the purpose of putting together this event, which, as a matter of fact, is a collaboration between the department Herrenhausen Gardens of the state capital Hannover, the German Association of Garden Art and Landscape Culture, an association founded in 1887 as the first professional organisation in garden art in Germany, the Stiftung Schloss Dyk. Zentrum für Gartenkunst und Landschaftsarchitektur / Schloss Dyck Foundation. Center for Garden Art and Landscape Architecture, the European Garden Heritage Network, as well as the German association for palaces and gardens. And it is a pleasure for me to welcome Ronald Clark, the director of the Herrenhausen Gardens department, and Jens Spanjer, the Director of the Schloss Dyck Center for Garden Art and Landscape Architecture. Moreover, the Volkswagen Foundation not only sponsored this symposium, but was also actively involved right from the start in planning this event as a coorganiser. Thank you very much particularly to Anorthe Wetzel and Celine Adrion from the Volkswagen Foundation. As to Leibniz University, the Centre of Garden Art and Landscape Architecture was significantly involved in designing and realizing this event. I would like to say a few words on the Centre, which certainly is a unique research centre in Europe. Its collaboration partners include numerous internationally renowned research institutions, such as the Centre for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art, or Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, both located in Washington D. C., as well as Technion Haifa.
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“Words of Welcome” by Vice President Strutz
Since its founding as a research centre of Leibniz University in 2002, the Centre has implemented many major events and research projects on garden history and landscape architecture, including several workshops and conferences sponsored by the Volkswagen Foundation. Let me only list a few of them with VolkswagenFoundation as its sponsor. The first symposium in 2005 was devoted to the subject “Gardens and Parks in the Lives of Jewish People after 1933”. The international symposium “Herrenhausen in International Comparison – a Critical Discourse” followed in May 2011. In 2015, the conference “Travel and Gardens. Travel, Travel Reports and Gardens from the Middle Ages to the Late 19th Century” sponsored by the Volkswagen Foundation was realized. This was the first event of the Centre that took place in Herrenhausen Palace, which was inaugurated in 2013. Thanks to the Volks wagen Foundation and its Secretary General Dr. Wilhelm Krull, Herrenhausen Palace is now a convention centre, which meets the highest international standards and has attracted worldwide attention. Last year’s symposium “Dangerous Landscapes – Re-Thinking Disaster Risk Management in Low-Income Communities” under the direction of Professor Christian Werthmann from the Institute of Landscape Architecture of our university took place also here in the Palace of Herrenhausen, also under notable national and international acclaim. As you can see, research on garden art and landscape architecture plays a widely acknowledged, important role at Leibniz University. Furthermore, the Volkswagen Foundation is an excellent sponsor for these topics. Let me take the opportunity to thank Dr. Krull for his open-mindedness and continuous enthusiasm and the Volkswagen Foundation for its willingness to support research topics that will concern us today and tomorrow. Leibniz University is located in the Welfengarten, one of the four Herrenhau sen Gardens. Starting out as a baroque garden, it was later remodelled into a landscape park. Today, it is a university park and serves as a park for residents in the northern part of the city. Recently, the Welfengarten was redesigned by the internationally acclaimed landscape architect Kamel Louafi – of course in consideration of garden heritage conservation [Mr Louafi will be one of the speakers at this symposium]. Today, it is a marvellous park with great historical tradition. I invite you to visit the Welfengarten during your stay in Hannover, as it illustrates how garden history and modern landscape architecture can be successfully interlinked. I invite you to take a break during the time of the Symposium to visit also the main building of Leibniz University which was built in the 1860s as palace for the King of Hannover. But as Hannover lost a war against Prussia the King had to leave and the Welfenschloss / Welfenpalace was available for better purposes. And
Christoph Strutz
to have the Leibniz University of Hannover in the Welfenpalace is the best use of such a wonderful building I can think of. Lastly, in connection with this symposium, I would also like to refer to the application of the state capital Hannover for the title “European Capital of Culture” in 2025. Especially with regard to its gardens, Hannover has outstanding potential for such an application. We at Leibniz University will be pleased to contribute our expert knowledge. The excellent collaborations between the state capital Hannover and Leibniz University in the field of garden heritage have a long tradition. Among other things, this tradition was supported by outstanding collaborations with Professor Kaspar Klaffke, head of the former Open Spaces Department until 2002 and then also professor at our department of landscape architecture, and Karin van Schwartzenberg, current head of the department Environment and Urban Parks of the City of Hannover. And particularly Ronald Clark as Director of the Herrenhausen Gardens stands for this fruitful and enjoyable collaboration between Leibniz University and the City of Hannover. I would be delighted if our symposium “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture” could also make a contribution in this regard. I wish all an interesting and successful symposium and a pleasant stay in Hannover with various garden pleasures here in Herrenhausen.
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Ronald Clark
Welcome Professor Billmann-Mahecha, Dr. Krull, distinguished Colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen, on behalf of the organization team I would also like to welcome you to Herrenhausen Palace. On the screen you see some aerial views of Hanover’s most important work of Garden Art, the Herrenhausen Gardens. And I hope you will have time, today or tomorrow, to visit at least one of them. Vice-President Prof. Christoph Strutz mentioned Welfengarten as one of the four gardens belonging to this ensemble. The other three have been owned and maintained by the City of Hanover since the 1920s and ’30s. The Great Garden (Großer Garten) was laid out under Elector Ernestus Augustus and Electress Sophie in the late 17th century. Hanover had become an Electorate in 1692 and thus ranked among the ten most important German States. The 200-acre garden was laid out in a mixture of French and Dutch Baroque style, enclosed by the Graft, a moat more than two kilometres long. The garden covered the same area as the medieval city of Hanover with its 20,000 inhabitants. Other Baroque gardens were more splendid, but we have two unique areas. First the Hedge Theatre, dating from 1691, with its gold-plated lead statues, the first complete garden theatre in garden history and the only one to have been preserved. In autumn 2019 we shall start renovation work, replacing all the trees on the stage and the amphitheatre and more than 150 metres of hornbeam hedges.
Fig. 1 Great Garden (Großer Garten) Herrenhausen (Foto © Lars Gerhardts/HTMG)
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Welcome
Fig. 2 View from the Palace to the Great Fountain (Foto © Lars Gerhardts/HTMG)
Fig. 3 Spring Water Garden (Springwassergarten) in the Great Garden (Foto © Marc Theis)
In 2020 we shall celebrate the tercentenary of the Great Fountain, which was the highest fountain in Europe when it was commissioned, at 35 metres. We also hope to have completed restoration of the Wasserkunst, the machine house from the 1860s with two huge waterwheels and four pumps that drove the fountain to 65 metres until the 1950s. Since then it has been driven by electrical power, ascending to 72 metres when there is no wind.
Ronald Clark
Fig. 4 Orangery Parterre and Gallery Building in the Great Garden (Foto © Lars Gerhardts/HTMG)
In spite of several alterations in the 1930s and 1960s, the structure of the garden is still the original Baroque, and Großer Garten is the only unchanged early Baroque garden in Germany. Across the road we have the Berggarten (mountain garden). Mountain, astonished? Every little hillock in Hanover is called a mountain. This one was a glacial sand dune north of the River Leine valley, and Berggarten is still a few metres higher than the Great Garden. From the mid-18th century it was developed as a botanical garden, famous in the 19th century for the palm and orchid collection. It was seriously damaged in World War Two, but today we have more than 12,000 different plants, notably the world’s largest orchid species collection. With such beautiful areas as the North American Prairie, Iris Garden or Perennial Ground, Berggarten is perfect for your Saturday afternoon stroll before the fireworks competition. Our third garden is Georgengarten, named after the Hanoverian and British King George IV, a landscape garden from the first part of the 19th century laid out by Christian Schaumburg, one of northern Germany’s leading landscape gardeners. There had been plans to change the Great Garden into a landscape garden in the early 19th century, but George IV decided to leave the Baroque garden untouched; although old-fashioned, it was said to bear witness to the achievement of his ancestors. So we now have two important, almost original gardens in contrasting styles side by side. Georgengarten today is one of the most popular public parks in Hanover. One thought - not about garden art but about gardens: Will our profession ever use the word “garden” again? It is lost to us, although one of the most positive
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Welcome
terms ever in nearly every language. “Garden” is emotionally charged; it gives us a glimpse of paradise. We have changed our titles, from garden artists to garden architects to landscape architects and open space planners. The municipal Garden Divisions of German cities have become Green Space Divisions. Of course, their tasks are more comprehensive, including urban, landscape and environmental planning. But now our work and image seem to be mainly technocratic, faced by so many restrictions. Can we focus on the emotional factor again, which is easily transported with the word garden? Vice-president Professor Strutz mentioned Hanover’s bid to be a European Capital of Culture in 2025. I can tell you that two days ago the application office decided that garden culture would be one of the main topics. As I will be responsible for the content, you can be sure that we will work together with the Leibniz University very closely. Our first meeting is on Monday. In closing, I want to thank this wonderful organization team for many good ideas and discussions and for all their work over nearly two years. It has been a great pleasure to collaborate with them. Thanks to the speakers and debaters from all over the world for coming to Herrenhausen, and of course to all the participants as well. However, what are all the good ideas and thoughts of a symposium worth, when there is no partner to finance them? So, Dr. Krull, our cordial thanks to the Volkswagen Foundation, to you and your colleagues, for making this symposium possible. Now, let us look to the future in this symposium and face the changes before us. I wish us much inspiration, lively discussions, and new contacts for a worldwide garden network.
Introduction
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Ronald Clark, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn
Foreword ‘From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture – Traditions, Re-Evaluations, and Future Perspectives’ – an international symposium with such a title was predestined to be staged in Herrenhausen; hardly any other venue offers such fascinating and felicitous juxtapositions of garden art and landscape architecture, both in the grounds themselves and their underlying principles. The Herrenhausen Gardens, an ensemble comprising baroque, landscape and botanic gardens, are directly adjacent to Leibniz University Hannover’s Faculty of Architecture and Landscape with its Centre of Garden Art and Landscape Architecture (CGL), and the Conference Centre in Herrenhausen Palace, where since its opening in 2013 the Volks wagen Foundation has hosted numerous symposia and conferences, many among them devoted to landscape architecture and garden history – and could there be a lovelier setting for a post-prandial stroll than among the baroque glories of the Großer Garten? This landscape and garden symposium was co-organised by the City and State Capital of Hannover’s Herrenhausen Gardens Division, the Deutsche Gesell schaft für Gartenkunst und Landschaftsarchitektur (DGGL), the Volkswagen Foundation, and the Centre of Garden Art and Landscape Architecture at Leibniz University Hannover, with some organisational support from the European Garden Heritage Network. Out of our collegial and fruitful cooperation evolved a symposium programme that generated a lively response in Germany and abroad; Herrenhausen Palace offered the ideal forum for outstanding speakers from many countries, whether internationally esteemed landscape architects or young academics and practitioners presenting new ideas and research findings. The latter were strongly represented during Session II, ‘Researcher’s Fair – Visions and New Research Projects’, with their ‘Lightning Talks by Early Career Scientists’. Our particular appreciation for his generous support is due to Dr. Wilhelm Krull, former Secretary General of the Volkswagen Foundation, with heartfelt thanks to Anorthe Wetzel and Celina Adrion of the Foundation’s Conferences and Symposia department and their Head of Conferences and Symposia Katja Ebeling for their organisational talents and programme suggestions, along with the former CGL Managing Director Dr. Sabine Albersmeier, and Jens Spanjer, former President of the DGGL, for their proactive involvement in the preparation and running of the symposium. Special thanks, also, to Mic Hale, who has again translated some contributions for this volume into English and whose copy editing and sensitive mediation between the English and German languages have enhanced other contributions to this volume. We would also like to extend our
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Foreword
warmest thanks to those numerous helpers without whom the symposium could not have taken place so successfully nor the symposium proceedings have appeared in this form.
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Ronald Clark, Jens Spanjer, Anorthe Wetzel, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn
Introduction “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture” The development of landscape architecture into a profession involving university training gradually took place during the course of the 19th century in connection with the processes of industrialisation and urbanisation. Originally, the area of responsibility for landscape architecture was based on the premise that planning and creating open spaces such as parks and gardens was the business of garden artists. Today, it also incorporates the protection of natural resources and the environment, urban planning, tourism planning and other disciplines, or at least, there are significant overlaps with other planning disciplines. Professionals trained as landscape architects work in numerous places, for example in municipal administrations such as parks commissions and parks departments, city planning offices, in governmental agencies such as nature conservation agencies, departments for the conservation of historic buildings and in educational institutions like universities – as employees, civil servants or freelancers. In the Early Modern Period this field of activity was indeed considered part of the arts, an art, moreover, that was closely connected to sciences such as mathematics.1 Professionals of the Baroque era, e.g. André Le Notre, who created extraordinary gardens like Vaux-le-Vicomte, Sceaux and Versailles, were perceived as ʽgarden artistsʼ. During the course of the 18th century, discussions related to garden art followed the shift from a formal baroque garden to landscape gardens. It was in this context that, in Germany, philosophy gained significance for garden art and vice versa, with philosophers acting as leading garden theorists. Beginning with Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten and Georg Friedrich Meier during the 1750s, aesthetics, as a science of sentiment – as opposed to reason – gained increasing significance as a philosophical field of reflection, culminating in Emanuel Kant’s “Critical Philosophy”.2 Between 1779 and 1785, the professor of philosophy Christian Caius Laurentz Hirschfeld, one of the most important landscape garden theorists in Germany, published his five volume work “Theorie der Gartenkunst”. The Leipzig philosophy professor C. H. Heydenreich wrote his “System der Ästhetik” in 1790. In 1792, Wilhelm Gottlieb Becker, professor of philosophy in 1 On this issue, see for example Volker Remmert, The Art of Garden and Landscape Design and the Mathematical Sciences in the Early Modern Period, in: Hubertus Fischer, Volker R. Remmert and Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (Eds.), Gardens, Knowledge and the Sciences in the Early Modern Period (= Trends in the History of Science), Birkhäuser/Springer International Publishing AG Switzerland, 2016 2 See Michael Lee, The German ‛Mittelweg’. Garden Theory and Philosophy in the Time of Kant, Routledge, New York & London, 2013
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Introduction “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture”
Dresden, wrote his famous work “Das Seifersdorfer Thal” (Leipzig), as well as the book “Der Plauensche Grund bei Dresden”. Johann G. Grohmann, professor for philosophy in Wittenberg, started publishing his widely distributed “Ideenmagazin für Liebhaber von Gärten”, a kind of sample book containing examples of architecture, grottos, bridges, benches, ruins, hermitages and more for utilisation in landscape gardens. In 1797, Grohmann wrote his work “Neue Theorie der schönen Gartenkunst” (Leipzig).3 In the context of this development, the garden increasingly became a subject of art history as well as of philosophy. Garden theory was strongly influenced by the intellectual debate that led to the establishment of aesthetics as a discipline between 1750 and 1790.4 An important point of critique within this new discipline was that, owing to the image of nature cultivated by the natural sciences, too many aspects of humans’ experiences of nature went ignored.5 Traditions that considered the field of garden design an ʽartʼ, as well as a corresponding image of the profession are clearly visible in Germany, up until the end of the 19th century at least regarding language use, In 1887, for example, the ʽVerein deutscher Gartenkünstlerʼ (VdG) (ʽAssociation of German garden artistsʼ) was founded in Dresden as the first professional interest group in landscape architecture. However, it is doubtful whether terms such as ʽGartenkunstʼ (ʽgarden artʼ) and ʽGartenkünstlerʼ (ʽgarden artistʼ) were considered rather technical, understood as professional designations only that were no longer meant to refer to garden art as part of the fine arts/visual arts. In 1899, twelve years after the foundation of the ʽVerein deutscher Gartenkünstlerʼ, the ʽAmerican Society of Landscape Architectsʼ (ASLA) was formed in the USA. The designation and use of the term ʽLandscape Architectʼ, the internationally renowned title to this day, may indicate various lines of traditions and contexts of origin in different countries.
3 Regarding the relationship between garden art and philosophy in the 18th century see in more detail the excellent work by Michael Lee, The German ‚Mittelweg‘. Garden Theory and Philosophy … (as note 2). 4 Friedrich Schiller and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe were also involved in the discussion on garden art as an art (form) (see, e.g., Friedrich Schiller, “Über den Gartenkalender auf das Jahr 1795”). Schiller’s writings on aesthetics are attributed to a phase of development “during which garden art had already lost its position of supremacy within the hierarchy of the arts” (see in more detail Stefan Groß, Die Weimarer Klassik und die Gartenkunst: Über den Gattungsdiskurs und die „Bildenden Künste“ in den theoretischen Schriften von Goethe, Schiller und Krause, Peter Lang, Frankfurt/M., 2009). 5 For example, aesthetics, as an attempt to capture and describe the poetic experiences and sensations during a sunset, was just as important and legitimate as scientific explanations of the same phenomenon. Confronted by a form of science which reduced the manifoldness of this and other natural phenomena to simple geometry, coordinates and general laws of nature, the founders of aesthetics endeavoured to systematically record these special experiences which could not be reduced to scientific models. Thus, from the very beginning, aesthetics as a scholarly discipline had a predisposition for natural beauty which eventually also favoured garden theories with affiliations to the English landscape garden.
Ronald Clark, Jens Spanjer, Anorthe Wetzel, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn
It was only at the beginning of the 20th century that the ʽVerein deutscher Gartenkünstlerʼ converted from a professional interest group into the ʽDeutsche Gesellschaft für Gartenkunstʼ (ʽGerman Association for Garden Artʼ), the present-day Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gartenkunst und Landschaftskultur (German Association for Garden Art and Landscape Culture), which also accepted lay-people with an interest in gardens.6 In the wake of these developments, the ʽBund Deutscher Gartenarchitektenʼ (BDGA) (ʽLeague of German Garden Architectsʼ) was founded in 1913 and the ʽVerband Deutscher Gartenarchitektenʼ (VDG) (ʽUnion of German Garden Architectsʼ) in 1914. Both institutions were reconstituted after the Second World War as the ʽBund Deutscher Landschaftsarchitektenʼ (ʽUnion of German Landscape Architectsʼ).7 Nowadays in Germany, the term ʽGartenkunstʼ (ʽgarden artʼ) is restricted to historic parks and gardens, regardless of whether these met the artistic demands at the time of their creation, or because they have survived to this day. This retrospective view on garden art has probably become prevalent during the first half of the 20th century. The question is whether there is such a thing as contemporary garden art. Which present-day parks and gardens would be regarded as garden art? Which criteria would have to be fulfilled in order to be classified as a garden artist? Who would be worth considering? These issues were raised in September 2018 in an interdisciplinary discussion, as the question of art is relevant just as much to architecture as it is to many other areas. The international symposium “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture – Traditions, Re-Evaluations, and Future Perspectives” invited representatives from different disciplines. It addressed questions which, based on the notion of garden art, should help to reconstruct, among other things, its historical development as well as the professional self-image in various phases of development, culminating in the question whether the term garden art can still possess relevance today. One section examined the transformation of the term ʽGartenkunstʼ both nationally and internationally. One core theme to be constituted by the points of radical change during the 20th century during which contemporary garden art was replaced in favour of historic garden art. The second section discussed, if contemporary garden art exists or even should exist. Do the fine arts/visual arts of today have the sole right of representation? Where is the boundary to architecture? Does such a thing as ʽBaukunstʼ (ʽart of 6 On the history of the VdG and the DGGL see Gert Gröning and Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, 18871987. Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gartenkunst und Landschaftspflege (DGGL). Ein Rückblick auf 100 Jahre DGGL, Boskett-Verlag, Berlin, 1987. 7 On the history of the BDLA see Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn and Gert Gröning, 1913-1988. 75 Jahre Bund Deutscher Landschaftsarchitekten BDLA. Teil I: Zur Entwicklung der Interessenverbände der Gartenarchitekten in der Weimarer Republik und im Nationalsozialismus, Köllen Druck + Verlag GmbH, Bonn, 1988.
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constructionʼ) still exist in this discipline? What would denote a landscape architect as an artist? For the third section, internationally renowned landscape architects whose work features distinctive characteristics were invited to self-reflexively take a stand on the question of whether their creations are garden art or not. Apart from lectures by distinguished academics, this topic was discussed on an international level by young researchers. Following a call for papers, candidates were selected for a fellowship and received the chance to present their research projects in a three-minute lightning talk during the symposium. Moreover, several groups consisting of students of landscape architecture from selected German universities participated in the symposium and presented statements in form of lightning-talks. The symposium was also meant to provide both experienced and young researchers alike with the opportunity for intense debate and for networking.
Session I Garden Art through the Ages
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Yichi Zhang
China’s Vauxhall: Pleasure Gardens in Modern Shanghai Chinese garden history is receiving increasing attention from academia. Scholars have carefully explored its aesthetics, developmental history, and role in the relationship between society and individual identity.1 Nevertheless, the existing literature mainly focuses on the historical gardens that served private owners and their guests, or on contemporary landscape constructions open to the public, while failing to draw enough attention to a type of designed landscape between these two types – the pleasure gardens. Like the famous Vauxhall Gardens in 18th-century London, the pleasure gardens of London, Paris and elsewhere were privately owned gardens open to the public.2 The creation and subsequent popularity of these gardens in China in the second half of 19th-century mainly resulted from the confluence of imported ideas on public parks with traditional private garden design and usage, as China became increasingly involved in international affairs. This designed landscape plays a key role in Chinese garden history, helping us to understand Chinese gardens’ transition from private places to public spaces (the communality dimension) and from traditional garden design to contemporary landscape design (the temporal dimension). Significantly, their unique semi-public status brought these gardens into continual conflict with established garden art and society, which in turn led to the development of particular physical constructions, operational approaches, and social influence. Shanghai is an excellent location for a case study of pleasure gardens in China. Historically, the city was a major urban centre of the wealthy and highly cultured Jiangnan region, where the garden art tradition goes back thousands of years. For scholars, Shanghai’s historical private gardens are often seen as emblematic of all Chinese gardens, particularly since the 17th-century, when a number of famous gardens such as Yu Garden and Luxiang Garden were established. Moreover, Shanghai was one of the earliest treaty ports in China. Opened in the mid-19thcentury, it has since served as the most important border crossing into China, through which foreign culture and ideas were introduced to Chinese society. Not surprisingly, Shanghai provided the setting for the appearance of the first pleasure 1 Hui Zou, The Jing of a Perspective Garden, in: Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes, 22, (2002), 4, pp. 293-326; Jung Woo-Jin, Changes in the Uses and Meanings of the Bamboo Screen in Traditional Chinese Gardens, in: Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes, 35 (2015), 1, pp. 7189; Mary Padua, Hybrid Modernity: The Public Park in Late 20th century China, Routledge, London, 2020; Yichi Zhang, From ‘Arcadia of the Literati’ to ‘Extravagant Enclosure’: The Tianjin Salt Merchant Gardens of the Qing Dynasty, in: Landscape Research, 45, (2020), 7, pp. 789-801. 2 Jonathan Conlin, Vauxhall on the Boulevard: Pleasure Gardens in London and Paris, 1764–1784, in: Urban History, 35 (2008), 1, pp. 24-47.
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gardens in China. In the course of time it had more than 20 pleasure gardens, among them several famous gardens such as Zhang Garden and Xu Garden. This paper explores in particular the pleasure gardens of Shanghai from the mid-19th- to mid-20th-century. By examining their physical construction, operational approaches, and social influence, it considers how the dimension of communality, or the ideas behind being in the public realm, interacted with the philosophy of private gardens to produce a landscape unique in modern China; it thereby offers a contribution to understanding the developmental history of Chinese gardens from garden art to landscape architecture, as well as the importance of the communal dimension. Furthermore, since Shanghai played a leading role in the development of urban construction in modern China (other cities used Shanghai as a blueprint for their own urban development), this study will contribute to the understanding of urban landscapes and urban modernization in other Chinese cities and beyond. Physical Construction Although open to the public, the Shanghai pleasure gardens were privately owned. Their owners adopted the naturalistic layout of traditional Chinese scholarly gardens; the principal landscape elements of scholarly gardens in the Jiangnan Area,
Fig. 1 View of Yeshi Garden, in: Youru Wu, The Great View of Shenjiang, Vol. I, Dianshizhai, Shanghai, 1884, p. 2.
Yichi Zhang
artificial pools and rockeries, formed the main body of each garden. In fact, almost all the gardens, including Hardoon Garden, Xu Garden, Yeshi Garden and Yu Garden, set pools within their boundaries (fig. 1). The owners furthermore arranged plants with symbolic cultural meanings in and around the pools to emphasise their literary themes and further beautify the gardens; bamboo and pines representing men of noble character were planted around the Curving Pool (Quzhao) in Zhang Garden3 and lotus was planted in the pool of Bansong Garden, symbolizing the noble and unsullied character of the literati.4 The excavated soil and debris was used to create the rockeries which became distinctive features of the gardens. For example, Grand Garden had an artificial rockery with pavilions on it as its main feature, forming a mountain landscape in the city.5 Min Garden had three rockeries. The highest rose to seven metres, from which visitors could enjoy a view of Huangpu River.6 Architecture was another key element of scholarly gardens. Adopting Chinese architectural traditions, the pleasure gardens’ owners built diverse structures to organize the landscapes. According to various records they included not only the pavilions, terraces and halls commonly seen in traditional Chinese gardens but also galleries, boats, houses, and bridges. Through various combinations of these structures, the gardens became ‘twisting and turning’ spaces.7 Interestingly, the owners named these constructions after literary references. A boat in Yeshi Garden was named Lotus Boat of Taiyi (Taiyilianzhou), which referred to the boat of a supernatural being.8 Hardoon named a pavilion in his garden ‘Pavilion with Woods and Water’ (shuimuqinghua pavilion) from a 4th-century poem.9 In Xu Garden, the owner set twelve scenic spots such as ‘Settling in the Tower to Listen to the Rain’ (Jiloutingyu), ‘Playing the Lyre in the Curving Gorge’ (Panguqinming), and ‘Enjoying Plum Blossom in a Hall of the Celestial Being’ (Xianguanpingmei), which both framed the visitor’s route through the garden and enhanced its cultivated atmosphere.10 Moving beyond favouring designs referenced on literature, garden owners strove to introduce new cultural features to attract the common people. For example, the owner of Yu Garden spared no expense to acquire a stone inscription 3 Shanghai Literature Committee, The Famous Historical Sites in Shanghai, Shanghai Literature Committee, Shanghai, 1948, p. 14. 4 Commercial Press, Guide to Shanghai, Commercial Press, Shanghai, 1920, p. 177. 5 Xuke Cheng, Tao Wang and Tiesheng Liang (eds.), Shanghai Garden Volunteers, Shanghai Academy of Social Science Press, Shanghai, 2000, pp. 80-81. 6 Cheng, 2000 (see note 5), p. 87. 7 Zhicheng Chi, A Dream in Shanghai, in: Yuanxu Ge, Notes on Travelling Shanghai, Shanghai Ancient Book Press, Shanghai, 1893, p. 162. 8 Changnian Wang, Guideline of Great Shanghai, Southeast Culture Service Centre, Shanghai, 1947, p. 173. 9 Mingsheng Tang, Shanghai Gardens, Wenhui Press, Shanghai, 2010, p. 124. 10 Wang, 1947 (see note 8), p. 174.
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hand-carved by Ku Hung-ming (1857-1928), a widely popular late 19th-century Chinese thinker and man of letters, and set it in a niche of the garden to offer a unique view and cultural attraction11. Yeshi Garden housed a stone sculpture of a mythological figure, Wan Xiliang, which had been buried under the city wall of Shanghai as a talisman to protect the city and was found when that part of the wall was demolished in the early 20th-century. Thereafter, the owner of the garden worshiped this sculpture at the rockery to imbue the site with a sense of history.12 Moreover, some pleasure gardens included animal exhibitions; in Zhang Garden, Grand Garden, Yu Garden, and Liusan Garden exhibitions with donkeys, white cranes, macaques, sika deer and boa constrictors are documented. Some owners also introduced European structures to enhance their gardens. Zhang Garden contained a European style two-storey building named Arcadia Hall after the region of ancient Greece. Accommodating more than 2,000, it was the largest European style building in 19th-century Shanghai.13 Li Yixian likewise constructed a European style building in his Xi garden, and named it Spring Hall (yinquanlou). European leisure amenities were also introduced; for example, Grand Garden, Xi Garden, Bansong Garden, and Min Garden all had Western restaurants, which not only served European dishes but also sold European wines, cigarettes and coffee. Zhang Garden, Xi Garden, Shen Garden and Yu Garden incorporated billiard rooms, tennis courts, and other amenities that were popular in Europe. The pleasure gardens thus constituted a hybrid landscape. They adopted the naturalistic layout of traditional Chinese scholarly gardens to organize the garden spaces, while a European style hall, larger and higher than the other constructions, occupied the garden’s central space and formed the main view. Around this hall, Chinese constructions such as pavilions, terraces, boats, rockeries and pools were arranged to create a cultivated literary atmosphere. As for other details, the owners set up various facilities and activities from home and abroad, such as animal exhibitions or billiard rooms, to enhance the entertainment value of the garden and attract a broader range of visitors. Consequently, these gardens offered multifarious landscapes, attracting city dwellers from all walks of life, from the literati to the commonalty. Operational Approaches After opening their gardens to the public, finding practical ways to finance their operation became a pressing issue for the owners of these designed landscapes, 11 Chang Feng, Antiques in the Garden, in: New Shanghai, (1925), 4, p. 20. 12 Feng, 1925 (see note 11), p. 20. 13 Weiqing Li, Local History of Shanghai, Shanghai, 1907, p. 24.
Yichi Zhang
and most of them began charging admission to raise funds. Bansong Garden and Grand Garden charged 20 cents; Xi Garden charged 12 cents; Xu Garden and Yu Garden charged 10.14 While the tickets allowed visitors to enter most areas within a garden, some scenic spots and activities were subject to an additional fee. For example, in Yu Garden a charge of 20 cents was made for attending storytelling or ballad singing events,15 while Grand Garden charged 10 cents to visit the animal exhibits.16 In Xu Garden, 20 cents were charged for tea17 and in Zhang Garden visitors could buy tea for 20 cents and nuts for 10 cents.18 Contemporary statistics record that the daily wage of a worker in the 1920s was 20 cents.19 Hence, the price of visiting pleasure gardens was approximately one or two days’ wages for a working class person, While these charges helped cover the running costs of the gardens and generate surplus funds, the owners also engaged in innovative operational approaches to make further profits. To accumulate the huge amounts of money needed for garden construction some owners managed pleasure gardens as an investment project and sold shares; Li Yixian used this method to found Xi Garden in 188720 and Zhuo Huwu adopted the same approach to create Grand Garden in 1888.21 Another innovation was to transfer the operating rights of parts of the gardens to concessionaires. For example, the owner of Zhang Garden sublet the Water Ball Hall to the Huafa Company and asked it to take over the Hall’s operation.22 Although he thus forewent some rights this benefited both the owner, who received a constant rent, and the tenant, who profited from the pleasure garden’s goodwill and congenial environment. Continuing to innovate, owners sought to attract more visitors and increase income from ticket sales by holding special activities designed to cater for diverse tastes; for over 20 years Xu Garden held annual highly successful orchid exhibitions, plum exhibitions, and chrysanthemum exhibitions to attract the upper classes. Yu Garden also staged magic shows and acrobatic displays to attract the masses. To cater for the ‘gallants and gossips’, Zhang Garden invited courtesans to its shows and arranged for a newspaper to report that they would be at the park 14 Commercial Press, 1920 (see note 4), p. 172; Yuezhi Xiong, The Opening up of Private Gardens in the Late Qing Shanghai and the Expansion of Public Spaces, in: Academic Monthly, (1998), 8, pp. 73-81; Xuezhi Xiong, The Parks and Daily Life in Modern Shanghai, in: Journal of Social Sciences, (2013), 5, pp. 129-139. 15 Xiong, 1998 (see note 14), p. 74. 16 Xiong, 2013 (see note 14), p. 139. 17 Xiong, 1998 (see note 14), p. 73. 18 Xiong, 2013 (see note 14), p. 139. 19 Yibo Mao, The Situation of Women Labours, in: The China Times, (1926), May 5, p. 3. 20 Fanwen Zhang, The Analysis of Shanghai Private Park Operating Characteristics and Reasons for the Thriving in Late Qing Dynasty, in: Zhuangshi, (2011), 4, pp. 80-81. 21 Cheng, 2000 (see note 5), p. 80. 22 Zhang Garden Holds Night Garden, in: Qingqing Film Newspaper, (1941), 39 July, p. 2.
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Fig. 2 Courtesans being photographed at Zhang Garden, in: Tuhua Daily 148, (1910), p. 7.
entrance every day (fig. 2).23 To promote the fine views and raise public awareness of such special events the owners used the media, often advertising in the leading Shanghai newspapers such as Shen Pao, Eastern Times, and Ta Kung Pao. Furthermore, some gardens that were located in remote areas attracted visitors by providing free transport; Grand Garden, for example, was separated from the city centre by a river, so its owner arranged for ferries between the park and the downtown area.24 Beyond their financial ambitions, the owners also treated pleasure gardens as a means of expanding their social circle and developing personal interests. This is exemplified by the owners of Xu Garden and Hardoon Garden. The owner of Xu Garden, Xu Hongkui, formerly worked as a labourer on the wharfs but enjoyed 23 Wuwo Chen, The 30 Years’ Memory of Old Shanghai, Dadong Press, Shanghai, 1928, pp. 102, 106; Cheng, 2000 (see note 5), p. 80. 24 Chang Feng, The Site of Grand Garden, in: New Shanghai, (1925), 3, p. 52.
Yichi Zhang
literary culture.25 Hence, he hosted a number of cultural communities in the garden, including Xu Garden Calligraphy and Painting Society, Lyra Society, Music Society and Literature Society, whereupon numerous scholars, painters, musicians and social elites cultivated the habit of gathering in Xu Garden to socialise. This not only gratified the owners’ penchant for literary culture but also bestowed on the garden a reputation as ‘the gathering place of scholars’.26 The owner of Hardoon Garden, Silas Aaron Hardoon, received politicians and royalty such as the mother of Empress Dowager Longyu, the senior officials Ruicheng (1863-1915) and Ceng Chunxuan (1861-1933) and even the ‘Father of the Republic of China’, Sun Yatsen (1866-1925). These invitations gained him an entrée to higher society and enhanced his social standing.27 Hence, in addition to income from admission, the pleasure gardens brought their owners social capital – economic, social and cultural benefits – that they would not have otherwise received. Social Influence The pleasure gardens became part of the ‘public space’ of Shanghai, where many city dwellers celebrated the important events of their life such as birthday parties, marriage ceremonies and welcoming ceremonies.28 They were also where certain groups within society presented new ideas and beliefs, novel products and services, and even imported technology, to the city and the nation. While their social influence was often positive, at times these same gardens caused friction within society. Social elites attempted to propagandize their ideologies in pleasure gardens, where they could see and be seen by the public. Since Shanghai had been opened to foreigners by military force and the garden owners were Chinese, these ideologies mainly propagated Chinese nationalism or anti-imperialism. Due the great number of visitors, these ideas spread quickly in Shanghai and the pleasure gardens became ‘cradles of revolution’. In 1902 the leading intellectuals and revolutionaries Cai Yuanpei (1868-1940) and Zhang Binglin (18691936) founded the China Education Society and the Patriotic Study Society and gave speeches every weekend at Arcadia Hall in Zhang Garden to denounce the nation’s deplorable state, inspiring a number of young students to commit themselves to revolution.29 More than 200 revolutionaries gathered in Zhang Garden 25 Laoxia Lao, Past Things of Xu Hongkui & Son in the Xu Garden, in: Memories and Archives, (2012), 9, pp. 59-62. 26 Various Faces of Shanghai, in: Minli Pao Newspaper, (1910), 27 December, p. 2. 27 Zhiyong Zhou and Qiankui Pang, Development of the Venue Spirit of Shanghai Hardoon Garden in the Late Qing and Early Republic of China, in: Journal of National Museum of China, (2020), 1, pp. 122-133. 28 Zongyi Yang, Wu Rangzhi Writes Poem for His Nephew in Yu Garden, in: The Eastern Miscellany, 14 (1915), 11, p. 132. 29 Cheng, 2000 (see note 5), p. 77.
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on 15 March 1901 to pressure the Qing court to oppose Russia’s violation of Chinese sovereignty in northeast China at the end of 1900. On 24 March 1901 more than 1,000 revolutionaries gathered in Zhang Garden to listen to a nationalist address,30 and in October 1903 over a hundred revolutionaries gathered in Yu Garden to protest at Russia’s occupation of Chinese territory.31 Social elites also used the public space the pleasure gardens provided to introduce and popularize advanced technologies from abroad. For example, when electric lights were introduced to China it was rumoured that they would cause lightning strikes, and so the masses refused to install them.32 To counteract this belief, the electricity company held a light show in Zhang Garden. Visitors were amazed at the hundreds of hanging lights, the show was a great success, and thereafter electric lights gradually became popular in Shanghai homes.33 A balloon and parachuting show took place in Zhang Garden in 1890, the first time the public had witnessed parachuting in China.34 In Xu Garden in 1896, before the establishment of the first cinema in China, a film show was presented that aroused the interest of the common people in this new entertainment.35 Such frequent events at the pleasure parks were designed to introduce the masses to all sorts of technologies from abroad, promoting their use in Shanghai. Whether by design or by circumstance, pleasure gardens were an ideal venue to promote the emancipation of women, who were traditionally confined at home (in the mid-17th-century, the Qing court even issued a regulation to prohibit females from visiting temples).36 However, many women were attracted to these designed landscapes and became regular visitors, not only during festivals but also to drink tea and appreciate the floral displays on other days.37 Since these visitors brought a substantial income to the gardens the owners did not bar them; some even admitted women free of charge, hoping to encourage their consumption of products sold in the gardens.38 Thereafter, female visiting became the subject of heated public debate, and sectors of public opinion sought to censure such activities, denouncing the garden owners’ ‘cheeky operations’ and stigmatizing the 30 Xiong, 1998 (see note 14), p. 73. 31 Cheng, 2000 (see note 5), p. 83. 32 Ke Xu, Telephone and Electric Lamp, in: Ke Xu (eds.), Anthology of Petty Matters in Qing, 1916, p. 103. 33 Xiangpin Zhou and Zhehua Chen, Transition of Shanghai Private Garden, in: World Architecture, (2007), 2, pp. 142-145. 34 Xiong, 1998 (see note 14), p. 76. 35 Xiangpin Zhou and Zhehua Chen, Transition of Shanghai Private Garden: Investigation of the ProfitOriented Private Garden Influence on the City of Shanghai in Latter-Day, in: Urban Planning Forum, (2007), 2, pp. 87-92. 36 Shih-Ying Chang, The People‘s Reactions to the Western Parks That Appeared in Shanghai During the Late Ching Period, in: Bulletin of Academia Historica, 14, (2007), pp. 39-96. 37 Chi, 1893 (see note 7), p. 161. 38 Conversation on the Garden: Advertising on Free Admission of the Female Visiting Gardens, in: Shen Pao Newspaper, (1908), 9 July, p. 13.
Yichi Zhang
female visitors as ‘street beauties’ (i.e., prostitutes).39 Although the garden, under such social pressure, revoked the free admission rule for females, to some degree the issue brought women’s rights into the public sphere, and even promoted women’s liberation in the early 20th-century. Apart from opposition to women visiting the garden, both the opening hours and activities of pleasure gardens met with opposition within society, and the gardens had to yield to local customs and public opinion. To enhance the profits some pleasure gardens, such as Zhang Garden, Xin Garden and Ji Garden set ‘evening gardens’ visiting hours in the summer and autumn, during which films and talk shows, dramas, magicians and the other entertainment were offered. It was reported that this attracted a lot of young men and women who chased and played with each other in defiance of the custom that it was improper for men and women to touch hands when passing objects, attracting public opprobrium40. Also, the noise from the gardens disturbed their neighbours. A doctor at a hospital near Bishu Garden complained to the newspaper that ‘the garden made noise during the whole evening, which meant all the people were unable to fall asleep, which weakened the health and [interfered with the] sleep of the patients.’41 Hence, she asked the government to close the garden at night. Along with the above negative aspects Shen Pao Newspaper, the leading Chinese-language newspaper in Shanghai, listed five more disorders caused by pleasure gardens’ opening hours: (1) evening opening hours created security problems, (2) visiting gardens was a highenergy consumption activity, (3) sleeping during the day and being awake at night adversely affected work and rest, (4) cold in the evening was harmful to health, and (5) the activities concealed hidden trouble allowing foreigners to interfere in internal affairs.42 Under such pressure from society the ‘evening garden’ opening hours gradually disappeared during the 1920s. Summary Pleasure gardens emerged in China in the second half of the 19th-century as a consequence of the encounter between imported ideas on public space and underlying traditional notions of Chinese private gardens. Open to the public, the primary aim of these privately owned gardens was financial gain, and this framed them as a unique designed landscape. To meet the aesthetic tastes of various classes of paying visitors, the owners not only developed traditional scholarly garden-like constructions but also set European constructions and entertainment facilities within 39 Conversation: Garden Owners II, in: Shen Pao Newspaper, (1908), 3 July, p. 12. 40 Notes on Night Tour, in: Xiaolin Pao Newspaper, (1908), 24 July, p. 5; Notes on Visiting Xi Garden, in: Shen Pao Newspaper, (1909), 1 August, p. 12. 41 Effeminate Doctor Asks to Close Evening Garden, in: Shen Pao Newspaper, (1909), 20 August, p. 18. 42 Yipei Yu, The Harm of Evening Gardens, in: Shen Pao Newspaper, (1910), 24 July, p. 18.
