Posthumanism challenges the centrality of the human, arguing for a view of the world where humans are only one actor among many—technological, ecological, nonhuman. It critically disturbs the hierarchy that placed man above nature, animals, and machines. At times, it risks becoming too abstract, but its force is in refusing the old humanist frame that made everything revolve around us. It demands new ethics of relation and responsibility. For landscape architecture, posthumanism opens the door to seeing landscapes as multi-species and multi-agency systems. Design is then less about control than negotiation with other assemblages, agencies, flows, and machines.
Landscape architecture should engage intensively with conviviality—it has the capacity to unify many issues in current theoretical debates and connect the discipline to the global network of the conviviality movement.
An essay on how we push animals into playing roles — from fables and films to renders of biodiversity and art — tracing how these projections tame, abstract, or estrange, and how synurbists and artists unsettle the human–animal divide.
Scientific research into animal behaviour still rests on many deeply ingrained assumptions about what is deemed to be “natural” human behaviour. For example, men—males—are assumed by nature to be more dominant and aggressive than women—females. And if men are violent, then the violent behaviour of other male animals in the wild can supposedly be explained […]
In the U.S., lawns cover nearly 2 percent of the land surface and, as researcher Cristina Milesi revealed using satellite data, “could be considered the single largest irrigated crop in America”—their total area is three times larger than that of irrigated cornfields. The infatuation with lawns runs so deep that, in some cases, failing to […]
… what is the stage of AI in and outside the profession and discipline of landscape architecture? Many firms are now incorporating Generative AI into their workflow. Firms such as SWA have been able to fund research fellows exploring generative AI. Anecdotally, I have learned that other firms have similar internal initiatives. One trend is using LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation of Large Language Models), a lightweight training technique that can “fine-tune” one’s Stable Diffusion models to generate images in a certain style.
Domesticated and genetically engineered organisms are usually overlooked by natural museums and institutions for cultural history. There is no space for artifacts such as dogs, chickens and corn. The Center for PostNatural History is the sequel to the natural history museum, and takes agriculture’s evolution as a starting point. CPNH focuses on the deliberate alterations […]
Giovanni Aloi is an author, curator, and creator with a PhD from Goldsmiths University, focusing on natural history in art representation. His work examines depictions of flora and fauna to uncover societal values and foster shifts in these through critical reflection. Through publishing, curating exhibitions, delivering talks, and editing Antennae: The Journal of Nature in […]
Laura Cipriani is an assistant professor of landscape architecture at Delft University of Technology and a founder of Superlandscape, a landscape and urban design firm. She holds a Ph.D. in Landscape Urbanism from IUAV, a master’s degree in landscape and urban issues from Harvard Graduate School of Design, and a master’s in Architecture from IUAV. […]
“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 […]
FOREST ENCOUNTERS: short stories, flash fiction, poetry, essays The European cooperation project FOREST ENCOUNTERS is looking for representations of different encounters with the forest from both human and non-human perspectives. The FOREST ENCOUNTERS project explores and proposes diverse imaginaries, concepts, and practices around the following questions: What and how can we learn with and through […]
In the talk, Lydia Kallipoliti – #architect #educator #researcher #thinker – presents her newly published book Histories of Ecological Design: An Unfinished Cyclopedia, followed by a Q&A where we talk about the intentions of writing the book, about how the “waste speaks of the incomplete perception of the World”, the psychological profile of ecological designers and […]
Urban biodiversity? Yes, please! Nevertheless … … Due to the transitional phase of our understanding of nature in the light of the Anthropocene, there are still some important notions, contradictions and misunderstandings that need to be addressed. To do so, we will operate with terms like nature, ecology, biodiversity, landscape, and aesthetics, and we’ll focus […]
The AI services embedded in tools for creative profiles are developing so rapidly that this article will definitely be outdated by 6 pm tomorrow. Last year we featured a piece on Midjourney and similar platforms, and it already reads like Grandpas discussing ‘the internets’ back in the 90s. I suppose enchantment by civilisation’s technological advances […]
