Activism

Activism is collective action aimed at social or political change. In the context of landscapes, it often emerges around issues of ecology, justice, and rights to space. Activism unsettles the idea that design is neutral—it insists that landscapes are political and contested. It can be disruptive, messy, uncomfortable, yet also generative. Design disciplines often borrow activist language but shy away from activist risk. We aim to investigate modes of 'activism through. design'.

In this article, we enter into a conversation with Danilo Milovanović (DNLM), an artist based in Slovenia, whose practice in public space leaves behind socio-political and environmentally engaged commentaries. His interventions open up civic debate and make visible the tensions that shape contemporary urban life. Trained in the visual arts, Milovanović positions his practice outside […]

Dr. Anette Freytag is a relentless researcher, moving between academia, activism, and public engagement. She taught at ETH Zurich, the University of Basel, and the Technical University of Innsbruck before joining Rutgers University, where she is the Professor of the History and Theory of Landscape Architecture at the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences. Freytag […]

Gary Hilderbrand has been teaching at Harvard Graduate School of Design since 1990 and is currently the Peter Louis Hornbeck Professor in Practice and Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture. He is also the founding principal of Reed Hilderbrand, a leading landscape architecture firm based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The firm was established in the […]

“Excerpts from a project on Trees and Beasts” Denise Hoffman Brandt© Denise Hoffman What do we actually mean when we talk about nature? As a professor in a discipline that since the early 1970s has, mostly, claimed to practice “design with nature”—referencing Ian McHarg’s book (1969) of that title—that’s a question I have often asked. […]

In the conversation with the landscape architecture professor, artist and writer Denise Hoffman Brandt, we speak about the morality issues attached to “doing good” while debunking Ian McHarg’s problematic position in Design with Nature. In the conversation, Brandt points out how our assumptions about nature shape our actions, why stewardship is problematic and what landscape […]

Charles Birnbaum is the CEO and founder of TCLF—The Cultural Landscape Foundation. In his work, he is a fearless advocate and activist for significant American landscape architecture sites. He was honored as a 2020 LILA Honour Award Winner for initiating and developing TCLF for over 25 years with an “innovative vision, executed with great precision, […]

Tim Waterman is Professor of Landscape Theory and Inter-Programme Collaboration Director at the Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL. He is Chair of the Landscape Research Group (LRG), a Non-Executive Director of the digital arts collective Furtherfield, and an advisor to the Centre for Landscape Democracy at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences. He is also […]

Climate activists group Extinction Rebellion (XR) sabotaged multiple golf courses around Spain. Spain is currently facing a severe drought while the golf courses are still being irrigated. According to XR, Spanish golf courses use more water than Madrid and Barcelona together. They planted some shrubs and perennials directly into the golf course and set a […]

Liam Young is together with Kate Davies running the Unknown Fields project. They travel around the world and explore landscapes behind objects we used on a daily basis: materials for our phones, fabrics for clothes, lithium for batteries … We caught Liam in Ljubljana, where he was narrating Unknown Fields film live.  

During all the media coverage—particularly in the United States—of Hurricanes Harvey (Category 4, 17 August-1 September), Irma (Category 5, 30 August-12 September), Jose (Category 4, 5-22 September) and Maria (Category 5, 16-30 September), the flooding and subsequent trail of destruction in Houston and southeast Texas, South Florida and the Caribbean, there was ceaseless talk of […]

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