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them, thereby shaping the gardens as a hybrid landscape. Owners adopted various approaches to fund the upkeep of the gardens such as charging admission, devising innovative business strategies and introducing new cultural facilities to attract more visitors. In addition to pursuing their business ambitions, owners further exploited the gardens to develop their social circles and acquire social resources that they would not have otherwise had access to. The pleasure gardens, like public parks, provided a ‘public space’ for society. This openness created some friction within society; although Chinese themselves, the owners met with sustained opposition from sectors of Chinese society, and had to yield to local customs and public opinion. The accessibility of the parks also allowed certain groups to use this space to present their ideas, beliefs, novel products, and imported technology to the masses and the city. Consequently, with the popularizing of the pleasure gardens in Shanghai, the idea of communal use spread in Chinese society and integrated with established garden art. This furthered Chinese gardens’ transition from private place to public space. Acknowledgement This work was supported by Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection (2015–2016 Summer Fellowship); European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme [grant agreement number 802070].
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Hubertus Fischer
Garden Art – Changing Significance and Contemporary Requirements Is the concept of “garden art” flourishing again? This seems to recur periodically. In 1914 Hugo Koch’s book Gartenkunst im Städtebau (Garden Art in Urban Development) appeared.1 In 1937 Hanover awarded itself the ambitious title of “City of Garden Art”.2 In 1996 a Hanover group organized the symposium “The Artificial Paradise – Garden Art in the Force Field between Nature and Society” to initiate a research centre, today’s Center of Garden Art and Landscape Architecture (CGL).3 In 2007 there was a meeting in Hanover under the motto “CityGarden-Art – On the Role of Garden Art in Urban Development”,4 and today we are looking forward to the Herrenhausen Symposium “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture”. Coincidence or not – let us take the matter at its word. “City” and “garden” were not first thought of together just under a hundred years ago. Thomas More did this in his Utopia at the very beginning of the Early Modern period: ‘They cultivate their gardens with great care, so that they have both vines, fruits, herbs, and flowers in them; and all is well ordered and so finely kept, that I never saw gardens anywhere that were both so fruitful [and so beautiful] as theirs. And this humour of ordering their gardens so well, is not only kept up by the pleasure they find in it, but also by an emulation between the inhabitants of the several streets, who vie with one another in this matter; and there is, indeed, nothing belonging to the whole town that is both more useful and more pleasant. So that he who founded the town seems to have taken care of nothing more than their gardens.’5
1 Hugo Koch, Gartenkunst im Städtebau, Ernst Wasmuth A.-G., Berlin, 1914; 2nd ed., 1921. 2 Karljosef Kreter, Marketing und Propaganda. Werbemittel und Plakate von 1936 bis 1966, in: Ronald Clark und Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.), … prächtiger und reizvoller denn jemals … 70 Jahre Erneuerung des Großen Gartens, Ausstellungskatalog, Landeshauptstadt Hannover – Herrenhäuser Gärten, Hannover, 2007, pp. 86-127, section 7, pp. 100-101. 3 Institut für Grünplanung und Gartenarchitektur der Universität Hannover: Günter Nagel und Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.), Das künstliche Paradies. Gartenkunst im Spannungsfeld von Natur und Gesellschaft. Internationales Symposium in Hannover 26./27. September 1996, Sonderdruck aus: Die Gartenkunst, Heft 1997/1, Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, Worms, 1997. 4 Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gartenkunst und Landschaftskultur e.V. (DGGL) (ed.), Gartenkunst im Städtebau. Geschichte und Herausforderungen (DGGL-Jahrbuch 2007), Callwey, München, 2007, p. 5. 5 Sir Thomas Morus, Utopia, or: The Happy Republic. A Philosophical Romance, to which is added, The New Atlantis, by Lord Bacon. With a Preliminary Discours […] by J. A. St. John, Joseph Rickerby, London, 1838, p. 84.
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Urban Gardening in 1516? Not at all – a fine symbiosis of citizenship and horticulture, a thought-out balance of building and gardening, usefulness and pleasure, fruitfulness and beauty. A hundred years later in Francis Bacon’s Utopia New Atlantis this fine symbiosis of citizenship and horticulture takes second place to the genetic optimization of plants and trees.6 Thus the ambivalent signature of garden art of the modern era is delineated: beauty and pleasure on the one hand, utility and profitability on the other. Initially, this ambivalence is still contained in the concept of “garden art”. In Germany the concept is first included in a dictionary compiled by Johann Christoph Adelung in 1775.7 ‘Garden art […] the art of carefully laying out and tending a garden both for its utility and for reasons of pleasure […]’.8 Today, not only have “utility” and “pleasure” disappeared, but the garden itself, as far as the term is concerned, seems to have become dispensable in garden art. In the Deutsches Wörterbuch (German Dictionary) published in 1997 by a working group at the University of Essen (now Duisburg-Essen) one finds under garden art: ‘[…] the planning of the design of public open spaces and parks and their artistic realisation’ (Planung der Gestaltung von öffentlichen Grünflächen u[nd] Parks u[nd] deren künstlerische Durchführung).9 According to this, private gardens do not fall within the realm of garden art, and the artistic work only begins when the work is actually being performed. Garden art appears to have lost the aspect of “utility” in the same measure as the “aesthetic garden art” (ästhetische Gartenkunst10) triumphed – at least for a certain time. In contrast, amusement or pleasure as an aspect of garden art was probably only lost in the 20th century. In Johann Christian Heyse’s Handwörterbuch 6 Cf. Hubertus Fischer, ‘Laßt uns das verlorene Paradies bejammern und seine Wiederherstellung herbeisehnen!’ – Reisen in die Gärten Utopias, in: Hubertus Fischer, Sigrid Thielking und Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.), Reisen in Parks und Gärten – Umrisse einer Rezeptions- und Imaginationsgeschichte, (CGL-Studies 11), Martin Meidenbauer, München, 2012, pp. 211-233; Hubertus Fischer, Utopia, Science and Garden Art in the Early Modern Era, in: Hubertus Fischer, Volker R. Remmert und Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.), Gardens, Knowledge and the Sciences in the Early Modern Period, (Trends in the History of Science), Springer, Switzerland, 2016, pp. 153-180. 7 Johann Heinrich Zedler’s “Universallexikon aller Wissenschaften und Künste” (1731-1754) is lacking an entry on Gartenkunst („garden art“); cf. Stefan Schweizer, Die Erfindung der Gartenkunst. Gattungsautonomie – Diskursgeschichte – Kunstwerkanspruch, (Kunstwissenschaftliche Studien 171), Deutscher Kunstverlag, Berlin & München, 2013, pp. 70-73. 8 Johann Christoph Adelung, Versuch / eines vollständigen / grammatisch=kritischen / Wörterbuchs / Der / Hochdeutschen Mundart, 2. Bd., Breitkopf & Sohn, Leipzig, 1775, p. 421-422; cf. John Ebers, The New and Complete Dictionary of the German and English Language composed chiefly after the German Dictionaries of Mr. Adelung and Mr. Schwan […], Volume I, A-G, Breitkopf & Haertel, Leipzig, 1796, p. 1010: “Gartenkunst, die, Gardening, the Art or Science of Gardening, the Culture or Improvements of the Gardens”. 9 Arbeitsgruppe für Sprachberatung und Lexikographie der Universität Essen (ed.), Deutsches Wörterbuch, Honos Verlag, Bergisch Gladbach, 1997. 10 Friedrich Schiller, Ueber den Gartenkalender auf das Jahr 1795, in: Friedrichs von Schiller sämmtliche Werke, Cotta, Stuttgart & Tübingen, 1826, 18. Bändchen, pp. 443-454, p. 445.
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der deutschen Sprache (Concise Dictionary of the German Language) from 1833 one reads (as in Adelung, but without the dual purpose of “utility” and “pleasure”): ‘[…] the art of laying out and tending a garden’,11 and at the end of the century, in 1890, one still finds in Moriz Heyne’s Deutsches Wörterbuch (German Dictionary): ‘garden art, the art of laying out and caring for a garden’.’12 When the tending of the garden was no longer understood as part of the garden art, the “Gartendenkmalpflege”13 or conservation of historic gardens as a separate discipline had to be invented in the 20th century to preserve works of garden art. Where do we stand now if we consult Duden, the Großes Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache (Great Dictionary of the German Language), still regarded as the standard work? Art as garden art in the lexical meaning is narrowed down to ‘aesthetic design’; thus the artist is freed of the responsibility for preserving the design, tending or maintaining the park or garden (today we would say for the sustainability of his work): ‘the art of aesthetically designing ornamental gardens and parks’.14 After that we find a colon, and what follows is particularly interesting: ‘In urban design and in g[arden art] architecture fuses with the plastic arts in striving towards the artistic structuring of public living spaces’ (Im Städtebau und in der G[artenkunst] verbindet sich die Architektur der Plastik in dem Streben nach künstlerischer Ordnung der öffentlichen Lebensräume der Menschen).15 Thus the Großes Wörterbuch exceeds the remit of a dictionary by making a statement about the position of garden art in the context of the fine arts – a position that, however, has always been strongly disputed. This may serve the symposium’s intention of uniting garden art and town planning in such a way – but it must strike one as strange that their common element is supposed to be the connection, and only the connection, of architecture with the plastic arts. There is no trace here of trees, air, paths and water. Is it due to the state of present-day garden art, that these have fallen out of the concept? Has nature, in whatever shape or form, disappeared from garden art? Just as garden art – to judge from the other quoted dictionary entry – has lost the garden? Or is it simply the inertia of man’s thinking that inspires the author of the dictionary? ‘Uncertain, which class of the fine arts they should actually side with,’ Schiller remarked in 1795, ‘garden art aligned itself with architecture for a long time’.16 Seen in this light, Duden actually reverts to a period – one of supposed certainty 11 Johann Christian Heyse, Handwörterbuch der deutschen Sprache […], Erster Theil, A bis K, Wilhelm Heinrichshofen, Magdeburg, 1833, p. 504. 12 Moriz Heyne, Deutsches Wörterbuch, S. Hirzel, Erster Band, A-G, Leipzig, 1890, column 1029. 13 Cf. Dieter Hennebo (ed.), Gartendenkmalpflege. Grundlagen zur Erhaltung historischer Gärten und Grünanlagen, Ulmer, Stuttgart, 1985. 14 Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden, 3., völlig neu bearbeitete und erweiterte Aufl., 3. Bd., Dudenverlag, Mannheim [i.a.], 1999, online: http://de.slovopedia.com/129/71/2064908.html. 15 Ibid. 16 Schiller (as footnote 10), p. 444.
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– that came to an end two hundred and more years ago, before the flowering of intense reflection on garden art that was associated in Germany with the names of Johann Georg Sulzer, Christian Cay Lorenz Hirschfeld, Friedrich Schiller and Johann Wolfgang Goethe. That it then has no place after the turn of the 19th century in Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling’s Philosophie der Kunst (Philosophy of Art) just as little as it does in Karl Solger’s Ästhetik (Aesthetics), is admittedly also a form of evidence.17 One can quote Schiller again: ‘Since it is so difficult to give aesthetic garden art a place among the fine arts, one could easily presume that it cannot be given a place here at all. But one would be mistaken to let such unsuccessful attempts testify against the possibility of doing it at all.’18 It is naturally also a result of the concept of art being elevated that garden art, if it is going to correspond with the term, has to be justified as an art in its own right within the system of the arts, especially the fine arts.19 The old “garden pleasure” (Gartenlust) of the Early Modern Era was unburdened with such ambition; the Frühneuhochdeutsches Wörterbuch (Early New High German Dictionary) includes “Gartenlust” as ‘taking pleasure in the garden and in horticultural beauties’ and quotes from a Baroque poem: ‘the noble Ardefil, / […] so rich in shrines, built in rich grounds, / adorned with garden pleasures (Gartenlust)“.20 But one can see here that “Gartenlust” means mainly an objective quality attached to the garden. Georg Henisch’s Teütsch Sprach vnd Weißheit (German Language and Wisdom) from 1616 is particularly instructive here. It lists under ‘Gärtner’ (gardener): ‘whoever deals with garden work / sets up fine pleasure in the garden / whoever adorns the garden with pleasure walks […]. See garden pleasure (sihe garten lust)’.21 There one finds: ‘Gartenlust (garden pleasure) / Lustgänge (pleasure walks) / Lustgesesse (pleasure bowers) / […] The art of making such things’.22 Accordingly “Gartenlust” is on the one hand a generic term for fine and pleasurable paths and seats, but on the other also the term for the “art” (Kunst) of creating such things in the garden. For a long time “art” (in Latin: ars), as is known, has meant skill (Fertigkeit) or craft (Handwerk) and the knowledge that goes with it.23 To be more precise: “Gartenlust” primarily relates to the forming organisation of the human body’s movement and rest in the area of the garden, in a way that is 17 Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling, Philosophie der Kunst (Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schellings sämmtliche Werke, Abt. 1, Bd. 5, 1802-1803), Cotta, Stuttgart & Augsburg, 1859; K[arl] W[ilhelm] F[erdinand] Solger‘s Vorlesungen über Aesthetik, ed. by K[arl] W[ilhelm] L[udwig] Heyse, Brockhaus, Leipzig 1829. 18 Schiller (as note 10), p. 445. 19 Cf. Schweizer see note 7), p. 73-85. 20 https://fwb-online.de/lemma/gartenlust.s.1f (6.12.18). 21 Georg Henisch, Teütsche Sprach vnd Weißheit. Thesavrvs linguae et sapientiae Germanicae […], Prima Pars, A-G, David Francus, Augsburg, 1616, column 1360. 22 Ibid., column 1361. 23 Cf. the dispute about the usage of the term “Gartenkunst” in: Journal für die Gartenkunst […], Achtes Stück, Johann Benedict Mezler, Stut[t]gart, 1785, Vorrede.
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pleasant for the body, but it is not primarily a subjective category. By contrast one finds “Gartenzierd” (garden ornament): This relates to the construction of plants and the reproduction of bodies animate and inanimate, including the shapes and ornaments: ‘Garden ornament / made with plants / as an arbour / seat / hut / and in the shape of animals / as lions / crosses / birds’.24 The “Gartenzierer” (garden adorner) is thus someone ‘who can grow and lay out beautiful shapes and structures from plants and herbs on the garden beds’.25 “Gartenzierd” (garden ornament) seems to be the older word (first instance of its use in 1561). It cannot be answered precisely how and when “Gartenkunst” (garden art) developed from “Gartenlust” (garden pleasure) and “Gartenzierd” (garden ornament) in the German language. We can only safely say that “garden art” was preceded by the “art” (skill) of the gardener (Gärtnerkunst), in everyday gardening,26 as Adelung says. The emergence of the term “garden art” in the emphatic sense of sensitive or aesthetic garden design accompanies the rise of the English Garden, as a consequence of which there soon appeared a Kurze Theorie der empfindsamen Gartenkunst (Short Theory of Sensitive Garden Art, 1786) with reference to the ‘English taste’ (englischer Geschmack).27 The connection is already evident from Sulzer’s praise of English gardens (englische Gärten)28 and his declaration: ‘This art has as much right as architecture to take its place among the fine arts. It derives directly from nature, which itself is the most perfect gardener’.29 Against the backdrop of a title such as Architectura Vivarborea (the Architecture of Living Tree Buildings)30 from 1716 one can better understand how garden art was able to assert itself as an art in its own right alongside architecture. But it is not the term “Gartenkunst” (garden art) that is associated with the town in this period in Germany, it is the term “Gartenanlagen” (garden sites or public gardens, there is no exact English equivalent). It is used to describe in particular the newly laid out public gardens ‘such as were set out in cities in place of dismantled ramparts, therefore often used in the plural and actually of the sites as long as they are new’,31 as the Grimms’ Deutsches Wörterbuch (German Dictionary) says. To strengthen the term’s meaning and explain its origin the dictionary continues: 24 Henisch (as footnote 21), column 1360. 25 Ibid., column 1361. 26 Adelung (as footnote 8). 27 Kurze Theorie der empfindsamen Gartenkunst oder Abhandlung von denen Gärten nach dem heutigen Geschmack, Siegfried Lebrecht Crusius, Leipzig, 1786, p. 4. 28 Johann Georg Sulzer, Allgemeine Theorie der Schönen Künste […], Erster Theil, von A bis J, M. G. Weidemanns Erben & Reich, Leipzig, S. 424. 29 Ibid., p. 421. 30 Friedrich Küffner, Architecturae / Viv-Arboreae et Neosyn- / emphitevticae / Pars II […] Der / Neu=erfundenen / Bau=Kunst, / Derer lebendigen Baum=Gebäuden […], [Mintzel], [Hof], 1716. 31 Jacob Grimm & Wilhelm Grimm, Deutsches Wörterbuch, 4. Bd., 1. Abt., 1. Heft, bearb. v. Jacob Grimm, Karl Weigand & Rudolf Hildebrand, S. Hirzel, Leipzig, 1878, p. 1401.
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‘but the term was then maintained from the joy experienced in the parks; the term will have emerged at the time soon after the Seven Years’ War when one began to take down the ramparts, and since this coincided with the triumph of the English taste in gardens over the French one, this explains why there is particular mention of the “Englische Anlagen” (English sites) […] and that the word “Anlagen” on its own, e.g. in spas, also meant such sites, “Anlagen” itself being an abbreviation of “Gartenanlagen”.’32
Adelung does not yet include “Gartenanlagen”, while Joachim Heinrich Campe talks in his Wörterbuch der Deutschen Sprache (Dictionary of the German Language, 1807–1811) of ‘neue Gartenanlagen’ (new garden sites) and Goethe und Schiller often use the expression “Gartenanlagen”.33 How closely associated the term is again with the anglicising style of garden can be seen in the involved title Ideen zu einer Gartenlogik, oder Versuch über die Kunst, in englischen Gartenanlagen alles Unverständliche und Widersinnige zu vermeiden (Ideas on a Garden Logic, or Essay in the Art of Avoiding all Things Incomprehensible and Absurd in English “Gartenanlagen”).34 With these “English garden sites” (englische Gartenanlagen) the towns also opened themselves up to the surrounding countryside, and their particular location came to the fore. At this point something oft-forgotten should be recalled: that great thinkers knew, centuries ago, how important for the site of a town not only the natural environment but also its location within the countryside was. In his De regno ad regem Cypri, written around 1265 to 1273, better known under the title De regimine principum, Saint Thomas Aquinas, whom one does not normally reckon among the theoreticians of town planning, enjoined princes to take to heart that: ‘A further requisite when choosing a site for the founding of a city is this, that it must charm the inhabitants by its beauty. A spot where life is pleasant will not easily be abandoned, nor will man commonly be ready to flock to unpleasant places’ (Est etiam constituendis urbibus eligendus locus qui amoenitate habitatores delectet. Non enim facile deseritur locus amoenus, nec de facili ad locum illum confluit habitantium multitudo cui deest amoenitas).35 Thomas’s justification could be a guiding principle today for planners, artists and architects: ‘since the life of man cannot endure without enjoyment’ (eo quod absque amoenitate vita hominis diu durare non possit)“.36
32 Ibid. 33 Ibid. 34 Christian August Semler, Ideen / zu einer / Gartenlogik / oder / Versuch über die Kunst / in englischen Gartenanlagen / alles Unverständliche und Widersinnige zu vermeiden, Schäferische Buchhandlung, Leipzig, 1803. 35 Thomas Aquinas, De regno ad regem Cypri / On kingship to the king of Cyprus, trans. by Gerald B. Phelan, revised by I. Th. Eschmann, O. P., The Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto, 1949, Liber 2, Caput 4, p. 142: https://dhspriory.org/thomas/DeRegno.htm (07.12.18). 36 Ibid.
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After these incursions into the history of “garden art” as a concept and an art37 we have to ask: What does “garden art” actually mean? Let us start with some findings. Out of forty authors, not one chose the German term “Gartenkunst” (garden art / garden design), when asked for key terms in landscape architecture. “Garten, Gartenkultur” (horticulture), even “gärtnerisch” (horticultural) were mentioned, but there was no talk of art.38 The implicitness assigned by Hugo Koch to “Gartenkunst” in town planning in 1914 as an undeniable task for the future is now lost within the profession. Koch did not mean historical garden art, although he borrowed several examples from this; he meant planning and park policy in the large towns of his time. “Garden art”, it seems, has been consigned to history. The features section in a newspaper, the travel section and the interested public definitely see it as something from the past: Villa d’Este, Versailles, Sanssouci, Muskau. Garden art has become a kind of open-air-museum that one can visit, like Ramses and Amenophis. In public spaces no one thinks of it. Nor was it not quite so clear with “Gartenkunst” in Koch’s time either.39 The journal Die Gartenkunst, published by the Verein Deutscher Gartenkünstler (Society of German Garden Artists) was subtitled ‘journal for general interest in garden art and gardening techniques as well as related fields of horticulture’.40 The umbrella term “Gartenkunst” (garden art) brought everything together that, from today’s point of view, does not belong together.; nowadays “Gartenkunst” is only associated with “higher garden art”,41 especially historic garden art. The theoretical starting point of this higher garden art lies, at least in Germany, in the 18th century and had to do with improvement: ‘the improvement of an earth, which is our temporary dwelling’ (Verschönerung einer Erde, die auf Zeit unsere Wohnung ist).42 37 Cf. for further aspects the detailed and comprehensive study of the “Invention of the Garden Art” by the art historian Stefan Schweizer (as note 7). 38 Cf. Hubertus Fischer (ed.), Zukunft aus Landschaft gestalten. Stichworte zur Landschaftsarchitektur, (CGL-Studies 17), Akademische Verlagsgemeinschaft München (AVM), München, 2014. 39 Koch (as note 1) himself explained: ‘I see the leitmotif of the garden art in urban development in the representation of the life of the townsmen. The attempts in scenic gardening of the last century, to carry real nature in the metropolis […] I take for pathological-sentimental.’ (p. 233). 40 Cf. for example: Die Gartenkunst. Zeitschrift für die Gesamtinteressen der Gartenkunst und Gartentechnik sowie der damit verwandten Zweige des Gartenbaues, ed. by Verein Deutscher Gartenkünstler (Emil Clemen), 1902; later: Die Gartenkunst. Zeitschrift für Gartenkunst und verwandte Gebiete, ed. by Deutche Gesellschaft für Gartenkunst (Carl Heicke), 1906. 41 The term “higher garden art” (höhere Gartenkunst) already in: Dr. Simonis, Ueber die Gartenkunst der Römer, in: Programm des Gymnasiums Blankenburg, Blankenburg, 1865, pp. 1-24, p. 1. 42 Christian Cay Lorenz Hirschfeld, Theorie der Gartenkunst, Erster Band, M. G. Weidmanns Erben & Reich, Leipzig, 1779, p. 156; cf. Linda B. Parshall, Introduction, in: C. C. L. Hirschfeld, Theory of Garden Art, ed. & trans. by Lina B. Parshall (Penn Studies in Landscape Architecture), University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 2001, pp. 1-56.
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But the author of Theory of Garden Art, Hirschfeld, was already uneasy with the term: ‘the expression Gartenkunst is admittedly not really convenient; however the expressions Gartenbau (horticulture) and Gartenbaumeister (horticulturist) are even more likely to cause misunderstandings’.43 Hirschfeld was disconcerted by the possible claim that art might make on its own behalf in the face of nature; he should actually have spoken of “Gartenkunstnatur” (garden art nature). But he was well-advised to stick to “Gartenkunst”, since it was a matter of legitimising it as an art in the system of the arts. However, one sees how uncertain even the eminent theoretician of garden art was when selecting the term. Since then, the system of arts has expanded and changed. The very notion of “art” has also changed, so that it is not possible to simply continue in this tradition. Instead, one notices a striking phenomenon. As soon as one begins to reflect on “landscape architecture” (which is the term we are considering today) as the object of its own theoretical reflections, its proponents seize on rapidly changing theories (Heidegger, Adorno, Foucault, Deleuze, Latour, Nowotny),44 but less and less on those that have emerged from their own profession. Exceptions such as the Swiss landscape architect Dieter Kienast,45 who died before his time, or the French “architecte-paysagiste” Bernard Lassus46 prove the rule. It is also striking that in this debate “landscape” attracts much attention, while “architecture”, in which the constructive and design elements and potentially artistic elements are contained, plays second fiddle. But what does “landscape architecture” mean? Horace Cleveland was even less happy with the expression, shortly after it was introduced in the USA, than Hirschfeld had been with “Gartenkunst”: ‘The term “Landscape Architecture” is objectionable, as being only figuratively expressive of the art it is used to designate. I make use of it, under protest, as the readiest means of making myself understood, in the absence of a more appropriate term. […] If the art is ever developed to the extent I believe to be within its legitimate limits, it will achieve for itself a name worthy of its position. Until it 43 Ibid., p. 145. 44 Cf. for instance, with extensive references to Deleuze and Guattari (beside Agamben, Canguilhem, Foucault, Heidegger, Latour): Alessandra Ponte, Mapping in the age of electronic shadows, in: Christophe Girot and Dora Imhof (eds.), Thinking the Contemporary Landscape, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2016, pp. 208-228. 45 Cf. Anette Freytag und Dieter Kienast. Stadt und Landschaft lesbar machen, gta Verlag, Zürich, 2015; Udo Weilacher, The Garden as the Last Luxury Today. Thought-Provoking Projects by Dieter Kienast (19451998), in: Michel Conan (ed.), Contemporary Garden Aesthetics, Creations and Interpretations (Dumbarton Oaks Colloquiums on the History of Landscape Architecture 29), Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington D.C., 2007, pp. 81-95. 46 Cf. Bernard Lassus, Les jardins suspendus de Cola, Imprimerie Granguillot, Paris, 2008; Bernard Lassus, The Landscape Approach. Introduction by Peter Jacobs and Robert B. Riley, Afterword by Stephen Bann, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1998.
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does so, it is idle to attempt to exalt it in the world's estimation, by giving it a high sounding title.”47
By the way, he did not think of “garden art”, because he saw it as his task to shape the landscape in order to preserve it for future generations. “Garden art”, German Wikipedia tells us, is ‘the predecessor of garden and landscape architecture, where scientific-technological standpoints are to the fore’. To regain “garden art” for landscape architecture presupposes that art has been regained by landscape architecture, and that cannot be a retrograde movement. From existing works of contemporary landscape and garden architecture it will have to develop a new and convincing concept of art (in relation to other arts, too), one that is capable of setting up theories and taking criticism. It can at best learn this methodological procedure from Hirschfeld’s Theory of Garden Art. The 18th century was not just the century of the Enlightenment, it also was the century of criticism. What has long been lacking is a professional critique of the relevant works of landscape and garden architecture in national newspapers, television, art journals etc.48 What we cannot do is sell old hats for new. One reads nowadays: ‘garden architects, scientists and of course designers have discovered the power of colour.’49 Long ago, the philosopher and mathematician Bernard Bolzano classified “artistic gardens, beautiful landscapes” as belonging to the morpho-chromatic “optical arts”, which worked with the effect of shape and colour.50 Planning projects that use 3D visualisations use the optical just as naturally. Scents, noises, feelings (sensitivity) do not belong by nature in these disembodied virtual gardens and landscapes. If the “art gardener” (Kunst-Gärtner) was a gardener ‘who in exercising his art aims primarily at pleasing people’ („welcher bei Ausübung seiner Kunst vornehmlich auf das Vergnügen der Menschen sieht“),51 then he did at least by definition have in mind people with all their senses. ‘Praise of Sensuality’ can do no harm.52 Something we do not desire is a garden art of gated communities; it will have to withstand exclusion, segregation and violence in public open spaces. It will have 47 H[orace] W[illiam] S[haler] Cleveland, Landscape Architecture, as Applied to the Wants of the West, Jansen, McClure & Comp., Chicago, 1873, Preface. 48 Cf. already Wolfgang Pehnt, Zaungäste des Paradieses – Die Gartenkunst und ihre Kritiker, in: Nagel / Wolschke-Bulmahn (as note 3), pp. 103-108. 49 Süddeutsche Zeitung, March 24/25 2016, p. 12. 50 Bernard Bolzano, Über die Eintheilung der schönen Künste. Eine ästhetische Abhandlung, Commissions-Verlag der J. G. Calve‘schen Buchhandlung, Prag, 1849, p. 34. 51 Johann Georg Krünitz, Ökonomisch-technologische Encyklopädie oder allgemeines System der Staats-, Stadt-, Hausund Landwirthschaft und der Kunstgeschichte, Bd. 55, Pauli, Berlin, 1791, p. 250. 52 Cf. Dieter Kienast – Lob der Sinnlichkeit. Beiträge von Dieter Kienast, Guido Hager, Bernard Lassus, Werner Oechslin & Arthur Rüegg, gta Verlag, Zürich, 1999.
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to make its contribution to a town’s openness and to society’s cohesion using new means, by making urbanity experienceable and graspable. Only on arbitrariness, which declares everything to be art that has (ever) been thought out and carried out, will it have to place restrictions. No limits will be set, if in this sense it renders the delimited area recognisable for all senses. Then, terms like “adornment”53, “pleasure”54, “utility”55 and “beauty”56 can ask to be reinterpreted. Then, perhaps, there will again be garden art in urban development, but that has to come afterwards. A ‘high sounding title’ is not enough – as Horace Cleveland said. Whether the nine International Garden Cabinets at the 2017 International Garden Exhibition in Berlin, showing pieces without relation to the surrounding space, represent a reinterpretation of garden art is at least worthy of discussion. Johann Christian August Grohmann wrote in his Neue Theorie der schönen Gartenkunst (New Theory of Beautiful Garden Art) at the end of the 18th century: ‘For the countryside onto which the garden has views also belongs to the formation of this landscape. The garden artist must on that account unify his design with the surrounding landscape and make them conformable. He must give his garden more or less the character of the surrounding countryside.’ (Denn die Gegend, die Aussichten außerhalb des Gartens gehören noch zur Bildung dieser Landschaft. Der Gartenkünstler muß daher auch die umliegende Landschaft mit seinem Anliegen in Verbindung setzen, und beide einander gemäß bilden; er muß seinem Garten näher oder entfernter den Charakter geben, den die umliegende Gegend hat).57
The Garden Cabinets do not do that, and their diversity of cultural backgrounds does not yet create a dialogue between these cultures. They are only isolated mon53 Today a rather negatively connoted term in landscape architecture; cf. for example the positive significance in the past: Joseph Forsythe Johnson, The Natural Principles / of / Landscape Gardening: / or / The Adornment of Land / for / Perpetual Beauty, Archer & Sons, Belfast, 1874; relating to town planning: Report on a plan for San Francisco, by Daniel H[udson] Burnham, assisted by Edward H. Bennett. Presented to the mayor and board of supervisors by the Association for the Improvement and Adornment of San Francisco, ed. by Edward F. O’Day, Sunset Press, San Francisco, 1905. 54 Cf. Wulf Tessin, Function, Fiction, Form and Feeling. On the “Aesthetic of Pleasantness” in Landscape Architecture, in: Christophe Girot, Anette Freytag, Albert Kirchengast & Dunja Richter (eds.), Topology. Topical Thoughts on the Contemporary Landscape (Landscript 3), jovis, Berlin, 2013, pp. 313-322. 55 Cf. Catherine Dee, To Design Landscape. Art, Nature & Utility, Routledge, London & New York, 2012; Dougal Sheridan & Deirdre McMenamin, The utility and aesthetics of landscape: a case study of Irish vernacular architecture, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture (JoLA), Volume 7, 2012, Issue 2, pp. 46-53. 56 Cf. Rudi van Etteger, Ian H. Thompson & Vera Vicenzotti, Aesthetic creation theory and landscape architecture, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture (JoLA), Volume 11, 2016, Issue 1, pp. 80-91; Heidi Petersen, Beauty and Sustainability: https://dirt.asla.org/2013/11/18/beauty-and-sustainability (09.12.18). 57 Joh[ann] Christian August Grohmann, Neue Theorie der schönen Gartenkunst, 2 Bde., 1797, Friedrich August Leupold, Leipzig, Bd. 1, p. 223; quoted after: Michael G. Lee, The German “Mittelweg”. Garden Theory and Philosophy in the Time of Kant (Studies in Philosophy), Routledge, New York & London, p. 201.
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ologues which appeal to the visitor – sometimes more so, sometimes less. But perhaps in them you can get some ideas, elements and design features of what is understood today as “garden art” or “gardening”. This rewarding investigation cannot be pursued here.
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“Landscape Architect better carries the Professional Idea”: On the Politics of Words in the Professionalization of Landscape Architecture in the United States In 1899, the founding year of the American Society of Landscape Architects, a note in the British horticultural journal The Garden ridiculed the new American denomination “landscape architect”: “The good old name of landscape gardener, which is the best possible term,” it commented, “is not good enough for our foreign friends, who wriggle out of it in various ways at some cost. The French invented the term ‘landscape architect,’ which the Americans have taken from them, and air very much in spite of the absolute incompatibility of the two things. […] The most amusing thing, however, is the way of such compound titles that has lately come to us in a letter from an American […] which is headed as set out below. So that the same paradoxical idea is spreading into other fields, and those who so dub themselves are not even afraid of the ridiculous.”1
Fig. 1 Detail showing the letterhead cited in the article “Landscape Architects,” published in The Garden in the November 18 issue in 1899 (p. 408) 1 Landscape Architects, in: The Garden, 18 November 1899, p. 408. This article is based upon excerpts from Sonja Dümpelmann, What’s in a Word: On the Politics of Language in Landscape Architecture, in: Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes 34, (2014), 3, pp. 207-225. For a recent selection of essays on the naming of the profession in the United States, see Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes 34, (2014), 3.
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The letterhead cited and printed in the article belonged to “C. H. Payne, C.E., Poultry Architect” (fig. 1). While the editors of The Garden, among them its founder William Robinson, were apparently not aware of the growing industry of poultry architecture in the US, this reaction against the new professional denomination is to be understood not only in the context of more general British preconceptions against the United States (and France, for that matter), but in particular in the context of the British debate between the landscape gardener William Robinson and the architect Reginald Blomfield. To the chagrain of British landscape gardeners, the architect Reginald Blomfield claimed the garden as the domain of architects because, as he argued, the garden was considered an outdoor room and therefore an extension of the house. On the other hand, Robinson, the proponent of the Wild Garden – a garden designed and planted in a naturalistic manner with site-specific perennials, bulbous plants, shrubs, and trees – claimed garden design the exclusive domain of landscape gardeners. After all, it was them who had the knowledge of soils and plant materials. In Robinson’s eyes “landscape architect” was “a stupid term of French origin implying the union of two absolutely distinct studies.” In contrast, he explained, “The term landscape-gardening [wa]s a true and, in the fullest sense, good English one, with a clear and even beautiful meaning, namely, the study of the forms of the earth, and frank acceptance of them as the best of all for purposes of beauty or use of planter or gardener, […].”2 What the 1899 quote from The Garden therefore shows very clearly is that the motivating forces in the discussions of professional titles included professional politics and programmatic agendas. By commenting on the ubiquitous use of “architect,” The Garden also unwittingly anticipated today’s widespread metaphorical and rhetorical use of “architect.” In the New York Times, for example, we have been able to read about the “Architect of Wall Street Reform,” the “Architect of Diplomacy,” and more recently about Donald Tusk describing the US as “main architect and guarantor” of “the rules-based international order” that it itself is now challenging.3 But looking at the United States at the end of the nineteenth century, in which context would the use of “architect” have made more sense than in connection with “landscape,” even if this made for a seemingly paradoxical, or even oxymoronic term? In the twelfth century the French theologian Alanus ab Insulis had described God as “architectus” who created the universe, including forests, oceans, meadows, lakes etc., according to the laws of geometry and sacred proportions us2 William Robinson, The English Flower Garden and Home Grounds, John Murray, London, 1907, p. 15. 3 Michael D. Shear, Trump Attends G‑7 with Defiance, Proposing to Readmit Russia, in: New York Times, 8 June 2018.
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ing his compass.4 Given the transcendental leanings of many pioneering American landscape architects, “landscape architecture” then, for a variety of reasons could have appeared the best – or, considering the widespread dissatisfaction with the term even by its users at the time – the least worst choice. Indeed, the naming of the fledgling profession in the United States during the last decades of the nineteenth century caused much discussion, confusion, headache, and perhaps even heartache, given how much time its leaders invested in what they liked to consider an “outdoor art,”5 a “landscape art,”6 a “national art,”7 simply an “art of design,”8 or even a “mother art”9 that as the young landscape architect Charles Eliot argued, should come before, and therefore stand above the arts of building and gardening. Repeatedly, even some of the most well-known contenders of the term “landscape architecture” voiced their dissatisfaction with the denomination. Others maintained that “landscape gardening” was the better choice. Horace William Shaler Cleveland even moved from calling himself “landscape gardener” to “landscape architect” and back again to “landscape gardener” during his career. Frederick Law Olmsted lectured about the use and misuse of terms in landscape architecture, including the profession’s denomination, to architecture students at MIT in the 1880s. And so the naming of the profession remained on the radar of critics, writers, and landscape architects themselves until well into the 1920s, two decades after the American Society of Landscape Architects had been founded in 1899.10 The discussion revealed and anticipated the struggle still ongoing today of landscape architecture coming into its own and gaining the recognition many of its promoters thought it deserved. 4 Otto v. Simson, in: Josef Koch, Humanismus, Mystik und Kunst in der Welt des Mittelalters, Leiden 1959, 159-179. 5 Opinions on the desirability of forming an association of landscape architects expressed in reply to a communication from Warren H. Manning, in: First Report of the American Park and Outdoor Art Association, 1897, pp. 68-76. 6 Ibd., pp. 74-75; Bailey, “Landscape Gardening” in the 1916 Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture, vol. 4 (London: Macmillan), p. 1779 (1777-1818); Frederick Law Olmsted Sr., Spoils of the Park, cit. in Forty Years of Landscape Architecture: Being the Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Central Park, ed. by Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr. and Theodora Kimball, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, New York and London, 1922, p. 147 (117-155). 7 Opinions on the desirability (see note 5), 1897, p. 74. 8 See Olmsted Sr., Spoils of the Park, p. 127. 9 Charles Eliot, Landscape Gardening in its Relations to Architecture, in: Transactions of the Boston Society of Architects (1891), p. 60 (65-73). 10 See, for example, Stephen Child, An Introduction to Landscape Architecture, in: American Landscape Architect, 1 (1929), 3, pp. 28-39; Stephen Child, Landscape Architecture: A Definition and a Resume of Its Past and Present, in: New England Magazine , 44 (1911), 3, pp. 339-354. For Cleveland, see Theodora Kimball Hubbard, H. W. S. Cleveland: An American Pioneer in Landscape Architecture and City Planning, in: Landscape Architecture, 20 (1930), 2, pp. 92-111; Frederick Law Olmsted, lecture to architecture students “Relation of Architecture to Landscape Architect. Use and Misuse of Landscape Architecture Terms,” Speeches and Writings File, Box 52, Reel 45, FLO Papers, Library of Congress.
