OPERARTIONAL CONSTRUCTS
from california to europe
juan prieto california polytechnic university, pomona
landscape architecture study abroad santa chiara, fall 20016
INDEX Introduction 3 1 2
Chapter
4-7
Chapter
8-9
3
Chapter
10-13
4
Chapter
14-21
5
Chapter
22-27
6
Chapter
28-30
7
Chapter
31-32
8
Chapter
33-34
9
Chapter
35-36
10
Chapter
37-41
11
Chapter
42-43
12
Chapter
44-46
Introduction As a quiet and rather reflective individual in the unknowns of Europe, as a stranger inhabiting the Italian landscape absorbing the conditions that have constructed it, have enabled me as a student to go out and explore and learn by means of getting lost. The following text and media is an attempt to deconstruct while constructing knowledge: using experience to improve my understanding of landscape architecture through discovery, research, instinct, and past events. As a student, I was asked to compare and contrast six references as they are applied to the city of Castiglion Firoentino (CFno.) and another city explored. These are, again, attempts as they are my interpretations and personal experiences expressed through photography, drawings, short form writings, and sketches.
References (1)
Walkscapes; Fancesco Creri, Walkscapes
(2)
Gardens and the Larger Landscape; David Leatherbarrow, Chapter 8
(3)
Grafting the Edelweiss on the Cactus Plants, The 1933 Italian Garden Exhibition and its Legacy; Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto
(4)
The Use of History in Landscape Architectural Nostalgia; Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto
(5)
Defining Urban Sites; Andrea Kahn
(6) Definign the Urbanistic Project; Joan Busquets
3
CHAPTER 1: Walkscapes; Fancesco Creri, Walkscapes
4
To open a path, to recognize a place, to comprehend, and to follow an instinct are simple actions and combined they could become useful to us as a tool with which to explore and transform our environment that exists today. This discussion narrates the perception of the landscape through a history of the traversed city. In a meeting at the park, especially one that is unplanned, unexpected, and brief; is where I began constructing the natural landscape and its surroundings. A symbolic form (wandering) that begins to interpret the qualities of the landscape between two contrasting cities, such as Castiglion Firoentino (CFno) and Florence, Italy.
As a traveler, who has no fixed itinerary, but freely moving from place to place in search for this idea of new nature. Today, this idea of new nature lives inside CFno., feeding on its remains and offerings, in exchange, its own presence as new nature that could be experienced only by inhabiting it. The interpretation of Castiglion from the point of view of roaming is based on experimental, radical, or unorthodox tools selected to achieve that surpassing of landscape architecture that was to become the foundation for any understanding of extending the cultural edge (cultural boundaries of what is accepted as the norm or the status quo). Like the Dadaist who discovered a dreamlike surreal aspect to walking (deambulation), a sort of automatic writing in real space, which was capable of revealing the unconscious zones of space, and the repressed memories of the city. Disputing deambulation, I began to construct a form of ‘escape’, which, over the course of my stay in Castiglion Fno. was to come into contact with the nomadic universe. After two months, I was able to provide a series of images of the city. Experimenting with playful creative behavior and unitary environments.
5
memory
CHAPTER 2: Walkscapes; Fancesco Creri, Walkscapes
8
The interpretation of the present city of Florence from the point of view of roaming is based on ‘transurbances’ conducted by an unexperienced traveler such as myself. Without memory, losing oneself amidst urban chaos, I was able to encounter those spaces dada defined as ‘banal’ and places the Surrealist defined as the unconscious city. As a quiet and rather reflective individual I was able to produce a system of new beginnings through which it is possible to drift. As in the labyrinthine of Gori’s Collection at the Fattoria di Celle, by Robert Morris 1982: a strong triangular structure discloses the third active color, to azure of the sky reflected from the surface. As a newcomer, the park offers a high stripped wall, the search for an invisible gate could vary depending on the individual’s assumptions and expectations. Like classical and medieval mazes, begin where they end and end where they begin. Its characteristics features imply metaphorical potential the presence of true and false paths in a multicourse maze may suggest the importance of an ethical choice in this world.
9
CHAPTER 3: Gardens and the Larger Landscape; David
10
Leatherbarrow, Chapter 8
Expressed in this chapter is the idea of distance relative to the city of Castiglion Fiorentino, Italy in contrast to the city of Siena, Italy. That distance, defined by David Leatherbarrow in Gardens and the Larger Landscape, could very well be the relationship to slope and the nearby landscape. Castiglion Fno. is situated on a hill top. The small town of 13,000 people overlooks the Val di Chio and the Preappenines. More distant horizons include the mountains and the nearby districts. Based on historical context, the site lends itself to the protection against threat invasion. Other historical facts alluded to the development of infrastructure at multiple scales, institution, open space, and agriculture.
