Water has become a commodity. Like other commodities, it now divides us between the haves and have-nots. Clean water and sanitation will further define us as nations, in how we carry forward our abilities to care for our peoples and our respect for the community of nations.
– The Very Reverend Dr. James A. Kowalski
We are at a Watershed Moment
This seminar will examine the design of waterscapes at multiple scales, from parks and gardens to follies and fountains. We will explore water as a spatial and territorial agent of change, a matrix for design intervention; as a phenomenological and evocative material, a design medium; and as a cultural lodestone, poetry and myth.
Course method
Assignments for this seminar will document the physical and cultural context of a local watershed using critical mapping, and develop a framework for discussing water design issues and tactics through analysis of contemporary art. The work will be compiled in a booklet; students will work individually, but within a standard format, and will compile individual pages to a seminar booklet for distribution in the department.
We will work iteratively and simultaneously, cycling through group sessions and draft reviews on both projects over the term, and presenting both in week 9.