by Gabriele Baleisyte
“Nature” or nature? Does natural geography still mater much to today’s city? What is the current relationship between our conception of nature and its role in urban life? Which nature is dominating now; the pure or the second one_- man made nature? During my current stay in Rotterdam, I have heard these questions widely discussed at the 6th International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam (IABR), examining the theme “Urban by Nature“. I found a lot of answers to them in the most recent issue of the Rotterdam- based magazine MONU: #20 – “Geographical Urbanism”
The first answer appeared to me as soon as I looked at the magazine’s cover. I got the impression that the visual representation of the issue was picked out deliberately by the magazine’s editors with the purpose of introducing the topic of “Geographical Urbanism”. The picture from the contribution entitled “Seduction and Fear” of the photographer Edward Burtynsky obviously represents the dialogue between human and nature (natural geography and human made geography). On one hand I understood the repetitive military planes with their covered windscreens as a metaphor of the uncountable faceless buildings that urbanize nature all over the planet while, on the other hand, that the natural geography of our world is manipulated dramatically by the brutal invasion of humans.
If we look at the topic from an historical perspective, first I would highlight the article entitled “The Geography of Geology” by Sean Burkholder and Bradford Watson. This particular story explains how the city of Buttle in Montana was formed by geology (mining claims), and reminds us about the traditional dependency between cities and natural geography. However, Nikos Katsikis shows in his article “On the Geographical Organization of World Urbanization” how the meaning of physical geography has been almost completely reversed since the early 19th Century. As an example of this, in his article “Niagara waterfall” Kees Lokman introduces man made geography as a significant success: artificial geography becomes a mass tourism attraction point which is as well known as the Seven World Wonders are.
While I continued reading the magazine I tried to find out what natural geography can still mean today to cities in a globalized world, in which they are becoming more and more influenced by networks. I noticed that some articles in the magazine complemented each other on this topic, and it intrigued me even more to read further. One contribution entitled “Urbanism after Geography: The Network is Context” that was written by Clarle Lyster shows, for example, that cities can no longer be understood merely as locations at particular places. After the network has become the context, replacing natural geography, global networks (from social media to fast track shipping, from fiber-optic communication to high speed travel) have become responsible for the shift in the longstanding relationship between geography and urban development. Such a network is, for example, created by the low cost airline Ryan Air and its airports within 100km distance of major cities. Places no longer seem to be defined by geographic coordinates, but more by communicational axes that are made possible through the network.
In relation to this, I found a completely different opinion from the Dutch architectural historian, critic and curator Bart Lootsma, in his interview entitled “Beyond Branding”, in which he emphasizes about the fact that due to the growing opportunities to work from home thanks to the Internet, and people’s increasing independency to choose their living locations in relation to particular geographical aspects, such as localization or climate conditions, natural geography is actually becoming more important.
These were only a few aspects from MONU magazine’s new issue. While reading it I felt like traveling, such as Edward Burtynsky does while taking photographs of urban phenomena: from Honolulu to Paris; Mexico or Qinto; from Sydney to the “unknown” Charleroi; or even to Innsbruck’s famous panorama of the Nordkette mountains. I could continue listing up things that you can find in the magazine forever, because it seems endless and full of serious analytical essays and researches that invite you to the world of urbanism. MONU has showed once again to be a great platform to provide fresh ideas and answers to challenging topics.
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Gabriele Baleisyte is a student of Architecture Theory and History. Focus on new urban theories, strategies and research methods in both analytical and experimental ways. Currently she is doing an internship in a Rotterdam- based architecture office.