The 3rd Annual SNRE Earth Art installations start today (Monday, Apri l 7), featuring the work of Landscape Architecture students from "NRE 503: Imprints & Archetypes." The exhibits can be viewed through Friday.

The outdoor exhibits this year move off main campus to two locations: North Campus Quad and the Nichols Arboretum. In past years, the presentations were set up in the Main Campus Diag near the Dana Building. But preparations for the 2008 commencement forced the exhibits to relocate this year.

The class is taught by Beth Diamond, a, associate professor in the School of Natural Resources and Environment's Landscape Architecture program.

Here are the students' description of their projects, as well as where on campus the exhibits can be found:

The Structure Beneath: Modeling the Science of Nature and Nature in Science. Students: Jeannine Bessette, Angela Lee, Cara Kappler, Rebekah VanWieren and Lindsey Miller.

Project location: North Campus Quad (Diag)

Description: This installation combines two forms - the conic helix and the TIN - to demonstrate how similar laws and forms underlie the natural order of the universe, and the maní¢â‚¬ made, artificial order of the built, engineered environment. Here's a brief introduction to theforms:

The Conic Helix: A conic helix is a combination of a spiral and a helix - a spiral on a conic surface. Spirals are a common form of organization in nature, found in shells (logarithmic spirals), sunflower florets (Fermat's spiral), etc. Helices also underlie many important forms in the natural order. Some example of helices in nature include DNA molecules (formed by two intertwined helices), proteins (many have helical substructures), climbing plants (tendrils take the shape of a helix), and pitch spaces (the modeling of relationships between pitches in musical theory). In short, mathematical relationships underlie natural forms; the conic helix is an example of a dynamic combination of two such mathematically based structures, which also happens (as we have modeled it) to resemble landscape.

The TIN: A TIN, or triangulated irregular network, is a representation of the landscape (topographical surface), made up of data points, connected by lines, which in turn form irregularly shaped, noní¢â‚¬ overlapping triangles. TINs portray landscape in three dimensions, and have important applications in GIS, landscape architecture, and engineering (among others). While a TIN will never replicate a natural landscape, its form is used here to underline the science which goes into any manipulation of landscape, and the science behind the study of land itself. In other words, it representsí¢â‚¬  in a compelling physical form í¢â‚¬  the architecture of landscape.

The concept: This installation gives physical form to the underlying structure of both natural laws and the maní¢â‚¬ made environment. More importantly, its formsí¢â‚¬  which exist both naturally and in maní¢â‚¬ made artificeí¢â‚¬  show a natural intersection and relationship. The conic helix and the TIN complement one another in much the same way that maní¢â‚¬ made forms can and should complement the natural order. The form of this installation shows their interrelationship, and seeks to illuminate the extent to which natural forms determine both what humans conceive and build, and what we find "naturally" beautiful.

(U)Natural. Students: Jenna Jones, Amy Kludt, Brian Laskowski, Marin Sullivan and Jingyuan Wang.

Project location: North Campus Quad (Diag)

Description/concept: By synthetically constructing "trees" in a highly manicured and restricted setting, this projects plays on notions of naturalism, artificiality, and manmade, controlled interventions in landscape design. Nine forms made to resemble trees will be placed into a grove within an open field. Eight of the trees will be placed in two rows of four. The ninth will be made larger, with a more expansive and sprawling canopy. This arrangement will be set next to the preí¢â‚¬ existing allíƒ ©e, as well as the single row of trees on the north end of the site, thus mimicking the geometric lines of the established landscape design. Haphazardly constructed of assembled fragments and pieces of scrap, processed constructioní¢â‚¬ grade wood, the canopies of these treeí¢â‚¬ like forms will be painted a bright, artificial green. This use of color, on already modified and manipulated material will intentionally engage an imitative antií¢â‚¬ aesthetic as means to question how space is landscaped.

 

 

 

Corn for Cars: A Visual Exploration of The Maladies of Growing Maize for Biofuel. Students: Becca Sowder, Angie Cambell, Lauren DeSilva, Laurie Lesch and Jessica Neafsey.

