ABSTRACT
At the core of this investigation is the proposition that landscape architects today find our practice to be that of a public dramaturg, working in the archive to develop a full understanding of the performance-history of sites, places, or circumstances, including the performance and resonances of its natural and cultural systems, its materials, and most importantly the lived experience of that place over time and through varied lenses and contexts. That places our work within the framework of deep mapping and explorations and discoveries that draw upon all the evidence available. Questions of the everyday, improvisation, assembling the evidence, curation, and representation are central to this way of working as a means of inquiry, as a means of revealing critical findings, as a means to bring the landscape’s hidden dimensions and stories to light, and as a means of grounding design responses. Improvisational representational media, including found photographs, photograms, cyanotypes, and other improvisational photo-based representational strategies are envisioned as important threads explored within the essay.
Cited works and writers include Mark Klett and Byron Wolfe, Yola Monakhov Stockton, TEN x TEN Studio, Iain Biggs, Hal Foster, Mike Pearson, and Siri Hustvedt.
