By examining the iconised photographs of the COVID-19 pandemic, published under the heading of The Great Empty by the New York Times in March 2020, this article explores the aesthetic operations... Show more By examining the iconised photographs of the COVID-19 pandemic, published under the heading of The Great Empty by the New York Times in March 2020, this article explores the aesthetic operations and ethical implications of representing anxiety through photographing desolate landscapes. To do so, it situates these images within the genre of late photography, also known as aftermath photography, to discuss how emptiness can function as a surrogate for anxiety. First, by foregrounding the unique temporality of the landscape genre in photography, it examines the aesthetic dimension of seeing deserted places in photographs. By shifting its focus from the image to its caption, it then discusses how the caption of such photographs can interpolate an ethical dimension onto them. Finally, by drawing on Giorgio Agamben’s philosophy of “gesture,” the article puts forward that the combination of aestheticized photographs with ethicised captions in The Great Empty expresses anxiety as a mode of gesturality: a sui generis communicational mode that simultaneously galvanizes and paralyzes the viewer. Show less
The skin is a surface that separates the inside from the outside while belonging to neither of them: it is a sheer instance of liminality where in the impervious borders of things are turned into... Show moreThe skin is a surface that separates the inside from the outside while belonging to neither of them: it is a sheer instance of liminality where in the impervious borders of things are turned into the porous boundaries of beings. The landscape, the skin of the world, is such a leaky boundary, which imbricates and implicates with terrestrial organisms while exceeding any organicity. By examining the recent photograph taken by contemporary Dutch artist Roosmarijn Pallandt (fig.1), this paper reads her representation of the landscape as the terraqueous skin of the world: an organelles organ that conduces the possibility of haptic perception through photography. To do this, it first draws on Tim Ingold’s theory of “surface vision” and then employs Edward S. Casey’s method of “liminology” to eventually apperceive the skin of the landscape as what Jean-Luc Nancy calls “a being-to-itself insofar as it is from side to side outside itself.” Show less
This dissertation presents a legal geographical analysis of the heritage laws of the independent English-speaking islands of the Lesser Antilles. The research considers the role of landscape or... Show moreThis dissertation presents a legal geographical analysis of the heritage laws of the independent English-speaking islands of the Lesser Antilles. The research considers the role of landscape or place (the spatial location of a community’s cultural identity) to sustainable heritage protection, given that these islands are former British colonies and their perceived ‘placelessness’ facilitated the destruction of land and the attendant community relationships essential for heritage, with the conversion to private property through the law.The research question considers the degree to which modern heritage law is spatially just (responsive to the needs of local communities) given this colonial legacy. The research findings indicate that while international law has pivoted away from colonialist approaches to indigenous and local communities and their relationships with heritage resources (now centering them in the effective functioning of the landscape) domestic laws in the Lesser Antilles have not. Decolonisation of the current legislative framework thus requires the incorporation of landscape protection in the law. Procedural environmental rights such as access to environmental information and public participation in environmental decision-making offer a solution, because they can equip communities with the tools to contest landscape use where community cohesion is threatened, ultimately protecting heritage bearers and their practices. Show less
Through photography, people share what landscapes mean to them. In her dissertation, which is interdisciplinary between art history, cultural geography and landscape architecture, Van den... Show moreThrough photography, people share what landscapes mean to them. In her dissertation, which is interdisciplinary between art history, cultural geography and landscape architecture, Van den Heuvel introduces a new methodology that consists of three steps: ‘georeferencing’, ‘geospecific comparison’ and ‘geogeneric comparison’. The method helps to analyse how landscape pictures create meaning of a location or – to speak with Yi-Fu Tuan – ‘make place’. Van den Heuvel first applies her method to three case studies in the Dutch landscape: the Haarlemmermeer area around Schiphol Airport near Amsterdam as photographed by Theo Baart and published in the photobook Werklust. Biography of a Landscape in Transition (2015); a tree nursery in the banks of the Lower Rhine as photographed by Gerco de Ruijter for the photograph Baumschule #2 (2009) and the nature reserve of a heath area near Laren in the Gooi-area in the Central Netherlands as photographed by Kim Boske for the photograph Mapping 5 (2008-2009). Conclusively is stated, that photographers do not only work with the physical elements that appeared before their cameras. Also, the photographer workds rhetorically with compositions and motives that persist from famous landscape painting to create meaning of a place. Show less