My intent in this chapter is to demonstrate through a series of photographs and illustrations how distances (David Leatherbarrow: horizontal distance, and vertical distance) that gardens open up within the landscape are culturally significant by virtue of separation. In other words, applying tools to create topographical identity by means of both difference and distance between two contrasting cities. Leatherbarrows three main points expressed in this chapter is the idea of distance relative to site location. That distance, horizontal distance, could very well be the relationship to actual distance and the nearby landscapes. The quality of these perceptual images as they relate to CFno. are in the form of textures, swatches of variant colors, strong points of contrast and the sky, and as well as the agriculture and the city and nearby mountains. The second point Leatherbarrow states is the idea of vertical distance in relationship to ground plane. The vertical distance between the ground plane could very well make all the difference in terms of your perception of space.
11:25
11:27
12
11:59
11:35
11:42
12:05
12:38 12:32
12:15
12:30
12:37
13
CHAPTER 4: Gardens and the Larger Landscape; David
14
Leatherbarrow, Chapter 8
Expressed in this chapter is the idea of distance relative to the city of Castiglion Fiorentino, Italy in contrast to the city of Siena, Italy. That distance, defined by David Leatherbarrow in Gardens and the Larger Landscape, could very well be the relationship to slope and the nearby landscape. Castiglion Fno. is situated on a hill top. The small town of 13,000 people overlooks the Val di Chio and the Preappenines. More distant horizons include the mountains and the nearby districts. Based on historical context, the site lends itself to the protection against threat invasion. Other historical facts alluded to the development of infrastructure at multiple scales, institution, open space, and agriculture.
Siena, like other Tuscan towns is located in the middle of a vast hilly landscape. In contrast to Castiglion, Siena’s path’s served as a destination for movement through buildings, the act of upward movement. Such paths and their destinations can lead you virtually to any space. Yet the upward movement from the street to the sky wasn’t only passage from darkness to light. The upper levels of buildings combined with natural light with opposite qualities, form sky like spaces that stretch into the horizon. Piazza del Campo, for example, the path one takes to get there: on both sides, walls that vary in number of floors and the road closes and opens as you ascend forms a sky like ceiling. Reducing the walls of the building to light plus geometry. Making this a unique approach to perceiving space differently.
CHAPTER 5: Grafting the Edelweiss on the Cactus Plants, The 1933 Italian Garden Exhibition and its Legacy; Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto
22
Relative to exploring the Italian landscape as a student in Landscape Architecture, historians have also put forward a great deal of emphasis on Italian Gardens. Perhaps because they have managed to remain untouched for hundreds of years. This chapter and the one following will begin to unfold graphically a new direction for ways of perceiving and applying new research to the city of Castiglion Firoentino, Italy and in contrast to the city of Berlin, Germany who lacks intellectual attention.
Mirka Benes and Raffaella Fabiani Giannette have examined the development and disciplinary diversity of Italian gardens. Discussed in this chapter is the effort put forth by fascist regime to form a national garden tradition that rejected diversity influence. The problem with this, this has generated a great deal of historical research by foreign intellectuals with an idea of Italy resting solely on its past. Untouched and unaffected by time. On the contrary, as traveler, voiding the image of the past while acknowledging its rich cultural qualities can not only do justice to famous attractions, but also encourage the study of less explored spaces in Castiglion Fno. or elsewhere as it may pertain to landscape architecture. If everyone was on board, new models of analysis could emerge that could suggest new approaches to landscape design. Exemplifying the role of the fallow fields once thriving agricultural parcels of land providing a product, the influence of tourism on any given environment altering the values of existing culture are all directions of investigations that’s could be expanded further.
CHAPTER 6: Grafting the Edelweiss on the Cactus Plants, The 1933 Italian Garden Exhibition and its Legacy; Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto
28
Relative to exploring the Italian landscape as a student in Landscape Architecture, historians have also put forward a great deal of emphasis on Italian Gardens. Perhaps because they have managed to remain untouched for hundreds of years. This chapter and the one following will begin to unfold graphically a new direction for ways of perceiving and applying new research to the city of Castiglion Firoentino, Italy and in contrast to the city of Berlin, Germany who lacks intellectual attention.
Gardens as they appear to be natural with a wealth of oak and beech trees that are clearly over a hundred years old. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, recreational parks were being renamed and transformed. From personal experiences, contemporary methods, have preserved the historical cultural identity of some of these spaces (gardens). Spacious playgrounds and meadows, tree plantings, and redesigned waterways are being added to spaces for the future of Berlin, Germany. While traveling through Berlin, exploring what someone once left behind for someone to be found of and later transform it into a landscape for historical preservation, as well as recreation, ecological, and cultural demands of today and the of the future.
CHAPTER 7: The Use of History in Landscape Architectural Nostalgia;
Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto
This chapter and the one following attempts to discuss two contrasting approaches, yet complimentary, outlooks of history in landscape architectural nostalgia that help depict an understanding of how landscape history has been absorbed, received, and reflected based on my own personal experiences while traveling abroad. References were derived from Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto: understanding of how nostalgia works in the making of landscapes.