Project location: North Campus Quad (Diag)

Description: Corn has sustained humans for millennia. Michael Pollan, in The Omnivore's Dilemma, reflects that "How this peculiar grass, native to Central America and unknown to the Old World before 1492, came to colonize so much of our land and bodies is one of the plant world's greatest success stories."(Pollan, 23) He even goes as far to say that "there is every reason to believe that corn has succeeded in domesticating us."(Pollan, 23) Corn has not only been a longstanding source of food, but an important source of fiber and animal silage, a heating fuel, and an intoxicant. Presently we ingest corn in an endless variety of processed ingredients, and corn byproducts can be found in wallboard and joint compound, linoleum, fiberglass. On top of all this, there is now a tremendous push towards growing corn for ethanol to fuel our oilí¢â‚¬ based economy.

The consequences of growing corn for biofuel are already proving to be somewhat disastrous. These negative impacts have to do with two things: the WHERE and the HOW of growing corn. First of all, the corn ethanol industry in the U.S. is heavily subsidized, and with 27 percent or our country's corn crop earmarked for fuel in 2007 (up 20 percent since 2006!), this meant both deforestation and displacement of agricultural cropland (McKenna, Phil. "Corn Biofuel "Dangerously Oversold" as Green Energy"). David Biello states that "Diverting food crops for fuel production leads to ever more land clearing as well. Ethanol demand in the U.S., for example has caused some farmers to plant more corn and less soy. This has driven up soy prices causing farmers in Brazil to clear more Amazon rainforest land to plant valuable soy. Because a soy field contains far less carbon than a rainforest, the greenhouse gas benefit of the original ethanol is wiped out."(Biello, David. "Biofuels are Bad for Feeding People and Combating Climate Change"). Second of all, our modern, industrial means of growing corn, that is heavily reliant on fossil fuels, pesticides, and herbicides, is incredibly damaging to the environment, causing erosion, depletion of groundwater, algae blooms, and the formation of "dead zones" in waterways inundated with toxic runoff, as evidenced most visibly in the Gulf of Mexico.

Our installation on the North Campus Diag will visually depict industrially grown biofuel corn, represented by thin 4' bamboo stakes with corn cobs attached at top, encroaching upon forests and farmland, represented by a multitude of colored trees (constructed from branches of discarded woody plant debris). The linear invasion of the corn rows will contrast the organic shapes and arrangements represented by the colored trees. The threatened "forest" and "orchard" will be confined to the corner of our site that is surrounded by sidewalks, creating a sense of enclosure and entrapment as the forest is forced to exist between impervious sidewalks and an encroaching monocrop.

Perhaps increased pedestrianism and bike friendly design and planning are part of the answer to this complicated and disastrous corn craze.

Evolution. Students: Chris Nordstrom, Peli Breese, Shazeb Qadir, M'Lis Bartlett and Sara Turner.

Project location: Nichols Arboretum, near the School Girls Glen at the entrance

Description/concept: School Girls Glen has become a scar í¢â‚¬  a tear in the fabric of nature.

Fears regarding stormwater runoff are actualized in the glen. Our antagonistic relationship with nature has created erosion on a massive scale. Fortunately, some are reaching out to heal the wound. By restoring the natural ecosystems and reducing the effects of runoff from impermeable surfaces, we can return the glen to its natural splendor.

Our project represents the glen's evolution. Using wrapped stones to represent the invasion of pollutants and runoff, brightly colored "sutures" to represent our efforts to heal the glen, and colored posts to represent a future union between nature and humanity, we strive to show the transition of School Girls Glen from natural wonder, to degraded structure, to restored brilliance.

The Sacred Grove. Students: Danielle Kahn, Michael Woznicki, Lauren Hoffman, Allison Krueger and Patrick Reed.

Project location: Guerilla installation (undisclosed).

Description: Columns once represented abstracted trees, and early architectural structures such as Stonehenge and the Parthenon emulated sacred groves worshipped in nature. Beneath a mammoth highway overpass, couched between the peaceful Huron River and industrial railroad tracks, there exists a series of bridge columns reminiscent of a sacred grove of trees. In this strangely beautiful industrial landscape, our group will transform these concrete, graffitií¢â‚¬ covered pillars back into trees, attempting a modern reinterpretation of the sacred grove. People passing by on the nearby bike path will stumble upon this contemplative, holy space, be struck by the awesome irony of our modern sacred grove, and take a moment to think about man's unprecedented impacts on the natural environment.