Art

Recently I have been re-reading or starting to read books I've read some time ago or have been intending to read for a while. It really gave a renewed perspective on my art-practice, a new focus, which I feel I had lost for a while. My work focuses on the ephemeral nature of the landscape and which role people play in this constantly changing landscape. I'm interested in how to represent this drifting landscape, how to grasp the ever-changing nature of environment, which we help to create. I want to understand and use it as a tool for my designs.Currently I am reading Rhythmanalysis: Space, time and Everyday Life, by Henri Lefebvre. He see our world as a collection of rhythms, each element has its own rhythms, which is constituted out of millions of rhythms themselve. The tree, which can be seen as a static element, suddenly becomes a living thing in motion. It moves but much slowerr than us. I just love these ideas. It makes you look at the world with completely new eyes.
I am starting to return to my thinking before I left Edinburgh, I don't know whether this is a good or a bad thing, but it definately gives me a renewed energy.

Time is the unknown denominator

Everyone screams we need to find a solution to the urban question. Well the answer is time. We should build things now with of course respect to the earth, people and the future, but we shouldn't be afraid to make mistakes. Not everything can be a masterpiece. (Also people seem to have a habit to learn more from their mistakes). The best things will stand the test of time and will become essential parts of our future cities. This does not mean city building should be a free for all. We should keep on being innovative and strive for perfection. But we should also face up that there is no such thing as perfection. So no matter how much research we do we will never reach a single answer. Time is the unknown denominator and will be the judge of our achievements.
I as a designer would love to crack the puzzle as well. It makes me humble and respectful towards this big thing we call the city. It will still stand strong even after we are gone and only time will tell if our plans were good enough to live on.

Project Zagreb

Since my move to the Netherlands and starting my new job. I spend about 1.5 hours on the train commuting. To me this equals to 1.5 hours of reading, sketching and writing time.
Recently I have been using this time to read 'Project Zagreb', a book by E. Blau and I. Rupnik. It deals with zagreb's urban history
One particular chapter of this book caught my attention, the section that deals with 'The Green Horseshoe'. The Green Horseshoe is a U-shaped network of green spaces and institutional buildings, which was the brain child of Milan Lenuci. Through architectural projects and programming he managed to maintain and create public space in the new urban expansion in the early 1900s. Milan Lenuci saved some areas from development by giving them a public program. For example: He created skating rinks on these spaces during winter and opened them up for sports and fairs during summer. By doing this he made the spaces part of public life and saved them from development. Milan Lenuci used public life to create public space.
According to me, my idea of rolling design (see earlier posts) is made up of a similar process of programming. In Rolling design though the process is used to re-link/re-engage people with an already existing public space. Rolling design is like the re-programming of a public space or the re-starting of a program in a public space. This type of programming allows people to re-claim the public realm for their public lives.

About wandering and places

I really enjoy site visits as they mean endless hours of wandering. It is one of the rare occasion where wandering seems the best thing to do. To me it seems the best way to really take in a place. There is no rush, it is just you and the landscape. It does not matter whether it is urban or rural. It is also at those moments that I regret taking photographs as it breaks that magical moment of the now and the context. I rather draw and sketch then to take a photograph. I find by drawing the landscape it reveals its story. It suits the wandering spirit as it takes time and a full devotion to the landscape just like the wandering itself.
While wandering it is sometimes hard to imagine that this is a place someone or something calls home. While wandering I find myself becoming the first discoverer of this long forgotten place, but I am not. Day to day, especially in citys, people wake up in this place and live there daily lives in here, but do they really see it?

Rolling Design

As earlier mentioned on my blog, I am interested in hosting events as part of the design process. For sustainable design there has to be a link between place and the surrounding community, as they will be the ones maintaining and should be using the park. By hosting events open to all and aimed at all, you would create a sense of a place. This sense of place is an emotional link within people’s minds to a place. It is what turns a site into a place. Once this link is established durable and sustainable design can start. Sustainable to me is more than an environmental aspect; it is also about the community involvement and timing. Within rolling design, there is a stepped design process. Instead of complete (re)development in one go, the stepped process will be drawn out over time and really feed of the needs of community. This design approach would be most suitable for Council owned land, as costs would be spread over time and by community involvement there might be a reduction in cost of maintenance.

Process:

Events

First part designed or improvement of infrastructure.

More events

Second part designed

More events

Third Part

…

Events

First part designed or improvement of infrastructure.

More events

Second part designed

More events

Third Part

In rolling design the design process never stops as our landscape never stops evolving. This approach would make sure no park or public space ever gets run down and means small gradual costs instead of one great big expense, which isn’t even half as sustainable.

Contemporary Wayfarers

I was reading Tim Ingold’s book ‘Lines’ yesterday. It has this section on wayfaring and transport. Wayfaring to him, as I understood it, is a way of life. The wayfarer is his line of movement. Within wayfaring, there are no endpoints. In transport, the journey has no importance. It is merely the means to get to the needed location. Every journey, within transport, has an ending.

This section was to me extremely important as I could really see myself as a contemporary wayfarer. I have no home, and although I tend to linger in one spot for quite some time, there is this constant craving to move on. I am not so much influenced by my physical environment, but by the opportunities that lie beyond. I will go where the best opportunities are. When I leave a place I leave with an open network in place, human connections. My traces are left hopefully in people’s minds and emotions, not so much physical.

It is that kind inter-human and also spatial connections I try to map. I try to visualize my fellow contemporary wayfarers’ movements/traces as they tend not to have a physicality themselves.

An interesting question

Just recently I got asked whether I took the patterns I made in an installation back to the studio to keep on working on it. The answer is no, I don't. The only thing left of my installations is just piles of used tape and lots, and lots of photographs. The whole taping thing is about spatial awareness and bringing people more in touch with the environment they live in. To me the most important thing within the whole installation process is the installing itself. The taping is such an in the moment process. For instant with 'Unearthed' if I would have made it on an other day it would have been completely different due to people working on different locations. In this way my work is also related to time.
I do produce some studio work in the form of notes and sketches for possible installations. Also my section drawings and notes made while reading books I consider to be studio work. I actually do not spend a lot of time in one specific place, which I would call studio. My kind of art permits me to be out there, observing people and their interaction with their environment in a specific time frame.

Dissertation, the moment of truth

As said in one of my previous posts, I am currently trying to write my project statement for my future dissertation. My first idea was to write about how politics influence the physical state of the landscape and use Brussels as my case study. I was also looking for a way in which I could incorporate my lines. This appeared quite difficult as they are practically 2 different subjects. So the only way to resolve the issue was to go back to my main interests in landscape architecture, the origin of my lines and what I want to achieve with these lines.

My main interest in landscape in architecture has from very early on been the idea of 'Genius Loci', the spirit of a place and the creation of a connection between people and landscape. One other major interest of mine is what I call accidental spaces. This is what you can call leftover space, spaces that have no function or meaning. they have no identity and are in derelict state, but they are also pockets of opportunity.
My lines on the other hand try to map people's movements through space and by mapping I gain a better understanding of the human-place relations and aim to enhance human-place awareness. The lines aspire to record and link up human space interaction. So I decided that these 3 elements should reflect in my dissertation.

So currently for my dissertation I am thinking of finding myself an accidental space and try to transform it into a place which is rooted into the surrounding community through a series of events. It would be a good test to see whether it is the people, who give a place its' spirit.

A thought

Emotions
All tangled up
Stay, go
leave, hang on
Whirll in the beauty
till it is a pool of mud