Devlin's Responses

Challenging the Pictorial: Recent Landscape Practice – Julia Czerniak

In Challenging the Pictorial: Recent Landscape Practice, Julia Czerniak argues both sides of the effectiveness and values of two-dimension representation of landscape. Ms. Czerniak points out that the two dimensional representations can be useful to the audience for pointing out certain characteristics about the landscape by accurately representing and highlighting those characteristics. However, there are many times that the representation can overshadow or misconstrue other important characteristics that could only be seen through viewpoints such as actual photography or aerial views as seen being used by Mr. Hargreave along with several other types of models and views including clay, planned views, and views of built work.
Several other examples by other landscape architects and theorists include Adriaan Geuze with a pictogram of natural elements and sketches showing rhythmic changes in a Dutch city, and Mr. MacLean offers aerial photographs to show what Corner and Cosgrove consider to be excellent ways to represent landscape and show view points which are not commonly able to be seen of the landscape. These examples show how effective other types of representation can be for landscape architects. Two dimensional representations is not the only way to represent a landscape.
All in all the main point that Czerniak is working to show is that the two dimensional representations can be great ways to show highly expressive representations of a site that actual photographs could never really show. However, the sketches and two dimensional drawings can also miss a lot of technical information that photographs, aerial or otherwise, can show the viewer. Additionally, diagrams can also help to represent those characteristics that can be seen in the drawn representations.

Transparency: Literal and Phenomenal Colin Rowe & Robert Slutzky

In Transparency: Literal and Phenomenal, Colin Rowe and Robert Slutzky explain the different types of transparency, where they are used, how they are effective, and the different techniques used to represent transparency. The types of transparency help to show different types of spatial organization and there effectiveness in representation of time, space, and other three dimensional organizations versus two dimensional rendering. Garches and the Bauhaus even represent the mediums and transparencies differently and use them in different ways. “At Garches the ground is conceived of as a vertical surface transversed by a horizontal range of windows while the Bauhaus gives the appearance of a solid wall extensively punctured by glazing.
Ultimately the expression of transparency is represented throughout the cubist movement and the article shows how the two types are different and how they interact with and without each other.

Machine in the Garden: Leo Marx

Machine in the Garden, by Leo Marx, explains the relationship of authors in the 19th century, their connection to the industrial revolution, and their ultimate connection to the landscape and what nature means to those who were experiencing the changes brought on by the Industrial Revolution. While mentioning authors like Thoreau, Emerson, and Melville, Marx more specifically looked at the work of Hawthorne. Hawthorne wrote a story about a man named Ethan Brand.
The story of Ethan Brand revolves around emotions that include “a sense of loss, anxiety, and dislocation,” which ultimately comes from the setting of the book. The setting being his return from the great American West where all is nature except for a few towns and the huge mechanic railroads that transports the people to these towns. The people in these towns were frightened due to the “Machine in the Garden.” The Machine in the story is the railroad and the Garden represents the great outdoors. Ultimately people found a great disconnect from the natural environment as a result of the Machinery and in the end the importance of nature becomes apparent.