The rhythm of site

Key words: rhythm, implication, binary thinking, Zixueyang, s3191595

ABSTRACT

Rene et Madieleine Caille public garden is located in the centre of Etats-unis Quarter, Lyon ( Desvigne & Dalnoky,1997) . Designed by Desvigne & Dalnoky practice, this project is underpinned as a blending of rhythms both from human force and nature, suggesting a way to reject the binary thinking between human and nature. The whole site was divided into two parallel space, one for public garden and the other for traffics flowed from the avenue nearby. Long paving bands stretch across the garden with distribution of blocks in different length with different interval Plane trees followed three main compositional lines with shrubs underneath, and a shorter strip of trees are arranged in the north of the garden which gives an obscure partition of this space. (Fig1)

This project employs proper implication which is significant in spacial design. These elements in this project function as an “absolute origin” to trigger human’s reflection, implying human to locate themselves in this space (Derrida, 1989).Meanwhile, the design endows differences for these two spaces: benches, recreational facility and proper tree shad are arranged in garden while the avenue was covered with asphalt. (Fig2) These differences shape human’s perception of space and make it to be a stable perception after their spatial experience accumulated over time.

Desvigne & Dalnoky is a French practice founded in 1988 whose works are characterized by constant contrast between nature elements and constructed elements. This peculiarity is inherited from their different ways of researching the relationship between architecture and landscape. One of its main designers, Christine Dalnoky explores the relationship by taking research of Italian Renaissance gardens whose layout are largely determined by geometric forms, while her partner Michel Desvigne starts his studies by observing a specific landscape formed by natural force, such as islets formed as a result of alluvial deposits in a stream bed.( Desvigne & Dalnoky,1997) The difference of getting inspiration contributes their concern about the blending of nature environment and geometric layout. This cognition supported post-modernism ideology that characterized by the rejection of binary thinking (H­­­arvey, 1935).

Bibliography

Rhythm: the key word to underpin this project. Constructed elements are read as rhythm of human force while natural changes are read as rhythm of nature.

Absolute origin: implication from design, to direct human’s behaviour.

Binary thinking: a pair of terms or concepts that are theoretical opposites. In binary thinking system, landscape architecture and architecture, nature and human are regarded as opposite standpoints which are rejected in post-modernism thoughts.

Reference

Elizabeth, k. Meyer, 1994, Landscape Architecture as Modern Other and Postmodern Grond, selected from The culture of landscape architecture, edited by harriedt edquist & vanessa bird

Derrida, Jacques, 1989, Edmund Husserl’s Origin of Geometry: An introduction by Jacques Derrida, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London

Desvigne, Michael and Dalnoky, Christine, 1997, White Library Deisign, translated from Italian by Jay Hyams

Harvey, David, 1935, The Condition of Postmodernity: an Enquiry into the origins of Cultural Change, Basil Blackwell, Inc