Faculty of Built Environment
LAND 2121 Introduction to Landscape Architecture
Session 1/2014
Convenor: A/Prof Linda Corkery


ASSIGNMENT 3: Critical Essay: Twentieth and early Twenty-first Century Landscape Architecture
Hand out: Week 10, 14 May
Due Date: Week 14, Tuesday, 10 June at 5.00 p.m. at the BE Student Centre
(Note: The course outline says Monday, 10 June…but Monday is a public holiday for the Queen’s Birthday so you can have that day to “polish” your assignment before you submit it!)
Value: 30%

The aim of this assignment is for you to select one major work designed by the landscape architect (or architect, designer, artist) you have been researching throughout the semester, and to produce an essay of critical analysis, which demonstrates your deep understanding of design principles and design philosophy.

Your essay will analyse the principles of that design in terms of its formal qualities, stylistic attributes and underlying design philosophy. You will also consider the relationship of the project to 1) other work by this designer, 2) the work of three other people you identified as relevant to your study in Assignment 1, and 3) the work reviewed in your zine assignment.

It is important that you go beyond simply describing the project.

? Begin by thoroughly understanding the physical and experiential qualities of your designed landscape. Imagine that you are actually in the project, or walking through it - produce a set of ‘word pictures’, sketches and analytic diagrams as if you are experiencing the physical and ephemeral qualities of the place.
? Consider the way in which the compositional issues, spatial qualities and the use of materials you are investigating in Design Fundamentals apply to the project you are researching.
? Think your way into the design. Carefully review any written statements by the designer(s) to begin to appreciate issues of design philosophy. How do these statements relate to the physical reality of the built work, or if it remains unbuilt, the way it has been represented?
? Pay particular attention to the way in which plant materials have been used and the way in which the ‘larger landscape’ has been incorporated in the design.
? Investigate the ideas and associations embedded in the works.
? Study the life story and personality of significant figures associated with the project as clients, promoters or occupiers. Seek to express something of their distinctive human qualities.
? Look beyond the immediate site to understand the urban and/or landscape context of the project.
? Reflect on the biography of the designer and place this work in the context of his/her design development.

Some 20th Century works are great examples of planting design, others are almost entirely architectonic or sculptural. Treat them all as ‘landscapes’.

In analysing your project, and relating it to other twentieth and twenty first century designs, you should consider the principal themes discussed in the Course textbooks:

Waymark, J. 2003, Modern Garden Design: innovation since 1900, Thames & Hudson, London.

In addition, you should relate your person’s scheme to the conceptual approaches contained in the Required Readings, i.e.the ‘Axioms for a modern landscape architecture’ advanced by Marc Treib (1993, pp.36-67).

To develop your skill in graphic analysis, study the diagrams contained in:
? Moore, Turnbull & Mitchell (1988); and consider
? the basic textbooks of landscape architectural form (see Catherine Dee, 2001) and the architectural analysis of Frank Ching (1979).

You should develop a means of graphic analysis similar to the above examples, and the elegant techniques developed by Bleam (1993) and Rainey (1993) in their essays on the work of Dan Kiley and Garrett Eckbo respectively. You should also become thoroughly familiar with

Once you have developed an understanding of the project you have selected, prepare an elegantly crafted essay of at least 2000 and no more than 2500 words (excluding References and Appendices), which has a clear introduction and conclusion and, overall, a compelling discussion. You are strongly advised to follow the steps in Essay Writing developed by the UNSW Learning Centre, contained in ‘Essay writing: the basics’ at http://www.lc.unsw.edu.au/onlib/Essay.html.

Submit your critical essay as a Word document, printed out in portrait format on A4 pages, illustrated with your own sketches (scanned and dropped into the Word document) and other images (accurately sourced and including captions), and fully referenced using the Harvard (Author-Date) system (Grayston & Farmer 1994, pp.148-168) and the ‘style guide’ of the UNSW Landscape Program Thesis Guidelines. Also available on the UNSW Learning Centre’s website, as per above link.

NOTE: PLEASE, do not bind your work. Do not submit in a plastic sleeve. Do not email your submission to me.

Include a copy of your Assignment 1 along with a signed UNSW/FBE Landscape Architecture Plagiarism Declaration Cover Sheet attached to the cover page of your essay. I suggest you make two hard copies of your assignment and keep one as a personal copy of this submission.

ASSESSMENT CRITERIA

The project will be assessed according to the following criteria:
? evidence of wide reading and creative research
? demonstrated understanding of the project and/or design work under review
? depth, elegance and power of your analysis and written expression
? quality of illustrations and analytical diagrams
? accuracy of references, bibliography, illustration sources
? in accordance with the table set out in Hay (1996 pp.19-20), ie. in terms of the quality of analysis and commentary
? fluent written expression and clean presentation, free of typos, spelling and grammatical errors
? sources and referencing all accurately included as discussed in class.


Note on sources
As with Assignment 1, the Course readings will form the point of departure for your research efforts, however you must go beyond these texts. You are expected to be creative and committed in locating comprehensive sources for your work.

You must base your research and writing on a predominance of printed scholarly and professional sources, i.e. books, journals, theses, reports, newspaper articles. To ensure the integrity and value of your research, no more than 10% of your sources can be drawn from the internet, other than refereed electronic journals.


Plagiarism & Academic Integrity

You must review the statement on Plagiarism and Academic Integrity contained in the LAND2121 Course Guide, and fully comply with University policy on the submission of original work. No plagiarism of any sort will be tolerated.

REFERENCES

Ching, F.D.K. 1979, Architecture: form, space, order, Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York.

Hay, I. 1996, Communicating in Geography and the Environmental Sciences, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, pp.19-20.

Moore, C., Mitchell, W.J. & Turnbull, W. 1988, The Poetics of Gardens, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass.

Treib, M. 1993, ‘Axioms for a Modern Landscape Architecture,’ in: Treib, M. (ed.) 1993, Modern Landscape Architecture: a critical review, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass., pp.36-67.

UNSW Landscape Architecture Program, 2003, Thesis Guidelines, The Program, University of New South Wales, Sydney.

Waymark, J. 2003, Modern Garden Design: innovation since 1900, Thames & Hudson, London.


Assignments and reading lists for LAND 2121 are based on course material that originated in 2008 with Professor James Weirick, from 2009 by Associate Professor Linda Corkery, and from 2010-2011 by Catherine Evans.


Direct any questions for clarification of these assignments to:
A/Prof Linda Corkery Red Centre/West Wing tel.: 9385 4843
l.corkery@unsw.edu.au


May 2014