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Landscape Architect When Theodora Kimball – then Harvard’s landscape architecture librarian – and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., who was teaching in Harvard’s landscape architecture program at the time while also running his late father’s design practice together with his cousin John Charles Olmsted, published the edited papers of Frederick Law Olmsted Sr. in 1922, they began the third part of the volume by commenting on the naming of the profession. They ascertained that when Frederick Law Olmsted was appointed Superintendent of Central Park in New York in 1857, “there was no well-established profession of landscape gardening in the United States and the term landscape architect was unknown.”11 They continued to explain that Olmsted and Calvert Vaux’s partnership that followed their first collaborative winning design for Central Park “brought about public recognition of a new professional field.”12 However, rather than calling himself landscape architect, it appears that chance and contingency may have played a role in Olmsted’s professional title. In 1860, Olmsted and Vaux were appointed “Landscape Architects & designers” to the commission created by the state legislature to lay out the streets of Manhattan above 155th Street; and from 1865 to 1877, Olmsted’s title was “Landscape Architect to the Board [of park commissioners of Central Park],” after which he was made an unsalaried “Consulting Landscape Architect.”13 The first use of the term “landscape architect” in 1860 appears to have been in a handwritten note by Henry Hill Elliott, one of the commissioners appointed to lay out streets and roads in Manhattan north of 155th Street, in an attempt to secure Olmsted and Vaux’s services for an urban design.14 Throughout his career, Olmsted not only repeatedly questioned his own title but also stressed that it had not been his own choice. For example, in a letter to his working partner Calvert Vaux in 1865, he complained: “I am all the time bothered with the miserable nomenclature of L.A. Landscape is not a good word, Archi-
11 Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Early Years and Experiences, 1922, p. 123. In a footnote they suggested that the term had found its way into American English merely indirectly by way of a review of several of American landscape gardener Andrew Jackson Downing’s books. Besides commenting on Downing’s books, the review author had also referred to an 1828 English title by Laing Meason: The Landscape Architecture of the Great Painters of Italy. There, however, landscape architecture meant architecture situated in landscape, and not the designed landscape itself. 12 Ibid. 13 Charles E. Beveridge and David Schuyler, eds., The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, vol. 3: Creating Central Park, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1983, pp. 31, 38-39, 267, n1; Frederick Law Olmsted to his father John Olmsted, 22 July 1860, cit. in Beveridge/Schuyler, Creating Central Park, 1983, p. 256; David Schuyler and Jane Turner Censer, eds., The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, vol. 6: The Years of Olmsted, Vaux & Company 1865-1874, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1992, 28. 14 For the handwritten note and the presumably first use of “landscape architect,” see Beveridge/Schuyler, Creating Central Park, 1983, p. 267, 1n; Edward Eigen, Claiming landscape as architecture, in: Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes 34 (2014), 3, pp. 226-247.
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tecture is not; the combination is not. Gardening is worse.”15 In a 1876 letter to the critical William Robinson in Britain, he pointed towards his innocence with regards to the term “landscape architect” which in America had been “adopted directly from the French, and was first fastened upon the occupant of such an office, who was not an architect in the English usage of the term, in disregard of his repeated remonstrances.”16 As historian Joseph Disponzio has shown it appears that “landscape architect” in the United States could have been a translation of “architecte-paysagiste,” first coined by the French landscape gardener Jean-Marie Morel at the beginning of the nineteenth century to differentiate between those who had trained as architects and had designed the classical French gardens like Versailles and those who designed naturalistic landscape gardens. After Morel had introduced the term, Louis-Sulpice Varé had used it when offering his redesign of the Bois de Boulogne in Paris to Louis III in 1854. The term’s use was further consolidated in particular through Édouard André who was well-known in the landscape world also beyond France in the second half of the nineteenth century. In the English language in the first half of the nineteenth century, the term was only rarely used to describe a person who designed landscapes, and it took Olmsted and Vaux and their work to popularize the term and finally turn it into an officially accepted nomination in the United States and subsequently in many other countries.17 Indeed, by the late 1880s, Olmsted had reconciled himself to the idea that landscape architecture was the term that best designated his profession. Writing to a park commissioner in Rochester in 1888, he explained that he had come to prefer the term landscape architect “tho’ I much objected to it when it was first given me. 15 Frederick Law Olmsted cit. in Victoria Post Ranney, ed., The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, vol. 5: The California Frontier, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1990, pp. 422-423. 16 Mr. Olmsted on Landscape Gardening [August 12, 1876], in: Charles E. Beveridge, Carolyn F. Hoffman, and Kenneth Hawkins, eds., The Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, vol. 7: Parks, Politics, and Patronage, 1874-1881, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2007, p. 227 (223-227). Also see publication in The Garden 10 (August 12, 1876), pp. 149-150: “My alter ego, if you please, of the Gardener’s Monthly apparently regards the title of landscape architect as one in which an assumption of superiority is affected toward those who beforetime have been called landscape gardeners. I do not see the assumption, but to remove the suspicion, however it arises, in at least one case, I will mention that the word architect, as applied to the manager of a public work, of which landscape gardening should be the chief element, was here in America adopted directly from the French, and was first fastened upon the occupant of such an office, who was not an architect in the English usage of the term, in disregard of his repeated remonstrances. As it is not wholly without an etymological propriety, as it has a certain special value in addressing a public which, in my humble judgement, is too much rather than too little inclined to regard landscape considerations as one thing and architectural considerations as quite another, and as it has now been fairly accepted as an intelligible term on this side of the water, I will submit to whatever reproach must follow on the other in subscribing myself in all goodwill, Frederick Law Olmsted, Landscape Architect, New York.” 17 For the history of the French term “architecte-paysagiste,” and its adoption in the United States, see Joseph Disponzio, Landscape Architecture: A Brief Account of Origins, in: Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes, 34 (2014), 3, pp. 192-200.
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I prefer it because it helps to established [sic] the important idea of the distinction of my profession from that of gardening, as that of architecture from building – the distinction of an art of design.”18 Recognizing the importance of formalizing a professional practice, Olmsted had preferred “landscape architect” because, as he said, it “better carries the professional idea. It makes more important also the idea of design” he suggested, and went on: “ ‘Gardener’ includes service corresponding to that of carpenter and mason. Architect does not. Hence it is more discriminating, and prepares the minds of clients for dealing with on professional principles.”19 A landscape architect, he later explained to architecture students, is
Fig. 2 Landscape architect Charles Eliot (Charles W. Eliot, Charles Eliot, Landscape Architect, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1902, plate between p. 486 and p. 487) 18 Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Early Years and Experiences, 1922, p. 127. Also see Frederick Law Olmsted, lecture to architecture students “Relation of Architecture to Landscape Architect. Use and Misuse of Landscape Architecture Terms,” pp. 1-2, Speeches and Writings File, Box 52, Reel 45, FLO Papers, Library of Congress. 19 On October 28, 1886 Frederick Law Olmsted had written to Charles Eliot: “That which chiefly limits success in our profession is the fact that so few know that landscape architecture is a matter in which professional service is very desirable and payment for it is profitable. Many millions of dollars are misspent every year for want of good professional practice. It was nearly the same with architecture forty years ago […] So will it be with landscape architecture as it comes to be recognized as a standard profession […] I prefer that we should call ourselves Landscape Architects, following the French and Italian custom, rather than landscape gardeners following the English, (though Loudon uses ‘Garden Architect’) because the former title better carries the professional idea. It makes more important also the idea of design. ‘Gardener’ includes service corresponding to that of carpenter and mason. Architect does not. Hence it is more discriminating, and prepares the minds of clients for dealing with on professional principles”, Frederick Law Olmsted, letter to Charles Eliot, October 28, 1886, Frederick Law Olmsted Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., Reel 20, frames 680-686; A Letter relating to Professional Practice from F.L. Olmsted, Sr., to Charles Eliot, in: Landscape Architecture 11 (1921), p. 189 (189-190).
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an architect “who with design forms or modifies the form or aspect or expression of character of landscape.”20 But another aspect played a role as well: that of space. Given the breadth of spatial planning they were carrying out by the end of the nineteenth century, Olmsted’s disciple Charles Eliot (fig. 2) pointed out that the mere term “architect” could not capture his activity and would lead to misconceptions. Olmsted at times liked to differentiate between “landscape architects [my emphasis]” and “building architects [my emphasis]” as well as “landscape works” and “building works.”21 Eliot therefore explained that it was important that the term “architect” would be preceded by “landscape.” Landscape architecture, as Eliot saw it, was “an art of design, and […] cover[ed] agriculture, forestry, gardening, engineering, and even architecture (as ordinarily defined) itself.”22 When discussions about the affiliation of landscape architectural education arose in the United States at the end of the
Fig. 3 Cover of the book Landscape Architecture, as Applied to the Wants of the West by Horace William Shaler Cleveland, published in 1873 20 Frederick Law Olmsted, lecture to architecture students “Relation of Architecture to Landscape Architect. Use and Misuse of Landscape Architecture Terms,” p. 13, Speeches and Writings File, Box 52, Reel 45, FLO Papers, Library of Congress. 21 Ibid. 22 “Landscape Architecture is an art of design, and in a very true sense covers agriculture, forestry, gardening, engineering, and even architecture (as ordinarily defined) itself. […] Since the word ‘architecture,’ as commonly used, does not convey this broad meaning, we have to put ‘landscape’ before it to designate the broad architecture which we practice, meaning by landscape ‘the visible material world; all that can be seen on the surface of the earth by a man who is himself upon that surface.’ (Hamerton).” See Charles Eliot in a letter addressed to Charles Francis Adams, December 12, 1896, in Charles W. Eliot, Charles Eliot, Landscape Architect, Houghton Mifflin, Boston and New York, 1902, pp. 630-631.
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Fig. 4 Warren H. Manning, map showing U.S. National Parks, Monuments, and Forests (Landscape Architecture 6 [1916], 3, p. 107 [106-109])
nineteenth century Eliot made it clear that landscape architecture belonged to the school of design and not to the school of horticulture.23 Like his older colleague Horace William Shaler Cleveland (fig. 3) – who as Olmsted had expressed his dislike of the term “landscape architecture” but carried it for a while before switching back to landscape gardener –, Eliot considered the preservation, conservation, and the design and implementation of parks and forest reservations instruments of urban development. Their colleague Warren Manning, one of the founders of the American Society of Landscape Architects and proponent of the National Park System, finally spoke in 1904 of his vision of “a movement to make our whole country a park.”24 By 1916, the year in which the National Park Service was founded to deal with federal land holdings comprehensively, he had mapped 190 national parks, monuments, and forests on a U.S. postal map (fig. 4).25
23 See Ibid., p. 630. 24 Warren Manning, The History of Village Improvement in the United States, in: The Craftsman, 5 (1904), 5, p. 431 (423-432). 25 Warren Manning, National Parks, Monuments and Forests, in: Landscape Architecture (April 1916), pp. 106112; Melanie Simo, 100 Years of Landscape Architecture: Some Patterns of a Century, ASLA Press, Washington, DC, 1999, pp. 24-25.
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Open space could be used to direct settlement, urban development, and to shape urban form. In the eyes of Cleveland, Eliot, and Manning landscape architects were active agents in the urbanization of the North American continent, and their building material was designed terrain – landscape. In this sense, they expanded upon one of the proclaimed objectives of their forebear, the landscape gardener Andrew Jackson Downing. Downing had considered his activity a means to tame the “spirit of unrest” in the young Republic and to induce his countrymen and – women to settle down.26 Rather than reacting to random settlement by embellishing its immediate surroundings like Downing before them, the landscape architects Cleveland, Eliot, and Manning, like Olmsted, were active in directing urban development in the first place and realized that means like railroad transportation were vectors of urban development. Cleveland had already in the 1870s proclaimed the need of landscape architecture to design and plan urban expansion along the Western frontier, thereby insinuating that landscape architects could create the frontier and prepare “the new country for civilized habitation.”27 He had also observed that “city and country have become so merged that it is hard to say where one ends and the other begins.”28 Entirely disregarded in this process were the Native American populations who were displaced, disposessed and decimated through murder and disease. On the East coast some 20 years later, Eliot was involved in designs and plans to both promote and guide the urban development of
Fig. 5 Metropolitan Park System Plan for Boston (Andrew Wright Crawford and Frank Miles Day, The Existing and Proposed Outer Park Systems of American Cities, Report of the Philadelphia Allied Organizations, Mount Pleasant Press, Harrisburg, 1905) 26 Andrew Jackson Downing, Rural Essays, Leavitt and Allen, New York, 1858 [1853], pp. 14-15. Also see Thomas Bender, Toward an Urban Vision: Ideas and Institutions in Nineteenth Century America, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore & London, 1975, p. 162; David Schuyler, Apostle of Taste: Andrew Jackson Downing 1815-1852, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore & London, 1996, pp. 107-126. 27 H. W. S. Cleveland, Landscape Architecture, as Applied to the Wants of the West, Jansen, McClurg & Co., Chicago, 1873, p. 73. 28 Ibid., p. 12.
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metropolitan Boston (fig. 5). From the beginning, then, landscape architects in the United States were devising plans that by the first decades of the twentieth century also fell under the tasks of yet another new professional: the city planner. Landscape architects not only worked for private clients, but they were also public servants, and as Olmsted wrote in a letter to his gifted young colleague Eliot, their “profession [wa]s a common wealth.”29 Landscape Gardener While many of the pioneering designers called themselves landscape architects, also considering it their mission to design entire unbounded landscapes and not merely bounded gardens, designers like O. C. Simonds and Beatrix Jones Ferrand who saw their field of activity more closely tied to the gardens and grounds of private estates and who focused more on the horticultural expertise of their occupation, continued to consider themselves “landscape gardeners” although they were clearly outnumbered in a vote that was taken in 1915 among members of the American Society of Landscape Architects. Out of the 37 votes cast, 29 chose “landscape architect” as the preferred professional name.30 In the late nineteenth century O. C. Simonds had explained his reluctance to use the term “landscape architect” with the fact that it could also mean – as indeed it had in some contexts in the early nineteenth century – “a man who designed summer-houses, pavilions, balustrades, fences, hedges and things with stiff formal lines.”31
Fig. 6 Cover of Mariana Griswold van Rensselaer’s book Art Out-Of-Doors, published in 1893 29 A Letter relating to Professional Practice, 1921, p. 190. 30 Thaisa Way, Unbounded Practice: Women and Landscape Architecture in the Early Twentieth Century, University of Virginia Press, Charlottesville & London, 2009, p. 25. 31 Simonds cit. in M. G. van Rensselaer, The Landscape gardener and his Work, in: Garden and Forest, July 21, 1897, p. 282 (282-283).
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One of the most ardent promoters of the term landscape gardener was the art critic and writer Mariana Griswold van Rensselaer (fig. 6). Van Rensselaer had only discovered the occupation in the 1880s, and she quickly began to use her writerly acumen to promote landscape gardening as a profession. Despite landscape architecture’s new status as a profession she regarded “the older, equally dignified and exacter term”32 landscape gardening as the more fitting name. There was nothing that could be done to convince her otherwise, as Olmsted realized when in a series of letters in the 1880s and 1890s he unsuccessfully tried to persuade her to use “landscape architecture” instead.33 Although the titles “garden designer” and “garden artist” hardly gained currency within the world of professionally working designers, they were preferred by famed Mid-western landscape architect Jens Jensen who also liked to talk of landscape gardeners. Rejecting landscape architecture used by many of his North American peers, particularly those practicing on the East and West coast, the Danish-born and German-educated Jensen who maintained contacts to his German peers throughout his professional life, still in 1931 argued for “garden designer” and “garden artist,” denominations that had been common in nineteenth-century Germany. This choice was probably encouraged or even caused by his close ties to German professional circles, his nativist ideology and the attempt to establish a naturalistic Midwestern design style that would compete against the beaux-arts and pastoral styles common on private estate grounds and in public parks on the Northeast coast. Both landscape and garden architecture were inacceptable names for him and did not represent his occupation that he considered a creative activity and an art that had to “grow out of the native soil.”34 Art But even if the early professionals disagreed upon the proper name for their occupation, both adherents of the title “landscape architect” and “landscape gardener,” as well as early professionals like Jensen, did not question that designing landscape was an art. They were familiar with the British eighteenth and nineteenth-century promoters of the picturesque landscape garden like William Gilpin, Richard Payne Knight, Uvedale Price, as well as Humphrey Repton and John Ruskin, and with the painterly appreciation of large-scale landscapes and were eager to establish a 32 Judith K. Major, Mariana Griswold Van Rensselaer: A Landscape Critic in the Gilded Age, University of Virginia Press, Charlottesville & London:, 2013, p. 52; MSVR, Architecture as a Profession, in: The Chautauquan: Organ of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle 7 (May 1887): 451-454; [M. G. van Rensselaer], LandscapeGardeners Needed for America, in: Century Illustrated Magasine, 34 (June 1887), 2, p. 313. 33 See Eigen, Claiming landscape as architecture (see note 14), 2014. 34 Jens Jensen, Gedanken eines Gartengestalters, in: Gartenschönheit, 12, 1931, 4, p. 63 (63-64).
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lineage between these men and their own work. But perhaps even more importantly, for the early professionals, declaring the act of designing landscape an art was a way to legitimize their profession and earn recognition, which turned out to be one of the biggest struggles. It was important to convince their clients and the public at large that they were artists and not merely businessmen: as artists they acted based upon higher motives than mere self-interest or profit.35 As Charles William Eliot would later explain, landscape architecture was “a fine art,” that was “an element in the pursuit of happiness” and human welfare.36 For Olmsted, gardening was a craft, and designing an art. In fact, landscape architecture was an art that required, as Olmsted pointed out, much training and “arduous study as is often given to any other form of art, or to any learned profession.”37 Before he could have anticipated that he would ever become a landscape architect, he had written in his Walks and Talks of an American Farmer in England: “What artist, so noble, […] as he, who with far-reaching conception of beauty and designing power, sketches the outline, writes the colours, and directs the shadows of a picture so great that Nature shall be employed upon it for generations, before the work he has arranged for her hand shall realize his intentions.”38
Like painters, landscape architects produced landscape scenes, but they produced them from natural materials, at one-to-one scale, and in three dimensions. In Olmsted’s opinion gardeners on the other hand were not “artists in respect to scenery, as scenery acts in the emotional nature of some of us.” They were craftsmen with botanical knowledge but without “the slightest interest in or understanding of landscape,”39 and in his eyes, they were most often also unable to look beyond the garden fence. According to Olmsted, then, gardener’s skills lacked feeling, or we may say, an aesthetics, and their work lacked depth and breadth. When he felt obligated to resign from his duty as Architect-in-chief and Superintendent of Central Park for the first time in 1861, Olmsted confidently explained that “the work of design necessarily supposes a gallery of mental pictures, and in all parts of the park I constantly have before me, more or less distinctly, more or less 35 See, for example, Ibid. 36 Dr. Eliot Talks On Life Work, in: The Sunday Herald Boston, 2 April 1911; Charles W. Eliot, Welfare and Happiness in Works of Landscape Architecture, in: Landscape Architecture 1 (1911), 3, pp. 145-153. 37 Forty Years of Landscape Architecture: Being the Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Central Park, ed. by Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr. and Theodora Kimball, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, New York and London, 1928, pp. 140-141. 38 Frederick Law Olmsted, Walks and Talks of an American Farmer in England, George P. Putnam, New York, 1852, p. 133; in a slightly amended version, also in Frederick Law Olmsted, Sr., letter to the Board of Commissioners of the Central Park, May 20, 1858, cit. in Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Early Years and Experiences, 1922, p. 50, ref. 8. 39 Olmsted cit. in Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Early Years and Experiences, 1922, p. 128.
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vaguely, a picture, which as Superintendent I am constantly laboring to realize. […] I shall venture to assume to myself the title of artist and to add that no sculptor, painter or architect can have anything like the difficulty in sketching and conveying a knowledge of his design to those who employ him which must attend upon an artist employed for such a kind of designing as is required of me. The design must be almost exclusively in my imagination. No one but myself can feel, and without feeling no one can understand at the present time the true value or purport of much that is done in the park, of much that needs to be done.”40
Olmsted went on to explain that the ground was his canvas or block that was to be painted or sculpted. In his subsequent second resignation as superintendent to Central Park in 1873, he explained that “an artist dealing with trees and plants has to adapt his work to the vicissitudes of seasons and other transient conditions of growth and that his processes are necessarily longer processes than those of an architect.” Olmsted had therefore objected to the title assigned to him – “Architectin-Chief of the Central Park” – but the Board of Commissioners had argued that “architect” implied better than any other the kind of professional responsibility he carried.41 The fact that “architect” implied professionalism, authority, and skill in the ears of the public, would ultimately sway Olmsted to become less critical of the title landscape architect. Although Olmsted’s colleague Cleveland harbored a changeable opinion with regards to the naming of the profession, he also declared it an art. For him it was “the art of arranging land so as to adapt it most conveniently, economically and gracefully, to any of the varied wants of civilization,” thus adding economic to the aesthetic concerns of the profession.42 The adherents of the name landscape gardening, likewise, considered the occupation an art. Van Rensselaer argued in one of her first essays on the subject that like painting, sculpture, and architecture, landscape gardening demanded creative power and skill. It was, she proposed, an “art whose purpose it is to create beautiful compositions upon the surface of the ground.”43 Only artists could be landscape gardeners, hence landscape gardeners were artists. To become a landscape gardener required studying the principles of painting, carefully observing works of sculpture, acquiring architectural training, and recognizing bad taste in decorative details.44 Furthermore, van Rensselaer maintained that the landscape gardener was to be seen like the sculptor and painter rather than the architect or 40 F. L. O., “Letter offering Mr. Olmsted’s Resignation,” cit. in Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Central Park, 1928, p. 310 (309-310). 41 Fred. Law Olmsted, Another Letter of Resignation, 1873, cit. in Professional Papers of Frederick Law Olmsted, Senior, Central Park, 1928, pp. 319-320 (318-327). 42 Cleveland, Landscape Architecture, 1873, p. 17. 43 M. G. van Rensselaer, Landscape Gardening – A Definition, in: Garden and Forest, 1 (February 29, 1888), p. 2. 44 Judith K. Major, Mariana Griswold Van Rensselaer: A Landscape Critic in the Gilded Age, University of Virginia Press, Charlottesville & London, 2013, p. 51.
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“Landscape Architect better carries the Professional Idea” Fig. 7 Opening page of Introduction of the Study of Landscape Design by Henry Vincent Hubbard and Theodora Kimball, published in 1917
musician as he drew his inspiration directly from nature.45 According to her, the use of natural materials could only produce good works of art,46 an art that in her mind was no art of imitation but one of creation. Land was turned into beautiful landscapes through the artists’ own individual interpretation, will of expression, taste, and professional skill.47 Still in 1910, at a time when many artists in other areas had moved beyond romantic views of the world, Charles William Eliot, then the emeritus president of Harvard University, asserted that landscape architecture was “primarily a fine art.”48 In the first issue of Landscape Architecture, the official organ of the recently founded American Society of Landscape Architects, he explained that this fine art created and preserved beauty, and that it promoted the comfort, convenience and health of urban populations. It was this definition that Henry Vincent Hubbard and Theodora Kimball used on the opening page of their 1917 book Introduction of the Study of Landscape Design and that would become a mainstay in the profession’s 45 M. G. Van Rensselaer, Landscape Gardening-II, in: Garden and Forest, 1 (March 7, 1888), pp. 14-15. Also see Major, Mariana Griswold Van Rensselaer, 2013, p. 66. 46 Major, Mariana Griswold Van Rensselaer (see note 44), 2013, p. 67; M. G. Van Rensselaer, Great Hill: A New American Country-seat – II, in: Garden and Forest, 4 (28 October 1891), pp. 506-507. 47 M. G. van Rensselaer, Landscape Gardening – III, in: Garden and Forest, 1 (March 14, 1888), p. 27; [M. G. van Rensselaer], “Natural Beauty and the Landscape Gardener,” Garden and Forest, 1 (December 5, 1888), p. 481; M. G. van Rensselaer, “Landscape Gardening – VI,” Garden and Forest, 1 (April 4, 1888), pp. 63-64; Major, Mariana Griswold Van Rensselaer, 2013, p. 68. 48 Charles W. Eliot, Letter to the Editors of Landscape Architecture, in: Landscape Architecture, 1 (1910), 1, p. 40.
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definition until the years after WWII when claims to landscape architecture being a fine art would finally fade in favor of an increased attention paid to its scientific foundations (fig. 7). Thus, in 1950, landscape architect and Harvard professor Norman T. Newton described landscape architecture as “the art and science of arranging land – and the spaces and objects upon it – for efficient, healthful, safe, and pleasant human use.”49 Again and again throughout the twentieth century, leading voices in the profession have called out the increased opportunities and the increased scales of the sites that the profession has been tackling. Throughout this evolution, the name “landscape architecture” resisted change. It had, after all, already implied all scales of design when it was first selected. But some of landscape architecture’s problems have also remained the same. As in the early years of the profession, still today we hear complaints about the lack of public and professional recognition of landscape architecture. This does not only have to do with the “fuzziness” of landscape, or with the relative vagueness of its definition already criticized by Olmsted and some of his peers. I would contend that it also results from a still pervasive lack of recognition within the profession itself that to establish itself as an equal player among the design professions it needs to acknowledge its history. Professionals and educators need to accept that history, like ecology, sociology, soil science, plant science, dendrology, and other fields is not only a support discipline for designers, but it is a distinct field of knowledge that requires skill and creativity and holds up a mirror to the profession. Without this recognition and the recognition of the other distinct fields of knowledge that inform landscape architecture, the profession cannot have the necessary foundation to stand its ground and successfully provide human nature and culture with a dignified living environment. It falls back into ideologies serving self-fulfilling prophecies and market-driven developments rather than seeking truth in humanitarian ideals and values which could be called an art.
49 Norman T. Newton, Landscape Architecture: A Brief Description of the Profession and its Scope, in: Landscape Architecture, 41 (1950), p. 19 (19-20).
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Makoto Akasaka
Professionalising Landscape Architecture in Japan: Are we Artists, Researchers, Planners, or Gardeners? For more than ten years now, the members of JILA1, the Japanese Institute of Landscape Architecture, have been concerned with ‘Landscape Architectural Heritage’, because one has become more self-aware within the profession: of what we are or what we have done in the world as landscape architects. We set up the ‘Making Landscape Architecture Inventory’ initiative, intended to promote understanding of our profession. It began in 2005 at our branch in Greater Tokyo and has since spread to every JILA branch. The initiative does not primarily focus on a detailed history of garden art in Japan but rather on how the profession has metamorphosed since the Edo Period. Some aspects of this professionalisation are mentioned below: • The era of Daimyo Gardens in the Edo Period and their decline • The reconstruction programme following the serious Kanto earthquake of 1923, and the wide opportunities this offered landscape architecture • Accommodation policies in response to the housing crisis after the Second World War and landscape architecture • My generation’s experience • Closing remarks. The era of Daimyo Gardens in the Edo Period and their decline Up to the beginning of the Edo Period there had already been various styles of ‘Japanese garden’. During the Heian Period (late 8th – 12th century) the pond garden style predominated. In the Muromachi Period (14th – 16th century) stone garden and tea garden styles appeared, and in the Edo Period (1603-1867) the Daimyo Garden (stroll garden) was born, in which all the preceding styles such as pond garden, stone garden and tea garden were combined. In the capital Edo (called Tokyo from 1868) there were many residences of the Daimyo (feudal lords of vast estates throughout Japan) with gardens. Each Daimyo owned several houses used as offices or housing, always with a garden. The hostage policy of the Edo-Tokugawa regime compelled each Daimyo family to reside within the city of Edo, while also obliging each Daimyo, for economic 1 JILA; Japanese Institute of Landscape Architecture, established 1925, publisher of the journal ‘Landscape Kenkyu (research) comprising peer reviewed articles, organiser of a large annual event including symposia, lectures and excursions and of Japanese and foreign academic exchanges.
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Professionalising Landscape Architecture in Japan Fig. 1 Rikugien Garden (late 17thearly 18th century) in Tokyo. Various scenes from Waka poems in Wakayama are symbolised in the garden (photo by the author)
Fig. 2 Korakuen Garden (17th century) in Tokyo. ‘Scenic beauties’ from both Kyoto (left) and also from China (right) are symbolised in the garden (photo by the author)
and political reasons, to return home to his estates, with his own troops and at his own expense, every year or two. The regime was a constant economic burden on the Daimyo, but on the other hand these journeys contributed to garden cultural exchanges as some famous gardens in the city of Edo were emulated in the Daimyo’s home estates. As the Daimyos’ subjects were very poor they had to find other employment, usually in flower and tree propagation. In the Edo Period garden books were circulating, and one could have a garden laid out to a template. This means that there were already professional gardeners; it is known that a kind of craft guild existed, for instance to fix the prices for garden plants or professional services. At the end of the Edo Period some Europeans arrived, and admired the capital city of Edo with its profusion of gardens and flowers. With the decline and fall of the Edo-Tokugawa regime all the Daimyo returned to their home estates. The time of the Samurai was over; they were redundant. The Daimyos’ city residences were partly bought up by politicians and businessmen of the new Meiji regime, but most of the gardens, which had been tended for over two hundred years, were left to run wild. The capital Edo was renamed Tokyo. Its population declined dramatically. The Governor of Tokyo issued an economic decree: ‘KUWACHA-REI’ (to grow mulberry and tea trees), to cultivate the land of the derelict city. The former houses and gardens of the Daimyo were demolished to make way for mulberries and tea. The decree was rescinded, but not before
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around a tenth of Daimyo properties had become fields. In the middle of Tokyo Hibiya-koen was laid out in 1903, the first municipal park on Western lines rather than Japanese patterns. The reconstruction programme following the major Kanto earthquake of 1923, and the wide opportunities this offered landscape architecture A catastrophic earthquake struck the Kanto region in 1923. Tokyo, Yokohama and other cities were completely destroyed, and around 100,000 people lost their lives. After the earthquake the necessity of public open spaces and green areas within the city was recognised and seriously addressed. The reconstruction programme included three large parks and 52 small parks in Tokyo. It was clear that JILA was established in this context, two years after the earthquake. Back then, the emphasis was on ‘green infrastructure’ rather than garden art. Parallel to this, from 1915 landscape architecture practitioners were involved in research and praxis for a major national construction project , the great Meiji-Jingu Shrine2 covering around 73 hectares. The shrine was planned as a memorial to Emperor Meiji-Tenno; it comprises two grounds, the Inner and the Outer Shrine. The Inner Shrine and its woodland surroundings were designed and built in Japanese style from 1917-1920 and the Outer Shrine (1914-1925) in Western style. The period of this project was very important for the academic and technical development of modern landscape architecture. Those involved also contributed to the reconstruction programme after the earthquake. In 1932 the Council for Green Space Planning in the Tokyo area (with a radius of 50 km, comprising 960,000 ha) was jointly established by the national Home Affairs Ministry, the Prefecture and City of Tokyo and the Police Authority. Its planning ideas were derived from the 1924 Amsterdam Resolution on green belt planning, and the
Fig. 3 Outer Shrine of Meiji-Jingu, 1918. Seidai Tanaka, Nihon no Koen (Parks in Japan), Kajimashuppankai, Tokyo, 19823, p. 193. The original plan of the Outer Shrine is taken from Meijijingugaienshi von Meijijingu Hosankai, Tokyo, 1937
2 Meiji-Jingu; Notably in the grounds of the Inner Shrine around 120,000 trees of 365 varieties were planted according to plan. The land at that time was bare; from 1921 an extensive wood was planted according to the principles of succession so that the woodland would reach its climax a century later. (Yasuhiko Ito: Seimei no Mori (Forest Life Meiji Jingu), Kodansha, Tokyo, 2015, p. 30).
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Professionalising Landscape Architecture in Japan Fig. 4 Ginkgo Allée in the Outer Shrine (photo by the author)
Fig. 5 1939 Plan for the green belt around Tokyo with extensive parks, several rivers, and recreational roads. Sho Sato, Nihon Koenryokuchi Hattatsushi (History of the development of parks and greenspace in Japan) vol. 1, Toshikeikaku Kenkyusho, Tokyo, 1977, p. 387
plan for a green belt around Tokyo with several rivers flowing into the city was approved in 1939. During the war, however, the plan was seen as not urgent and the land used for other purposes such as growing crops, flak positions or other military facilities. Accommodation policies in response to the housing crisis after the Second World War and landscape architecture The economic boom of the 1960s bought chaotic development in cities; many Tokyo landscapes that had survived the catastrophic earthquake and wartime bombing disappeared under its depredations, gardens among them. This period, when profit was preferred over beauty, saw a terrible crisis for garden art. Before the boom, right after the war there was a critical housing shortage. It was not until 1955 that central government established the Japan Housing Corporation to accelerate housing provision. Development policy had two main aims: to provide both accommodation and green space. Therefore, housing provision all
Makoto Akasaka Fig. 6 Disposition of apartments and greenspace, Yonemoto Estate 1970. Toshikibanseibi Kodan (formerly JHC), Machi to Midori no Ayumi---Danchi Zouen 45 nenshi---,’Machi to Midori no Ayumi’ editorial, 2002, p. 50
over Japan always began with laying out open spaces, parks, and other greenspace; the ideas of ‘green infrastructure’ made a substantial contribution to this. In actual fact many competent landscape architecture professionals were trained within the JHC and later became professors or experts in their own right. The existence of this body contributed to the development of a landscape architecture discipline, along with GREEN INFRA. Against the background of housing development policy there had already, before the war, been certain landscape architectural assemblages through the establishment of modern suburban housing under the influence of the ‘Garden City’ and ‘Lebensreform’ movements. Postwar housing policy followed the principles: ‘modern, rational, functional’ – far removed from those of the traditional Japanese garden. My generation’s experience My time as a student, 1969-1975, saw a period of university reform; our Landscape Architecture faculty was also reconstituted, introducing the new subject areas of Ecology, Botany and Information Technology. It was not that simple in those days for students to visualise their occupational profile; we asked ourselves whether we would become artists, researchers, planners, or gardeners. But that is 40 years ago now; in retrospect one can say that a repertoire of landscape architecture has evolved, but back then in Japan chaos reigned. That is why I came here to Hannover 40 years ago to look into the blue sky. Did things go well or wrong for me? Closing remarks Where is the ‘garden art’ of the Japanese garden? Some Daimyo gardens were acquired by leading figures of the new Meiji regime, but only a part have been retained as Japanese cultural heritage, while some have become public parks. The new rulers also built Western style villas or Western gardens with cottages, including a tea house and tea garden because they did not want to do without the tea culture that was such an integral part of political and social discourse. In the Meiji
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Professionalising Landscape Architecture in Japan Fig.7 Murin-an, Kyoto (photo by the author). The gardens with their wide rivers, laid stepping stones and mountain view (Higashiyama) as a borrowed scenery (outside of the garden) were highly innovative for their time
Period, ‘New Style Gardens’ by Ogawa Jihei were laid out in Kyoto (Murin-an) and became famous. Ogawa Jihei also made Japanese gardens in Tokyo, while the Englishman Josiah Conder designed villas in the same grounds (the Mitsui Club, Furukawa-Teien in Tokyo). The two cultures are not intermixed but rather co-exist side by side, distinguished by elevation or separated by hedges and trees as if one should enjoy different tastes distinctly. On the one hand, after World War II the Japan Housing Corporation promulgated the ideas of public greenspace within housing provision (GREEN INFRA). This movement gave rise to many planning bureaux and greenspace design companies outside JHC. On the other hand, surviving Japanese gardens have been retained as traditional templates and currently the landscape architects approach to their care and reconstruction is growing. A district of Tokyo, Setagaya-ku, laid out a new Japanese garden as a public park in 2013. Frequent natural disasters – not only earthquakes such as in Hanshin-Awaji in 1995, Chu-etsu inn 2004, Higashi-Nihon and the Fukushima tragedy in 2011, and Kumamoto in 2016, but also typhoons, landslips, floods and more – mean that the Japanese are constantly faced with serious challenges. Contributions to averting and ameliorating such catastrophes are also required from the discipline
Fig. 8 Kaitokaku Palace designed by J. Conder, 1908 (photo by the author)
Fig. 9 Part of the tea house within the Shinagawa-ku palace grounds, Tokyo (photo by the author)
Makoto Akasaka Fig. 10 Kisin-en, Futakotamagawa, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo (photograph by the builder, Yasutaka Takasaki)
of landscape architecture. We have to address both the spatial and the human dimensions, as many people have lost their homes through such catastrophes and their rehousing brings its own problems. Today we see a growing interest in ‘community design’ in the field of landscape architecture. Natural disasters can sometimes inflict deep wounds on contemporary civilisation; we must recognise that our lives are founded in the natural world. And we as landscape architects must consider how to overcome such disasters and reconstruct the best possible environment through a deeper connection between nature and mankind. The notion of a ‘man made landscape’ implies ‘cultural landscape’, referring to ‘Fudo’ (風土): air and soil, and in Japanese gardens one still strives to symbolise this. In any case, however, the territorial expansion of the landscape architecture discipline is causing conflict about a change to the JILA name (in Japanese: 造園 Zoen). I feel that ‘Zoen’ has nuances of history and culture that in some ways are opposed to the functionalism of ‘green infra’. The garden, however, will exist in perpetuity as long as one loves it and never forgets the essential connections of greenery, soil, water and air.
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Session II Researcher’s Fair – Visions and New Research Projects
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Christian Werthmann
Researcher’s Fair – Visions and New Research Projects When I am talking to colleagues from other disciplines, especially the natural sciences and the arts, about research in Landscape Architecture, I always have to explain a lot. Sometimes I am not sure whether whoever I am talking to has understood me at all, or whether he or she really approves of the diversity of our research approaches or even values their wide-ranging results. The initial reaction is mostly astonishment: ‘Wow. I never knew you did stuff like that.’ – followed by interrogation, preferably from to the specific perspective of their own discipline. For instance, if we are talking about “Research through Design” such a conversation can end abruptly or go on for ages. During the Herrenhausen Symposium “From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture” it was encouraging to see how, in an admittedly sheltered disciplinary context, young up-and-coming scientists and students confidently presented a spectrum of various research approaches. Landscape Architecture has so far, in spite of a few efforts to the contrary, stoutly resisted any hardline segregation bet ween the natural, cultural and engineering sciences. This new generation is in the process of developing the plotline of our “dirty” discipline for the next series. It is only in the throes of disciplinary turbulence, with help from dogged pursuance of joined-up thinking, that the massive, complex challenges for landscape and life can be tackled at all. In this spirit, Landscape Architecture has what it takes to be a key discipline in an age of climate change and rapid urbanisation.
Lightning Talks by Early Career Scientists
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Nayla M. Al-Akl
Redefining the Values of Beauty in Landscape Architecture: The Challenge of an Emerging Field in the Urban Context The disparity between beauty and performance in landscape architecture may be shrinking in certain parts of the world where landscape architecture, as a field and profession, has strongly established itself over time. While early scenic and pictorial understanding of landscape shaped the field in the 18th and 19th century Europe, later influences of environmental consciousness and ecological significance further defined it in the 1960s. The decades to follow highlighted the significance of a holistic understanding of landscape, where both aesthetics and multileveled performance were deemed critical and at the core of its mission. The value of beauty in itself, both as an experiential experience as well as having performative benefits has regained interest in recent years. The experience of beauty has been argued to be a learning tool that arouses our curiosity, teaches us about the environment and moves us into action, thus encouraging us to sustain and preserve it.1 Several studies have investigated the link between aesthetics and ecology, focusing on concepts of ecological aesthetics2 and investigating notions of landscape preferences as ways to better understand what people perceive, prefer and value in their reading of the landscape. Literature has thus suggested a growing understanding of beauty beyond its traditional formal aesthetics, highlighting ideas of functional beauty3 and the performance of appearance4, and emphasizing the value of beauty from an ethical, ecological and environmental perspective. While this blurring of boundaries may be apparent in some contexts, in Lebanon, where the profession is relatively young and often associated with beautification, there is little knowledge of how people perceive and experience the landscape, what attracts them to it, and more significantly what expectations they have from the field. The absence of an Arabic word corresponding to a holistic meaning of ‘landscape’5, makes its definition, meaning and applications even more ambiguous. 1 Elizabeth K. Meyer, Sustaining beauty. The performance of appearance: A manifesto in three parts, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture, 13 (2008), pp. 6-23. 2 Paul H. Gobster et al., The shared landscape: what does aesthetics have to do with ecology?, in: Landscape ecology, 22 (2007), 7, pp. 959-972. Joan Iverson Nassauer, Cultural sustainability: aligning aesthetics and ecology, Island Press, Washington D.C., 1997. 3 Susan Herrington, Beauty: Past and future, in: Landscape Research, 41 (2016), 4, pp. 441-449. 4 Meyer (see note 1). 5 Jala M. Makhzoumi, Landscape in the Middle East: an inquiry, in: Landscape Research, 27 (2002), pp. 213228.
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The Challenge of an Emerging Field in the Urban Context
A recent study by Makhzoumi6 has looked at new holistic approaches to the field in the Middle East, investigating projects that have promoted community inclusive nature conservation, sustainable agricultural development, rural heritage and sustainable water resource management, and ecological landscape approaches and urban greening strategies. The study has been instrumental in shedding light on new social, environmental and ecological awareness and its impacts on planning and design. Nevertheless, a study on the personal experience of landscape is required to further enhance our understanding of the field from a user perspective, focusing on the person and his/her experience of the everyday landscape. This is particularly important in the urban context, where landscape takes a variety of forms and is often reinvented, with limited scope, size, typology and demand, and where connections to the more familiar cultural and rural landscapes have been erased. This research aims to 1. investigate how people perceive the urban landscape and what attracts them to it 2. shed light on the types of aesthetic experiences and how they relate to the concept of beauty 3. clarify the values of beauty in landscape architecture as an emerging field in the urban context of Beirut. Funded by the University Research Board (URB) at the American University of Beirut in 2017, the study relied on a mixed method approach investigating people’s landscape experience in their daily journey to/from work, in the city of Beirut, Lebanon. It relied on semi-structured interviews and ‘go-alongs’ in order to highlight landscape and aesthetic experiences of the city streets and landscapes with the aim to better understand what they saw, what they liked and what they valued. The results highlight a series of significant findings that shed light on the types of landscape features and characteristics observed. While formal aesthetics were very much discussed as predictors of preference and often as signifiers of beauty, the recognition of a range of perceived aesthetics, including but not limited to environmental aesthetics and aesthetics of stewardship, highlighted an interesting and complex reading of the everyday urban landscape by laypeople. Some experiences were general and categorical, for instance participants saw beauty in highly recognizable and influential landscape entities such as the sea, which seemed to overpower and control their experience as a whole. The sea was read and understood equally as a landscape component, water, a quality, a natural resource,
6 Jala M. Makhzoumi, From urban beautification to a holistic approach: the discourses of ‘landscape’ in the Arab Middle East, in: Landscape Research, 41 (2016), 4, pp. 461-470.
