- Friday 25 September
- 10:00 – 18:00, reception
- University of Greenwich, 10 Stockwell Street, Tessa Blackstone Lecture Theatre [11_0003]
The Dark Side: Subverting Architecture and Landscape
‘It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the paramount axis of cultural conflict in Los Angeles has always been about the construction/interpretation of the city myth, which enters the material landscape as a design for speculation and domination.’
City of Quartz, Mike Davis, 1990:23
Architecture and landscape are easily subverted. Owen Hatherley (2015) suggests that the work of architects in London facilitates social cleansing, simultaneously the design of new landscapes is strategically formed to enhance property values and accelerate gentrification. The dark side of landscape, as critiqued by John Barrell (1980), points to concealed agendas which inform the representation of the landscape, in turn reinforcing the ideology. Barrell’s dark side exposes imperial ideologies, through the 18th century painting of pastoral scenes, which are claimed to still co-opt a scenographic design practice today (Corner 1999). Simultaneously, there are opportunities for alternate subversions, from ecological inventions to ludic ambitions, which could reimagine forms of practice.
The continual subversion/revolution of our disciplines is the subject of the 2015/16 conference at the University of Greenwich’s Department of Architecture and Landscape.