This thesis focuses on reconstructing the daily lives of Bronze Age farmers as well as the landscape for their subsistence practices. Doing so, Wild West Frisia analyses the separate components... Show moreThis thesis focuses on reconstructing the daily lives of Bronze Age farmers as well as the landscape for their subsistence practices. Doing so, Wild West Frisia analyses the separate components comprising Bronze Age subsistence (i.e. crop and animal husbandry, hunting and gathering) rather innovatively: instead of summarizing the known data for each subsistence strategy and drawing conclusions solely based on these observations, this study first determines what may have been... Show less
My doctorial thesis, entitled ‘Landscape Practices and Representations in Dongchuan, Southwest Eighteenth-Century China’, focuses on the interdisciplinary study of landscape, space and architecture... Show moreMy doctorial thesis, entitled ‘Landscape Practices and Representations in Dongchuan, Southwest Eighteenth-Century China’, focuses on the interdisciplinary study of landscape, space and architecture in Southwest eighteenth-century China. Through intensive archival research and contemporary ethnographic fieldwork I demonstrate that despite the Qing Empire’s remaking of the indigenous landscape in the eighteenth century, indigenous concepts of landscape and space have survived to the present in people’s stories and myths. Show less
Central Javanese temples were not built anywhere and anyhow, quite the contrary: their position within the landscape and their architectural design was determined by a series of socio-cultural,... Show moreCentral Javanese temples were not built anywhere and anyhow, quite the contrary: their position within the landscape and their architectural design was determined by a series of socio-cultural, religious and economical factors. Correlations between temple distribution, natural surroundings and architectural design provide valuable clues as to how Central Javanese people structured the space around them, and how the religious landscape thus created developed. This thesis reveals the main traits of land occupancy during the Central Javanese period (late 8th to early 10th centuries): a core agricultural region, a series of secondary centres, an extensive communication network, and several religious centres – sometimes relatively isolated. It also explores the relationship between temples and landscape, and assess the role played by specific landscape markers on the choice of a building site. Beyond the questions of territory and landscape, the present work also offers a reflection on the structure of the built space and its possible relations with conceptualized space, showing the inlfuence of imported Indian concepts – as well as their limits. Show less
"Grounding the Past" addresses archaeological field praxis and its role in the political present of Santiago Tilantongo and Santiago Apoala, two communities in the Mixteca Alta region of Oaxaca,... Show more"Grounding the Past" addresses archaeological field praxis and its role in the political present of Santiago Tilantongo and Santiago Apoala, two communities in the Mixteca Alta region of Oaxaca, Mexico. Efforts to involve local stakeholder communities in archaeology have become an important issue worldwide. In this study, Alexander Geurds argues that projects of participatory archaeology, many of which go under the heading of ‘community archaeology’, cannot dispense with reflexive analysis of field praxis, if they are to avoid idealized and thus untenable narratives of harmonious local collaboration. Past and present archaeological praxis often carries negative connotations in the Mixteca Alta, because archaeological projects have failed to recognize conflicting interests and issues of representation of local and non-local parties. Geurds reviews the constitutive elements of their partnerships, such as official meetings, public presentations and conferences, where the involved local and non-local parties produce conflicting agendas by creating and transforming power relations. He identifies and analyzes the attendant influences on participatory elements through the application of qualitative techniques derived from ethnography and social geography. The first part of the book follows an approach consistent with consistent with the regional archaeological tradition focused on materialist analysis of surface artefacts. Information derived from surface surveying and mapping receives special emphasis. The second part explores alternative means for embedding the production of historical knowledge into local perceptions of landscape and monuments. For this purpose, oral history and in particular knowledge of local placenames is focused on. Show less