Nayla M. Al-Akl
a soothing feature, entertainment, a functional space and regional identity, all of which contributed to the understanding and valuation of beauty. In other instances, people emphasized particular details and qualities that attracted them and made the urban landscape more attractive and even beautiful. From a formal aesthetic perspective, these were widely defined. Some were focused on general features such as “green” or “greenery” as a quality within itself in the context of a dense and arid urban environment thus emphasizing interest in ecosystem services and environmental values, others included more specific qualities relating to a more conventional language of formal aesthetics such as symmetry and balance (of the landscape elements), diversity (in vegetation palette), contrast and ‘good’ composition. Rhythm was highlighted as a strong influencer of the aesthetic experience whereby the rhythm of repetitive landscape features, such as tree trunk alignments along the sidewalk, allowed drivers to be more aware of their sense of movement and the distance that they have completed, while providing a soothing repetitive experience and an element of guided focus. The concept of scale demonstrated to be significant in the reading of the landscape and ‘big’, ‘vast’, ‘tall’ adjectives were often seen as aesthetically pleasing. Additionally, particular and focused features such as texture, color and seasonal changes were perceived as highly significant in the experience and beautiful within themselves, especially for participants who conducted the interview on foot. Pedestrians in fact, noted that the positive sensorial experience of the landscape was in many cases influenced by a sense of smell, either with reference to a particular attractive smell such as that of ‘jasmine’ and ‘orange blossom’, which were culturally recognized by many, or due to a more general ‘nice smell’ that people attributed as a powerful aspect of the experience. This often allowed them to transcend to a different reality, or a faraway memory, away from the hustle and bustle of the city and their immediate context. The landscape experience in the urban context proved not only the diversity of aesthetic experiences but also the variety of values associated with the urban landscapes and the different scales in which they appear. While many saw beauty in particular formal aesthetic features, others saw beauty in the affordance that urban landscapes provided them with. These heavily relied on the local context and the current concerns and awareness related to climate change, sustainability and loss of natural resources. Stewardship and responsible treatment of the landscape as a natural and cultural resource were seen as positive influencers of beauty and were highly perceived and documented. In conclusion, the variety of aesthetic landscape experiences in the city of Beirut emphasizes the readiness of the local community to recognize holistic landscapes and to support the profession in moving beyond beautification into better address-
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ing aesthetics and performance in landscape architecture. All in the aim of promoting cultural environments that focus on human, ecological and environmental health using beauty as a tool for communication, promotion and evaluation. Acknowledgement This study was funded by the University Research Board (URB), American University of Beirut, 2017.
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Camilla Jane Allen
Three Cathedrals of Trees: From Allegory to Architecture The trees were here before us, they outlive us, are ascribed wisdom beyond our human capacity, and we can only guess at how magic and meaning came to be associated with them: from the Tree of Life to the Tree of Knowledge; emblematic liberty trees during the French Revolution to the everyday but essential street tree. Our relationship with trees offers up a wealth of interest, but this is not an exploration of allegory in relation to trees, but how that allegory has been transformed, in three different iterations, into architecture: the story of Britain’s three cathedrals of trees. Historians have pondered the question of whether the forests produced architecture or whether architecture plundered the forest for its forms: Marc-Antoine Laugier developed the theory that the earliest buildings had been constructed within the living trunks and boughs of trees; and Salomon de Caus enlivened the columns of the Hortus Palatinus in Heidelberg with trunk-like decoration. Simon Schama and Robert Pogue Harrison both posit the woodland origins of built sacred spaces, with, in Pogue Harrison’s mind, the columns in temples being analogous for the cluster of trunks in a sacred grove, and in Schama’s as indicative of a tension within the early Christian church as it attempted to distance itself from pagan nature-worship.1 The concept of groups of trees being church-like and churches being tree-like, manifests in different ways in recent history alone: a cluster of nine Redwoods form the ‘Cathedral Tree’ in California, there is a ‘Cathedral Grove’ on Vancouver Island, and the closing motif in the Disney film Fantasia is that of a procession through a forest where the branches of the trees form perfect Gothic arches. The author John Stewart Collis described the ‘peace and the mystery, the soft encircling silence of the glades, the holy calm within the vaulted tree-walled path, these we find again when we enter the Gothic Church and pace the aisles therein and gaze upon the fretted branches of the roof.’2 Alexander Pope had the practical idea of actually creating a cathedral using trees. Recorded in Joseph Spence’s Observations, Anecdotes and Characters of Books and Men (1820) he declared: “I have sometimes had an idea of planting an old Gothic cathedral, or rather some old Roman temple, in trees. Good large poplars, with their white stems, cleared of boughs to a proper height, would serve very well for the columns, and might form the differ1 See Robert Pogue Harrison, Forests: the shadow of civilization, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1992, pp. 178-179; Simon Schama, Landscape and Memory, London, Harper Press, 2004, pp. 226-239. 2 John Stewart Collis, The Triumph of the Tree, London, Jonathan Cape, 1950, p. 110.
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ent aisles.”3 He also used the allegorical form in his poem ‘The Garden’ which describes trees forming the pillared nave of a cathedral.4 Reconciling the theory of architecture with practical horticulture, however, was very much on the mind of Sir James Hall, geologist, President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and author of Essay on the Origins, History and Principals of Gothic Architecture (1794). In the essay Hall sought to demonstrate the artisanal beginnings of this mode of construction and was so convinced of his theory that he sought to bring the form to life, creating his own living experiment which would prove that the vaulted ceilings, arches and windows of the Middle Ages were a direct facsimile of nature. The illustration that introduces his essay shows the scale of building he was able to achieve, with it being more like a quaint and verdant folly, than an imposing Gothic cathedral. But he was satisfied enough to declare that the “appearance of the whole, whether seen from within or from without, bears, I flatter myself, no small resemblance to a cathedral.”5 There is a wealth of spiritual and sylvan incident and allegory to be found in the biography of Richard St. Barbe Baker, founder of the Men of the Trees. Baker’s childhood alone yields a spiritual awakening in the woods, and later in his career he sought to establish a sacred grove in the coast Redwood forests of California. The journal of the Men of the Trees, published from 1936, is replete with pro clamations of tree plantings for all manner of occasions, including shield-shaped formations for the Coronation of Edward VIII, and alongside the more prosaic activities of the society is a reference to a project in Scotland where one member had felt compelled to plant “trees in the form of a cathedral, creating a sylvan church […] the wonder and admiration of everyone who sees it.”6 Scotland’s Cathedral of Trees was created by the businessman Alexander Mackay (1856-1936) in 1921 on his estate to the East of Oban. As well as building a mansion he also financed a golf course, and on the grass and heathland on his land he participated in the afforestation efforts which were popular at the time as a means of preventing a timber shortage like that which had been experienced during the Great War. A photo from 1926 shows the tree cathedral in its first decade, constructed with heathers, yews and beech, with lime trees along the external wall line. 3 Alexander Pope, quoted in Joseph Spence, Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books and Men, edited by James M. Osborn, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1966, p. 256. 4 Alexander Pope, ‘The Garden, after Cowley’, from Imitations of English Poets. Written before 1709; first published in Pope’s Works, 1736. 5 James Hall, Essay on the origin and principles of Gothic Architecture, The Royal Society of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, 1797, p. 26. 6 ‘Scottish Notes’, TREES, 1936, p. 10.
Camilla Jane Allen
Later, the assertion that Glencruitten was intended as a memorial to the Great War has been made, but there are no formal elements within the cathedral that denote it as such (figs. 1 and 2). The Mackays are interred in front of the East Window, an architectural form aped through the use of red leaved acers in a cruciform pattern, which carpet the floor with crimson when their leaves fall in autumn. There is no evidence to suggest that many people were aware of Alexander Mackay’s activities in Scotland, but the significance of trees as both fellow casualties
Fig. 1 A photo of the Glencruitten Cathedral of Trees reproduced in the first issue of TREES., the Journal of The Men of Trees, in 1936
Fig. 2 The leaves of three red Acers cover Alexander Mackay’s headstone (Camilla Jane Allen, 2016)
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of war was not lost on the artist John Nash. Nash had painted the brutality of the Western Front in painting which often lacked human casualties, but instead focussed on the twisted mass of German planes or the shattered trunks of branchless trees. He returned to England after the war and painted numerous landscape studies, of which groups of trees took centre stage, finding an eerie peace in the British countryside. And around 1930, both Nash and an accountant, E.K. Blyth, were inspired by groups of trees; in Nash’s case it was to paint ‘Wood on the Downs’ and for Blyth it was to create a cathedral. The cathedral of trees in Whipsnade is unambiguously a memorial to those lost in the Great War. Edmund K. Blyth (1898-1969) had served and lost two friends during the conflict. It was upon the death of a third in 1930 that he was inspired to create an ambitious model, in part inspired by a visit to the Liverpool Anglican Cathedral and the beauty of watching the sun set behind a copse of trees. The chancel and nave are 140 yards long and are planted with lime, chestnut and tulip trees, replacing trees which were lost to Dutch Elm disease and with different ‘chapels’ for different seasons. It is now Grade II listed, with Historic England recognising it as a ‘highly unusual memorial landscape’, based upon a ‘conceptual rather than a literal design.’7 Unlike Glencruitten, it does not follow a specific schematic, but was intended to be cathedral-like, and in Blyth’s words: ‘Although it contains beautiful areas, that is not its primary significance and nor is it a garden. It is managed to emphasize the vigour and balance of individual plants, in patterns that create an enclosure for worship and meditation, offering heightened awareness of God’s presence and transcendence.8 The third cathedral of trees is in Newlands, Milton Keynes, and was designed by the landscape architect Neil Higson in 1986 (fig. 3). Higson had been commissioned to bring to life two ambitions for Milton Keynes: first, that it was to eventually become a city, and that - as a city - it would be known as “the City of Trees”. These points are important, because the municipal context for the Newlands Tree Cathedral does give it significant role in the town, much as a stone-built cathedral does in a city: the centre of a diocese, indicative of a thriving economy and population. And, along with the Newlands tree cathedral, Higson was also responsible for the creation of a turf maze based upon an ancient turf maze in Saffron Walden in Essex. These spiritual and magical elements were all part of what Higson felt was his brief “to make the much publicised image of Milton Keynes as The Beautiful City believable and real. Look around you and BELIEVE 7 Whipsnade Tree Cathedral Historic England, [accessed 5 August 2018]. 8 E. K. Blyth, Whipsnade Tree Cathedral, Historic England [accessed 5 August 2018].
Camilla Jane Allen Fig. 3 A figure walks down the central nave of the Newlands Tree Cathedral (Camilla Allen, 2017)
[…]”.9 But how does this idea of a magical or symbolic landscape relate back to Glencruitten, from there to the United States and before that to the ideas of the Rosicrucian Enlightenment? Much as Alexander Pope’s poetry harks back to an Arcadian idyll, there have been other movements which lionize past ages. In the late nineteenth century, two Americans claimed to have been initiated into the Rosicrucian brotherhood – a secret fraternity dating back to the sixteenth century and which was in turn informed by hermetic, alchemic and occult doctrines – and they went on to form esoteric Protestant organizations based in the United States, now known as the ‘Ancient Mystical Order Rosae Crucis’. In 1937, the AMORC reported the death of Alexander Mackay, himself a member, and described what he, as “one good Brother was inspired by the Great White Brotherhood” had done “to represent the spirit of the Cathedral of the Soul on earth.” The article in the Rosicrucian Digest describes that Mackay had spent his life’s savings “to give to future posterity something that would symbolize the spirituality of the soul in meditation, the principles of universal brotherhood and love, and the symbolism of the Cross”.10
9 Neil Higson Milton Keynes Rose [website] [accessed 7 August 2018]. 10 ‘Cathedral Contacts’, The Rosicrucian Digest, (December 1937), [accessed 5 August 2018].
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And it is upon this theme that the tree cathedrals of Milton Keynes and Glencruitten connect, not through some great occult conspiracy, but through a form which was used to bring meaning and magic to the land; that of the labyrinth. The turf maze in Saffron Walden is often referred to as being Rosicrucian, not because of its association with secret societies, but as a result of having been laid out in the period between the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, when alchemic, hermetic and herbal gardens were being created across Europe, and the Protestant communities of the North were seeking to imbue their culture with a richness of allegory.11 That the first and last tree cathedral have this Rosicrucian connection in common may be incidental, yet it does serve to illustrate the deep tradition that these sylvan temples are a part of; one in which meaning, memorial and magic are intertwined, and that the compulsion to bring the idea to life supersedes the eccentricity of the form. That there is no direct connection between the three tree cathedrals suggests that the inspiration and energy necessary to manifest in root, trunk and branch a form of such beauty and significance is a perennial dream, manifest in different ways at different times. All three share similarities and ambiguities: all three are open throughout the year to anyone who would wish to visit; only one is formally part of a park; two are places of interment; two are war memorials; and they all use trees as the primary material. They are manifestations of unusual creative vision, and are evidence of the potential that tree planting has to create places of rest, beauty and meditation. There are no bishops, no doors, and the windows are unglazed; the seasons replace sermons, and in these tree cathedrals we find an enduring expression of faith in nature.
11 See Frances A. Yates The Flowering of the Rosicrucian Enlightenment (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1972), and James Stevens Curl, The Design of Historical Gardens: Cultural, Magical, Medical and Scientific Gardens in Europe, Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 13:3, pp. 264-281.
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Ana Catarina Antunes, Teresa Portela Marques, Teresa Andresen
The German Influence in the Genesis of Landscape Architecture in Portugal This paper is about the German influence in the genesis of landscape architecture in Portugal, through the contributions of two men who obtained their training in Germany, in schools that have a common origin. They are Emil David (18381873) and Francisco Caldeira Cabral (1908-1992) (fig. 1). Emil David, a landscape gardener trained by the Royal School of Gardening (Königliche Gärtnerlehranstalt) in the mid-19th century, came to Portugal to the city of Porto at the invitation of the Society of the Crystal Palace (Palácio de Cristal) to design the gardens of the precinct built for the Porto International Exhibition of 1865. This project, as well as other projects that he executed in Portugal, played an important role in the art culture of the 19th-century gardens in the country, influencing the popularity and appreciation of outdoor spaces, with far-reaching consequences for the gardens created in the following decades.1 In the 20th century, Caldeira Cabral brought the novelty of Berlin again. In 1939 he obtained the landscape architect diploma (Diplom-Gärtner) at the Higher Institute of Agriculture of Berlin (Landwirtschaftliche Hochschule), and when he returned to Portugal in the same year, based on what he had learned and seen in the years spent in Berlin, he recognized the ‘importance of creating a school where his recently acquired knowledge could grow roots and attract supporters for his cause of Landscape
Fig. 1 Francisco Caldeira Cabral (1908-1992). In 1936-1939 he studied landscape architecture at the Higher Institute of Agriculture in Berlin. When he returned to Portugal in 1939, he created the landscape architecture university degree and a new profession (Archive of the heirs of Francisco Caldeira Cabral) 1 T. Portela Marques, Dos jardineiros paisagistas e horticultores do Porto de “Oitocentos ao modernismo na arquitectura paisagista em Portugal”, PhD Dissertation, Instituto Superior de Agronomia, Universidade Técnica de Lisboa, 2009.
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The German Influence in the Genesis of Landscape Architecture in Portugal
Architecture!’2, contributing to a profound mind-set transformation in and to the prevailing professional culture. These two men, in periods around 75 years apart, brought new models and principles to Portugal that would influence the prevailing mind-set in designing parks and gardens and looking at the landscape and the city. The school that connects these two personalities is the Royal School of Gardening, established in 1824 in Potsdam. It signalled the beginning of gardening teaching of an institutional nature, differentiating itself from similar schools; it taught and valued an educational method that emphasised scientific training together with garden design and the practice of gardening. With a strong connection to the Royal School of Gardening, around 100 years after its foundation the first course in Landscape Architecture was created in Germany at the Higher Institute of Agriculture in Berlin, which Caldeira Cabral attended and which influenced him years later in the creation of a similar school in Portugal (fig. 2).
Fig. 2 Notes for the classes of the landscape architecture university degree, which began in 1941 (Archive of the heirs of Francisco Caldeira Cabral) 2 Teresa Andresen et al., Três décadas da Arquitectura Paisagista em Portugal (1940-1970), in: T. Andresen (ed.), Do Estádio Nacional ao Jardim da Gulbenkian, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon, 2003, pp. 18-97. Andresen 2003, p. 123.
Ana Catarina Antunes, Teresa Portela Marques, Teresa Andresen
Hence, we conclude that the schools of Landscape Architecture in Berlin and in Lisbon are heirs of the Royal School of Gardening. In addition to this common origin, we find strong parallels in their history. In Berlin and in Potsdam, the art of the 19th century garden was distinguished by the education provided by the Royal School of Gardening and by the practice promoted by the school’s principal, Peter Joseph Lenné (1789-1866), who was at the same time Director of the Royal Parks and Gardens of Potsdam. In Portugal, in the city of Porto, in the mid-19th century Emil David, recommended by Lenné to the Society of the Crystal Palace and later associated with Marques Loureiro (1830-1898), owner of a renowned nursery (‘Horto Loureiro’), were the predecessors of an informal school in Porto that originated a new model in the conception of parks and gardens that spread across the country over several years. Whereas in the 20th century, in 1929, the degree in Landscape Architecture was established at the Higher Institute of Agriculture in Berlin by Erwin Barth (1880-1933), 12 years later Caldeira Cabral did the same in Portugal at the Higher Institute of Agronomy in Lisbon. Francisco Caldeira Cabral, the founder of landscape architecture in Portugal and one of the most important protagonists of the profession in Portugal and abroad, is seen by Barbara Birli as the first example of knowledge transfer from one country to another, of a way of transnational cooperation in the teaching of Landscape Architecture.3 In the monograph that Teresa Andresen wrote on Caldeira Cabral, he is presented as ‘one of the world leaders of landscape architecture in the 20th century’4 and Ribeiro Telles, one of his first students, who also became a well-known landscape architect, stated that Caldeira Cabral is credited with ‘not only the foundation of teaching Landscape Architecture, but also the humanist vision and cultural depth that he determined from the outset the essential of Landscape Architecture.’5 International recognition became more apparent and widespread when he was appointed Vice President of the International Federation of Landscape Architecture in 1960 and President in 1962, a position in which he remained until 1966. In five decades, he produced a diverse set of works, which included the project for the National Stadium in Lisbon (fig. 3), gardens and parks, ‘quintas’ (rural estates), as well as planning works. He was also the author of a large number of publications that contributed to the status of landscape architecture in Portugal and abroad.
3 Barbara Birli, From Professional Training to Academic Discipline - The Role of International Cooperation in the Development of Landscape Architecture at Higher Education Institutions in Europe, PhD Thesis, Faculty of Architecture and Planning, University of Vienna, 2011, p. 54. 4 Teresa Andresen, Francisco Caldeira Cabral, Reigate (LDT Monographs), 2001. 5 G. Ribero Telles, O Ensino de Arquitectura Paisagista – Francisco Caldeira Cabral, in: Revista Agros, October 1995, p. 9.
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The German Influence in the Genesis of Landscape Architecture in Portugal Fig. 3 Photograph of the National Stadium, Lisbon, Horácio Novais Studio, 1944. It was the first landscape architecture project of Francisco Caldeira Cabral, which he did together with Konrad Weisner, his teacher in Berlin (Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Horácio Novais Studio Collection)
This research aims to analyse the German contribution to the genesis of landscape architecture in Portugal, something that has not been objectively studied and described in the historiography of landscape architecture in Portugal. This void justifies the relevance and importance of the research, which aims to develop further the work already done on Francisco Caldeira Cabral, focussing on in-depth knowledge of the principles and events of the genesis of landscape architecture education in Portugal.
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Michelle Knopf
Witness of unique Garden History in deep Slumber – A Conservation Management Plan for the Neunhof Castle Garden near Nuremberg Hidden treasures of garden art and landscape cultivation can be found all over the world. They may have been preserved in their original state or deformed over time, sometimes beyond recognition, so that the full extent of their cultural heritage is not visible at first glance. One of these treasures lies in the heart of the so called “Knoblauchsland”, which is located in the center of the three cities Nuremberg, Fürth and Erlangen and, with an extension of around 2100 hectares, forms the largest continuous vegetable cultivation area in Bavaria.1 Its history dates back well into the High Middle Ages.2 Due to the diversity of cultivation on small-sized plots, the appearance of the villages and surrounding countryside are unique and considered one of the most important cultural landscapes in Bavaria. 3 With its unmistakable architectural style, its exemplary state of preservation and its distinctive location in the surrounding countryside of Nuremberg, the Neunhof Castle has been the subject of numerous publications and is regarded as a showpiece for the building type of a Nuremberg manor house of the late 15th and early 16th centuries.4 The castle possesses a half-timbered facade on a sandstone base and is surrounded by a, nowadays dried out, moat. The entire castle district of Neunhof is bordered by a natural stone wall. It has the shape of a triangle with the peak in the north and the longest edge in the south. The Neunhof castle complex can be divided into four sections – the private area of the former farm yard in the west of the complex, the semi-public inner courtyard, the publicly accessible parterre garden and the equally public, park-like main garden covering 550m2 in the east. Latter is accessed by visitors through the “Kressenstadel”, a former farm building with a characteristic sandstone plinth, which is also one of the oldest barns in the village. Neunhof Castle nowadays is owned by the heirs of the Kress family, once a wealthy patrician ménage, who leased the property and the associated gardens to 1 Literally translated “Knoblauchsland” means “garlic country”. 2 Erich Guttenberg and Herrmann Rusam, Knoblauchsland, Verlag A. Hofmann, Nürnberg, 1989, p. 7. 3 Stadtplanungsamt Nürnberg, Begründung zum Rahmenplan des Bebauungsplanes Nr. 4628, „Knoblauchsland“ für ein Gebiet zwischen dem südwestlichen Ortsrand von Neunhof, südlich des Sooswegs, der Stadtgrenze, nördlich des Reuthwegs, dem nordöstlichen Ortsrand von Kraftshof und östlich der Kraftshofer Hauptstraße, Nürnberg, 11.11.2015, p. 5. 4 Renate Freitag-Stadler, Herrensitze im Bereich der Reichsstadt Nürnberg unter Berücksichtigung des Problems der Weiherhäuser, Magisterarb. Phil. Diss. Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, unpublished, Erlangen, 1972, p. 81.
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the Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg in 1956.5 As a result, the maintenance of the entire complex is the responsibility of the City of Nuremberg. The first mention of the complex was in 1482, but already in 1246 there have been indications of the existence of a manor house in Neunhof.6 In terms of the garden however, the first notice dates back to 1589.7 Before that, no sources mention the outside areas of the castle. In the 17th and 18th centuries, on the other hand, the sources for the exterior of the castle, such as copperplate engravings and descriptions, are very well comprehensible. Thereafter it was possible to retrace the historical development, which revealed, that the design of the garden can be divided into four different time phases. From the 15th century onwards until the early 18th century, it had the function of a summer residence for a wealthy Nuremberg family, called Kress, as well as an auxiliary castle for military protection of the city.8 The castle courtyard surrounded by a moat, the so-called Zwinger, is during this time equipped with different fruit trees, flowerbeds as well as a grapevine. Further, two large lime trees in the outer castle courtyard were mentioned, under which there stood a stone table.9 The great eastern garden was surrounded by a dense fence and enclosed from the inside by a young hedge. At that time, there were four entrances to the garden, which contained numerous fruit trees.10 Among others for instance apples, pears, plums, cherries and sour cherries were planted there. Kitchen herbs and rose bushes grew under the trees. For the first time, a so called “Vogelherd”11 is mentioned, whose traces can still be found today in the south-eastern corner of the garden. At this time it is apparent, that the garden design was based on the “villa rustica” or “villa suburbana” primarily found in Italy. “Villa rustica” thereby refers to a country house surrounded by agricultural areas,
whereas “villa suburban” is a rural residence near the city.
Both are concepts for the privileged upper 5 Robert Giersch, Andreas Schlunk and Berthold Haller, Neuenhof bei Kraftshof I (Burgen und Herrensitze in der Nürnberger Landschaft, ein historisches Handbuch), Verlag Altnürnberger Landschaft, Lauf a. d. Pegnitz, 2006, p. 305. 6 Irene Spille, Das Patrizierschloss Neunhof bei Nürnberg. Dependance des Germanischen Nationalmuseums, Nürnberg, 2001, p. 5. 7 Renate Freitag-Stadler, Herrensitze im Bereich der Reichsstadt Nürnberg unter Berücksichtigung des Problems der Weiherhäuser, 1972, p. 115. 8 Erich Guttenberg and Herrmann Rusam, Knoblauchsland, Verlag A. Hofmann, Nürnberg, 1989, p. 18 f. 9 Renate Freitag-Stadler, Herrensitze im Bereich der Reichsstadt Nürnberg unter Berücksichtigung des Problems der Weiherhäuser, 1972, p. 248. 10 Ibid. p. 250. 11 A “Vogelherd” is a historical device used to catch birds for subsequent consumption. This was preferably built on a 6 to 30-metre-long, more or less oval, grass-covered hill with a north-east orientation so that the birds migrating to the south-west had a clear view of the area. The word part “- herd” is an outdated expression and means in this context as much as earth or ground. The main species captured were thrushes. Cf. Johann Georg Krünitz, Oekonomische Encyklopädie oder allgemeines System der Staats- Stadt- Hausund Landwirthschaft, Berlin, 1855, as well as Hermann Rusam, Die Vogelfänger von Nürnbeg, Nürnberg, 2004.
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class, that make “lightness of life in the country” possible. The aim was not to cultivate garden art, but to show an affinity to agriculture. However, after the garden was redesigned in 1740, it was given a basic geometric structure, possibly based on the Hesperide Gardens, which modelled on the baroque gardens of French and Italian noblemen, common in Nuremberg between the 1650’s and 1750‘s.12 Nevertheless, the Neunhof Castle Gardens never actually were a Hesperide Garden, facing that the initial gardens were equipped with multiple statues and water features, none of which can be found in Neunhof at this time.13 In the war and post-war years of the 20th century, the garden was mainly used for food cultivation.14 Unfortunately, when the garden was once again redesigned in 1961, it was converted to Baroque style and many important elements, such as the former “Vogelherd” went unheeded. In addition, the historical valuable function of the castle garden as a kitchen garden, which followed through the 17th century up to the early 20th century, nowadays no longer exists. Today, not only the disease of the box hedges in the parterre garden, which were planted in the course of the modernization in the 1960s, is a significant problem which the castle management has to face, but upon closer examination it is visible, that also the main garden has its issues – like a lack in maintenance – because, unlike the castle itself, the garden has been always somewhat neglected.15 Other issues are furthermore the poor integration of the museum use in the outside area as well as the scant involvement of the population, who are very attached to the property. The biggest problem however remains financing. There is clear potential in the Neunhof garden complex, both in terms of heritage conservation and maintenance. It is regrettable, that the original appearance of the complex was completely lost during the redesign in 1977. Moreover, a great opportunity for the present use of the garden, as a museum garden, is wasted. This becomes apparent, as the average length of stay of visitors in the Neunhof castle garden is fairly short, since no attractions are offered, especially not for children or adolescents.16 Regarding the further management of the castle in the years 12 Bürgerverein St. Johannes, Spaziergänge durch St. Johannis, Nürnberg, 1992. 13 Further, the term “Hesperidengärten” was shaped by Johann Christoph Volkamer, who depicted these gardens in the book “Nürnbergische Hesperides, oder gründliche Beschreibung der Edlen Citronat, Citronen, und Pomerantzen-Früchte” (Nürnberg, 1708). The castle complex of Neunhof was never portrayed therein. 14 Hermann Rusam, Das Jagdschlösschen Neunhof im Knoblauchsland, date of publication unknown. 15 For a detailed description of the current situation, as well as its evaluation and illustration of issues, see Michelle Knopf, A Conservation Management Plan for Neunhof Castle Gardens near Nuremberg, Bachelor Thesis at the Institute of Landscape Architecture, Professorship for the History of Landscape Architecture and Garden Heritage Conservation, University of Technology Dresden, unpublished, Dresden, 2017. 16 In 2017, a staggeringly small number of only two information boards existed in the main garden of Neunhof Castle, on which little if any information about the history of the castle complex could be found.
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to come, it is essential to adapt to today’s user requirements, taking into account financing and sustainability. Therefore, the primary aim for both the parterre garden and the main garden should be to restore the historical structures as elaborated by the historical analysis, in a way that is appropriate for the preservation of historical monuments, for instance by emphasizing important historic elements. Meaning, that in the parterre garden the historic plan from 1821 should be used as reference, therefore, elegant flowerbeds should be located on the lawn to bring out the prestigious function of the garden. To make the garden more attractive for visitors, the provision of information boards and seating for visitors needs to be implemented in both garden parts. In the main garden, nature conservation aspects should be considered, which also help facilitate the maintenance of the garden. For example, with the creation of a meadow with scattered fruit trees, in order to also establish reference to the historic orchards. Besides, the pavilion – the currently neglected central element of the garden – could be used for temporary exhibitions. The display of crop and ornamental plant beds with historic plants can also help to better understand the garden. These design approaches open up financing opportunities: for example, through partnerships with school- or nursery classes, who take care of the crop- and ornamental plant beds as a “school garden-project”, as well as through the interested and committed population of Neunhof, who can use meadows for haymaking or as pastures and thus maintain them. Finally, it should be noted that of the once rich culture of rural manor houses in the Nuremberg countryside, only a few remain, such as the patrician manor houses in Großgründlach or Almshof. These are used in very different ways. Only Neunhof, as a public museum, helps to preserve this culture, which is unique in Germany. The gardens of Neunhof Castle conceal a historically valuable and exceptional potential, which must be revived and sustainably preserved for future generations.
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Verena Zapf
Student Competition: Fürst Pückler in Branitz In 2017 a student competition, “Kulturlandschaftspreis Fürst Pückler”, was jointly announced by the Fürst Pückler in Branitz e.V association, BTU Cottbus Senftenberg Technical University, the Fürst-Pückler-Museum Park und Schloss Branitz foundation, and Cottbus City Council. The competition sought to promote student urban and regional development projects that further garden and park design and the development of the cultural landscape in and around the historical park of Branitz and the city of Cottbus. Hermann Fürst von Pückler-Muskau (1785-1871) was an eccentric German prince and landscape artist, well known in Germany not just for his garden art but for “Fürst-Pückler ice cream”, called “Neapolitan” in other countries. He travelled widely, as far as the Orient, and wrote notable travel journals such as “Tour of a German Prince”. As a landscape artist he extended the idea of the English landscape park and set out his innovative notions in the enormously successful “Andeutungen über Landschaftsgärtnerei” (Hints on Landscape Gardening). When financial difficulties forced the sale of his extensive park complex in Bad Muskau he laid out a new garden by the small village of Branitz near Cottbus, transforming a sandy wasteland into a timeless masterpiece to leave an enduring impression on the landscape. However, this cultural landscape will soon be subjected to massive alterations when the largest artificial lake in Germany is created near the City of Cottbus and Branitzer Park on a for-
Fig. 1 Localization of park, city centre and lake in the city area of Cottbus, which is located in the east of Germany
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mer brown coal mining site; by 2030 this will significantly reshape the cultural landscape. It is important that the new lake will not distract from and eclipse Pückler’s historical parkland. My concept therefore aims to link the new and the old landscapes in five ways: Establish walking and cycling trail connections between city, park and lake. Circumvent obstacles along these connections such as the River Spree, busy roads or railway lines by building pedestrian- and cycle-friendly bridges and underpasses. Include the surrounding cultural landscape, not only the park and the lakeside but also fields and forests. Create settings for the entrances to park, lake and city for better navigation and localization. Set up highlights along the connections like a new observation tower as a landmark.
Fig. 2 The new routes between park, city and lake, which can be taken in stages or combined as a circular tour. Each path is suitable for pedestrians as well as for cyclists
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As a result, the old and the new cultural landscape can be assembled in a symbiotic relationship, one which will strengthen and define the entire cultural landscape around Cottbus.
Fig. 3 A summer’s day at the lakeside
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Karin Seeber
From Palimpsest to Hypertext: reading Garden Historiography Figure 1 shows a picture of the garden of Gawthorpe Hall, Lancashire,1 where the old structure was made visible through the parched grass by 2018s‘ summer heat waves. It shows three layers of a garden: an archaeological, historic one, which was meant to be erased by the smooth lawn of the second one, both designs. And then it shows a third one, a passing condition, caused by nature, that reveals the historic layer which was meant to be covered. The picture thereby highlights the tension between the idea of a garden as fixed in historic layers and the forces that mainly form gardens. Garden historiography’s aim is to preserve garden designs through texts and pictures. The traditional understanding is that of gardens and landscapes as texts, as signifying systems that are subject to cultural techniques. This still seems to be the ruling principle, albeit it has undergone vast methodological transformations. The notion of the garden as palimpsest, as an erased text, which has to be made visible again through careful study of sources, has been established by Marie Luise Gothein’s “Geschichte der Gartenkunst” (“A History of Garden Art”) in 1914.2 Here it is the concept of different historic layers that can be clearly reconstructed
Fig. 1 Gawthorpe Hall’s Victorian parterre in the dryweather of 2018 (Lancashire County Council) 1 See: nationaltrust.org.uk/gawthorpe-hall. 2 Marie Luise Gothein, Geschichte der Gartenkunst, Eugen Diederichs, Jena, 1914 [http://digi.ub.uniheidelberg.de/diglit/gothein1914ga]; english translation: Marie Luise Gothein, A History of Garden Art, Joseph Malaby Dent, London etc., 1928.
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and separated from each other through careful reading. In landscape architecture, André Corboz used the model of the palimpsest for the historic understanding of landscapes.3 The literary metaphors left their marks on landscape research until the present day, as visible in book titels like Anette Freytag’s “Stadt und Landschaft lesbar machen”4 and Udo Weilacher’s “Syntax der Landschaft”, who defines: „Immer wieder geht es um die Lesbarkeit des Gartens und der Landschaft, um den gezielten Einsatz von Gestaltungselementen als Sprachelemente, mit denen der Landschaftsarchitekt mit den Menschen über Natur und Umwelt in Dialog tritt.“ (“Again and again we are concerned with the readability of garden and landscape, with the targeted use of design elements as linguistic elements which the landscape architect uses to enter into a dialogue on nature and environment with his contemporaries”).5 The focus has shifted from historic layers to designed elements. But how these elements, arranged and filled with meaning by the designer, can be “read” is again based on methods of literary criticism, when John Dixon Hunt transfers Wolfgang Iser’s concept6 of the implicit reader into garden studies.7 As such, the concept of historic garden and landscape as texts remains, despite all methodological change, foremost a repository of information about the ideal understanding of gardens not only by the author, but also of his or her time. As such it is an object of ecocritical questions.8 The history of gardens is a history of man’s perception of nature. Ecocriticism has established itself as a methodology to interpret “belles lettres”; in garden and landscape research ecological thought manifests itself in an interest in ephemeral – threatened – phenomena of gardens. The signifié of elements that has been designed by climate change has established itself a central issue for the reception of gardens and landscapes of our time and we cannot go back beyond that knowledge. If Gothein would have described Gawthorpe Hall, her aim would have been to find sources depicting or describing the “first” historic layout and to uncover it as one genuine design, which was a strict art historical and architectural reading of the site. For contemporary viewers the information carried by the picture is more disturbing: the effects of climate change act as destroyers of garden design by accidentally uncovering old garden structures. The transformation from traditional 3 André Corboz, Die Kunst, Stadt und Land zum Sprechen zu bringen (Bauwelt Fundamente, Bd. 123), Birkhäuser, Basel etc., 2001. 4 Anette Freytag, Dieter Kienast, Stadt und Landschaft lesbar machen, gta Verlag, Zürich, 2016. 5 Udo Weilacher, Syntax der Landschaft. Die Landschaftsarchitektur von Peter Latz und Partner, Birkhäuser, Basel etc., 2008, p. 25. 6 Wolfgang Iser, The Implied Reader. Patterns of Communication in Prose Fiction from Bunyan to Beckett, Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 19905. 7 John Dixon Hunt, The Afterlife of Gardens, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 2004. 8 See Urte Stobbe, Ulrike Kruse, Maren Ermisch, Ökologische Transformationen und literarische Repräsentationen (Graduiertenkolleg Interdisziplinäre Umweltgeschichte Seminar für Deutsche Philologie), Universitätsverlag, Göttingen, 2010, pp. 3-12, p. 4 f.
Karin Seeber 109
garden historiography to a new concept which sees the study of nature as part of environmental humanities must bring with it a change of metaphors. When it becomes more and more obvious that the dominant anthropological approach towards nature threatens nature itself, her constituencies get into focus: Horticultural studies like those by Mark Laird9 and encounters with “Sound and scent in the garden” speak a clear language that the environmental aspect of the garden must be taken much more seriously, an insight only brought about by the perils of climate change that made the fragility of garden concepts clearly visible.10 The notion of nature, however, blocks – due to its ideological character – a “real relation to earth and its lifeforms”.11 To cite Timothy Morton: “The environment was born at exactly the moment when it became a problem. The word environment still haunts us, because in a society that took care of its surroundings in a more comprehensive sense, our idea of environment would have withered away. The very word environmentalism is evidence of wishful thinking. Society would be so involved in taking care of ‘it’ that it would no longer be a case of some ‘thing’ that surrounds us, that environs us and differs from us.”12
If man would not see himself separated from the world that surrounds him, there would also be no need to “read” nature.13 But this cultural technique remains the main access for mankind’s “otherness”, environment or nature, and the metaphor cannot be ignored. Since the strict interpretation of gardens and landscapes as palimpsest has been softened by including different interest groups, the modern idea of gardens and landscapes as signifiés invites a new perspective: that of gardens and landscapes as signifiers in their own right. As such, they qualify as hypertexts in Roland Barthes’ sense of the word – consisting of hidden structures, intensely linked to many phenomena, offering a multitude of perspectives without hierarchies of perception. Weilacher in his book speaks about the designing elements that are “written down” by the designer, Hunt’s focus is on the reader of these texts, and Anette Freytag had argued in her lecture at the symposium in 2018 for a much bigger approach to landscape design projects by including the neighbor9 Mark Laird, A Natural History of English Gardening, 1650-1800, Yale University Press, New Haven etc., 2015; D. Fairchild Ruggles (ed.), Sound and scent in the garden (38. Dumbarton Oaks Colloquium on the History of Landscape Architecture), Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington, D. C., 2017. 10 See also Judith Elisabeth Weiss, Guerilla-Gardening, Paradiesgärtlein und planetarischer Garten. Zur Aktualität des Gartens als Metapher und künstlerisches Wirkungsfeld, in: Kunstforum International, 258 (2019), pp. 106-115. 11 Timothy Morton, Ecology without Nature. Rethinking environmental aesthetics, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. etc., 2007, p. 8. 12 Ibid., p. 141. 13 Gilles Clément, Jardins, paysage et génie naturel, Librairie Arthème Fayard und Collège de France, Paris, 2012 (German translation: Gärten, Landschaft und das Genie der Natur: vom ökologischen Denken, Übersetzung Brita Reimers, Matthes & Seitz, Berlin, 2015), suggests the term “milieu” to include mankind into ecosystems.