This first approach to understanding nostalgia as it pertains to Castiglion Fiorentino, Italy and later compared to Paris, France. In Castiglion Fno. gardens proved to be inspired by a sensitive and discerning nostalgia for the past without however recurring to historicist solutions. Like Garret Eckbo, I to, rejected the formal principled of the past. Inspired by the current state, as a traveler, but also happen to live in a country (3 months) with a 500 year old national identity. Only looking at the past for clues about the best way to represent the Italian character and ideals. History should be understood as encompassing the architectural typology, neglected spaces, and gardens that could be discussed in the manner of materials, people, and culture in respect to its environment. While many landscape architects/students are trained to respond to history in many ways, I propose graphical series of photographs and illustrations to show greater importance to a sites past history. By constructing history as a personal memory, whose traces are preserved through design processes and their outcomes.
31
32
CHAPTER 8: The Use of History in Landscape Architectural Nostalgia;
Raffaella Fabiani Giannetto
The following text in comparison to the previous chapter expressed the need to preserve nostalgia as a means to help transform and improve the present. A contemporary example of how nostalgia may make good use of the past is Paris, France. As it is evident in many spaces, landscape architects have decided whether or not to bring the presence of the past to the forefront. Exemplifying this idea of acknowledging history through design is Bernard Lassus’s 1990 proposal for the restoration and extension of the Jardin des Tuileries in Paris. Earlier Traces of design are present, as more layers are then added over time, and by more recent interventions. Rather than neglecting the past, Lassus’s nostalgia is selective in the way it choreographs the diversity of historical strata of the site. Like Lassus, being critical of the past, rewrite history by creating different elevations, treatments, and paving materials denouncing its different identity and earlier origins. 33
CHAPTER 9: Defining Urban Sites; Andrea Kahn
This chapter and the one following will attempt to deconstruct the contemporary meaning of urban sites through a series of photographs as they apply to personal experiences while traveling abroad. As a traveler, traveling through many trajectories crisscrossing an unbounded space. Radiating edges/ boundaries activate the photographs, depicting an image that extends outward beyond the edge of the page. These drawings will make it difficult to locate its edge, its volumetric capacity, and its exterior. References from Andrea Kahn: Defining Urban Sites, were gathered and applied in hopes to better understand the concept as it will make it easier to conceive the city as stable yet permeable comprised of many overlapping spaces.
As a resident of Castiglion Firoentino (CFno), Italy, over the course of three months, I was able to recognize that urban sites are constantly in motion rather than still, they are constantly fading far into the distance rather than bounded, they are complex like da Vinci’s Milan sketch rather than simple. My aim in this chapter is to re-think representation as a tool rather than depicting reality, but about making knowledge. At the most basic level, representation gives meaning to urban site because it deconstructs the idea of city form, as shown by these images. Each photograph of CFno. proposes an identifiable site reality, because each operates as a unique construct of thinking about site.
35
CHAPTER 10: Defining Urban Sites; Andrea Kahn
This chapter and the one following will attempt to deconstruct the contemporary meaning of urban sites through a series of photographs as they apply to personal experiences while traveling abroad. As a traveler, traveling through many trajectories crisscrossing an unbounded space. Radiating edges/ boundaries activate the photographs, depicting an image that extends outward beyond the edge of the page. These drawings will make it difficult to locate its edge, its volumetric capacity, and its exterior. References from Andrea Kahn: Defining Urban Sites, were gathered and applied in hopes to better understand the concept as it will make it easier to conceive the city as stable yet permeable comprised of many overlapping spaces.
Treating urban sites as operational constructs deducing their boundedness. Such sites are conditioned by, and contribute to, their surroundings. MAXXI, in Rome, Italy, arguably fits this description: a confluence of lines of many different geometries denoting the energy of the site. That of a disused military compound in the Flaminio neighborhood, an area just north of Rome’s historical center, aligned to the Olympic Sport Palace by Pier Luigi Nervi (1960) and the Auditorium by Renzo Piano (2002). The sites lines intersects and intertwines in ways that it allows for curatorial decisions that lead to a diversity of connections hosting exhibits depicting fields of multiple juxtapositions.
37
CHAPTER 11: Defining Urbanistic Projects; Joan Basquets
42
To conclude these final two chapters I would like to discuss Joan Busquets contemporary approaches to Defining Urbanistic Projects as they apply to the city of Castiglion Firoentino, Italy and Paris, France. Each of these works proposes methods and instruments that can change the way we approach city building as landscape architects. The series of photographs and analytical drawings below differentiates two of ten urbanistic approaches that give resolution to the most pressing issues our cities face.
In a city like Castiglion Firoentino who faces many challenges like, the configuration of underutilized spaces – spaces created by the geometry of historical structures, outdated spaces in need to be updated, and new spaces that hold the capacity for new and existing growth. CFno. could benefit from reconfiguring surfaces (approach 1), since it can provide a new cultural influence in the city. With a wide offer of activities and special events. The next series of images provides an example.
43