Less sculptural more intellectual: conceptualizing landscape in the architecture of 1990s and 2000s
Less sculptural more intellectual: conceptualizing landscape in the architecture of 1990s and 2000s

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this paper is to discuss the radical shift which emerges in the 1990s and enhances architecture in the 2000s by turning it into a less sculptural more intellectual field of design. Hence, architects rather focus on ground than figure in design projects. This leads them to interrogate the conventional relationships between figure and ground enabling figure to dominate the ground in architecture for decades. They discover the mutual relationships between figure and ground, and design grounded structures instead of ungrounded sculptures. These artificial structures seem like the extensions of the natural landscape, as such the conceptual and categorical distinction between artificial and natural blurs in architecture. Another conceptual blurring emerges between the concepts of landscape, ground, and field. These are generally used as interchangeable concepts, but landscape encompasses ground and field, making it a more comprehensive concept for architects. It is revealed in the paper that landscape is a re-emerging concept which refers to the conceptual shift from form and function to flow and force in architecture. Landscape, therefore, awaits to be explored as a field of flows and forces by even more architects in this century in which cities are characterized by sculptural forms and objects.

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