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hood on different scales. Other modern methodologies try to leap the garden fence of the anthropocentric viewpoint by including animals and plants and their ways beyond garden boundaries. It is the non-linear sequencing of hypertexts that captures best contemporary notions of garden and landscape historiography.14 The term “hypertext” was coined by the philosopher Theodor H. Nelson in the 1960s.15 The common understanding is that of non-linearity: The structure of texts is given by their links, which the reader can combine to create new complexes of information. This manipulation is given through sensitive fields (hyperlinks) in the text.16 The reader “must abandon conceptual systems founded upon ideas of center, margin, hierarchy, and linearity and replace them with ones of multilinearity, nodes, links, and networks.”17 From the notion of the garden as palimpsest, where there is one definite layer that can be read in its historic linearity and that is established as dominant in the historical hierarchy, we turn to a concept of the garden that is defined by its methodological approaches and receptions of different interest groups beyond anthropocentrism. “Palimpsest” as a metaphor is unable to capture the ever-changing character of landscapes and gardens in every moment of their existence; “hypertext”, instead, introduces the idea of punctuation of sites and their surroundings by hyperlinks that connect different historical events and phenomena. Garden and landscape become a “galaxy of signifiers” (Roland Barthes),18 creating a network which brings together (human) designer and percipient, plants and animals, ephemeral phenomena and historical developments, and create a network of meanings. This net may in the end be capable of even weaving humans into its structure so that they become part of the system, not the problem.19 Future garden historiography will tell if this narrative can happen. 14 It is also vice versa, when a manual about writing good hypertexts compares the more structured against the wild parts of the texts with garden and park: Mark Bernstein, Hypertext Gardens: Delightful Vistas, Eastgate Systems, Watertown, 1998 [http://www.eastgate.com/garden/Seven_Lessons.html or: faculty. washington.edu/farkas/HCDE510-Fall2012/BernsteinGardens.pdf]. 15 George P. Landow, Hypertext 2.0. The Convergence of Contemporary Critical Theory and Technology, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore etc., 1997; see also: George P. Landow, Hypertext 3.0. Critical Theory and New Media in an Era of Globalization, Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 20063 for the expansion of the concept to new developments in computing. 16 See article „Hypertext“ in: Klaus Weimar (ed.), Reallexikon der deutschen Literaturwissenschaft, de Gruyter, Berlin 20003. 17 Landow, Hypertext 2.0, 1997, p. 2. 18 Roland Barthes S/Z. Translated by Richard Miller, Hill and Wang, New York, 1974, pp. 5-6, as cited in Landow, Hypertext 2.0, 1997, p. 3: “In the ideal text, the networks are many and interact, without anyone being able to surpass the rest; this text is a galaxy of signifiers, not a structure of signifieds; it has no beginning, it is reversible; we gain access to it by several entrances, none of which can be authoritatively declared to be the main one […] for the plural text, there cannot be a narrative structure, a grammar or a logic”. 19 Clément, Jardins, 2012 suggests an understanding of the planet as garden in order to make analoga between the careful work of the gardener in contrast to the destructive work of economy and environmental approaches.
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Myungjin Shin, Jeong-Hann Pae
Aesthetic Experience of Urban Agricultural Landscape in PostIndustrial Seoul Since the passing of the Act on Development and Support of Urban Agriculture in 2012, urban agriculture has become a topic of diverse array of research in South Korea.1 The current urban agriculture research in Korea is influenced not only by the global trends but also by the idealized rural imagery that dominates the urban agricultural landscape in Seoul. The reasons for such proliferation of the rural ideals can be attributed to several factors, including, but not limited to, (1) the relatively short industrial history of Seoul, which began in the early 20th Century; (2) the success of compressed economic development in the 1960’s and the 1970’s; (3) rapid population shift from rural to urban; and (4) the high-density urban development following the Korean War (1950-53). As a result, a considerable portion of Seoul residents displays nostalgic attitude towards the rural imagery. Although the idea of pastoral lifestyle and rural illusions is innate in the development of urban agriculture, it is only part of the urban agricultural landscape, as urban fabric is layered with cultural signs of numerous backgrounds. The reproduction of rural aesthetics without exploration into its meaning in the present context and its effects in terms of public experience has the potential to reduce the urban agricultural landscape to a mere spectacle, failing to realize its possibility as a culturally charged agent in shaping our urban environment. Hence, the appreciation and the understanding of urban agricultural landscape in Seoul requires an approach that is distinguished from garden history. This study demonstrates such an alternative by understanding and interpreting the urban agricultural landscape as site-specific everyday site and seeks to define the role of landscape architecture in the age of newly emerging landscapes. One can reimagine the urban agriculture practice as a performance that enriches the public experience of the urban tissue in the post-industrial megalopolis by considering the power of the appearance of landscape and its aesthetic experience. Such experience of the landscape affects the viewer’s perspective through
1 Article 1 defines the purpose of the Act on the Development and Support of Urban Agriculture as follows: “The purpose of this Act is to develop a nature-friendly urban environment by providing for matters regarding advancement and support of urban agriculture and to contribute to harmonious development of cities and rural communities by raising urban residents’ understanding of agriculture” (Act No. 11096, Nov. 22, 2011).
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the means of aesthetic-moral judgment, which plays a significant role in determining the cultural sustainability of a given landscape.2 Ideas of the landscape, as well as the concretized notions of the urban and the rural, have not changed much despite the globalized world. Constant return to such preconceived notion is not unique to the urban agricultural landscape, but manifestations of the rural ideals in contemporary urban design are more apparent than other newly emerging landscapes, as demonstrated by the urban agricultural plots in Seoul that interpret urban agriculture as revival of ancient traditions.3 As efforts to preserve and to advocate for the urban agricultural landscape in Seoul stands at stalemate, the socio-economic logics continue to challenge the sustainability of the existing sites. By considering the performance of appearance in the urban agricultural landscape and their effect on the larger public, the discourse on the aesthetic experience of this landscape in Seoul offers an alternative way of understanding social benefits that may arise from the landscape. This study finds that the theories of everyday aesthetics and site-specificity are useful in understanding the urban agricultural landscape as part of our everyday landscape. In particular, the aesthetic theories presented by Yuriko Saito in her discussion of ambience and transience in everyday life show the connection bet ween everyday aesthetics and the concept of aesthetic-moral judgment, which is necessary for the discussion of cultural sustainability in Seoul’s urban agricultural landscapes.4 Furthermore, landscape studies that relate landscape architecture to site-specificity in recent years are insightful. In his discussion of site-specificity, John Dixon Hunt finds that three ideas should also apply to landscape design: emphasis of process in design and reception, application of abstraction, and confidence in the artistic quality of the work.5 The idea of site-specificity can be appropriated as a filter through which the mundane aspects of the urban agricultural landscape can be reimagined as artistic and aesthetically invoking qualities. The interaction with the urban fabric in the urban agricultural landscape is always specific to the site; the site-specificity defines the identity of the given landscapes and contributes to the aesthetic experience. Based on the two theories, three interpretations of the urban agricultural landcapes in Seoul can be extracted. The sites under investigations are two ur2 For explanation on the performance of appearance, see Elizabeth Meyer, Sustaining Beauty: The Performance of Appearance, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture, 3 (2008), 1, pp. 6-23. Also, a thorough discussion on the idea of cultural sustainability in landscape is presented by Joan Iverson Nassauer. See Joan Iverson Nassauer (ed.), Placing Nature: Culture and Landscape Ecology, Island Press, Washington D. C., 1997. 3 Myungjin Shin, Aesthetic Experience of Urban Agricultural Landscape, Master’s Diploma Thesis at the Graduate School of the Seoul National University, unpublished, Seoul, 2018. 4 Yuriko Saito, Everyday Aesthetics, Oxford University Press, New York, 2007. 5 John Dixon Hunt, Greater Perfections: The Practice of Garden Theory, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, PA, 2000.
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ban agricultural plots, Nakseongdae Urban Agricultural Learning Grounds and Ganggamchan Urban Plots, both located in Gwanak-gu, Seoul. They represent the typical plot-based urban agricultural sites in Seoul. Two interpretations that propose alternative understanding of the urban agricultural landscape and one that deconstructs the prior landscape-viewer relationship is provided as follows. Experience of Physical Reality Synaesthetic experience of the urban agricultural landscape made possible through the immediacy of the environment involves visual, olfactory, auditory, and tactile senses. Tactile aesthetic as an extension of the visual allows the non-participants to engage in aesthetic experience with the landscape. Through associative power of synaesthetic experience, the urban agricultural landscape can detach itself from the traditional, abstract ideas of agricultural landscape and be experienced in its unique, immediate reality. As a result, the viewer engages with the landscape – the sound of dried produce under the footsteps, the smell of leaves breaking beneath the steps, the bustling of the people – and come to recognize that the urban agricultural landscape is more than just an urban spectacle. Experience of Cultural Hybrid The urban agricultural landscape is a landscape of cultural mixture, where signs of each culture co-exist to create meaningful dialogues. At Nakseongdae Urban Agricultural Learning Grounds, the glass and concrete structures stand nearby and draw student visitors to the area. These modernistic facilities, which are in fact pre-date the urban agricultural landscape, function as mid-layer between the plots and the mountains behind to provide contemporaneity to the overall site experience.6 The aesthetic, and the strangely familiar experience of hybridity in the urban agricultural landscape therefore inhibits the viewer’s nostalgic recognition of the site. Experience of Inter-Corporal Relationship with Nature The crop cycles symbolize for the viewer the closely knitted network involving the viewer, food, and nature. This reminder manifests itself through the experience of the inter-corporal relationship between man and the earth. Adapting Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s idea of phenomenological flesh, exposure and confrontation is
6 For a detailed description of the sites, see Shin, Aesthetic Experience of Urban Agricultural Landscape (see note 3), pp. 75-96.
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enough to affect each other.7 Through worldly flesh, the spatial-temporal states of the skin and the earth become exchangeable. This process of assimilation to the environment and sharing the time-space is an aesthetic experience that is often evoked in the phrase, to be one with Nature. The aesthetic experience of this intercorporal relationship with Nature forces the viewer to understand the environment not as the other but rather as something that encompasses and includes the viewer through his or her bodily engagement. The effect of the aesthetic experience of the urban agricultural landscape, therefore, can be summarized as the deconstruction of the previously held man-nature relationship and the provision for alternative ways to appreciate this landscape [or: these landscapes] in Seoul. The significance of understanding the urban agricultural landscape from an aesthetic point of view lies in the fact that this experience can be shared by the larger public as the agricultural landscape assumes a larger part of the urban fabric. The overall effect of the urban agricultural landscape on the larger public, including its performance to produce aesthetic experience, should be recognized for the potential to contribute to its cultural sustainability. Despite the soaring demands for urban agriculture, several sites in Seoul have already shut down to give space to real estate development. Considering that the most plots designated for urban agriculture in Seoul are on public land that are rented annually, disregard for the performance of the appearance of the landscape on the larger public by the urban agriculture participants as well as the city officials seems ironic. We should see the urban agricultural landscape as culturally charged field of social negotiations as a result of ongoing conflicts from spatial limitations, and as a landscape form in the ever-continuing process of urban landscape transformations. Inserting the ideas of culture and art will allow the landscape architects, as well as anyone affiliated with the production and the care for such agricultural landscapes, to consider the cultural sustainability of the site and to find ways to engage the larger public through the performance of the landscape appearance.
7 Suzanne Cataldi and William S. Hamrick (eds.), Merleau-Ponty and Environmental Philosophy, SUNY Press, Albany, NY, 2007.
New Projects from two University Teams
117
Jasmin Laske, Ben Jamin Grau
Designing Public Spaces from a Night Perspective
Introduction Students of landscape architecture and environmental planning at the Leibniz University Hannover, Germany, were tasked with taking a bottom-up approach to designing public spaces from a night perspective. Landscape architects are normally commissioned to create public spaces that work in daylight, with the nighttime not being the priority. Night-time brings a shift in the productivity, usage and perception of open spaces. The projects we showed at the Garden Art conference were conducted during the past two years, emerging from the observation that public spaces are increasingly being used during the night-time. Together with students of lighting design from the University of Applied Sciences and Arts [HAWK] Hildesheim, landscape architecture students worked interdisciplinarily to achieve night-time designs. We asked ourselves which challenges arise when attempting to design open spaces attractively for both daytime and night-time scenarios and how they could be illuminated in new and innovative ways. Projects The topic of designing public spaces from a nocturnal perspective was focused on in two different student projects. The first one, Luther’s Glow, which took place in 2017, was in connection with the Luther Year, the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in Germany. The project was about redesigning a square located in the historic center of Hannover, which is the site of the medieval Marktkirche or market church flanked by a large statue of Martin Luther. The project focused on the increasing significance of town squares as cultural and touristic attractions over the last couple of hundred years and how to deal with the rising demands on this type of public space. The aim was to design an open space around the historic church for both day- and night-time visitors. The project group thus visited the square and the church as well as a public event on the square to get a feeling for the location. Furthermore, the project group collaborated with students of lighting design at the Hildesheim University of Applied Sciences and Arts, with the whole group conducting exchange visits to each university for presentations, technical input and feedback. In groups of three, the Hannover and Hildesheim students worked together on concepts for combining landscape architecture and lighting design
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approaches. The landscape architecture students built models of the project site, thereby gaining insight into designing projects for diurnal as well as nocturnal use. The second project was named Observed in the Darkness. Students focused on a number of problematic areas in Hannover. These areas have few to no lighting concepts and were analyzed as being important for the city nightlife. This project is the main focus of the current paper. Observed in the Darkness Each student found his/her own approach in terms of creating a night design for a public open space. Important questions were, for example, whether the lighting design should emphasize the appearance the place has during the daytime. Should the night design give the square a new look? How is the lighting currently being used and what are its functions? Are the lights permanently on at night or do they somehow interact with their environment? Which objects can be used as a light source and which should be illuminated? How can the daytime look be converted into a nocturnal scenario? We came up with very diverse concepts as to how to answer these questions. For example, the project Light Flow at Georgsplatz in Hannover by Jasmin Laske aims to influence movement of pedestrians through intelligent lighting (figs. 1 and 2). The public square she designs is divided by a street with heavy traffic, that divides the square into two separate halves. So she uses a special ground-level lighting pattern which connects the two halves and revitalizes unused areas at the outer edges of the square. Additionally, alternately glowing pieces of street furniture are used to reduce the feeling of fear in shady corners at night and create a peaceful atmosphere. The overall design resembles a mountain stream. Lines of light seem to flow across the square, while the raised flower beds, seating areas and glowing furniture remind one of small pebbles spread along a river bank. The vegetation used for the design resembles shoreline vegetation, although the plants are suitable for a city climate. The impressive, tall, old trees on this town square are positively accentuated by the new design.
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A different approach is taken by the project Into the Wild by Lena Skibowsky (figs. 3 and 4). She uses projection mapping of images of nature. In addition, she proposes employing special furniture to transform the Raschplatz in Hannover, which is completely sealed with concrete, into an amusing wild jungle to show that there
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is more than one face to a public open space. Her intention is to make the square attractive and not let it remain a place one passes through quickly. She creates a nature-style city square. Beneath the Raschplatz run Hannover’s city railway. This design overcomes the difficulty of not being able to plant trees on this square by contributing a wilderness. Her idea is to develop a multi-functional element that resembles a large branch spread over the square. It adds a special effect to the square and is intended to function as a seating element and a playful object. Skibowsky also adds large lamps that look like tree stumps to illuminate the square, as well as LED ground-level lights. Additionally, natural images are projected onto the ground surface of the square. The proposed real facade greening of the surrounding buildings aims to look good and have a positive impact on the urban climate. With this design, the square can maintain its functionality, provide mandatory escape routes and still function as a green recreational oasis in Hannover’s dense urban fabric without actually using any space on the ground for plants. The next project Interaction Steintor by Ben Jamin Grau ambitiously uses smart city components to increase the interaction between users of this central city space. The Steintor is located in Hannover on the site of one of the former town gates. “Steintor” translated means “stone gate”. There is no visual reference to this historic meaning, although the square constitutes the entrance to the pedestrian zone and the city center. Presently, the Steintor has a design that seemingly mimics the main square in Siena, at least in the shape and layout of its paving. Many nightclubs and the red-light district are located directly at Steintor or in the immediate vicinity, so the current situation is considered inconvenient or even hazardous to people visiting or passing by.
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The concept of redesigning and enhancing Steintor demands an array of modern technology. It is proposed that integrated sensors be used for lighting solutions to trigger effects embedded in the ground surface. Algorithmically programmed furniture is used, for example, to sense when someone is seated. Then the smart furniture creates ground-level light pulses in multiple directions. So if, for example, at a given time two people are seated on separate sitting blocks, those people would be connected via lit up furniture. Everyone could experience a dim light pulse emerging from the sitting blocks. In combination with a suitable landscape architecture design, all this aims to integrate the constantly evolving uses of dense urban open spaces. The fourth and final project, Küchengarten LivingRoom by Tim Andlauer, uses a concept of comforting lights to create a living room feel outside (figs. 5 and 6). The Küchengarten square is located at the entrance to a lively multicultural neighborhood called Linden, near to Leibniz University Hannover. The project LivingRoom uses different furniture styles such as couches, bar stools, bar tables and benches, all of which are somehow illuminated. At key locations, near entry points or at points of interest, for example, checkpoints are envisaged. Checkpoints are distinguishable by basic concrete blocks with wooden seating planks, which are of course lit up. In Küchengarten square, Tim Andlauer has designed different zones for potential multiple use. Located at the center of the Küchengarten there is a generous free space dedicated to multi-functionality. On the west side a welllit “dancing tree”, on the east a comfortable “living room” area and to the south there is a “bar”.
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In conclusion, all of these projects are just scratching on the surface of the potential for outdoor lighting solutions using landscape architecture applications, and the whole student team is curious to see how this field will develop in the future. Conclusion When designing public spaces from a night perspective we had to ask ourselves which key elements were important and what should be included. Many factors played a role; to name just a few, the location and nature of the site is important as well as all the stakeholders involved. There is no general answer to lighting solutions when designed to fit in an outdoor environment. Germany has industrial safety standards in place, which limit lighting designs. We had to explore creative solutions for the future within these safety limitations. If a pure night-focused design is required, how might it influence the daytime functionality and place’s appearance? The projects discussed in this paper always have a landscape architecture aspect, but there is a lot to learn about lighting solutions for outside environments from past projects and art installations. The observation that public open spaces are being more frequently used during night time raises several questions about how landscape architects and lighting designers should and can work together. A lighting plan is something a landscape architect should incorporate right from the start. With our experience gained from these projects, we hope to enhance our future designs and work together in an interdisciplinary way with lighting designers. Furthermore, an appearance that combines daytime and night-time functionality within collaborative designs can help to shape a brighter future.
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Anet Scherling, Christoph Pelka and Jakob Hüppauff
Why Landscape Architecture must find its own Role: Reflections on the State of Landscape Architecture As landscape architects in training - who are looking to find their place within our profession – keenly aware of the sustainability and other future challenges like climate change and social cohesion – we reflect on our first experiences in our field. Based on reviews of real-world projects we suggest new frames for contemporary landscape design. We identify shortcomings of present planning practice, illustrate new approaches, and discuss the future role of universities for the practice of planning liveable spaces. The following thoughts arose after taking part in a landscape architectural competition for a new neighbourhood in a small town in southern Bavaria. To our surprise, we won the first prize. The task was to design a conversion of a former industrial production site for agricultural engines into a pleasant car-free residential area with the constraint of resource-gently planning. The gap between design and implementation We developed our open space concept using a multi-dimensional design approach, consisting of form, use of materials and realization of values. In our opinion, the values to be realized should be those of sustainability.1 The most widely used interpretation of sustainability is the three-sphere model, which defines sustainability as the interaction of social, ecological and economical aspects without exceeding natural resources: • Ecological aspects were implemented primarily by conserving resources and their reuse; for example, preserving the pavement and the existing narrowgauge railroad. Further, the demolition material from the existing buildings should be reused to produce walls of tamped concrete. • Social aspects were the respectful treatment of existing structures and a network of diverse open spaces with places of different sizes and atmospheres; for example, in front of the only remaining factory building at the main square of the new neighbourhood the post-industrial atmosphere is created by reusing the old tracks and the old pavement. • Economic aspects we wanted to incorporate by delivering qualitatively high design with minimal investment and avoiding long-term societal follow-up costs, which we achieved by preserving soils, and reusing materials at the site. 1 For example: European Commission: Nachhaltige Entwicklung in Europa für eine bessere Welt: Strategie der Europäischen Union für die nachhaltige Entwicklung, KOM(2001)264, Brussels, 2001, p. 2.
124 Reflections on the State of Landscape Architecture Fig. 1 Own Graphic: “Framing”
Unfortunately, shortly after the winning entry was announced, the entire construction site was cleared. Therefore, central design elements could no longer be realised. The look and feel we designed are now being implemented by adding new surfaces for pavements and even new tracks, it is a mere reference to the very idea. It does not do justice to our original design idea because it is a shallow reduction to a one-dimensional image. Once again, landscape architecture is reduced to landscape painting. Design is also invisible2 We would like to discuss what happened not as an individual disappointment, but as an institutional conflict. By using the metaphor of a painting we would like to stress that a picture – as we perceive it – is constituted on at least two levels: the actual drawn picture (which refers to the action of making plans) and the picture frame (which refers to a planning process within which landscape architecture gets realized). Therefore, if one of either level is not addressed, and their interaction neglected, then the realized result of the planning process is incomplete and can rightly be labelled a failure. The relation between picture and its frame is – at least for us – an important issue of the role of our profession. The profession of landscape architecture needs to evolve competences to design both: picture and its frame. We want to discuss two answers to the aforementioned question: • Either we can be honest about our limited scope of influence and drop our claim for sustainability – it is not part of landscape architects work. As we had to learn in our project, for instance, our choice of conserving the paving at the 2 Lucius Burckhardt describes in his essay Design ist unsichtbar that design is not reducible to its visual perception. Design also includes an invisible component: The institutional and organisational framework by categorizing the environment into objects or complexes. Lucius Burckhardt, Design ist unsichtbar, in: Helmut Gsöllpointner, Angela Hareiter und Laurids Ortner (ed.), Design ist unsichtbar, Wien, 1981, pp. 13-20.
Anet Scherling, Christoph Pelka and Jakob Hüppauff 125
main square was irrelevant, because we did not have any influence on its realisation – like an unfulfilled wish. Thus, the challenge of landscape architects is to draw harmonic pictures of urban landscapes from bird’s-eye-view. • Or, we can state the shortcomings of present structures, which prevent landscape architects from realizing sustainability. Landscape architectural offices do not have the power to realize both picture and frame, nor do municipalities. Consequently, if we as landscape architects stick to the ideal of sustainable design, we must fundamentally question the picture-frame metaphor. As an example, an architectural competition can be seen as one of those frames. Who of the participating landscape architects decided that a competition is the right way to find a sustainable design for a specific site, if there is no mechanism to implement the design principles in reality? As we illustrated, the picture-frame duality plays virtually no part in the design approach, thus landscape architecture cannot meet its own claims. Thus, we are convinced that the task of landscape architecture is to also design the invisible picture frame within which the picture gets realized. Landscape architecture must find its own role! As future landscape architects we ask ourselves, how can the profession shape both the frame and the picture. As a first suggestion we stress the role of universities as potential laboratories for an expanded practice of design to meet this challenge. We would like to suggest putting the teaching of landscape architecture in a greater context of lateral design, which crosses present hierarchies. As a second, equally important, part of a planning process it can manage the relation between picture and its frame. This practice is already taking place, for instance, at the University of Kassel in the seminar Forschendes Lernen3 or in the ChangeLab4 at the University of Stuttgart. Both are strongly related to the concept of Reallabor, which aims to combine scientific and everyday knowledge to design customized and sustainable solutions. Universities should embrace these ideas to be able to better design sustainable living environments. Finally, the role of landscape architecture as a profession is to ask how its sustainable claim can be realized and not to rely on existing frames that do not lead to adequate solutions.
3 Homepage of Forschendes Lernen at University of Kassel. Online available: https://journals.uni-kassel.de/ index.php/RRes [Last access on 14.12.2018]. 4 Homepage of ChangeLab at University of Stuttgart. Online available: https://www.project.uni-stuttgart. de/changelabs/ [Last access on 14.12.2018].
Session III Future Challenges for Landscape Architects
129
Bianca Maria Rinaldi
The Future of Landscape Architecture Education The Covid-19 pandemic has had a lasting impact on education.1 Following its outbreak, while the immediate adjustments forced by the virus resulted in vast numbers of classes all over the world being switched to online learning platforms, a lively debate on the future of university education also arose. It was driven by a sense of urgency to rethink both university spaces and working and teaching methods,2 and stimulated reflection on the effectiveness of remote instruction for specific courses that traditionally depend on close interaction between students and instructors such as design studios for design disciplines including architecture and landscape architecture.3 But, more generally, it was animated by a desire for a nuanced balance between technological advancements and traditional teaching methods.4 While this exceptional global health emergency demanded the development of a variety of new creative instruction modalities and teaching tools (a development that may have a lasting impact on the future of education), in the design disciplines discussion of the relationship between traditional methodologies and technology is nothing new. The evolution of digital technologies – most notably computer-aided design software applications, computer graphics, and 3D modelling software – has not only given a new specific direction to design strategies and processes but in the last twenty years also impacted on the ways design is taught. In relation to landscape architecture and design teaching methods in particular, during the “Thinking the Contemporary Landscape – Positions & Oppositions” 1 Among the many articles and studies on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on education, see, e.g., Cathy Li, Farah Lalani, The COVID-19 pandemic has changed education forever. This is how, in: World Economic Forum, 29 April 2020, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/coronavirus-educationglobal-covid19-online-digital-learning/ (accessed 3 September 2020); Giorgio Di Pietro, Federico Biagi, Patricia Dinis Mota Da Costa, Zbigniew Karpinski, and Jacopo Mazza, The likely impact of COVID-19 on education: Reflections based on the existing literature and recent international datasets, EUR 30275 EN, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, 2020, https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/ bitstream/JRC121071/jrc121071.pdf, (accessed 3 September 2020); United Nations, Policy Brief: Education during COVID-19 and beyond, August 2020, https://www.un.org/development/desa/dspd/wp-content/ uploads/sites/22/2020/08/sg_policy_brief_covid-19_and_education_august_2020.pdf, (accessed 3 September 2020). 2 Serena Danna, interview with Carlo Ratti, in: OPEN, 22 May 2020, https://www.open.online/2020/05/22/ coronavirus-intervista-carlo-ratti-universita-scuola/, (accessed 3 September 2020). 3 Robert Grover, Alexander Wright, National Design Studio Survey: Initial Results, University of Bath, 2020, https://researchportal.bath.ac.uk/en/publications/national-design-studio-survey-initial-results, (accessed 3 September 2020). 4 For a student’s point of view, see, e.g., Ollie Thakar, The future of education: A lesson from COVID-19, in: The Daily Princetonian, May 7, 2020, https://www.dailyprincetonian.com/article/2020/05/the-futureof-education-a-lesson-from-covid-19, (accessed 3 September 2020).
130 The Future of Landscape Architecture Education
symposium held in Hanover in 2013, a spirited discussion between James Corner and Christoph Girot arose when they debated the role of newly developed visualization methods and point clouds vis-à-vis more traditional tools such as plans, sections and physical models in the design process.5 The papers in this section of the book offer a wide spectrum of discussion on the persistence of tradition and the necessity for innovation in landscape architecture education. Complementing the Corner – Girot debate, Philipp Belesky reflects on the evolution of representation techniques used in international competitions for the design of large parks, and discusses the influence of technology, including parametric modelling, on contemporary design strategies. Karsten Jørgensen offers a discussion on the evolving scope of designed landscapes and their changing roles as imposed by shifting external conditions. Focusing on a recently launched Master Program at the School of Landscape Architecture at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences in Ås, Jørgensen addresses the necessity for landscape architecture curricula to be redevised if they are to address current global challenges. Stefanie Hennecke offers an in-depth analysis of the Landscape Architecture programs offered by German higher education institutions. Highlighting the emergence of specializations in a variety of curricula, Hennecke argues for “a return to openness in Landscape Architecture programs to strengthen the ability of every student, to define their own way through our interdisciplinary jungle”.6 Assuming that current and future global challenges will continue to affect our ways of thinking about, teaching about, and transforming the environment, and that technological advancements will expand the set of useful tools and methods for landscape architects, landscape architecture students and instructors, the three papers that follow contribute to the current global debate on possible future scenarios for landscape architecture education.
5 A video record of the session titled “Method and Design: Comments and Discussion”, with Sébastien Marot, James Corner, Christophe Girot, and Stanislaus Fung as speakers, can be found at the following link: https://video.ethz.ch/conferences/2013/ila/07_saturday/3366f2a6-6a74-48b0-a001-04040cff1323. html. The international symposium “Thinking the Contemporary Landscape - Positions & Oppositions”, organized by the ETH Zurich, Institute of Landscape Architecture, Chair of Christophe Girot, and the Volkswagen Foundation, took place 20-22 June 2013. 6 The quote is taken from the essay by Stefanie Hennecke included in this volume (see p. 151).
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Karsten Jørgensen
From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture There is a general consensus that landscape architecture has developed from a millennia-long tradition of garden art. Most books about landscape architecture start with an account of the history of garden art. In all schools of landscape architecture, the history of garden art is on the curriculum. My own students seem to find the subject relevant and useful. However, the link between landscape architecture and garden art is not always clear. Do they stand for the same phenomenon? It seems not. So, what are the differences? The results of both garden art and landscape architecture lie before our eyes. The combination of artistic, technical and horticultural skills has led to great gardens like Versailles and Stourhead. The same skills lie behind great accomplishments in landscape architecture today, like the High Line in New York or Fornebu in Oslo (fig. 1). The question is of course dependent on how we define the terms ‘garden art’ and ‘landscape architecture’. In 1992, at the ECLAS1 conference in Ljubljana, the definition of landscape architecture was on the agenda. The meeting was reviewed
Fig. 1 Fornebu – the former location of Oslo Airport, closed in 1998 – is developed into residential and business areas surrounding a huge green park. The park, designed by Bjørbekk & Lindheim Landscape Architects, has received several prizes and awards (Photo: Tone Lindheim) 1 ECLAS - European Council of Landscape Architecture Schools.
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by former president of CELA2, Ron Stolz, in Landscape Review 19933. With the help of professor Helmut Weckwerth from Berlin, he summarised the discussion in a series of diagrams showing how the different discussants defined the relationships between concepts like ‘landscape planning’, ‘landscape architecture’ and ‘garden art’. The most striking is the lack of consistency. The only thing that all would agree in, was that ‘garden art’ was not the parent concept; it was either irrelevant, or a part of landscape architecture or landscape planning. After a lengthy debate, the convenor of the conference, Professor Ducan Ogrin, made the often cited remark: “Why should the future of the world be turned over to a group of people who cannot define who they are and what they do?”. This essay is an attempt to show the differences and define the central terms. In my view, the main difference is not one of design or material or even size, but more of social intentions. The transition from garden art to landscape architecture came with a shift of focus in the profession from being primarily concerned with garden making for (wealthy) private clients, to working predominantly with public spaces in the form of parks, cemeteries, sports fields and recreation areas etc. This means that the shift from garden art to landscape architecture took place in the enlightenment spirit of the 18th Century. In his seminal book, “Design on the Land”, Norman T. Newton, dates the transition half a century later – “some twenty years after Repton’s death” – and he simply names it “Transition to public service.”4 He describes it as “an epochal shift”, and emphasises the technological development, as well as the development of a more humanist attitude in society: “a steady increase in concern for the living and working conditions of all men.”5 I subscribe to all he says, except that I think the development started earlier. Signs of a new age: Milton Abbey at Dorset and Englischer Garten in Munich There were many events during the 18th Century that can be read as signs of a new era, also linked to garden art. One was the project for Joseph Damer (Lord Milton) in Dorset by Capability Brown. Milton hired Brown for the first time in 1763 to create a plan for Milton Abbey, a former monastery and estate he had bought in 1752. Brown found the landscape magnificent, with rolling hills, intersecting valleys and a stream that could be dammed and form a lake. He set out to create a new landscape with long undisturbed views. Unfortunately, there was a medieval village, 2 CELA – Council of Educators in Landscape Architecture. 3 R. Stolz, 1992 European Conference of Landscape Architectural Schools (ECLAS), August 27-29, 1992, at University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, in: Landscape Journal, 12 (Fall 1993), 2, pp. 202-206. 4 Norman T. Newton, Design on the Land. The Development of Landscape Arcitecture, Belknap Press, p. 221. 5 Ibid.
Karsten Jørgensen 133
Fig. 2 The Englischer Garten in Munich, opened in 1792, is an early and influential example of a public park, or ‘Volksgarten’ as Hirschfeld named it (Photo: Ludmiła Pilecka, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by-sa/3.0/legalcode)
Middleton, in the way for the project, so the idea of the removal of the village came up. Similar undertakings had been made many times before, removing villages for aesthetic purposes was common practice all over the place, only that this village was of a slightly larger scale and slightly older and more established than what Capability Brown previously had been involved in. However, in the 1770ies, the villagers were bought out, and were offered new housing in Milton Abbas, a village created out of sight from the House, probably designed by Brown6, and the more than a hundred houses in Middleton were demolished one by one. As soon as one house was gone, the site was landscaped and sown with grass or planted with trees. Only one tenant, William Harrison, who was a solicitor and knew his rights, refused to give up his plot. The whole project was delayed, and although it was completed later, the unexpected resistance from an ordinary tenant must have been a setback to the landowner, as well as to Capability Brown. The time when people could be moved around for the sake of a piece of garden art was beginning to fade7. Another example of events pointing in a new direction for the field of garden art is the establishment of the Englischer Garten in Munich (fig. 2). The Elector of Bavaria, Karl Theodor, engaged his friend Benjamin Thompson, a veteran from the American Revolution, who had served on the Loyalist side, as his military 6 Jane Brown goes a long way to trivialise Capability Brown’s role in her hagiographical biography “The Omnipotent Magician” from 2011 (Jane Brown, The Omnipotent Magician. Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown 17161783, Chatto and Windus, London). She may be correct, but this is of less interest in this context; the resistance against removing entire villages to enhance the view from a rich man’s estate, was beginning to gain credibility. 7 It happened again of course, and may still happen. Even the hero of public parks, Frederik Law Olmsted, removed Seneca, a squatter village of workers who lived in the area where Central Park was established in the 1860s.
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advisor. Thompson suggested that soldiers should be engaged in civilian work, such as farming and gardening, during peacetime, and established military gardens. In Munich, the work started in July 1789 – the year of the French Revolution. Avoiding a revolution in Bavaria may well have been a motivation for Karl Theodor. In August the same year, he announced the park to be solely for the benefit of the citizens of Munich. He appointed the royal gardener Friedrich Ludwig von Sckell (1750-1823) to supervise the design of the park. In the spring of 1792 the park was officially opened, as the first major public park in the world. In terms of size, it is still unprecedented in relation to the size of its city. With the Englischer Garten in Munich, a new standard was set for green areas as part of the urban infrastructure, and a new mission for landscape gardening was born. Scholarly support The first scholarly mention of the design of landscape for public benefit dates from 1775, more than 60 years before the term ‘landscape architecture’ was invented8. Christian Cay Lorenz Hirschfeld, a professor of philosophy at the University of Kiel, published his “Theorie der Gartenkunst”. In 1779-85 an extended version in five volumes came out. In a small chapter he described what he named the “Volksgärten” or “public parks”. According to Hirschfeld, this type of garden or park is found in some of the major cities, often called public promenades. He mentions Paris, Frankfurt and London. According to Hirschfeld, such public gardens are of great significance for civic life, and should be regarded as a necessity for all cities. It is a place of great natural beauty, there are walkways, roads for carriages and benches for people, where they can sit and admire the scenery. The parks should be accessible for all, so the different classes would be exposed to each others. Blended with the vegetation and other natural elements, there should be statues of deceased heroes and monuments of important events with instructive inscriptions, that could remind the viewers of their good fortune and enhance their loyalty to the nation. The book reached an extensive readership and has had significant influence on subsequent publications and policies. It may well have been a recipe for the layout of Englischer Garten in Munich. During the next few decades ‘Volksgärten’ 8 John Claudius Loudon (1773-1843) used the term in 1840, when he published an anthology of the complete writings of Humphry Repton (1752-1818): The Landscape Gardening and Landscape Architecture of the Late Humphry Repton (Brian Davis and Thomas Oles, From Architecture to Landscape, in: Places Journal, October 2014. Accessed 28 May 2019). William Andrews Nesfield, who designed garden areas for Buckingham Palace in London and Castle Howard in Yorkshire, used ‘landscape architect’ as a professional title in 1849 (Nina Antonetti, William Andrews Nesfield and the origins of the landscape architect, in: Landscape History, 33 (2012),1, pp. 69-86). Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux followed suit in 1863.
Karsten Jørgensen 135
emerged in almost every major city in Europe, also in the outskirts of Europe, like Norway, where King Karl Johan9 bought land at Bellevue in Oslo for a future palace and garden, and at nearby Bygdøy, for the public park that was opened in 1837. Enlightenment and democracy The emergence of public parks around 1800 signifies a turning point for the profession of landscape architecture: after this date, landscape architects have gradually turned their attention more towards public landscapes than private gardens. A major issue in Hirschfeld’s ‘programme’ for the Volksgärten was the ‘democratic’ ideals that were linked to this new type of urban landscape: the parks should have general access, nobody should be excluded. The different classes should, “by approaching each other more closely,”10 develop understanding and tolerance towards each other. In addition, the parks should promote public health and “increase national consciousness and cultural unity”11 among citizens by having sculptures and monuments commemorating important national deeds. Later advocates for public parks have expressed corresponding ideas. John Claudius Loudon published “Hints for Breathing Places for the Metropolis, and for Country Towns and Villages, on fixed Principles” in 1829. Loudon thought that public improvements should be undertaken in a democratic fashion by the authorities, not sporadically by the benevolence of the wealthy. Frederick Law Olmsted referred to Hirschfeld12 and made several visits to European parks, when he worked on Central Park and Prospect Park in New York and consecutive assignments, e.g. in Buffalo and Boston. One of the central concepts in landscape architecture is ‘nature’. This includes not only the nature that scientists talk about focusing on biological systems and processes, but also the ‘nature’ that surrounds us whether in urban or rural areas; nature as green structures – Nature as our existential common ground. Olmsted saw this when he began advocating for the preservation of the Niagara Falls surroundings in the 1860s, which led to the founding of the first state park in US, the Niagara Reservation in 1885. The motivation was largely parallel to the ones one can find in Hirschfeld’s ‘Theorie’: “A man’s eye cannot be as much occu9 Karl Johan’s (his real name was Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte) was headhunted as dauphin to the Swedish throne in 1810 after the death of the previous dauphin, Karl August. In 1814, he also became governor and later King of Norway as a result of the Treaty of Kiel. He was Napoleon’s ambassador in Vienna at the end of the 1790s, and was often seen in Prater, one of the earliest public parks ever, laid out by the Emperor Joseph II some 30 years before. This may have been his inspiration for investing so much in the establishments of public parks in both Stockholm and Oslo. 10 Hirschfeld in Linda Parshall’s translation (C. C. L. Hirschfeld, Theory of Garden Art [edited and translated by Linda Parshall], 2001, p. 407. 11 Ibid p. 26. 12 Franziska Kirchner, Der Central Park in New York, Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, Worms, 2002, p. 144.
136 From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture
pied as they are in the large cities by artificial thigs […] without a harmful effect, first on his mental and nervous system and ultimately on his entire constitutional organization.”13 Current research supports this position.14 There is a new and fresh focus on the links between public parks and public health: “A renewed interest in the ideas that contributed to the development of public parks and green-belts may bring back the landscape focus in urban and regional development that is called for in the European Landscape Convention.”15 Everyday landscape – the European Landscape Convention More recently, a new step in this development materialized as the European Landscape Convention. The convention states that, as a reflection of European identity and diversity, the landscape is our living natural and cultural heritage, be it ordinary or outstanding, urban or rural, on land or in water. A central point in this convention is that landscape policies should also take everyday landscapes into consideration. Landscape architects have a strong common platform in this professional history, as well as in the garden art tradition. From these ‘commons’ we also have a shared understanding, common concepts and a common ‘language’. The European Landscape Convention has confirmed and strengthened the basis for landscape architecture’s allegiance. An innovative element in the Convention was the shift from landscape as scenery to an all-embracing arena, where the stakeholders’ view is the focus: ‘Landscape’ means an area, as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the action and interaction of natural and/or human factors. Thus, not only public parks, but also the landscape as a whole is our common ground, and all people have interests and rights related to the landscape. Landscape is a common resource. Landscape architects’ social mission is to enhance the common sharing of this resource for the benefit of current and future generations. The development of the education for landscape architects should reflect this.
13 Olmsted, quoted in Charles E. Beveridge and Paul Rocheleau (1998) Fredrick Law Olmsted. Designing the American Landscape, Universe Publishing, New York, 1998, pp. 30f. 14 See for example the seminal The Experience of Nature: A Psychological Perspective by Rachel and Stephen Kaplan, Cambridge University Press, 1989. 15 Karsten Jørgensen, From public parks to urban green-structures, in: Karsten Jørgensen, Morten Clemetsen, Kine Halvorsen Thoren and Tim Richardson, Mainstreaming Landscape Through the European Landscape Convention, London and New York: Routledge, 2016, p. 20.
