Landscapes are in every way embedded in creative processes, from design to their making, from planning to their management, engaging different and often disparate community expectations. Of course the endlessly creative natural processes, from geology, to plants, to ecology and so on provide the prime matter with which the landscape professions are concerned. Creation almost always provokes a responsive reaction, sometimes as an opposing natural force or process, and often a human response ranging from approval and celebration to extremes of disgust and opposition. Creation can result in transformation as well as revolution – for better or for worse. The processes of transformation and revolution in design are an inherent part of the creative process, and it is often the moments of conflict or tension that can be the most creative. These catalysts may be found in creation and reactions across all practices in landscape, and thus we encourage participants to explore these active and often difficult situations they find in the course of their work.
Submission of abstracts:
We invite abstracts for oral paper presentations. Contributions are welcome under any of the above themes. We encourage those specifically dealing with areas of conflict or tension in landscape processes. We welcome submissions across the range of research, education, and practice in landscape architecture, planning, management, science, and all associated fields. Topics that may be addressed in the conference include, but are not limited to: creative destruction/revolution, consultation and co-creation, landscape democracy, planting and ecological processes, remediation, reclamation, amelioration and restoration, collaboration and community engagement, urban development and gentrification, natural disasters, war relief and rebuilding, materials and waste.
Award winning landscape architects to give keynote lectures at ECLAS 2017 at the University of Greenwich.
Johanna Gibbons is founding partner of J & L Gibbons and director of Landscape Learn, a new seasonal prototype for learning and engaging with the landscape. Her design practice with Neil Davidson has won several international competitions most recently the Museum of London, and many industry awards including the LI President’s Award in 2008 and 2011 for East London Green Grid and Making Space in Dalston respectively.
Martí Franch, a graduate from University of Greenwich, is the founder of EMF landscape architecture, an interdisciplinary practice of independent experts in the field of urban and environmental design. His work has been published internationally and awarded with an ASLA American Society of Landscape Architects Honor Award 2012, European Landscape Biennal – Rosa Barba Prize 2012, as well as a selected finalist in FAD 2012, Rosa Barba Prize 2010, CCCB European Prize of Public Space 2012 among others.
Lynn Kinnear’s practice, KLA, is immersed in the possibilities of social change and art and design’s power to help deliver this change. She is currently directing the Walthamstow Wetlands project, leading a large multidisciplinary team, and working with a complex stakeholder group and complex funding strategy. This project will open up 200 ha of land in London to public access, giving local populations access to nature.
Mark Morris (AA/Cornell) is Head of Teaching and Learning at the Architectural Association. His curatorial projects have included shows on James Casebere’s model photography, the drawing collection of the Tchoban Foundation in Berlin, “models of models” by Daniel Libeskind, and a pavilion design collaboration by Steven Holl and José Oubrerie. Mark is a recent Graham Foundation grantee.
Gillian Darley OBE is a writer, journalist and broadcaster on architecture and landscape. Her Villages of Vision (reissued, revised in 2007) is a pioneering work on planned and utopian communities. She has written biographies of three important figures in the shaping of London, Octavia Hill, John Soane and John Evelyn. In the mid 1990s, she was the Director of Geoffrey Jellicoe’s Landscape Foundation.
The deadline for submission of abstracts is Monday 6 March 2017 (5:00pm Greenwich Mean Time).
Outline Programme of the Conference:
The outline conference programme from 10 – 13 September is as follows:
- Sunday 10 September: Doctoral Colloquium
- Monday 11 September : 1st day main conference programme with keynote talks and oral papers
- Tuesday 12 September : 2nd day main conference programme with keynote talks and oral papers
- Wednesday 13 September : Field trips
For any queries please write to: eclas2017@gre.ac.uk