Karsten Jørgensen 137
A new curriculum for landscape architects in Norway Norway is among the countries in the world that has most landscape architects in relation to its population and the profession enjoys relatively high standing.16 Since the establishment of a scholarly curriculum for landscape architecture at the Agricultural University of Norway in 191917 – the first of its kind in Europe – garden architecture has been regarded as being of significance to the level of civilisation. One of the leading landscape gardeners in Norway at the beginning of the 20th Century, Iosef Oscar Nickelsen, comments this: “[…] the rise in culture will compel this to take place, just as a growing understanding of the enormous development of garden art in recent years will doubtlessly make it crystal clear that consistently thought-through and artistically defensible gardens can only be created by someone who is able to unite the ability of the architect to design and construct with the artist’s sense of composition and the gardener’s intimate knowledge of the life-conditions of plants and their effect in the landscape – by the modern landscape gardener or garden architect. Let us hope for a new era also in Norwegian garden art. It will and must come if we want to affirm our position in cultural society in general. Particularly for a tourist country like ours, it is important that our public parks present themselves in the most attractive form possible. Our visitors also assess our level of culture by the state in which our city gardens find themselves.”18
Today, the discipline is looking ahead to identify future challenges. Landscape architects as representatives of humankind not only have a common history, we also share the same future. This was emphasized in the report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future in 1987, chaired by former prime minister of Norway, Gro Harlem Brundtland. 200 years after the changes in society that led to a new public mission for landscape architects, we are facing new challenges that call specifically for the skills and understanding inherent in landscape architecture. The report focuses on the interdependence of nations and people in the search for a sustainable development for the planet. Global development leads to environmental, societal, and territorial challenges – urbanization alters land use at alarming rates, migration and political change increasingly bring into question people’s rights to use landscapes, and at the same time climate change and natural disasters pose new risks to land development. These global challenges affect how people interact with and perceive their everyday surroundings. Shaping these surroundings is the goal of landscape architecture – planning, 16 Birli, Barbara, From Professional Training to Academic Discipline. Dissertation, Fakultät für Architektur und Raumplanung, Fachbereich Landschaftsplanung und Gartenkunst, Technische Universität Wien, 2016, p. 35. 17 Karsten Jørgensen, 100 years of landscape architecture at Ås, in: Jenny B. Osuldsen (editor), Outdoor voices. The pioneer era of Norwegian landscape architecture, Orfeus Publishing, Oslo, 2019. 18 (Nickelsen 1914 p. 194).
138 From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture
Fig. 3 This landscape met the students of the new programme at NMBU when they arrived in the overcrowded Moria refugee camp at Lesvos in January 2020. Students formed groups and made proposals for improved situations for the inhabitants, and in addition they learned about a new global perspective in landscape architecture. (Photo Jörg Rekittke) The curriculum can be found here: https://www.nmbu.no/en/studies/ study-options/master/landscape-architecture-global-sustainability/node/37844
designing, and managing functional, beautiful, and holistically sustainable places that respond to diverse human and ecological needs. All these aspects form the basis of future developments of landscape architecture curricula. In the wake of the Centenary of the School of Landscape Architecture at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences opens up for a new curriculum: “Master of Landscape Architecture for Global Sustainability”. The programme will educate landscape architects who will be able to apply design and problem-solving skills in different global contexts – with awareness and consideration of existing ecological, social and cultural systems. A number of different global developments lead to environmental, societal, and territorial challenges – urbanization alters land use at alarming rates, migration and political change increasingly bring into question people’s rights to use landscapes, and at the same time climate change and natural disasters pose new risks to land development. These global challenges affect how people interact with and perceive their everyday surroundings. Shaping these surroundings is the goal of landscape architecture – planning, designing and managing functional, beautiful and holistically sustainable places that respond to diverse human and ecological needs. Landscape architecture education in this way holds the potential to contribute meaningfully to international development and development assistance work that depends upon context-sensitivity and durability.
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Global landscape architecture In times of global cultural and political diversity, it is key for landscape architecture to seek for common understanding with landscape architects from different parts of the world to promote sustainable development across borders. We must seek common platforms with other professions and disciplines to promote transdisciplinary understanding, and common ground between opposing worldviews to promote peace and justice for people all over the world. Landscape architects are in many ways engaged in securing and developing environments that ensure sustainability, well-being and quality of life for people on all continents, e.g. through the work done by IFLA19 committees, actions and working groups like Landscape Architects Without Borders. It is time for landscape architecture to take a new step from public service to global service.
19 IFLA – International Federation of Landscape Architects.
141
Stefanie Hennecke
Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019, with Reference to the Bologna Process On the 20th anniversary of establishing the European Higher Education Area (EHEA), this chapter critically reflects on landscape architecture education in the light of the Bologna Process. In 2019 in Germany, 57 different landscape studies programmes are offered at five science-based universities and ten universities of applied sciences. Several institutions of higher education can in some way look back on 200 years of developing study programmes in this field. Others are quite young, having been institutionalized during the 1970s or even later.1 Taking Germany as an example, this paper focuses on the length of study programmes, academic and professional specialisations, and responses to concepts of sustainable development for a democratic society. University websites were the main sources of information on study programmes and curricula. The assumptions to be tested are that students take longer to complete study programmes than before the implementation of the Bologna Reform, that study programmes now offer numbers of specialisations that exceed those of landscape architecture practice, and that concepts of sustainable development play widely varying roles in educational programmes. If implementing the Bologna Process contributes to extending study times and to disciplinary fragmentation, these would both be unwanted side effects of the reform. Reflecting on the state of landscape architecture education at universities in the context of this volume, I wish to start a discussion about the possible advantages and disadvantages of specialization in the broad spectrum from artistic garden design through mediating social conditions in urban open spaces to ecological engineering on the basis of natural sciences.2 Landscape architecture at German institutions of higher education The joint declaration of European ministers of education in Bologna in 1999 (in the following: “the Declaration”) initiated a general reform of studying in Europe, setting the “Bologna Process” in motion. The goal was to establish a common European Higher Education Area (EHEA) by introducing Qualifications Frame1 The detailed history of the development of Landscape Architecture education in Germany still remains unwritten. For an excellent overview see Gert Gröning, Die Institutionalisierung der Gartenkunst in der kommunalen Verwaltung und in der Ausbildung im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, in: Stefan Schweizer und Sascha Winter (eds.), Gartenkunst in Deutschland. Von der Frühen Neuzeit bis zur Gegenwart, Verlag Schnell und Steiner, Regensburg, 2012, p. 158-179, here p. 166 ff. 2 I already started this discussion with my colleague Prof. Dr. Diedrich Bruns and want to thank him for many inspiring annotations to this paper.
142 Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019
works (QFs), guidelines for Quality Assurance, and a European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS). Aiming to establish a common structure of comparable degrees, countries converted national systems to a two-tier structure consisting of a first course of study leading to a Bachelor’s degree and a second course leading to the Master’s degree. The hope expressed in the Declaration was that the mobility and employability of European students and citizens would thereby increase. Over the years that followed, in concert with the entire German higher education system, all German universities and universities of applied sciences offering study programmes in the fields of landscape architecture and landscape and environmental planning restructured their curricula, replacing their existing Diploma structures and degrees with the two-tier Bachelor and Master structure. It is safe to assume that now, in 2019, the structure, concept and content of all current landscape architecture study programmes in Germany have been in place for no longer than ten to fifteen years. Table 1 shows all 57 current landscape architecture programmes in Germany in March 2019, and serves as the basis for my considerations. It was compiled by gathering information from the institutional websites on study objectives, study duration and curricula structure. When counting just-closed study programmes, research on the homepages of different universities offers also an interesting insight of the ongoing process of experimenting with course structures and contents. At the Technical University of Munich, for example, the Master programmes in Landscape Planning, Ecology and Nature Protection and in Environmental Planning and Ecological Engineering were recently shut down and replaced by new programmes.3 At the Technical University of Berlin the Bachelor course in Landscape Architecture and Landscape Planning has just been replaced by two separate Bachelor programmes, and the Master programme in Environmental Policy and Planning has been abolished.4 Table 1: List of all first and second tier landscape architecture programmes in Germany in March 2019; columns from left to right: name of the university, name of the study programme, kind of degree, estimated duration of the programme in semesters, number of necessary credit points and focus of the study programme: landscape architecture (LA) or landscape/environmental planning (LP), or both (LA+LP), some in addition with an broader interdisciplinary approach (int.) Source: websites of the schools in March 2019, research by Stefanie Hennecke.
3 http://www.landschaft.wzw.tum.de/studiengaenge.html (27.2.2019). 4 https://www.planen-bauen-umwelt.tu-berlin.de/menue/studium_und_lehre/studiengaenge/ (27.2.2019).
Stefanie Hennecke 143 School
Study programme with possible specialization
Bachelor / Master
Sem.
ECTS
Focus
Anhalt University of Applied Sciences; Department Agriculture, Ecotrophology, and Landscape Development
M.Eng. Landscape Architecture
M.Eng.
2
60
LA
MA Landscape Architecture
M.A.
4
120
LA
B.Eng. Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning
B.Eng.
8
240
LA + LP
B.Eng. Nature Conservation and Landscape Planning
B.Eng.
6
180
LP
M.Sc. Nature Conservation and Landscape Planning
M.Sc.
4
120
LP
B.Eng. Landscape Construction and Green Space Management
B.Eng.
7
210
LA
M.Eng. Urban Plant and Open Space Management
M.Eng.
3
90
LA
B.Eng. Landscape Architecture
B.Eng.
7
210
LA + LP
Erfurt University of Applied Sciences; Faculty of Landscape Architecture, Horticulture and Forestry
B.Eng. Landscape Architecture
B.Eng.
6
180
LA + LP
M.Eng. Landscape Architecture Three specialization possibilities: Nature Conservation, Environmental Planning and Developing Cultural Landscapes; Open Space Planning and Historic Garden Conservation; Construction in Landscape Architecture
M.Eng.
4
120
LA + LP
Geisenheim University
B.Eng. Landscape Architecture Three specialization possibilities: Open Space Planning; Construction of Garden and Landscapes; Nature Conservation and Landscape Planning
B.Eng.
7
210
LA + LP
M.Sc. Landscape Architecture Two specialization possibilities: Open Space Development; Developing Cultural Landscapes
M.Sc.
4
120
LA + LP
M.Eng. Environmental Management and Urban Planning in Dense Metropolitan Areas
M.Eng.
4
120
LA int.
M.Sc. Landscape Development
M.Sc.
3
90
LP
Beuth Hochschule für Technik Berlin University of Applied Sciences; Department of Life Sciences and Technology
Hochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft Dresden University of Applied Sciences; Faculty of Agriculture/Environment/ Chemistry
144 Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019 Leibniz University Hannover; Faculty of Architecture and Landscape Sciences
Neubrandenburg University of Applied Sciences; Landscape Sciences and Geomatics
Nuertingen-Geislingen University; Faculty of Landscape Architecture, Environmental and Town Planning
Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences; Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Landscape Architecture
Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Applied Sciences (Höxter); Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning
EMILA European Master in Landscape Architecture
M.Sc.
4
120
LA
M.Sc. Landscape Architecture
M.Sc.
4
120
LA
B.Sc. Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning
B. Sc.
6
180
LA + LP
EuMiTD - European Master in Territorial Development
M.
4
120
LA + LP int.
M.Sc. Environmental Planning
M.Sc.
4
120
LP
B.Eng. Landscape Architecture
B.Eng.
8
240
LA
M.Eng. Landscape Architecture and Green Space Management
M.Eng.
2 or 4
60 or 120
LA
B.Sc. Nature Conservation and Land Use Planning
B.Sc.
8
240
LP
M.Sc. Land Use Planning
M.Sc.
2
60
LP
B.Eng. Landscape Architecture Two specialization possibilities from the fourth semester: Planning and Building; Planning and Design
B.Eng.
8
240
LA
M.Eng. International Master of Landscape Architecture (IMLA)
M.Eng.
3
90
LA
M.Eng. Sustainable Town and Regional Planning
M.Eng.
3
90
LA + LP int.
B.Eng. Landscape Planning and Nature Conservation
B.Eng.
7
210
LP
M.Eng. Nature Conservation
M.Eng.
4
120
LP
B.Eng. Open Space Planning
B.Eng.
6
180
LA
B.Eng. Landscaping
B.Eng.
6
180
LA
M.Eng. Landscaping Two specialization possibilities: Construction; Management
M.Eng.
4
120
LA
M.Eng. Landscape Architecture Three specialization possibilities: Garden Culture and Open Space Development; Integrated Urban and Regional Development; Nature Conservation and Landscape Development
M.Eng.
4
120
LA + LP
B.Eng. Landscape Development
B.Eng.
6
180
LP
B.Eng. Open Space Management
B.Eng.
7
210
LA
B.Eng. Landscape Construction and Management
B.Eng.
8
240
LA
M.Sc. Landscape Architecture
M.Sc.
2
60
LA
B.Sc. Landscape Architecture
B.Sc.
8
240
LA + LP
Stefanie Hennecke 145 Technical University of Berlin; Planning Building Environment
Technical University of Dresden; Faculty of Architecture
Technical University of Munich; Department of Architecture
University of Applied Sciences WeihenstephanTriesdorf; Department of Landscape Architecture
University of Kassel, Faculty of Architecture, Urban Planning, Landscape Planning
B.Sc. Landscape Architecture
B.Sc.
6
180
LA
M.Sc. Landscape Architecture
M.Sc.
4
120
LA
M.Sc. Urban Design
M.Sc.
4
120
LA int.
B.Sc. Ecology and Environmental Planning
B.Sc.
8
240
LP
M.Sc. Ecology and Environmental Planning
M.Sc.
2
60
LP
M.Sc. Urban Ecosystem Science
M.Sc.
4
120
LP
M.Sc. Environmental Planning
M.Sc.
4
120
LP
B.Sc. Landscape Architecture
B.Sc.
6
180
LA
M.Sc. Landscape Architecture
M.Sc.
4
120
LA
M.Sc. Spatial Development and Natural Resource Management
M.Sc.
4
120
LP int.
M. of Arts Landscape Architecture
M.A.
3 or 4
90 or 120
LA
B.Sc. Landscape Architecture and Landscape Planning
B.Sc.
8
240
LA + LP
M.Sc. Urbanism - Landscape and City
M.Sc.
4
120
LA int.
M.Sc. Ecological Engineering
M.Sc.
4
120
LP
M.Sc. Nature Conservation and Landscape Planning
M.Sc.
4 or 2
120 or 60
LP
B.Eng. Landscape Construction and Management
B.Eng.
7
210
LA
M.Eng. International Master of Landscape Architecture (IMLA)
M.Eng.
3
90
LA
B.Eng. Landscape Architecture Three specialization possibilities from the sixth semester: Open Space Planning; Landscape Planning; Urban Planning
B.Eng.
7
210
LA + LP
B.Sc. Landscape Architecture and Landscape Planning
B.Sc.
6
180
LA + LP
M.Sc. of Landscape Architecture and Landscape Planning Four specialization possibilities: LF Landscape Architecture and Open Space Planning; ST Urban Design; LB Landscape Practice and Planting Design; ULM Environmental Planning and Landscape Management
M.Sc.
4
120
LA + LP
146 Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019
Diversity of study programme duration Most German higher education institutions (universities, universities of applied sciences and colleges) divide the academic year into two semesters. Students will complete first degree programmes (gaining a Bachelor’s Degree) in three to four years and second degree programmes in one, two or three years.5 According to the Bologna Process, students obtain their first degree after successfully completing a study programme with 180-240 ECTS credits, and a second degree after successfully completing a study programme with 60-120 ECTS credits. Adding together first and second degree ECTS and semesters, for students to attain their Master’s Degree in Germany they need to invest at least 10 semesters of study time and accumulate a minimum of 300 ECTS credit points. There are considerable differences in the duration of study programmes included in Table 1. They result either from the integration of internships in the curricula or from the many different educational attitudes and principles that are particular to individual landscape architecture departments. For example, by offering eight-semester first tier study programmes, some departments aim to equip students for full employability as defined by the German Chamber of Architects (minimum four years of study). Adding a short second cycle study programme then offers opportunities for academic or scientific specialization leading to a second degree and, potentially, opening the way towards third-tier studies and a doctorate. Other departments are convinced that only a combination of standard firstand second-tier degree programmes will deliver the kind of education necessary to become landscape architects or planners. These institutions mostly offer firsttier programmes of six semesters and second-tier programmes of four semesters. Formerly, Diploma study programmes had a regular study period of eight to nine semesters, not including internships. By implementing the Bologna Process, landscape architecture departments extended the average study time by one or more semesters, at least at universities where it was decided to continue offering study programmes according on the consecutive model. Thus, the result of the reform has not been to shorten the average study time in Germany, as intended by German politicians and stakeholders.6 The fewest students reduce their study time from 8-9 Diploma semesters to 6-8 first-tier semesters. By adding a Master’s to the Bachelor’s, as most teachers recommend and 5 Diedrich Bruns et al., ECLAS Guidance on Landscape Architecture Education. Tuning Landscape Architecture Education in Europe, 2010. Online-resource: http://www.eclas.org/index.php/activities/92-eclas-guidanceon-landscape-architecture-education (6.3.2019). 6 For this intention see: Karl-Otto Edel, BOLOGNA und der Wandel der akademischen Bildung. Vortragsmanuskript für das 25. Canetti-Symposion „Wider den Erziehungszwang“, Wien, 22. November 2013, 18 pages, here p. 16. Online-resource: https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4fhbrb/files/846/ SYMPOSION+Wien+2013+BOLOGNA+und+der+Wandel+der+akademischen+Bildung.pdf (6.3.2019).
Stefanie Hennecke 147
most students do, the standard time of study has been extended to at least 10-12 semesters for the average student. Strangely, talking with colleagues we all have the feeling that nowadays students have less time to learn and that it is difficult to complete all the necessary modules within the regular study period. Another consequence of the reform is that study duration differs markedly from school to school – so the objective of comparability of degrees is not being achieved even within the same country. At the University of Kassel for example, a one-semester internship is compulsory within the six-semester Bachelor programme. As a consequence, one studies for just five semesters at the university and spends one semester on practical work. By contrast, at the Technical University of Munich one can spend a full eight semesters on the Bachelor course at university if the internship is replaced by a one-semester course of study abroad. The result can be a three-semester difference in the duration of a first-tier programme in landscape architecture depending on which university one attends. Differentiation in landscape study topics Landscape Architecture developed as an academic discipline in the 19th century, and formal education at universities and colleges was introduced in the early 20th century. As the range of work undertaken by the profession expanded the number of subjects grew; specialisations gradually emerged.7 While there is recognition today of the profession developing into ‘discrete sub-disciplines’8 the question arises of how wide the range is and how great the potential for continued fragmentation might be. With Bologna, the total number of study programmes per university expanded markedly.9 After a period of experimentation, today we have reached a maximum of differentiation and specialisation within the newly drafted first- and second-tier programmes. In our field of landscape architecture / landscape and environmental planning today, 15 German universities offer 24 Bachelor and 33 Master, a total of 57, different programmes in the field. Some of the study programmes are offered in English, some include compulsory periods of study abroad, some offer a Bachelor’s combined with a professional apprenticeship in gardening or open space management. Almost all of the programmes include practical training during one or more obligatory internships. To give just one example: At the Technical University of Berlin I received my Diploma in Landscape Planning in 1998, when it was the only possible degree in this field. Today people can choose at the same university between two first-tier 7 Adri van den Brink et al., Research in Landscape Architecture: Methods and Methodology. Routledge 2017, p. 1. 8 Simon Swaffield, Theory in landscape architecture. A reader. University of Pennsylvania Press 2002, p. 227. 9 See Edel, Bologna (as note 6), p. 7.
148 Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019
programmes, in Landscape Architecture or in Ecology and Environmental Planning, and five second-tier programmes, in Environmental Planning (only offered in English), Landscape Architecture, Ecology and Environmental Planning (in German), Urban Ecology, and Urban Design. At the Technical University of Munich one can apply for only one first-tier programme but has to specialize after the first two semesters and then choose between four second-tier programmes. A similar structure applies in Hannover or Dresden. The University of Kassel stays with only one first- and one second-tier programme, but within the Master programme students can choose between four curricula leading to specialisation as urban planner, landscape architect, landscape planner, or in landscape construction. I detect three different strategies in conceptualizing the first- and second-tier curricula: 1. Strategy of specialization: The separation of landscape architecture from landscape planning, long and recurrently discussed in our profession in Germany10, is now implemented from the first day of study. Whether a Bachelor of Science or Engineering, with this strategy students only receive a part of the former overall education when they decide either for the Bachelor of Landscape Architecture or the Bachelor of Environmental Planning, of Ecology, of Nature Conservation or Management of Open Spaces (marked in the table either with a focus on “LA” or “LP”). 2. Strategy of an overall education: The Bachelor course still serves as a programme where people get an overview of the whole spectrum of our profession, from design skills through to nature sciences in ecology and sociological knowledge (“LA + LP”). 3. Strategy of an even more interdisciplinary approach: Some universities aim at the broad interdisciplinary linkage of urban or regional planning, architecture, ecological or geographical sciences with landscape architecture and planning (“interdisciplinary”). Entering the second-tier programmes, almost all students in Germany have to decide for one of the two main directions of our profession: either a more designbased approach in Landscape Architecture or a more science-based approach in landscape and environmental planning.
10 See for example of the Technical University of Berlin: Ulrich Eisel und Stefanie Schultz, Geschichte und Struktur der Landschaftsplanung. Verlag der Technischen Universität Berlin, Berlin, 1991, Nachdruck 1995; Ulrich Eisel, Über den Umgang mit dem Unmöglichen. Ein Erfahrungsbericht über Interdisziplinarität im Studiengang Landschaftsplanung, in: Stadt und Grün/Das Gartenamt, 41 (1992), 9, p. 593-605 and 10, p. 710-719.
Stefanie Hennecke 149
Looking at the numbers, 38 of the 57 programmes demand a specialization according to strategy one: 15 programmes tend to specialize from the beginning of the first tier (10 in LA and 5 in LP) and continuing in the second tier (13 in LA and 10 in LP). Only fifteen programmes for a Bachelor’s (9) or Master’s Degree (6) stay with the interdisciplinary approach (strategy 2 above), six choose the even more interdisciplinary path (strategy 3 above). But students can also specialize within all the interdisciplinary second cycle programmes. Nearly half the programmes specialize in landscape architecture, one third in landscape planning and ecology, and the rest pursue an interdisciplinary education. Measuring the advantages and disadvantages of specializing All these programmes were established at a time when general discourse in Western societies had accepted the principles of sustainable development as very important for the continuation of human life on this planet. In this context, people had also begun to address such major challenges as biodiversity and climate change, socio-demographic changes, and other social, economic and environmental issues. One might interpret the Bologna Declaration as part of the political and academic discussions addressing global challenges, as the Declaration stresses the importance ‘of giving […] citizens the necessary competences to face the challenges of the new millennium’.11 The Declaration emphasizes ‘the importance of education and educational co-operation in the development and strengthening of stable, peaceful and democratic societies’.12 Especially important documents for our professional landscape discourse were the Club of Rome report Limits of Growth (1972), the UN Brundtland Report Our Common Future (1987) and the findings of the 1992 Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit such as Agenda 21. Focussing on planning, in the Bologna year of 1999 critical questioning of “top down” planning as an ideal of architecture, urban and environmental planning was in full swing.13 The postmodern concepts of context-based design, participatory planning processes, incrementalistic and integrated planning strategies had already 11 Joint declaration of the European Ministers of Education (“The Bologna Declaration”), 19. June 1999 (online available: https://www.eurashe.eu/library/bologna_1999_bologna-declaration-pdf/). 12 Ibid., here the whole paragraph: „A Europe of Knowledge is now widely recognised as an irreplaceable factor for social and human growth and as an indispensable component to consolidate and enrich the European citizenship, capable of giving its citizens the necessary competences to face the challenges of the new millennium, together with an awareness of shared values and belonging to a common social and cultural space. The importance of education and educational co-operation in the development and strengthening of stable, peaceful and democratic societies is universally acknowledged as paramount, the more so in view of the situation in South East Europe.” (Page 1 of the Declaration). 13 Stefanie Hennecke, Die Kritische Rekonstruktion als Leitbild. Stadtentwicklungspolitik in Berlin zwischen 1991 und 1999, Verlag Dr. Kovac, Hamburg, 2010.
150 Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019
achieved consensus in planning theory and practice, at least at the educational level. In open space or landscape planning, the International Building Exposition in Berlin (1984/87) with its focus on sustainable planning and sensitive urban redevelopment, and the opening of the Landscape Park Duisburg-Nord in 1994, along with the International Building Exhibition Emscher Park (1989-1999) as a symbolic start on reclaiming former industrial areas for housing and recreation, can be named as hallmarks of a new planning policy in Germany. Considering this state of professional knowledge and discussion, we could ask how this awareness of future challenges influenced the new curricula established 2000 in Germany. And what are the consequences of the aforementioned tendency to split the spectrum of landscape architecture studies in the context of this discussion? One advantage might be that by specializing one has more time to face the complex challenges of our modern world: acquiring specialized knowledge, learning specialized techniques, especially with digital tools. From this standpoint we would be following the assumption that our modern society demands a focussed education in a very narrow professional field. But these arguments referring to future challenges might just cover a long-lasting wish of our profession to get rid of the exhausting interdisciplinary aspiration to be both landscape planner and landscape architect, skilful in design, in planning, in sociology and natural sciences. Maybe it would relieve us of this burden simply to concentrate either on landscape architecture and the roots of our profession in garden art, or on a fundamental science-based methodology to protect our natural resources.14 But does this idea of specialization meet the challenges set out in the Bologna Declaration? Can a specialized landscape architect include the objectives of sustainability for our society in all its facets in their design? Is the goal of building a green infrastructure for European cities achievable solely with specialized knowledge? Can we be competent partners to advise federal government in the process of fostering urban multifunctional greenspace, inspired by the theory of eco system services, by sociological and demographic studies and by experience in liveable urban design? In my opinion, today we especially need experts in an interdisciplinary approach of integrated planning, experts who are able to oversee the complexities and interdependencies of a modern urbanized planning context. I think it would be important to attempt this balancing act – of an interdisciplinary 14 See: Ulrich Eisel, Unbestimmte Stimmungen und bestimmte Unstimmigkeiten. Über die guten Gründe der deutschen Landschaftsarchitektur für die Abwendung von der Wissenschaft und die schlechten Gründe für ihre intellektuelle Abstinenz – mit Folgerungen für die Ausbildung in diesem Fach, in: Stefan Bernard und Philipp Sattler (eds.), Vor der Tür, Callwey Verlag, München, 1997, p. 17-33.
Stefanie Hennecke 151
conceptualized study programme between design, planning, natural sciences and sociology. Educating landscape specialists for a democratic society? In addition to the loss of interdisciplinary overview I am concerned with the ossifying power of increasingly differentiated study programmes. This “Sudoku” of module numbers threatens the idea of educating individuality and personality referred to by Wilhelm von Humboldt.15 A comparative look at the first paragraphs of study regulations before and after the Bologna reform indicates the dismissal of Humboldt’s educational ideals as a frame for university studies. The study regulations from 1978 at the Technical University of Berlin tell us that a university’s task is to prepare each student to exercise their professional skills and their responsibility in a liberal, democratic society according to our constitution. In the Landscape Planning study programme, one should assimilate methods of scientific and autonomous learning. The student should especially learn to reflect critically upon the traditional practices of landscape planning and the current challenges of society.16 In 2017 the reference to democratic responsibility, to autonomous learning and critical reflection vanished from the study regulations for landscape architects. Now the student is to acquire scientific skills and knowledge and competences in planning practice;17 it seems that differentiation and specialization have sidelined perceptions of the important political role of planners in democratic societies. Dieter Lenzen, formerly president of the Freie Universität Berlin and today president of the University of Hamburg, recommends resistance within the system in his critique of the Bologna process.18 In this sense I would propose a return to openness in landscape architecture programmes, to strengthen the ability of every student to define their own way through our interdisciplinary jungle. Education in the fine arts could be a role model. Teaching in the fine arts only works when con15 Stefan Kühl, Der Sudoku-Effekt. Hochschulen im Teufelskreis der Bürokratie. Eine Streitschrift, Transcript Verlag, Bielefeld, 2011. 16 § 1 Studienordnung/Studienplan und Prüfungsordnung für den Studiengang Landschaftsplanung der Technischen Universität Berlin (6. September 1978): “Gemäß § 2 Abs. 2 des Gesetzes über die Universitäten des Landes Berlin vom 16. Juli 1969 hat die Universität die Aufgabe, die Studenten auf ihren Beruf und auf ihre Verantwortlichkeit in einer freiheitlichen demokratischen Gesellschaftsordnung im Sinne des Grundgesetzes vorzubereiten. Im Studiengang Landschaftsplanung sollen dem Studenten gründliche und ausreichende Kenntnisse sowie die Fähigkeit vermittelt werden, nach wissenschaftlichen Methoden selbständig zu arbeiten. Der Student lernt insbesondere durch die kritische Auseinandersetzung mit der traditionellen Praxis der Landschaftsplanung und mit aktuellen Konflikten im gesamtgesellschaftlichen Bezug, sein Praxisverständnis zu entwickeln.“ 17 See for example: Studienordnung für den Bachelorstudiengang Ökologie und Umweltplanung an der Fakultät VI – Planen Bauen Umwelt an der Technischen Universität Berlin vom 11. Juli 2012. 18 Dieter Lenzen, Bildung statt Bologna! Ullstein Verlag, Berlin, 2014, p. 89.
152 Reflections on Landscape Architecture Education in Germany in 2019
ducted with a maximum of openness and respect for each student’s individuality. Our task as professors is not only to teach knowledge but moreover to promote attention to scientific standards and democratic principles. The wide scope of our profession is an uncomfortable but necessary challenge, one we should take up by facing the complex tasks that await for landscape architecture and environmental planning.
153
Philip Belesky
Park, Process, and Parameter Design competitions for large parks have played a large role in the discourse of landscape architecture. The scale and scope of their sites spur ambitious design strategies while the public and competitive nature of their process lead to a diversity of design approaches. The commission of Central Park did much to promote the professional title of ‘landscape architect’ in the United States while the competition for Parc de la Villette highlighted a number of compositional strategies of continuing influence. This paper compares the finalists of the Downsview and Taichung Gateway competitions and identifies a shift in the techniques used to design large-scale landscapes in contemporary practice. In both competitions, entries employed design strategies that foreground the agency of natural processes, but there are key differences in the techniques used to marshal this perspective into practice between each competition. These differences reflect broader trends in the use of design technology within landscape architectural practice and are particularly evident in the use of computational design strategies, such as parametric modelling. That these technologies have influenced design strategy is not surprising. Their impacts are now well-documented in publications such as Codify,1 Dynamic Patterns,2 and Landscape Architecture and Digital Technologies.3 Moreover, their use in landscape architecture extends back to the ‘first digital turn’ of the early 2000s – as documented in A Manual for the Machinic Landscape4 – and even further back to the origins of computer-aided design and geographic information systems – as highlighted in Charting the Unknown.5 At Taichung, their presence is less a daring debut than a detailed resolution, as digital design techniques explicitly underpin key design strategies, rather than implicitly supporting design development in general. This particular competition makes this contrast especially clear as the brief and site echoes the format and focus of earlier competitions for large urban parks and so provides a means of positioning computational design approaches within this lineage. In tying technology to technique to theory, the shift between each com1 Bradley Cantrell and Adam Mekies (eds.), Codify: Parametric and Computational Design in Landscape Architecture, Routledge, Abingdon, 2018. 2 Karen M’Closkey and Keith VanDerSys, Dynamic Patterns, Routledge, New York, 2017. 3 Jillian Walliss and Heike Rahmann, Landscape Architecture and Digital Technologies, Abingdon, Routledge, 2016. 4 Mohsen Mostafavi and Ciro Najle (eds.), Landscape Urbanism: A Manual for the Machinic Landscape, Architectural Association Publications, London, 2003. 5 Nick Chrisman, Charting the Unknown, ESRI Press, Redlands, 2006.
154 Park, Process, and Parameter
petition evidences both an evolution, and critique, of the design strategies that remain influential to contemporary landscape architectural practice. The Sites of Landscape Urbanism The Downsview and Freshkills competitions, held in 1999 and 2001-2003 respectively, were both heralded as key moments in the emergence of landscape urbanism.6 The scale of the Downsview site matched the ambition of the thennascent movement to position landscape as the correct lens to see and solve the complexities of contemporary urbanism. To foreground landscapes as a formal model for these complexities not only reflected the scale of these issues, but also highlighted that they were best addressed in a medium that is “uniquely suited to the open-endedness, indeterminacy, and change demanded by contemporary urban conditions.”7 This call to emphasise the dynamic aspects of landscapes is explicitly echoed in the brief for the Downsview competition: in repurposing a retired military base, the park’s design would explicitly account for its ongoing implementation and long-term evolution by developing contingencies for the uncertainties present in each process.8 Across the competition, many entries are notable for their exploration of process-driven design strategies.9, 10 In doing so they portray ecological, material, and social dynamics as interdependent systems and project the trajectories of those relations over time.11 The winning entry, Tree City embraced this logic, and did so in the form of representation that came to define much of landscape urbanist practice: the diagram. The proposal by OMA and Bruce Mau reduced the key design moves to a procedural logic, visually depicted as circular patterns (fig. 1). These represented an adaptive planning scheme driven by an ongoing cascade of interventions – most evident in a pseudo planting plan of dots – that would grow across the landscape according to multivalent causes and purposes. The in-
6 Charles Waldheim, Landscape as Urbanism: A General Theory, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2016, p. 15. 7 Charles Waldheim, Landscape as Urbanism, in: The Landscape Urbanism Reader, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2006, p. 13. 8 Alissa North, Processing Downsview Park: Transforming a Theoretical Diagram to Master Plan and Construction, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture, 7 (2012), 1, p. 11. 9 Julia Czerniak, Appearance, Performance: Landscape at Downsview, in: Julia Czerniak (ed.), CASE: Downsview Park Toronto, Prestel, Munich, 2002, p. 16. 10 In the case of Bernard Tschumi’s own entry for Downsview a graphic deliberately contrasts his approach against the strategies that won at Parc de La Villette through explicit juxtapositions such as “typology/ topology”, “cows/coyotes”, “follies/spools”. 11 Andrew Hansen, From Hand to Land: Tracing Procedural Artifacts in the Built Landscape, in: Scenario Journal, 2 (2011), https://scenariojournal.com/lu-from-hand-to-land/, fetched March 16 2012.
Philip Belesky 155
Fig. 1: Circles designating ‘vegetal clusters’ define the master plan with circulation and program distributed opportunistically (image by OMA/Bruce Mau)
156 Park, Process, and Parameter
fographical – or “iconic diagrammatic flatness”12 – of the plan illustrates a static state contingent upon a series of evolutionary tactical procedures, such as soil remediation that would be enacted through staged sacrificial planting or a path network with varying levels of material permanence.13 The proposal thus pitched “a diagram designed to maximise the park’s options for survival.”14 However, the scheme has a contentious legacy when considered within the lineage of contemporary landscape architectural approaches that employ process-oriented perspectives. To Somol, the project is a “single gesture – scetic, arid, generic, primitive” that is “unconcerned with the productive registration of time” in contrast to competitor’s propositions that are “technically detailed” or “thick with material information.”15 To others, like Raxworthy, the scheme is both “strategic and tactical” in that its proposed implementation is grounded in knowledge of terrestrial processes. Regardless, this overall approach seemed insufficient as the winning proposal was not implemented in any meaningful sense and the site has now reverted back to a conventional master-plan-based implementation.16 As noted by both Barnett and Czerniak, there is an irony to the indeterminacy of the proposed system being the very thing that saw it unable to catalyse the social and urban dynamics necessary to secure its own implementation – despite that ostensibly being their primary purpose.17, 18 Below the Surface The Downsview competition and the interest in landscape urbanism across the early 2000s coincides and converges with the mid-point of the first ‘digital turn’ in architecture.19 At Downsview, the impact of this turn on landscape architectural design strategy is most apparent in the use of complex curvilinear surface modelling to define topographic features in the entry of Foreign Office Architects. Building on the success of the Yokohama Port Terminal, the scheme is organised through circuit-like diagrams that develop overlapping circulation patterns which 12 Stephanie Carlisle and Nicholas Pevzner, The Performative Ground: Rediscovering the Deep Section, in: Scenario Journal, 2 (2012), https://scenariojournal.com/article/the-performative-ground/, fetched April 22 2013. 13 Julian Raxworthy, Novelty in the Entropic Landscape. Landscape architecture, gardening and change, The University of Queensland, 2013, p. 68. 14 Julia Czerniak (ed.), Case: Downsview Park Toronto, Prestel, Munich, 2001, p. 80. 15 Robert Somol, All Systems Go!: The Terminal Nature of Contemporary Urbanism, in: Julia Czerniak (ed.), CASE: Downsview Park Toronto, Prestel, Munich, 2002, p. 130. 16 North, Processing Downsview Park (see note 8), 2012, p. 18. 17 Rod Barnett, Emergence in Landscape Architecture, Routledge, London, 2013, p. 54. 18 Czerniak, Appearance, Performance (see note 9), 2001, p. 15. 19 Mario Carpo, Introduction: Twenty Years of Digital Design, in: Mario Carpo (ed.), The Digital Turn in Architecture 1992-2012, John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, 2015, p. 13.
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sculpt a landform defined through spline-based geometries that embrace continuous deformation.20, 21 While other aspects of the digital turn had less of an impact on mainstream landscape architectural practice during this period, the Architectural Association’s Landscape Urbanism program investigated these techniques in tandem with landscape urbanism itself. More advanced digital strategies such as scripting, simulation, fabrication, and animation, were tested as a means of expressing the “open-endedness, indeterminacy, and change” that drove the program’s namesake. Like the techniques themselves, this theoretical project cross-pollinated from architectural practice, where those same qualities of ‘non-linearity’ were identified in the computational mechanics underpinning digital design tools.22 What this narrative of cross- and inter-disciplinary transfer obscures is that re-orienting the outputs of digital design techniques from buildings to landscapes changes their relationship to their underpinning rationalisation. While landscape urbanism shares common features with the notions – such as emergence and morphogenesis – that characterised in digital architecture they transform their purpose. To design a building with evolutionary or parametric methods is to impart the design process itself with the qualities of indeterminism. However, these dynamic means still create a static end. As Massumi notes: “[…] if the idea is to yield to virtuality and bring it out, where is the virtuality in the final product? Precisely what trace of it is left in the concrete form it deposits as its residue? What of emergence is left in the emerged?”23 In contrast, the model of emergence employed in a landscape context is more territory than map: its capacity is sought out in the space of representation precisely because its presence in the world is a given. Landscapes are characterised as having an inherent capacity for dynamism, and so tools that exhibit similar qualities thus become able to model the agency of landscapes as a medium – not just the agency of the designer’s process. Tracing the output of the Landscape Urbanism program through to the present day reveals an ongoing process of exploring the limits and impact of this unification. While earlier work hewed close to the forms and tectonics of its architectural origins,24 it came to refine investigations into landscape processes and materials that more closely foreground natural systems on their own terms,25 rather than as processual metaphors. 20 Alejandro Zaera and Farshid Moussavi, Phylogenesis: Foa’s Ark, Actar, Spain, 2003, p. 24. 21 Here the notion of topology presents itself as driving both an abstracted spatial map of movement between nodes and as driving the mathematics of forms that are parametrically variable within defined limits. 22 Carpo, “Introduction” (see note 19), 2015, p. 8. 23 Brian Massumi, Sensing the Virtual, Building the Insensible, in: Architectural Design 68, no. 5/6 (1998), p. 22. 24 Raxworthy, Novelty in the Entropic Landscape (see note 13), 2013, pp. 57-60; Christopher Gray, Turning the Field: Contradictions in Landscape Urbanism, in: Kerb, 15 (2007), p. 98. 25 Niki Kakali and Anastasia Kotenko, Aeolian Sand Odyssey, in: Kerb, 22 (2014), pp. 102-104.
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Pattern and Process The competition for the Taichung Gateway park26 presents a familiar setting. Like Downsview, it sought a large-scale urban park made possible by a decommissioned airport. Aside from the public program, the brief also called for an ‘eco-park’ that would deploy “renewable energies and an intelligent park management system.”27 A collaboration between Philippe Rahm Architectes, Mosbach Paysagistes and Ricky Liu & Associates won the competition with a proposal to create a series of 11 ‘Climatic Lands’. In each Land “temperature, humidity and air pollution were intensively modified” through landscape features (vegetation, topography, water) alongside pavilion-like devices that employ conductive cooling, dehumidification, misting, and climate-control other technologies. Each Land thus actively or passively manipulates its immediate environment to support a particular program and collectively generate “multiple field conditions punctuated by intensities and singularities of difference, variety and variation in the distributions of factors.”28 Aside from the atypical use of active climate-control in an outdoor setting, the scheme is notable for employing advanced digital analysis to underpin its design strategy. This followed from the use of computational fluid dynamics (CFD): a method of simulation that enact a particular mathematic model of fluid flows to analyse the interactions between liquids or gases.29 This form of modelling is key to understanding the performance of phenomena, such as air flow, whose non-linear behaviour is highly complex and thus not able to be reliably examined with lower-fidelity tools.30 While their use required specialist knowledge (handled here by consultants) and is often time-consuming,31 they offered the design team a means to understand the climatic conditions of the existing site, and the performance of proposed design, in detail.32 The results of this approach are most evident in the structures spread across the park; however, a detailed and spatially-explicit understanding of climate also supported the hydrological, vegetative, and topographic design features.33 Nota26 Also known as the Jade Eco Park after the design competition and Taichung Central Park post-construction. 27 Adrian Welch, Taichung Gateway Park: Taiwan Architecture Competition, https://www.e-architect.co.uk/ taiwan/taiwan-gateway-park-competition, fetched March 3 2018. 28 Philippe Rahm and Mark Garcia, Future Landscapes of Spatial Details, in: Architectural Design, 84, no. 1 (2014), pp. 78-85. 29 Asha Rao, Yan Ding, and Jessica Dunn, Computational Fluid Dynamics, in: Jane Burry (ed.), Designing the Dynamic, Melbourne Books, Melbourne, 2013, p. 85. 30 Ibid., p. 87. 31 Ibid., p. 86. 32 Jr-Gang Chi, Jade Eco Park, http://www.wbw.ch/en/magazine/reports/original-texts/2016-7-jade-ecopark.html, fetched March 18 2017. 33 Jillian Walliss and Heike Rahmann, Designing the Twenty-First Century Urban Park: Design Strategies for a Warming Climate, in Living and Learning: Research for a Better Built Environment: 49th International Conference of the Architectural Science Association, International Conference of the Architectural Science Association, Sydney, 2015, p. 52.
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Fig. 2: Plan and diagrams detailed the winning entry and its use of climatic conditions to organize the different design features across the site (image by Philippe Rahm Architectes, Mosbach Paysagistes and Ricky Liu & Associates)
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bly, the planting palette is described as creating “detailed planting regimes, featuring plants with particular performative attributes”34 that made use of the CFD analysis to calibrate the planting palette and pattern to help create the desired thermal conditions.35 These features help define the field-like distribution of elements that define differences in heat, humidity, and air quality across the site (fig. 2). Another entry – Bellwether by PEG – employs a different set of digital design tools. Parametric techniques enable the design logic of the scheme, whereby different elements of the design are progressively developed through a differentiated geometric logic (fig. 3). Initially, a circular grid is overlaid onto the site with the radius of each element growing or shrinking in response to an analysis of surface water flows that illustrated where runoff would concentrate.36 Intersections bet ween this grid define a series of sinuous arcs that demarcate a varied distribution of different landscape features, such as wetlands, forests, and fields.37 A further series of irregularly-placed circles is overlaid atop this grid at the locus of surface water flows and define depressed landforms that act as ‘buffers’ to absorb a surplus or scarcity of water and thus create seasonal fluctuations that would contrast with the other features of the park. Designed ten years after Downsview, these two schemes showcase the ongoing impact of digital technologies on landscape architectural design strategy and illustrate two broad paradigms for its use. In the winning scheme, the use of a detailed analytic process provides a means of understanding site with greater levels of detail alongside the opportunity to employ that same process as a simulation of the proposed design’s performance. As a result, design development trails analysis or simulation in an iterative process, whereby climatic data presents opportunities for the scheme to more precisely calibrate its effects. In contrast, the PEG entry employs a tighter tie between the analytic and generative roles, whereby a parametric system automatically incorporates hydrological analyses into the geometric logic that defines the key features of the design. The two approaches present divergent evolutions of the strategies of “distanced authorship”38 that defines landscape urbanist strategies. Each begins to more tightly wed landscape systems to digital design systems, but one does so in design generation – via the indeterminism of
34 Walliss and Rahmann, Landscape Architecture and Digital Technologies (see note 3), 2016, p. 57. 35 Chi, “Jade Eco Park” (see note 32). 36 Karen M’Closkey, Synthetic Patterns: Fabricating Landscapes in the Age of ‘Green’, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture, 8, no. 1 (2013), p. 24. 37 Ibid., p. 24. 38 Charles Waldheim, A Reference Manifesto, in: Charles Waldheim (ed.), The Landscape Urbanism Reader, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2006, pp. 82-83.
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Fig. 3: Plan of the Bellwether proposal, showing the two different grid structures – the larger ‘buffer’ circles and the tear-drop shapes that alternate between different landscape types (image by PEG Office of Landscape + Architecture)
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parametric models – and the other does so in design analysis – via the indeterminism of CFD models.39 Squaring the Circles While the design briefs of Taichung echo that of Downsview, each set of schemes presents a noticeable shift in the precision of the proposed strategies. The same diagrammatic design strategies persist as a means of engaging with the dynamism of landscape processes, but their resolution has become more exact: the simple grid and randomness of the Downsview circles have become precisely differentiated pieces within a wider fields or subdivided ellipses arrayed across a self-similar grid. This might, at first, seem as a reversal of the “frameworks over form”40 approach. However, it also suggests an evolution of this strategy that recognises that extant critiques of that approach, which highlight that “in order for something to be adaptable, it needs to be precisely designed to be adaptable.”41 Although diagrammatic strategies offer a means to explore the indeterminism of landscapes in terms of their operations, the success of a design still depends on evaluating the resulting effects given that the ultimate impact of any broader dynamic system evidences itself in relation to grounded local conditions. To approach one aspect without the other is to reify process as form rather than seeing form as a product or proponent of process.42 In doing so, the purpose of the diagram is undercut: if altering or enacting a landscape process then its resolution is subject to an ongoing process of reconsideration as the intervening-form and intervened-phenomena each modify the other over time.43 Without this, processual strategies thus can become a way of avoiding complexity rather than harnessing it through rigorous detail.44 This bind between static and dynamic was a common criticism of the Downsview competition entries and the broader shift in strategies they embody. Bowring and Swaffield argue that “design ‘open-endedness’ is thus conditional and 39 These two approaches could be theoretically combined; however the computationally-taxing nature of CFD simulation means that their goals are somewhat at odds. The flexibility of parametric modelling encourages designers to hone that parameters that resolve a general logic on an ongoing basis; a task that running complex simulations obstructs. 40 Czerniak, Appearance, Performance, 2002 (see note 9), p. 13. 41 Anita Berrizbeitia, On the Limits of Process: The Case for Precision in Landscape,”https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=xbXd1iznH7I, fetched December 11 2017. 42 Barnett, Emergence in Landscape Architecture (see note 17), 2013, p. 207. 43 Peter Connolly, What Is Design Research in Landscape Architecture? in: René van der Velde and Peter Connolly (eds.), Technique, RMIT University Press, Melbourne, 2002, pp. 22-23. 44 Colin Ware, Towards a Perceptual Theory of Flow Visualization, in: IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications 28, no. 2 (2010), p. 3.
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bracketed within known landscape processes, institutional arrangements, design operations, and construction methods.”45 To Mah, it “works to circumvent the responsibility of the landscape designer to give material shape and quality to designed environments.”46 Somol notes that “in its dominant form of process-obsession, contingency indicates an abdication of a professional role rather than a desired end-state condition that one must proactively work to install.”47 While the Taichung entries do not fully resolve this tension, they demonstrate that the seeming contradiction between recognising landscape systems as dynamic and resolving landscape designs can be at least partially mitigated. In both cases, computational design technologies play a key role in alleviating the labour involved in resolving diagrammatic strategies without overlooking or marginalising their ties to landscape systems. In mitigating the tax of precision they allow for – in this case – a greater scalar range of resolution to be explored without ignoring either grounded conditions or dynamic mechanics.48 This approach is contingent in an ongoing process of adaptation in design technology and design strategy.49 Computational design methods, such as environment simulation or parametric modelling, are comparatively much more common in an architectural context, and their reuse as part of landscape architectural design strategy requires rethinking their implementation and employ. Most obviously this follows from a change in purpose, whereby the forces and forms of landscape are distinct to those of architecture. Less obvious is that there is also a change in use, whereby the indeterminism of computational design means that the operations of design processes can more closely model the operations of landscape processes. In the time since the Taichung Gateway competition, these two challenges have been tackled to increasing effect in contemporary projects.50 However, it is at Taichung itself where computational approaches to landscape architecture first demonstrate their potential to tackle the questions posed by Downsview. Rather than present a fracture within this lineage, Taichung presents an evolutionary practice that unites the ecological and the digital in both design strategy and design outcome.
45 Jacky Bowring and Simon Swaffield, Shifting Landscapes in-Between Times, in: Harvard Design Magazine 36 (2013), pp. 96-104. 46 David Mah, Sense and Sensibilities, in: Kerb 23 (2015), p. 69. 47 Somol, All Systems Go! (see note 15), 2002, p. 134 48 The same extension of agency is also possible for evaluating the temporal range of landscape projects, although the Taichung proposals are less concerned with this aspect relative to the Downsview entries given it was not explicitly called for in that competition’s brief. 49 Philip Belesky, Adapting Computation to Adapting Landscapes,”Kerb, 21 (2013), p. 50. 50 Jillian Walliss, Landscape Architecture and the Digital Turn: Towards a Productive Critique, Journal of Landscape Architecture, 13, (September 2, 2018), 3, p. 18.
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Bibliography Barnett, Rod. Emergence in Landscape Architecture. Routledge, London, 2013. Bowring, Jacky, and Simon Swaffield. Shifting Landscapes in-Between Times, in: Harvard Design Magazine 36 (2013), pp. 96-104. Cantrell, Bradley, and Adam Mekies, eds. Codify: Parametric and Computational Design in Landscape Architecture. Routledge, Abingdon, 2018. Carlisle, Stephanie, and Nicholas Pevzner. The Performative Ground: Rediscovering the Deep Section, in Scenario Journal 2 (2012). https://scenariojournal.com/ article/the-performative-ground/. Carpo, Mario. Introduction: Twenty Years of Digital Design, in: The Digital Turn in Architecture 1992-2012, John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, 2015, pp. 8-14. Chrisman, Nick. Charting the Unknown. ESRI Press, Redlands, 2006. Connolly, Peter. What Is Design Research in Landscape Architecture?, in: René van der Velde and Peter Connolly (eds.), Technique, RMIT University Press, Melbourne, 2002, pp. 20-33. Czerniak, Julia. Appearance, Performance: Landscape at Downsview, in: Julia Czerniak (ed.), CASE: Downsview Park Toronto, pp. 12-21. Prestel, Munich, 2002. ———, (ed.), Case: Downsview Park Toronto. Case. Prestel, Munich, 2001. Gray, Christopher. Turning the Field: Contradictions in Landscape Urbanism, in: Kerb 15 (2007), pp. 94-100. Hansen, Andrew. From Hand to Land: Tracing Procedural Artifacts in the Built Landscape, in: Scenario Journal 2 (2011). https://scenariojournal.com/lu-fromhand-to-land/. Kakali, Niki, and Anastasia Kotenko. Aeolian Sand Odyssey, in: Kerb 22 (2014), pp. 102-107. Mah, David. Sense and Sensibilities, in: Kerb 23 (2015), pp. 66-71. Massumi, Brian. Sensing the Virtual, Building the Insensible, in: Architectural Design 68, no. 5/6 (1998), pp. 16-24. M’Closkey, Karen. Synthetic Patterns: Fabricating Landscapes in the Age of ‘Green’, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture 8, no. 1 (May 1, 2013), pp. 16-27. M’Closkey, Karen, and Keith VanDerSys. Dynamic Patterns. Routledge, New York, 2017. Mostafavi, Mohsen, and Ciro Najle, eds. Landscape Urbanism: A Manual for the Machinic Landscape. Architectural Association Publications, London, 2003. North, Alissa. Processing Downsview Park: Transforming a Theoretical Diagram to Master Plan and Construction, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture 7, no. 1 (May 1, 2012), pp. 8-19.
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Rahm, Philippe, and Mark Garcia. Future Landscapes of Spatial Details, in: Architectural Design 84, no. 1 (2014), pp. 78-85. Rao, Asha, Yan Ding, and Jessica Dunn. Computational Fluid Dynamics, in: Jane Burry (ed.), Designing the Dynamic, Melbourne Books, Melbourne, 2013, pp. 84-87. Raxworthy, Julian. Novelty in the Entropic Landscape. Doctoral Thesis, The University of Queensland, 2013. Somol, Robert. All Systems Go!: The Terminal Nature of Contemporary Urbanism, in: Julia Czerniak (ed.), CASE: Downsview Park, Prestel, Munich, 2002, pp. 126136. Waldheim, Charles. A Reference Manifesto, in: Charles Waldheim (ed.), The Landscape Urbanism Reader, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2006, pp. 13-19. ———. Landscape as Urbanism, in: Charles Waldheim (ed.), The Landscape Urbanism Reader, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2006, pp. 35-53. ———. Landscape as Urbanism: A General Theory. Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2016. Walliss, Jillian. Landscape Architecture and the Digital Turn: Towards a Productive Critique, in: Journal of Landscape Architecture 13, no. 3 (2018), pp. 12-15. Walliss, Jillian, and Heike Rahmann. Designing the Twenty-First Century Urban Park: Design Strategies for a Warming Climate, in Living and Learning: Research for a Better Built Environment: 49th International Conference of the Architectural Science Association, Sydney, 2015, pp. 869-878. ———. Landscape Architecture and Digital Technologies. Routledge, Abingdon, 2016. Ware, Colin. Towards a Perceptual Theory of Flow Visualization, in: IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications 28, no. 2 (2010), pp. 1-6. Zaera, Alejandro, and Farshid Moussavi. Phylogenesis: Foa’s Ark, Actar, Barcelona, 2003.
Bibliography (author’s own index) Belesky, Philip. Adapting Computation to Adapting Landscapes, in Kerb 21 (2013), pp. 50-54. Bibliography (internet sites) Berrizbeitia, Anita, On the Limits of Process: The Case for Precision in Landscape, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbXd1iznH7I, fetched December 11 2017. Chi, Jr-Gang, Jade Eco Park, http://www.wbw.ch/en/magazine/reports/originaltexts/2016-7-jade-eco-park.html, fetched March 18 2017. Welch, Adrian, Taichung Gateway Park: Taiwan Architecture Competition, https:// www.e-architect.co.uk/taiwan/taiwan-gateway-park-competition, fetched March 3 2018.
Session IV Contemporary Reflections on Art and Garden Art
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Hartmut Troll
What is Art, what is Garden Art, today? The invitation in this question – to self-affirmation by art, by garden art – should be answered from several angles, sketched out in the following to justify the respective point of view to some extent. Looking back, pertinent theoretical writing in the anglophone world addressed not Garden Art but Modern Gardening, Oriental Gardening or Landscape Gardening in such a way as to link the object with the productive, creative activity. Here in Germany things were different; the initial terminological definition and categorisation of Garden Art as a discrete form may be traced to Johann Georg Sulzer, who saw the relationship to Nature as crucial but declared the term unclear in its differentiation from the professional practice, namely: ‘in the minds of those who lay out such [gardens].’1 A modern reading would indicate that continual discussion of its affiliation to the visual arts has been more important to the subsequent establishment of Garden Art than a stable terminology.2 As an historical phenomenon, at least, the term has matured to self-evidency; thus it constitutes the thematic determinant of the conference title, and the aforementioned tradition of debate finds an echo in this discussion. The emergence of the term in the 18th century, its negation in the 19th and the revival of both term and debate in the early 20th century, along with the adaption nowadays of some essential aspects such as the relationship to Nature and the unconcluded, more processual character of the work supply the cues that assume professional resonance in the deliberations of Stefan Schweizer and Michaela Ott. Protagonists of its re-establishment such as Max Läuger explicitly stand for a return to the art and craft tradition of creative design, on whose principles the discussion reflects. The transference of such principles – simplification and unity, form and function – to the scale of Nature – the essence of a form in which, to cite Schiller, Nature is represented through itself 3 – ignited a fundamental dispute around the Hamburger Stadtpark that raged for years.4 In this sense one could conceive of the history of design as catalyst for modern Garden Art and its diver1 Georg Friedrich Sulzer, Allgemeine Theorie der Schönen Künste […] Zweyhter Teil, Leipzig 1774, p. 308. 2 Sebastian Fizner, Die Gartenkunst als Kunstwerk und Gattung. Über den Wandel des Kunstwerkcharakters und die Terminologie eines sich verändernden Gegenstandes, in Stefan Schweizer, Sascha Winter, Gartenkunst in Deutschland, Regensburg, 2012, pp. 72-87, p. 73. 3 Friedrich Schiller, Über den Gartenkalender auf das Jahr 1795, in: Schillers sämtliche Werke, Vol. 4, Stuttgart 1879, pp. 762-767, p. 762. 4 Hartmut Troll, Die Bedeutung des Wettbewerbsbeitrages von Max Laeuger im Lichte der Formfindung der frühen Moderne, in: Die Gartenkunst, 1 (2015), pp. 37-50.
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sification and extension, along with inter-genre dialogue, such as with Land Art; Tulga Beyerle and Udo Weilacher have made this their professional field. As epilogue, a sentiment expressed by the Irish-American artist Sean Scully, noted in June of 2004: ‘WHAT ART IS. I think that art is a wound in a dance with love. And if the wound and the love are the same size they can dance well.’
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Michaela Ott
Contemporary Art and Landscape Architecture From the watchtower of philosophy and cultural studies one discerns a convergence of trends in the visual arts and landscape architecture since the 1960s. The art of the post-war era – deeply marked by the experience of the Holocaust, appalled by its own blindness to the political processes and with its notions of genius shattered – abandoned its former striving for renditions of reality in favour of comparatively raw, abstract and cryptic means of expression. Franco-German “Tachisme”, which left black stains in the middle of photographs as traces of unresolved social issues and notorious repressions (and thereby inadvertently signified the growing presence of African immigrants in France), was a symptoma tic aesthetic articulation of those times. Reproaches from critical theory, that art was servicing the culture industry, were answered by space-specific US American minimalism and the time-referenced “Fluxus” movement with semi-authorless, apsychological, conceptual and explicitly contingent positing, supported by numerous, notably French, theoreticians of Modernism such as Foucault, Derrida and Deleuze/Guattari. In its contiguity to critical theory, they regard the value of art precisely in its closeness to nature, which in an emphatic sense is upheld as not manmade and thus of an inaccessible magnitude, setting the scale for artistic positions; in the best cases they elude human processing, are not subject to customary norms and ways of perception but rather unfold on their own terms, forcing the regime of signifiers into disparity, allowing temporality and ephemerality to appear as such and self-reflecting on their immanent metamorphosis and impermanence. As Udo Weilacher expressed so well in his 1996 Zwischen Landschaftsarchitektur und Land Art 1 , this artistic and theoretical development has also impinged upon landscape architecture, although the discipline is also obliged to pursue practical as well as aesthetic problem solving. In US American Land Art, especially, a sense of the interdependencies of site, sight und insight was sharpened. Having said this, such famous examples as Walter de Maria’s “The Lightning Field”, a grid of vertical steel poles in New Mexico that attracts the frequent lightning strikes of the region to produce a spectacular lightshow, or James Turell’s “Roden Crater” in Arizona, are less about landscape than about the staging and technical amplification of natural (and catastrophic) spectacles and thus above all about altered and enhanced modes of perception. During the installation of his “Running Fence”, snaking many kilometres through the terrain to Bodega Bay in California, Christo spoke of ‘the temporary use of the sky, the hills and the ocean’. Conversely Fran1 Udo Weilacher, Zwischen Landschaftsarchitektur und Land Art, Birkhäuser, Basel, 1996.
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cis Alys, who had a mountain of sand piled up in Mexico by local inhabitants, was more concerned with the participatory approach and its effect upon the local society. Continuing this line of the tradition, here in Germany we see more examples of playing with natural conditions, for example when artist Werner Klotz installs polished steel shingles on house façades and lets them reflect the passing clouds. Admittedly, all these artists are more concerned with their work of art and the new ways of seeing that they elicit than with landscape design. These days, for political and epistemological reasons, the “proscription” of aesthetic “representations” of reality in painting, sculpture or design is even more severe; it is plain that any attempted reproduction is per se a construction of reality, and thus any positing must interrogate its own aesthetic choices and framework. Artistic references to Nature occur as less self-assured, expansive, and sensationalist but rather, ecologically motivated, take the path of gentle intervention. One observes a growing tendency to bring together organic and regenerative materials in an artistic setting to create new ecological milieus. The human being, made responsible for the ‘Anthropocene’, has realised that he/she has literally denaturised Nature and is in the process of laying waste the basis of his own terrestrial existence. As he/she has destroyed his lofty reference value of Nature he/she is now starting to backtrack and practise ways of local intervention that are attuned to conservation, try to reinstate lost resources and emphasise the crucial regard for hitherto less valued actors such as microbes. The artist who first set off on this path is generally accepted to be Dieter Roth; he has long been interested in mould and other forms of organic decay, regarding them as transformations akin to artistic processes engendering new material and developing unforeseen aesthetic qualities – his ‘Arche Noah’, conceived as a large research laboratory, stood for a long time in Berlin’s Hamburger Bahnhof railway station. Now, in 2018, we are compelled to reflect on further matters. Stemming from a new focus on Germany’s colonial past and postcolonial issues, the imperative arises to call into question Western culture – its representative tradition in general and its inherent predilection for violence. At the 2018 Berlin Biennale it appeared crucial to put a brand on Western artistic articulations, their framing and concomitant blind spots. Thus video films by John Akomfrah, a Black Briton from the Audio Video Collective in London, were often shown at art exhibitions such as in the Haus der Kulturen der Welt and at Dak’Art, the African contemporary art biennale in Dakar. The films also address landscape architecture, for they offer melancholy strolls through European landscapes whereby each walk through the natural environment becomes an occasion to interrogate the landscape design about its misappropriation and its inherent latent violence, such as through the slave trade or the exploitation of mine workers; images of Northern landscapes are superimposed with Dürer’s drawings of African faces and thereby robbed of their putative timelessness and innocence.
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In this spirit, today’s artistic works that lay claim to political relevance employ diverse means of self-dissolution both with regard to cultural embedment and to the human acteurs; posing epistemological problems in experimental settings is the principle aim. You may remember that the work which caused the greatest stir at the last Münster Sculpture Project was an installation by Pierre Huyghe, who set up a kind of jagged, fissured lunar landscape in a hall to which one was granted very selective access. In this space, Huyghe staged an electronically controlled and also random interplay of microbe activity, lighting effects and visitors’ movements; they walked through this futuristic landscape, observing the interferences between these qualitatively diverse agencies. At dOCUMENTA 13 he installed a composting site to stage an ecological heterotopia. “An encounter is always a divergence” was his gloss on the work; he was interested in the unforeseeable, in whatever the human will cannot dominate and programme. His understanding of art correlates on the one hand with contemporary approaches in landscape architecture and on the other with philosophies that suggest expanding the anthropomorphic view, including significantly more complex interrelationships and placing more worth on compost than on composition – on regeneration rather than creation. Someone like Donna Haraway would say that ‘human’ is now derived from ‘humus’ and no longer from ‘homo’. Instead of a composer she recommends becoming a composter; recognising non-anthropomorphic processes and integrating them in one’s thought and practice, allowing human logic to run wild as is permitted in some woodlands, imposing less neat finish and love of orderliness on the non-human external world … this appears to her as the only way out of terrestrial self-destruction. In this regard one can observe a certain convergence between landscape architecture planning and contemporary artistic praxis. It would be desirable if these approaches developed towards ‘dividual settings’, as I like to call them – because today it can no longer be about displays of individual performances and great deeds. What’s more urgently needed is a facilitation and consideration of promising interferences and prudently planned participation, of kinds of deliberate scission and segmentation and of gentle absorption – of processes for which I use the generic term dividuation2. Dividuations reject the ‘in’ of ‘individuations’ that posits a negation of participation and, against all contemporary evidence to the contrary, persists in notions of indivisibility. Today we know there is no ‘individuum’ as a translation of the Greek ‘atomos’; that we are never individuals, indivisibles. Contemporary art has begun to grasp this, expressing itself as complex ways of interweaving epistemological differences and thus converging on certain, albeit largely implicit, notions of landscape architecture. 2 Michaela Ott, Dividuations.Theories of Participation, Palgrave Macmillan, New York/London, 2018.
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Udo Weilacher
The Risk of Anaesthetic Landscapes In the Anthropocene, the age of humankind, the world is confronted with major challenges in all three dimensions of sustainable progress: economic, social, and environmental. According to the French philosopher Bruno Latour and his new book Down to Earth. Politics in the New Climate Regime1 the main challenge is to deal with the persistent denial of global climate change by economically influential global players that causes not only environmental catastrophes of unprecedented scope but also a dangerous explosion of inequalities worldwide. Landscape architecture and all its associated environmental planning and design professions are therefore especially concerned with the development of an intact global environment and the protection of landscape as the natural foundation of all life on this planet. But what about the aesthetic quality of landscape? Currently there seems to be a clear concentration on improving the functional efficiency of green spaces, leading to ethically normative conceptual coinings like “green infrastructure” (GI) or “ecosystem services”. In 2013 for example, the European Commission declared that nature as infrastructure is a handy and cost-efficient way of mobilising investments and delivering services: ‘GI is a successfully tested tool for providing ecological, economic and social benefits through natural solutions. It helps us to understand the value of the benefits that nature provides to human society and to mobilise investments to sustain and enhance them. It also helps avoid relying on infrastructure that is expensive to build when nature can often provide cheaper, more durable solutions. [It is] a strategically planned network of natural and semi-natural areas with other environmental features designed and managed to deliver a wide range of ecosystem services.’2
Obviously, our society is still seeking a technological way out of a crisis precipitated by technology itself, and regressing to a merely functionalist planning profession as established in the 1960s suddenly seems to be a very small step for contemporary landscape architecture. Given the currently reinforced functionalist understanding of nature and landscape as cost-efficient “machines” and providers of “services”, “garden art” (Gartenkunst) with its traditional focus on the aesthetic qualities of the environment becomes inevitably doomed to insignificance. Such vilification is nothing new; at the end of the 19th century, in the economic and
1 Bruno Latour, Down to Earth. Politics in the New Climate Regime, Polity Press, Cambridge, 2018. 2 European Commission, Green Infrastructure (GI) – Enhancing Europe’s Natural Capital, COM(2013) 249 final, Brussels 2013, pp. 2/3.
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social crises in society after a phase of heavy industrialisation and rising nationalism in Europe, garden art was considered rather irrelevant: ‘This so-called garden art is nothing more than the capricious and yet natural sister of architecture and spatial art, or better, of cultivated construction. I consider it to be part of the applied arts. As such, it shares the avocation of everything applied: to be partly dependent on purpose, situation and material. […] Why am I talking about it at all when I actually wish to negate it? Because I want people to stop talking to those of us who create gardens about things that can only be created through work. You can see just how dangerous this is: By just trying to give those who work hard to survive the day-to-day struggle more freedom from the overwhelming aesthetic aspects of gardening, I have almost begun – horror of horrors! – to wax rhetoric myself.’3
It was the German garden architect and “Green Spartacus” Leberecht Migge who, at the beginning of the 20th century, was firmly convinced that the future of the industrial society and especially of the working class could only be secured through the creation of a new kind of garden culture. In his work, he vehemently refused to have any association with art and declared ‘as the first representative of his profession the death of garden art. The function of the garden has to be expressed [...] without any aesthetic considerations’4. For Leberecht Migge the garden of the future could only be a useful fruit and vegetable garden, that in his opinion need not be beautiful or of a particular garden style as, if necessary, a style would develop by itself, ‘growing from the life of its own time’5. Migge’s ‘innate tendency to have extreme views and revolutionary aspirations, and his predisposition for ruthlessness in his actions’6 resulted in being banned from professional practice by the National Socialist regime in 1933. His progressive ideas were then slowly forgotten about for several decades. Interestingly, the same Leberecht Migge who proclaimed the death of beautiful garden art is currently considered by followers of the urban gardening movement to be ‘a kind of guiding spirit of gardening in the city’7. They do so with complete disregard of the significant changes that have occurred in the economic, ecological and social conditions since the beginning of the 20th century. It now appears as if gardening in the urban context is gaining attention and importance again in 3 Leberecht Migge, Die Gartenkunst des 20. Jahrhunderts, Diederichs, Jena, 1913, pp. 142, 151. 4 Clemens Alexander Wimmer, Geschichte der Gartentheorie, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt, 1989, p. 368. 5 Leberecht Migge, Der kommende Garten 1927), in: Gartenschönheit, quoted in Fachbereich Stadt- und Landschaftsplanung der Gesamthochschule Kassel (ed.), Leberecht Migge 1881-1935, Gartenkultur des 20. Jahrhunderts, Worpswede 1981, p. 70. 6 Quoted in Gert Gröning, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Grüne Biographien. Biographisches Handbuch zur Landschaftsarchitektur des 20. Jahrhunderts in Deutschland, Patzer Verlag, Berlin und Hannover, 1997, p. 264. 7 Christa Müller (ed.), Urban Gardening. Über die Rückkehr der Gärten in die Stadt, oekom verlag, München 2011, p. 15.
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landscape architecture. Migge, who clearly rejected gardening as an activity influenced by art, was crucially instrumental in gardening’s loss of reputation among landscape architects. Numerous urban garden activists today not only admire this “Green Spartacus” for his rigorous functionalist approach to gardening but consciously describe themselves as autonomous amateurs and vehemently reject all the efforts of professional landscape architects to improve inner-city open space aesthetically. Given the current critical environmental conditions, urban gardeners feel disconnected from the professional discourse about the aesthetic aspects of landscape design. They are convinced that landscape architecture today is too often simply about “l’art pour l’art” and Leberecht Migge, clearly expressing his deep scepticism about garden art, speaks to their heart. Garden and landscape design are undoubtedly cultural phenomena, and according to Umberto Eco, ‘all cultural phenomena are in reality systems of signs, i.e. culture can be understood as communication’8. Therefore it must follow that landscape architecture must not only fulfil certain functions but also serve as a means of communication. Designed landscape is actually a non-verbal language, a system of signs with which professionals work, and art is an essential part of this language. More than ever before it is important to understand to whom and about what landscape architects communicate with design, and it is important to know the rules according to which this communication takes place at a given time under given societal circumstances. These are key requirements for successful landscape architecture if it is to combine the useful with the meaningful and the beautiful. If landscape architects today want to convince the public that their work is not just “l’art pour l’art”, they will have to make sure that they are communicating with people about the relevant issues of their daily life. Artistic qualities of landscape architecture have to be activated to create meaning. Learning from Leberecht Migge today means not creating “shallow” aesthetic forms, treating simply the surface of landscape, preparing it for more convenient and arbitrary consumption, but rather creating landscape forms that are deeply rooted in the understanding of our current society and connected to relevant environmental challenges. In 1991 John Tillmann Lyle, Professor of Landscape Architecture at California State Polytechnic University in Pomona, called such forms “deep forms” and explained: ‘Deep form is shaped by the interactions of inner ecological process and human vision, which can make the underlying order visible and meaningful in human terms: Such deep form stands in contrast to shallow form, which has only the surface perceptual order and lacks the solidity of coherent process beneath the surface. In deep form is a meeting of appearance and reality, mind and nature, art and science. 8 Umberto Eco, Function and Sign: The Semiotics of Architecture, in: Neil Leach (ed.), Rethinking Architecture: a reader in cultural theory, Routledge, London, 1997, p. 182.
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[…] We live in a time when our conceptions of nature and the human role within it are evolving; for the moment they seem blurred and contradictory. Much contemporary landscape reflects this confusion. A major task for a landscape architectural avant-garde is to explore possibilities for restoring cohesive relationships between people and nature and to give form to relationship.’9
Almost three decades after John T. Lyle’s farsighted statement, civilisation is still struggling to restore an intact relationship between man and nature. Unfortunately, many environmental planning professions are still not taking into account that man is not a rational factor to be incorporated in scientific man-environment equations, e.g. related to the computation of ecosystem services. Man is a living being, largely driven by desires, emotions and personal experiences. Art, when understood as an integral component of contemporary garden and landscape design, is a communicative means of tapping the rich reservoir of the emotional relationship between man and nature. To ignore the art-related design approach to gardens and landscapes entails the risk of creating unaesthetic or even “anaesthetic landscapes”. Anaesthesia, from Greek “without sensation”, as a state of loss of awareness or sensation might, in landscape design, eventually lead to a loss of environmental consciousness and ecological awareness. Today, the scientific community should be fully aware that precisely this lost consciousness is the true reason for the global environmental crisis. This inconvenient truth was clearly announced in The Limits to Growth. A Report for the Club of Rome’s Project on the Predicament of Mankind 10 as far back as 1972. An important manifesto against an “anaesthetic” environment was published in 1934 by John Dewey in Art as Experience11. This book is the most significant work of this renowned American philosopher on aesthetics, and is internationally recognised as one of the most profound analyses of the impact of all arts, such as architecture, sculpture, painting, music, and literature, on people’s environmental perceptions and social life. For Dewey, all human experience is aesthetic, and therefore art is an integral part of all human behaviour as well as a powerful tool for creating and communicating knowledge. ‘Art is a mode of prediction not found in charts and statistics, and it insinuates possibilities of human relations not to be found in rule and precept, admonition and administration.’12 With respect to architecture he expatiated:
9 John Tillmann Lyle, Can Floating Seeds Make Deep Forms? in: Landscape Journal, Spring 1991, Vol. 10(1), pp. 39-44. 10 Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, Jørgen Randers, William W Behrens III, The Limits to Growth. A Report for the Club of Rome’s Project on the Predicament of Mankind, Potomac Associates, New York, 1972. 11 John Dewey, Art as Experience, Capricorn Books, New York, 1934. 12 Ibid., p. 349.
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‘Why is the architecture of our large cities so unworthy of a fine civilization? It is not from lack of materials nor from lack of technical capacity. And yet it is not merely slums but the apartments of the well-to-do that are esthetically repellent, because they are so destitute of imagination. Their character is determined by an economic system in which land is used - and kept out of use - for the sake of gain, because of profit derived from rental and sale. Until land is freed from this economic burden, beautiful buildings may occasionally be erected, but there is little hope for the rise of general architectural construction worthy of a noble civilization. The restriction placed on building affects indirectly a large number of allied arts, while the social forces that affect the buildings in which we subsist and wherein we do our work operate upon all the arts.’13
The urban environment witnessed and described by John Dewey in 1934 has developed very rapidly and dramatically in the last decades, aggravating the contrast between urban living quarters for the rich and the poor. More than ever before, the land is under a severe ecological burden worldwide and we have reached “peak soil”, the point at which, due to commercially driven land grabbing and land consumption, we no longer have enough fertile soil to sustain the world’s population. Prices for building land and housing in Europe have risen enormously in recent years. The German Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR) for example states: ‘Between 2011 and 2016, the average price of building land for single family houses in Germany has risen by 27 per cent, from 129 to 164 Euros per square metre.’14 Landscape architecture can surely be considered as one of the “allied arts” mentioned by John Dewey above affected by ‘an economic system in which land is used - and kept out of use - for the sake of gain’15. Therefore, a purely functionalist approach to landscape, focussing solely on the usefulness and economic importance of the environment without taking its aesthetic value into serious consideration, is extremely dangerous. More than 80 years ago, Dewey was convinced that: ‘As long as art is the beauty parlor of civilization, neither art nor civilization is secure.’16 Today it should be very clear that as long as art is banned from garden and landscape, neither humankind nor nature is secure. Art in landscape is desperately needed as a powerful tool for creating and communicating knowledge beyond the traditional limits of conventional science.
13 Ibid., p. 346. 14 https://www.bbsr.bund.de/BBSR/DE/Home/Topthemen/2017-baulandpreise.html (January 30, 2019). 15 Dewey, Art as Experience, 1934, p. 346. 16 Ibid.
Session V (Garden-)Artist, Designer or Both – Self Reflections on the Work and the Profession by Renowned Landscape Architects
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Jörg Rekittke
Preferred Situations The key question that had to be answered in Session IV was straightforward. Are landscape architects, in this day and age, artists, designers, or both? The four renowned speakers delivered – each in their own way – a rather unambiguous answer: landscape architects are designers but they are hardly artists. Christophe Girot impishly illustrated that artists produce art, and landscape architects, though trying very hard to produce art, deliver mundane built projects. Kamel Louafi showed examples of his exposition works that are popular, but, on no account, works of art. Monika Gora calls herself an artist, nevertheless, her built projects are no works of art after all. Mario Schjetnan presented his professional work without raising any suspicion of being an artist or producing art. Common denominator of the four individual contributions was their perceptible tendency to point into the same direction. It is not beneath any landscape designers dignity to be no artist, or to cease from desperately desiring to be an artist. Instead, they are well advised to simply be with relish what they are – landscape designers. Lenné, Le Nôtre, and Capability Brown are partly to blame for the downright knee-jerk craving for recognition as artists on the part of many exponents of the landscape guild, but the late luminaries operated under completely different conditions. Today, landscape architectural assignments do not enjoy the privilege of innocence anymore, as historic garden art largely did. Contemporary landscape architecture cannot be uncommitted. It burns up resources, for a good purpose ideally, but by doing so, it unavoidably is subject to the prevailing sustainability principle. That is all right. Not Théophile Gautier’s l’art pour l’art 1 lends itself to serve as leitmotif for landscape architecture in the anthropocene, but Herbert A. Simon’s mantra that everyone designs who devises courses of action aimed at changing existing situations into preferred ones.2 If we equate preferred with desirable – as in sustainable, ecological, meaningful, reasonable, or artless – it finally does not matter if only the next mundane built project comes out, or a rare piece of art.
1 Wolfgang Ullrich, L’art pour l’art. Die Verführungskraft eines ästhetischen Rigorismus, in: Wolfgang Ullrich, Was war Kunst? Biographien eines Begriffs, Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, 2005. 2 Herbert A. Simon, The Sciences of the Artificial, M.I.T. Press, Cambridge, 1968.
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Monika Gora
Garden or Art or Both? Introduction Whether a work is a garden or art is dependant on the context and interpretation of the work. What is perceived as art stands out and becomes art with time. Traditionally the classification follows the commission. If a work is commissioned, or bought, as art it is regarded to be art. If it is commissioned as landscape architecture or garden design then it is that. Through my practice I have been challenging those categorizations. Partly because I have always wanted to do something more both out of landscape architecture and art commissions. This approach has lead me to work preferably with both at the same time. When working with landscape architecture projects it is exciting for me to add ambiguity, new meanings, and expose the site specific paradoxes and overlapping structures at the same time as adding new sensory perceptions and possibilities for the visitors own exploration and interpretation. I often work with objects that by their own might be interpreted as sculptures but together form a structure (grid, spine) that enhances the experience of the site. This is the same strategy as in a renaissance or baroque garden but without the strict pattern. In public art commissions there is traditionally a limitation to sculptural objects. It has been important for me to work with a bigger picture - with the surrounding space, including the site specific context and sensory impressions beyond the visual. The sculptures are intended to be experienced visually and explored through movement and touch. I find it important to work sculpturally in a wider concept with tools like ground modelling, living plants, and the surrounding landscape. This approach of using the landscape architectural tools, brings the art projects closer to design of landscapes or gardens which of course also includes changes over time. As I see, it this brings us closer to the reality of climate, life conditions and experiences of presence. The following presented four projects contain different mixtures of art and garden. Whether they are art or gardens is finally up to the visitor to experience. Travelling Kitchen Garden Gunnebo manor, Göteborg, summer of 2008 Type of project: Temporary exhibition garden at the exhibition Gothenburg Gardens of Lust (Göteborgs lustträdgårdar) with more than 350 000 visitors (figs. 1-3). Material: Greenhouse with non-rigid plastic and textile fabric, vegetables, mobile home
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Commissioned by: Gunnebo Slott & Trädgårdar AB Planting: Gunnebo Manor As a reflection on the notion of growing your own food in transit, a motorhome with an attached greenhouse was temporarily parked in the setting of an old manor. I drafted a greenhouse which was made from non-rigid plastic and textile fabric. It was erected around the entrance to a motorhome and served as my interpre-
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tation of a temporary/mobile vegetable garden. The car was parked in the gardens of Gunnebo Manor in connection with a big exhibition. Here the motorhome got firmly rooted with its vegetables under the tent, ready to leave but hesitant to go. The Travelling Kitchen Garden had an odd shape and it looked messy and chaotic when placed in the sophisticated environment. Gunnebo Manor is surrounded by wild woods and the installation served as a reminder of the borrowed land. Revealing the obvious occupation constantly associated with gardens. The Travelling Kitchen Garden defies ownership of land. It occupies land belonging to the manor gardens and challenges the definition of ’what is a garden’. With the lightness of the nomadic life it has never the less landed here to experience the rootedness of being a resident and steal the land. But steal from who? Who is the original owner? The manor owner? The forest trees? The animals? The work is also about mobility and residency, and longing after both at the same time. Glass Bubble Scaniaplatsen 2, Western Harbour in Malmö, 2006 Type of project: Residential garden with an orangery (figs. 4-7) Material: Glass, steel, rust shale stone, plants light, Norwegian slate Dimensions: Ground area 10-16 m x 40 m, height 9.5 m and length 22 m of the Glass Bubble Commissioned by: Södertorpsgården Project management: Stadsfastigheter, Malmö Construction and engineering: Octatube International B.V.
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Background It all started with a meeting with the board of Södertorpsgården, an organization that manages buildings providing flats for elderly people in Malmö. They took a vivid interest in their buildings, they improved and extended their premises. The project manager of the municipal housing corporation was to oversee the erection of a new building at a prominent, central site by the sea. A decision had been made about the contractor for the building, and the time had come for the grounds. The board appreciated my previous projects, and I was engaged in the project as a landscape architect to design their courtyard facing the sea. Because of its orientation to the northwest the building surrounding the courtyard was shading the courtyard itself. The building opened up towards the sea and to the prevalent wind direction much like the letter U, it was very windy. It was a difficult point of departure; the site would not allow a traditional garden. Would it be possible to create a garden here – in this narrow, dark and windy yard?
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A garden A garden at an impossible site was a challenge that had excited me once already. In the project “Sheltered Tree” I wanted to plant trees in extremely exposed places and make them survive with the help of conservatories. I was fascinated by the connection: the conservatory serving as an incubator for the tree, the tree and the conservatory serving as a symbolic image of our need to look after the living things we choose to have around us and cherish. In the project “Sheltered Tree” a small orange tree was to grow in a field of volcanic stones in Iceland. The work was to be financed by the biggest industry in Iceland, the aluminium smelting plant in Hafnarfjordur. But their managing director asked whether the construction was in any way connected with the environmental effects of the smelting plant. If I had answered, “Of course not, this is a garden,” the glassed-in orange tree would have been there today, under the care of the smelting plant. Instead I replied, “This is a work of art. It is in the nature of a work of art to be open to the interpretations of the onlookers.” They chose to spend the money on a plantation with no conservatory. More than ten years later I was again face to face with a site with a harsh climate. This time I had a commission. What I had to show was not much of a draft – a piece of clay which I placed in the model of the building together with a couple of quick, hand-drawn sketches. The glass structure was a freestanding, curved form, as big as possible. Its contours were as softly sweeping as those of the Crystal Palace in London in the middle of the 19th century. It was an orangery or a greenhouse in the proper sense of the word: simple, clear glass, perhaps some moisture on the glass from the plants and the soil. A protected garden in an impossible spot, planted on top of an underground garage. They chose the most extreme solution, the one whose size was the most provocative. The project proceeded. I had a clear idea of the Glass Bubble but it was not easy to find a builder. The project manager Christer contacted Happolds in London. We went there – the members of the board, Christer and I – to discuss different construction strategies, and we took the opportunity to visit both old and new glass structures. The contract for the glass job was placed in the same way as my contract, only this time I was on the committee. We singled out the three most interesting firms. Christer and I visited them. Octatube in the Netherlands, which is run by Mick Eekhout, inventor, constructor and architect, was by far the best. Together we continued to develop the construction. At the second meeting in Delft Mick said, “There are three kinds of project: things we have done before and know we can handle; border-cases – things we have not done before but which can perhaps be done; and, third, things we know we cannot build. Things go wrong only in one type of project”. “Which one?” I asked. “When you work with things you have done previously. You relax, thinking
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that you are able to do it, and suddenly you make a mistake”. “OK,” I said. “What about the Glass Bubble? Have you done anything similar before?” “Well, we have built similar structures, not exactly the same but similar ones”. “So how can we make it more difficult? How can we change the construction to make it a greater challenge?” Now all the participants, except for Christer, the project manager, who had become a bit nervous from this new development, felt elated and alert and started to come up with ideas for simplifications and improvements. The horizontal framework was removed altogether, and all that remained was steel arches anchored in the ground and glass binding the arches together. The glass became supporting like an eggshell. No pains were spared during the planning and design work. Octatube built mock-ups, that is full-scale models, parts of the glasshouse where we compared thermopane against glass, crystal against glass, and tested how the steel structure looked and how the glass-panes were secured. The models were erected in the big hall at Octatube. It all looked enormous indoors. Lena, one of the board members, exclaimed, “Wow! Is it going to be that big!” “No, this is just half the size”, said Mick. When the whole structure was assembled in an open space outside the workshop as a test it suddenly seemed quite small. Everything is relative. When the shape of the bubble was clearly indicated on its concrete foundation in the yard it looked big again. Was there really enough room for it here? The empty yard appeared small and bare. The tenants had already moved in. The structure was erected, and suddenly everything fell into place. The Glass Bubble belonged here, like a piece of a magical jigsaw puzzle. The Glass Bubble proved to be perfect for this spot. In the inner courtyard there was hardly any wind at all anymore, and it also became much brighter due to the reflected light. During the planning and design stage we saw to it that the construction was as light and transparent as possible. Inside the bubble you experience a sense of space – it actually feels bigger than the courtyard it sits in. The Glass Bubble is at its biggest and highest at the front of the site. Here the tenants can sit, sheltered from the wind, close to the adjacent promenade, and watch the sea, the weather and life. A roof over one’s head. A safe spot from where you can start exploring the world. The humidity inside creates moist on the glass walls, from the outside it looks like a breathing organism. The outdoor space was designed with pine trees, grasses and raised beds creating an atmosphere of a Swedish pine forest. Inside the glass construction we created a feeling of a Mediterranean forest and selected species that would survive zero degrees. The Glass Bubble has been given a lot of attention, and it has been met with much appreciation too. Couples have gotten married inside, and it has served as the stage for the shooting of a film. It has been seen on numerous magazine cov-
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ers, prominent guests have visited it and people strolling past notice it and take pictures. The Glass Bubble has the potential of becoming a meeting-place, a spot where the old people living here can meet others who are interested in gardens and architecture, just as in New York and parts of England where privately owned houses and gardens are open to visitors certain hours every week. There are many people who press their noses to the glass, wondering if they might come in. As of yet they cannot. Personally I wish that my next winter garden could be open to the public and that many more people could experience it from the inside. The Glass Bubble project is an impossible garden and an incubator. A magical trick that changed a windy, dark, narrow garage roof site into lush garden with Mediterranean flora leading to improvement of overall conditions; climate, space, privacy, diversity, light inside the Bubble and outside of it. At the same time the garden is at the mercy of its owners with other, more conventional, gardening ideals as green lawns and flowering roses. Two Piers Sidensjö, Örnsköldsvik, 2005 Type of project: Site-specific sculpture on world heritage site (figs. 8-11) Material: Blasted stainless steel, wood, LED lamps Dimensions: 2 piers 20 and 30 meters long, 1.5 m wide. Total area of site 7100 m2. Commissioned by: Sigrid, Johan and Jonas Nätterlund Memorial Foundation The Two Piers may seem meaningless where they stand apparently reaching for the hillside. The body of water by which they are placed is much lower down. And they would not have been useful as landings in the lake either. With railings all around they are rather like balconies, balconies sticking out from a hillside, or levels measuring the steepness of the slope. The history of the piers begins in Jonas Nätterlund’s last will and testament written in 1961. He clearly expressed that the assets left at his death were to form Sigrid, Johan and Jonas Nätterlund’s Memorial Foundation. The proceeds of the fund were to be used for buying artworks and sculptures for the adornment of public premises and places in his native district, the rural district of Nätra-Sidensjö. Jonas lived nearly all his life in Stockholm, leaving his birthplace at the age of twenty and visiting it only once, two years before he wrote the will, for his moth-
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er’s funeral. And yet he gave all his money to adorning this remote area where he was born, money for art and sculptures for a sparsely populated region that does not believe it needs adornments – the scenery is beautiful enough.
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Lake Drömme The Foundation invited me to make an adornment for a place overlooking the lake called Lake Drömme or Drömmesjön. I interpreted the name as a lake for dreaming, with dreams or a dreamt lake. The landscape where the lake is situated is dreamlike and exceptionally beautiful. The lake flows into the sea at The High Coast, an area inscribed on the World Heritage List. The working team of the foundation chose the site by the lake because the National Road Administration was to build a lay-by for the road passing by the lake. The reason why they invited me was that I am used to working with art that is linked to landscape. I spent a long time making draughts. The ideas were few in spite of the rich sources of inspiration: the life story of Jonas Nätterlund, the exciting geography and cultural history of the area. It was as if Drömmesjön was enchanted. It did not want any adornment. I was hoping to be able to anchor my design somehow in the lay-by. This is where people would stop and rest. Perhaps a combination was possible, a lay-by with artistic value. But cooperating with the National Road Administration was not an option. Their construction work was quick; the lay-by was finished. It was a “free-hand” job, as the contractor who was responsible for the project told me – reluctantly, not being used to having to explain why – when I asked for the draughts. He said that they had done their best, that this was a firstclass lay-by – top-standard, with a flush toilet. Here people can take a break, use the toilet, sit down at the tables and eat, look at the view. All the damage caused by the construction work would soon be healed by nature; nothing to worry about, he said. All right, this is one way of looking at design. Two Piers I started to sketch on the slope towards the lake again. I experimented with pavilions, little houses made of wire mesh which would diffuse the image of the lake in order for it to come into sharp focus again once you left the pavilion. I placed the pavilion on the hillside, below and away from the lay-by. It was given a footbridge to the entrance. And suddenly I found myself in a state of flow; it was obvious that no pavilion was needed. The footbridge sufficed as a springboard into the air above the landscape and into the landscape. With two footbridges another dimension was added as they formed a relation to each other – different heights at the end, different lengths, somewhat different angles. My suggestion was accepted. We signed the contract. Some of the people living in the nearby village of Näs were upset and protested against the project; this was not really art. I could understand their point of view. They had longed for a statue, perhaps one of a farmer ploughing his land with a horse, some cultural historical document showing that this was an area that had been cultivated for a long time. They wanted a monument, preferably in bronze. But the two piers – how can they
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be called art? What are they doing here? That a place can be a work of art in itself was an inconceivable and obviously crazy idea. I made an addition to the title: “Two Piers – the treasure is where the two piers meet”. Suddenly, the two piers could be seen as representing something. What they represented was a matter of interpretation. The treasure could be buried where the imaginary extensions of the two piers intersect, or the treasure could be this place by the two piers as there’s obviously two of them. Or it could be the meeting between the beholder and this place that is valuable or else that there’s something valuable in the meeting between two persons, or … So much depends on chance, but also on hard work, on somebody, or some people working very hard for something, wanting something special in spite of opposition and skepticism. For a while I felt like giving this project up. I could have said: Sorry, I don’t do figurative bronze sculptures. I could have left with my fee for the draughts. I wouldn’t have had to take the financial risk for the construction work when the price of stainless steel kept rising. Then, I thought that it is more exciting to complete a project than to give it up and that Jonas Nätterlund had saved money all his life for this project. The piers were constructed, and today the place is appreciated and valuable for the region, for excursions, as a site for events and festivals or individual experiences. Stepping out on the jetties feels like flying. You walk straight out without any effort and you take off. Once you let go of the ground, the surrounding landscape becomes much more tangible and the experience much stronger. Two Piers are two sculptural elements, measure instruments for reading the landscape. Two Piers could be seen as a garden with no borders that uses the japanese art of “shakkei” or “borrowed scenery and landscape”. The full experience of the artwork occurs through movement along the piers and bodily experience of height along the movement. La Familia Emergency entrance at Skåne University Hospital, Malmö, 2010 (figs. 12-15) Type of project: Site-specific sculpture constellation at hospital emergency entrance Material: Polyester (reinforced with fiberglass) in color variations from blue to green, LED lamps
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Dimensions: 5 different sculptures (in total 27 pcs) of varying size, length 0.4 m-0.9 m and hight 0.8 m-1.2 m Commissioned by: Skåne Regional Council La Familia is a garden where no vegetation was possible. It is an artwork that is an artificial garden that tells a story of a real garden through its sensual qualities of color, light and shapes. Five sculptural elements multiplied to in total 27 occupy and inhibit the entrance to the emergency reception at the hospital area. The garden was made entirely of plastics because of the fear of unwanted live organisms that might penetrate into the buildings if real plants were allowed to creep on the walls. Plastic objects that gain life through light and turn a none site into an inhabited place. The title La Familia is about connection affinity and relationships. With the friendly and with the threatening, with all living things. With patients and with
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the hospital staff, with other people. La Familia is welcoming you even if you come alone. The assembly of light sculptures greet you at the entrance to the emergency entrance and infection clinic. The color and shapes reminiscent of other animals and plants and all living things. The members of the family are many. Irregular soft shapes up in the ceiling and on the floor in the entrance. They meet you when you pass on the way in and out. You can stop for a moment to sit on the large circular protrusion with them. They are there together in the entrance; above, around us, beside us. Some of them are scattered and gathered, they form a unit together that radiates softness and warmth. They welcome the visitor like an embrace and want to touch and be touched. In the evening when it is dark, they provide light and bring with it a sense of security and hope. Their shape resemble flowers, hearts or even butterflies where they sit in the ceiling, on the ground. They radiate comfort and playfulness at the same time. The sculptures are made from the same reinforced plastic material as some boats are made of, only more transparent and with significantly greater thickness. The material distributes the light evenly, the small pigment particles are “floating” in the plastic and give an iridescent color and slight color shifts. La Familia is an artificial garden where sensual qualities of color, light and shapes tell the story of a garden. A none site is turned into a place to pass through or linger on.
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Kamel Louafi
Art in Public Space
Nature Art near Arris, Algeria Erosion and dune formation, along with vegetation development/succession, are important quasi creative or sculptural works of nature; they lead to natural forms of frequently incomparable beauty, not explicitly functional, emerging from a transformative process (fig. 1). Such metamorphoses are the inspiration for our installations, spatial designs, buildings, and sculptures. Our artistic intentions are, right from the conceptual stage, integral parts of the parks, squares and gardens. The objects, spaces and sculptural work we devise are complementary features within the design framework of the open space – part of the ensemble – and our interpretation of its history, the place, the vision; they are part of the landscape. Every artistic approach and sculpture is devised in relation to the project as a whole and cannot be transplanted to another location; they assert their autonomy but do not ignore their context. The creation initially evolves like a painting of several layers. The geometry, the references, the requirements of the site comprise the first layer; they are then readopted, instrumentalised, allocated, extended, and thus create the first outlines of the composition as a whole. The first layer is overlaid with a second, they merge and create a new layer. The first silhouettes emerge, the image acquires form, the interpretation takes shape, the intentions become visible. The imaginary is articulated, it expresses emotion, arises as manifestation: the eye discovers the creation. Art is born, with character, and restraint, without denaturising the overall intention. It is a matter of articulating the invisible, materialising it, eschewing ignorance of the context, connecting the art with the landscape.
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Ballet of the Scarecrows at EXPO 2000 in Hannover Scarecrows are the eternal witnesses of farming; they have been part of the landscape from time immemorial in every culture and, despite manifold technological developments, will continue to accompany human history through the 21st century. Several scarecrow sculptures made of rattan in the Expo parkland invoked its agricultural uses before the World Exhibition – a reference to soil sealing (figs. 2-9).
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The theme of “art in public space” is increasingly attracting general attention and heated debate. Reasons for this development usually lie in people’s growing identification with public space and the reclaimed tradition of civic participation. Public space projects have become an issue for politicians, journalists, local residents and simple passers-by; the projects’ intentions and design ideas are often called into question or even rejected. Such art installations as the sculptures of Niki de Saint Phalle in Hannover or her fountain at the Centre Pompidou in Paris were initially met with scepticism and only later accepted, even becoming city landmarks and points of reference. Such processes are a long time in the making; today, art installations and sculptures in public space must increasingly, if they are to be accepted, take account of the space in their substance and technical features, and often be devised specifically and exclusively for the site. They must, in effect, be designed to complement the new or existing spaces. Nevertheless, there will continue to be approaches that assert the autonomy of the works – that stand for themselves alone and could also be erected elsewhere. They, too, will be valid, and there will always be such works of art. Art does not automatically address a social component; it can exist for its own sake, as a purely aesthetic entity. It can also, however, enlighten and/or aggravate or provoke discussion through its substance and intentions. Conversely, site-specific art installations are subject to the restraints of creative, economic and social integration, and obliged to fulfil the desired function of their use. Platz der Fünf Kontinente (Brillplatz) in Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxemburg An international competition was announced, I entered as landscape architect and artist in collaboration with the HerbstKunkler architecture practice, and we won. Along with the garden art I designed fifteen bronze sculptures totalling twelve metres in length (figs. 10-16). There were reservations, not publicly, but involving discussions: ‘[…] 15 works of art by a landscape planner – here, fifteen different artists could work.’ was one frequent comment. I did not ignore this but presented my concept to artists, opponents, supporters and anyone interested. I said that although I had won the international competition I would not exclude other solutions, and furthermore explained that my artistic concept was part of the entire concept and that the sculptures were thematic leitmotifs for the structure as a whole. I mentioned in passing that when we are no longer here, in 100 or 200 years, the gardener would still be able to refer to the bronze sculptures when trimming and shaping the hedge forms. Someone called out from the floor of the hall: ‘How are fifteen artists supposed to achieve this complementarity better […]?“ I contended that my artistic sculptures were individual and would only work in this
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space and within this concept. ‘Without the entire composition the sculptures are worthless; the intention is contrary to the “autonomy of art”.’ I answered further questions to clarify the issue. The casting models were made full-size over 16 months in Berlin. From my sketches we transferred the textures to the surface, the bronzes were cast at the Gugg foundry in Schwabing, and in June 2013 we set up the fifteen sculptures in Esch-sur-Alzette. Already, on the evening of their unveiling, remarks by some visitors were very forthright: ‘Are such sculptures right for this rough district?’ ‘Will people respect them?’ It sounded as if they saw no place for art in this district of the proletariat, workers, immigrants and steelworkers. When we are no longer here, in 100 or 200 years, the gardener will still be able to refer to the bronze sculptures when trimming and shaping the hedge forms.
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As landscape architects and planners, we must not only offer space for art in our concepts but also think as artists ourselves. In this we must ensure that public space is not privatised and that it endures as a stage – AGORA – for its users, for diverse uses, and for art. We currently find ourselves in the midst of a social debate about the value of public space. Often we hear: ‘Is this design intention appropriate for this district
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and its inhabitants?’ or ‘Why change things?’ It is important that landscape architects, artists and others work outside this kind of scepticism. As soon as the Platz der Fünf Kontinente with my fifteen bronze sculptures was opened in a “difficult” district of Esch-sur-Alzette in Luxemburg the first derogatory comments about such high-quality measures in this location were made. We have heard similar remarks about the Königsplatz in Kassel with its 36 bronze sculptures and Welfengarten with its long sofa in Hannover’s Herrenhausen Gardens. The joyfulness with which children, local residents and visitors have appropriated these spaces and their works of art consoles us for all the stress and confrontation that we went through during the years of planning and even afterwards.
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Mario Schjetnan
Art and Landscape
Introduction Landscape architecture is the art of creating spaces through the encounter of sky and land. The landscape architect manipulates the surface of the earth to create new topographies. Our raw material is made of natural elements – vegetable, mineral and aquatic – and we construct horizontal and vertical elements that communicate, contain, and expand the new landscape. Both, architecture and landscape architecture are professions that are geared to improve the quality of life of an individual and a community. Landscape architecture mediates between the user and the environment with the aim of improving both. Landscape architecture is dynamic and alive; it grows, evolves, adapts, transforms. It is being, it is place, but it is also trajectory and movement, displacement. It is essentially phenomenological and temporal. It is light ordered by time, by geography, by season, by the hour. It connects us to nature, signaling our place within a larger cosmic system. Landscape architecture is therefore, art: it communicates and provokes emotions and moves a spiritual notion through ideas and concepts and therefore forms part of the world of culture. The great Mexican poet Octavio Paz writes in his book “The bow and the lyre”1 his definition of poetry and I have taken some of his concepts and definitions to extend them to the art of landscape architecture: “Phrases, words: when put together, the poet recites; and when put together, composes a poem”. “Poems can be metaphors, symbols, allegories, myths, fables, memories, and images”. We can borrow from Paz this concept to extend it to landscape architecture. The landscape artist composes by producing the notion of place through images, atmospheres and SPIRIT. Paz continues: “The poem does not say what it is, but what it wants to be”. Therefore, I add: the landscape work is an ASPIRATION. Art is the transcendence of the ordinary: Not all literature is art. Not all sculpture is art. Not all landscape work is art. Art transcends when it evokes and provokes emotions. When it inspires, when it invites to think, to question. An artist discerns a new way to see.
1 Paz, Octavio, El arco y la Lira: El poema, la revelación poética, poesía e historia, México, Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1956.
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Landscape and city The city is a complex construct, a system developed over time by multiple actors and agents. Morphologically, it consists of both open and closed spaces constructed by systems and networks of supply, communication and movement: buildings, structures, vehicles and infrastructures. It is a dynamic metabolic system that generates energy and waste. And in the end it is a natural system, one shaped by its geography: topographic, hydrologic, climatic, geological, and vegetative. Urban design is therefore eminently multidisciplinary. It is where architects, landscape architects, urban planners and engineers come together. Therefore, the great challenge of urban design is to strike a balance between the natural and the artificial, between mass and open space, and to create environments that foster habitability, beauty and quality of life. The ideal city is the one that satisfies needs in terms of safety, health, work, movement, culture, education and recreation as well as to provide poetry and beauty. It is one of the mediums to provide equality and to offer and open opportunities for every inhabitant. A methodology: the elements of the design The ability to combine, arrange and express the elements of the landscape architecture project are the eternal factors for the organization and composition of the built work. They are, as we well know, the manipulation of land and topography; the proper use and presence of vegetation and its palette. Also, water, in its many forms and manifestations; mineral elements such as stone, concrete, steel, and the infinite combined materials of pavements and surfaces: either horizontal or vertical. And finally, the integration of structures: being platforms, terraces, walls, buildings, bridges, towers, and so on. These elements constitute the letters of the landscape alphabet. The medium to create a sublime poem or in opposition, the most ordinary, bizarre or mediocre of landscapes. These elements, used eternally from the origins of the pre-hispanic temples, sacred cities and landscapes, to the creation of the productive islands or “Chinampas” of Xochimilco in the Valley of Anáhuac in the 9th Century; down to the plazas, patios and Colonial cities founded by the Spanish conquerors; to the modernist inspirational creations of a Luis Barragán or Roberto Burle Marx. The two great modernist landscape architects from México and Brazil, who transformed the vocabulary and expression of landscape design in the first half of the 20th century, having composed memorable moments of art and truly, poetic environments.
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Five case studies Xochimilco Ecological Park Xochimilco, Mexico City, 1993. The rehabilitation and restoration of Xochimilco’s lacustrine district formed part of a larger project undertaken by Mexico City’s government following the designation of the area, as a World Heritage Site in 1987. Xochimilco’s identity and typology is heavily based in the “chinampa” system, formed by artificial islands contained by “ahuejote” trees (Salix bondplantiana), Xochimilco’s guardian tree. Since its origins in the 9th Century, this intensive, sustainable agronomic system has been the most important technological innovation of the pre-Hispanic culture, as the chinampas supplied food to the lake towns of the Anahuac Valley, allowing the Aztecs to conquer other parts of Mesoamerica and the possibility to develop art, architecture and urbanism. Chinampas are not only an intensive, sustainable production system, but also represent the creation of a beautiful cultural and memorable landscape. Xochimilco Ecological Park, with an area of 277 hectares, is part of this vast ambitious project, consisting in the intervention of a 3,000 hectare district, encompassing the re-engineering of the chinampa zone and its canals, horticulture and
Water spouts near the entrance and the lagoon view (photo: Gabriel Figueroa)
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silvicultural production with a large new nursery, three sewage treatment plants, road infrastructure, and the creation of a new city park with recreational and sport facilities as well as a sprawling plant market. On-site research was conducted by a team of historians and archaeologists, as well as engineers, ecologists and biologists, who made key contributions regarding the myths, history and toponymy of lakes, mountains and settlements. Engineers focused on the level of water tables, hydrology, the possibility to excavate lakes, as well as considerations and limitations regarding soil mechanics. Ecologists discussed how to create a variety of ecosystems in the wetlands and where to find plants to repopulate them and attract species of avifauna that had long disappeared from Xochimilco. The park’s different sections are oriented towards mayor mountains establishing ample visual axis to the regional landscape. But the central concept of the ecological park is water, which manifests itself in a variety of forms and elements. A systems of aqueducts and water spouts, branching from the entrance, mark the feeding of large amounts of treated water into the main lake. Further on, a helixshaped tower above a square tank contains potable water. A group of lakes and wetlands was designed, with varying depths and shapes to create diverse ecosystems of plants, birds and amphibians. A canal was also dug towards the south, to connect with the historic chinampa area. A visitor information center was designed at the plaza entrance, consisting of a square building and circular patio with water, opened to the sky. The roof was converted into a large observation deck that can be accessed from the plaza via a ramp. The plant market is located in the park’s northern section, with a capacity of
Water spouts near the entrance (photo: Jerry Harpur)
Mario Schjetnan 207 Chinampas, trajineras and outdoor amphi theater (photo: Michael Calderwood)
1,800 shops. A true landscape of rich variety of plants is exposed for sale. Lagoons capturing water from parking and roads are interspersed in the sports park. Xochimilco Ecological Park is a microcosm of a historical – cultural landscape – expressing its different ecological, historical, aquatic and agricultural attributes. It is a landscape architectural project on a large scale, recovering the lacustrine landscapes of the Anáhuac Valley. La Mexicana Park Cuajimalpa, Mexico City, 2018. In the midst of a complex and disconcerting cacophony of tall office and residential towers located in the western hills and outskirts of the metropolitan area, a new edge-city sprung in this area from the reaction to the destruction that the great earthquake left Mexico City in 1985. The site is a 41 hectare impacted scour that for 50 years was a sand, gravel and stone quarry. La Mexicana mine was shot down in the late 1980’s and for many years the communities and residents fought to build a park on this city owned parcel. After intense negotiations with the city authorities an agreement was settled to sell 30 % of the site to developers and 70 % would be dedicated to the construction of a world class park. The developers were to build the park and infrastructure first, as payment for the developable parcels with the possibility to build up to 1,600 apartments. The masterplan was developed by our firm Grupo de Diseño Urbano in collaboration with the architectural office of Victor Marquez Arquitectos. Conceptually, the park is structured through a “human axis” and a “humid axis”, which twine together through the park’s length, composed through a sequence of fountains, channels, bioswales and lakes. The park is designed to collect and manage stormwater for irrigation. The human axis is a sequence of gardens attached to the main
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La Mexicana Park Master Plan, Mario Schjetnan - GDU and Víctor Márquez Arquitectos
pedestrian way, connecting platforms and topographical spaces which are up or down the walking stroll. The result is a very dynamic sequence of topographies, forested spaces, mea dows and terraces, water pools, fountains and grassy slopes. After close investigation of unstable subsoil’s, debris and the resulting topography of the quarry exploitation, and on the other hand a continuous dialogue with the community associations a clear and precise program emerged: running and bicycle paths, children’s play areas, a dog park, a skate facility, grass and meadows, lookout points and serene spaces, an open air amphitheater, intense forestation and shade.
Entrance doors to the park (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
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In addition, a careful business plan was developed to have amenities, services, restaurants and parking as concessions for the economical sustainability of the park. The public park will be managed by a trust fund with representatives of the authorities, the community and a local university.
Water feature and walk way entrance (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
Night view of main plaza and skyline (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
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Natura Garden, Bicentennial Park Miguel Hidalgo, Mexico City, 2011. Natura Garden is key part of the Bicentennial Park Master Plan, a public space built on the site of the old Azcapotzalco refinery in northwestern Mexico City. The Azcapotzalco refinery closed in 1988 after producing gasoline, oil and lubricants for 70 years. According to the presidential decree for its closure, the 55-hectare industrial facility would be used as a public park. After multiple studies of the site’s characteristics, soil, and subsoil, Pemex began remediation in 2007. The cleanup and remediation strategy occurred in three stages. Liquid extraction, semi-solid extraction, gas extraction and the airing and ventilation of the soil was carried out by zone, in accordance with the Pemex studies. Industrial facilities (towers, tanks, ground-level pipes, etc.) were dismantled immediately after the plant´s closure, while all subterranean infrastructures (foundations, pipes, tanks, etc.) remained on site. Among the buildings, only the power station and a large open tank were preserved. The master plan, developed by an interdisciplinary group, was the winner of a nationwide competition organized by the federal government. The park’s design responded to the site’s soil conditions and was based around smaller parks or gardens with different themes: Natura, a botanical garden; Viento (Wind), an athletic area; Tierra (Earth), an open space for unstructured play, family outings, field days and other events; Sol (Sun), the old power station, which was converted into an
Aerial view of Bicentennial Park, in foreground The Natura Botanical Garden (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
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Chinampa in the aquatic garden / temperate wetland (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
alternative energy museum; Agua (Water), containing a large artificial lake with treated water for irrigation and recreation. Natura is built on an eight-hectare parcel in the northeastern section of the park, close to the Refineria subway station, and constitutes the main entrance to the site. It is important to note that Pemex’s tanker trucks were loaded with gasoline in this section of the site and there was a 40 cm slab of concrete over the entire area, which was not demolished so the garden was built on top of it. This botanical garden has sections for each of Mexico’s eight most important biomes. Five of them are outdoors and three of them are located in glass greenhouses, which stand out as symbolic elements of the urban landscape. An orchid garden was also designed within the park’s last remaining tank.
Orchidarium (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
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The greenhouses are 15 x 15 x 15 m glass cubes-modules with translucent roofs in the form of an inverted pyramid, funneling rainwater and introducing it into the tanks to be injected into the subsoil. The garden’s topographic design was based around the needs of the plants from each biome: the desert section, for example, is practically at ground level, while the tropical forest biome requires four meters of additional soil. The orchid garden was located in the old tank, whose dimensions are 15 x 100 x 5 m. At the base, a humid jungle was created with walkways that appear to float above it. Each supporting element or container in the orchid garden hangs from the translucent roof structure, creating a magical, immersive sensation as visitor slowly descend into this enclosed space. Canal de la Cortadura Tampico, Tamaulipas, 2004-2018 This project was designed to provide a major infrastructure upgrade for a Gulf Coast city that enjoyed a petroleum boom in the first half of the 20th century but underwent in decline in the second half. The focus was to improve a 1.5 kilometer long canal near the city’s historic district. The canal connects a large lagoon to the Panuco River, and the river discharges into the Gulf of Mexico. Historically, the canal provided safe port into the lagoon, called Laguna del Carpintero. Today, the lagoon is acceptably clean and provides open space, parks and a Convention Centre in the middle of the city.
Aerial view of Canal de la Cortadura and surrounding neighborhoods (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
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The canal itself became very polluted, with illegal discharges of black water, trash and non-navigable. Unsightly concrete abutments and houses were built in some portions right up to the edge of the water. In 2004, when we were selected to do the project, the whole district was socially and economically deteriorated. The goal was to recover the waterfront space for public use and create a navigable waterway from lagoon to the Pánuco River. Our firm, Grupo de Diseño Urbano (GDU) proposed redesigning the canal’s edge as a continuous pedestrian space featuring walkways, gardens, plazas and terraces. Pedestrian paths would be lowered and separated from streets. Connections across the canal, from the barrios to the downtown would be improved by the addition of six vehicular bridges and seven pedestrian crossings (also designed by GDU). Along the canal, opportunities would be provided for residential and commercial use. In addition, an old marketplace was restored and its waterfront turned into a terrace with small restaurants. At the other end, a community plaza includes a small amphitheater, kiosks and children’s playground. Two tourist barges provide trips along the canal connecting both ends and trips into the Carpintero Lagoon. The project’s most challenging technical feature involved deciding how to treat the canal’s edge after dredging and widening it. The plan involved using metal sheet piling to contain the sides and then capping and filling behind them. This would allow for a variety of edge features: both stepped and sloped, hardscape or planted along the project. By widening and deepening the canal, and cleaning the canal from illegal discharges, water runs more freely and cleanly from river to lagoon, as a result of
Canal de la Cortadura public spaces (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
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stronger daily tides. Increased fauna has been observed now in the canal: fish, egrets, cormorants, crustaceans, etc. Intense night lighting, benches, children’s playgrounds, plants and shade trees have contributed for people to intensely use the area. Signs of initial investments in the form of small restaurants, stores and apartments start to sparsely appear, contributing to the improvement and resurgence of the entire district. IMMSA Master Plan. Remediation of San Luis Potosi Industrial Plant San Luis Potosí, San Luis Potosí, 2004-2018 The IMMSA San Luis Master Plan was created in the context of the global-contemporary urban development movement that aims to recycle large expanses of obsolete industrial land which has lived out its productive life. In general, these sites are found in urban environments with excellent infrastructure. This transformation consists of a careful, scientific restoration process to clean up the land and its structures and an evaluation and selection process for the buildings to be recycled, reinterpreted and reinserted into a new urban context. This trend has been named “post-industrial urbanism” for the creation of sustainable cities. This vision emphasizes the landscape, ecology, and sustainable water use and energy conservation, complemented by public transportation and bicycle lanes, thus integrating new architecture into its urban context. Another theoretical condition is centered around the multiplicity of land uses, including urban subcenter and housing of diverse types and socioeconomic levels, along with services for educational, business and cultural institutions. This master plan incorporates a modern industrial plant for the productions of zinc, which meets the highest environmental and noise control standards. The plan
Remediation. Structure of the soil capping (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
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Aerial view of the Bicentennial Park (photo: Francisco Gómez Sosa)
also includes a generous system of open spaces, including parks, reservoirs and natural conservation areas, as well as malls and a 14 kilometer bicycle lane system. The IMMSA San Luis Master Plan has been implemented through concrete actions, such as San Luis Potosi Bicentennial Park, a didactic plant nursery, a logistics center, wastewater treatment plants and sites for the disposal of waste products from restoration process. Bibliography Beardsley, John, Mario Schjetnan: Landscape, Architecture and Urbanism, Spacemaker Press, Madison, 2007 Grayson Trulove, James, and Mario Schjetnan, Ten landscapes Mario Schjetnan, Rockport Publishers, Gloucester, 2002 Jonathan, Lerner, The Dream Seller, in: Landscape Architecture Magazine, 108 (2018), pp. 100-116 Paz, Octavio, El arco y la lira: el poema, la revelación poética, poesía e historia, Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico, 1956 Schjetnan, Mario, et al., Reconciling city and nature, Facultad Arquitectura, Ciudad de México, UNAM, 2017 Schjetnan, Mario, Jimena Martignoni, and Roberto Segre, Mario Schjetnan: Entorno urbano y paisaje= Urban Environment and landscape, Arquine, Ciudad de México, 2012
Series of CGL-Studies Vol. 1 Inken Formann Vom Gartenlandt so den Conventualinnen gehört. Die Gartenkultur der evangelischen Frauenklöster und Damenstifte in Norddeutschland Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2006 ISBN: 978-3-89975-040-3 Vol. 2 Bianca Maria Rinaldi The „Chinese Garden in Good Taste“. Jesuits and Europe´s Knowledge of Chinese Flora and Art of the Garden in the 17th and 18th Centuries Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2006 ISBN: 978-3-89975-041-1 Vol. 3 Gert Gröning, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Naturschutz und Demokratie!? Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2006 ISBN: 978-3-89975-077-2 Vol. 4 Eberhard Eckerle, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Landschaft, Architektur, Kunst, Design. Norbert Schittek zum 60. Geburtstag Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2006 ISBN: 978-3-89975-076-4 Vol. 5 Hubertus Fischer, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Gärten und Parks im Leben der jüdischen Bevölkerung nach 1933 Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2008 ISBN: 978-3-89975-144-4 Vol. 6 Hermann J. Roth, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Carl-Hans Hauptmeyer, Gesa Schönermark (eds.) Klostergärten und klösterliche Kulturlandschaften. Historische Aspekte und aktuelle Fragen Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2009 ISBN: 978-3-89975-167-3
Vol. 7 Hubertus Fischer, Julia Matveev, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Natur- und Landschaftswahrnehmung in deutschsprachiger jüdischer und christlicher Literatur der ersten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2010 ISBN: 978-3-89975-185-7 Vol. 8 Andrea Koenecke, Udo Weilacher, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Die Kunst, Landschaft neu zu erfinden. Werk und Wirken von Bernard Lassus Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2010 ISBN: 978-3-89975-116-1 Vol. 9 Géza Hajós, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Gartendenkmalpflege zwischen Konservieren und Rekonstruieren Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2011 ISBN: 978-3-89975-217-5 Vol. 10 Rosemarie Münzenmayer, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Der Garten als Kunstwerk – Der Garten als Denkmal Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2012 ISBN: 978-3-89975-276-2 Vol. 11 Hubertus Fischer, Sigrid Thielking, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Reisen in Parks und Gärten. Umrisse einer Rezeptions- und Imaginationsgeschichte Martin Meidenbauer, Munich, 2012 ISBN: 978-3-89975-288-5 Vol. 12 Katharina Peters Die Hofgärtner in Herrenhausen. Werk und Wirken unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der „Gärtnerdynastie“ Wendland AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2013 ISBN: 978-3-95477-003-8
Vol. 13 Sophie Gräfin von Schwerin Der Berggarten. Seine wissenschaftliche Bedeutung und sein Stellenwert als botanischer Garten im (exemplarischen) Vergleich AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2013 ISBN: 978-3-95477-004-5
Vol. 19 Irmela von der Lühe, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Landschaften – Gärten – Literaturen. Festschrift für Hubertus Fischer AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2013 ISBN: 978-3-95477-017-5
Vol. 14 Sigrid Thielking, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Herrenhausen im internationalen Vergleich. Eine kritische Betrachtung AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2013 ISBN: 978-3-95477-005-2
Vol. 20 Hansjörg Küster, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Zu den Qualitäten klösterlicher Kulturlandschaften. Geschichte, Kultur, Umwelt und Spiritualität AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2014 ISBN: 978-3-95477-024-3
Vol. 15 Peter Fibich Gartendenkmalpflege in der DDR. Handlungsstrukturen und Positionen eines Fachgebiets AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2013 ISBN: 978-3-95477-011-3 Vol. 16 Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Klaus-Henning von Krosigk (eds.) 50 Jahre Arbeitskreis Historische Gärten in der DGGL. Einblicke in die jüngere Geschichte der Gartendenkmal pflege in Deutschland AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2013 ISBN: 978-3-95477-008-3 Vol. 17 Hubertus Fischer (eds.) Zukunft aus Landschaft gestalten. Stichworte zur Landschaftsarchitektur AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2014 ISBN: 978-3-95477-009-0 Vol. 18 Hubertus Fischer, Sarah Ozacky-Lazar, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Environmental Policy and Landscape Architecture AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2014 ISBN: 978-3-95477-010-6
Vol. 21 Andrea Koenecke Walter Rossow (1910-1992): „Die Landschaft im Bewußtsein der Öffentlichkeit“ AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2014 ISBN: 978-3-95477-029-8 Vol. 22 Gert Gröning Von Dangast nach Colorado Springs. Irma FranzenHeinrichsdorff 1892–1983. Leben und Werk der ersten Absolventin eines Gartenarchitekturstudiums AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2014 ISBN: 978-3-95477-030-4 Vol. 23 Hubertus Fischer, Georg Ruppelt, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Eine Reise in die Schweiz. Das Reisetagebuch des hannoverschen Hofgärtners Heinrich Ludolph Wendland aus dem Jahr 1820 AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2015 ISBN: 978-3-95477-053-3 Vol. 24 Gert Gröning From Dangast to Colorado Springs – Irma Franzen-Heinrichsdorff 1892–1983. Notes on the Life and Work of the First Woman Graduate in Landscape Architecture AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2016 ISBN: 978-3-95477-061-8
Vol. 25 Marcus Köhler, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Hanover and England – a garden and personal union? AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2018 ISBN: 978-3-95477-081-6 Vol. 26 Hubertus Fischer, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, John Beardsley (eds.) Reisen und Gärten. Reisen, Reiseberichte und Gärten vom Mittelalter bis in die Gegenwart AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2019 ISBN: 978-3-95477-087-8
Vol. 27 Tal Alon-Mozes, Irene Aue-Ben-David, Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn (eds.) Jewish horticultural schools and training centers in Germany and their impact on horticulture and landscape architecture in Palestine / Israel AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2020 ISBN: 978-3-95477-092-2 Vol. 28 Joachim Wolschke-Bulmahn, Ronald Clark (eds.) From Garden Art to Landscape Architecture. Traditions, Re-Evaluations, and Future Perspectives AVM-Verlag, Munich, 2021 ISBN: 978-3-95477-125-7