The city we argue does not exist.

•November 3, 2009 • Leave a Comment

The potential remains unknown. The searching comes in the final goodbye. I wonder a thousand solitary steps why that it does prove a reprise. Why then does the city repeat such foot steps.

 

The temporary. The residual.

 

It lingers.

 

A moment which forces repetition to forge reality that can perhaps seek a solace in walls of partially cement.

 

The city we argue does not exist. it is a mere construct of narratives which we repeat and repeat to form and accountabilty. The city becomes an exercise in reason and rationale; a test of our own accountabilty to a general narrative. the everyday becomes a mock up of a series of dialouges and exchanges that layer a land. The everyday is a rhythm of silences and breaths; gasps and exhalations of simulataneous shock when our narratives collide. the personal reality and interealities which we allow to form constructs can fall; we can stop believing a visison of a city then the city falls and becomes a ruin.

 

Tomorrow I return again to Venice. The city a man on the bus tells me has died. he has lost faith in the narration of the city which his rather reclaimed and sees now only the pink glitter postcards of an unknow present.

The city however to the tourist who hovers arond us as we sit in Donatellos cafe still exists with a venom which I can not define.

To each of us the city recalls a different narrative; the architecture must provide though some unity; the street grid system keeps our narratives in check; forcing us to march in vague unity.

a complicated junction of a thousand narratives which seek different fairy tales as their empathy. the garden paths are paved now in sky scrapers and in the pub you can order a chinese take away; you can ship your packages now to america in one day and you can walk to little tokoyo in seconds on second life.

what is the city if not an intersection for these narratives?

a narrative intersection

a thought that denies nostalgia

•October 30, 2009 • 2 Comments

a homage. to a city that falls. and rises.

homage

The city as an emblem for our desires, the whispers of a fallen desire to become something that this city cannot permit, the shouts of exaltation and passion when the city fits the identity that you wish it to assume. What does It mean to dream in London, how does the city act as canvas for dreams.

 

Fields of the city that can be rambled through, as pastures of a forgotten dream scape, those who see the city through such sad eyes,, though who murmur  quietly in their sleep of dreams unfilled.

homage (2)

a thought that denies nostalgia; seeking to reinvent memories of hope and motivations; a religion of progress and a stride that evades classification or definition beyond the confines of worship. To pay homage is respect or reverence paid or rendered. Homage was essentially the acknowledgment of the bond of tenure that exists between self and an article. Homage is a personal expression of sentiment beyond the totality of verbal expression; navigated and contrasted through the varying impacts on the psyche of the urban form

homage (3)

 

The everyday is a thousand stories that collide; the personal realities and inter-realities which amount to the sum we call daily life. To chose a focus for a critical engagement one must first define the terms of the nature of the engagement.

homage (4)

The city that murmurs as to a new age; a vision that rests in the architect’s office of an inbuilt future of no certain intent.

The trend to walk the city knows no relent through the ages of urban progress; but how can the urban society become a language and what form will the language

homage (5)

A space of peace. The city for dreams desires and fears. A movement of solace and empathy for the lost ideals.

O parte istorie

•October 28, 2009 • 1 Comment

A tale of an imagination

can visual research support notions of personal definitions of urban experience

The following passages can be seen as a research tool. I have embarked now on a larger scale of walks through areas of unknown terrain under the umbrella of London. I question the semiotics of the spaces I am forming and remaking through systematic footstones. An archive of resent and homage to unknown future:

Void space

void

Memory is alive, breathing and feeling the chill of the air

History repeats

And what frustration when memory fails

To avoid such failure memory invents the void

Forming disparate fragments for what it fears may have been lost.

 

A memory that lingers through frozen concrete

A thought of a softness that falls in rotting leaves

The city does not conceal such sadness

Rain that hurts as it cuts cold sunken flesh

Possibility of an encounter in another city

We wait

 DSC00651

Waiting for a note of memory to return on a pigeon’s wing

 

We sat in the empty swimming pool with the frog

It watched us as we confused sentiments and stepped on each others broken shoes

A sadness that hollowed your jaw

 her jaw

The light falls now on a tomb to possibility

 

The room was dark, small, a cage for dreams 

un touch

Container of unspoken secrets that the bus driver swears not tell

Printed now in the news as to a fallen army of smashed youth

Pill packets protect us from your mind

 future citta

This city knows no fear; it marches towards a plastic future

Trees line the streets that were supposed to be our home

That day we walked the length of the field we feared

 

Socks damp with discontent

 

Who walks through me

 who

I wonder where you might hide as I see another fallen tree

Dead to the notion of hope still and imperfect

A dream we share that still lies between pages of a buried page

a mouse has eaten your picture hidden under the carpet

 mouse trap

that to know cannot comfort

 a love that skips through; a happiness of the past that reeks now  in this sordid corner of a failed romance

he is cold. A harshness that pains and toils

alone now; a ship wreck of a love that has yet to sail and sits in a foreign climb

who hears this silence blasted through mundane song of another

I miss

 

A tenderness that waits and holds me strong; silent but strong

Alert

 

The clock has stopped

trace

I can walk now

With the thought of the memory to pace

A hurried foot fall through lonely plain

 

Who remembers the frog who still waits our return

The swimming  pool is filling with fallen leaves

 

The candle still burns

Dripping wax over silk untouched silk sheets

 

A march

futura

And then there was a bus journey

The destination was not marked

The view from either side of the window was lined with avenues of apartments; lives in small boxes to which this tale is of no consequence, and still for the memory of an existence it continues and repeats; forms to then disappear.

 

A walk that lingers through dim candle light in search of a home; a place to rest and to feel the weight of such journey cease to concern. Such lightness as the body submerges to the fall of the descent.

The end has no celebration

the end

The road has always been long

A lady places dead flowers by smashed graves

A prayer that is heard by deaf ears bringing a chill to warm comforting rooms

slow

The house has a stillness that is disturbed by his presence as he stands silent

The hat remains on the stand; his coffee still undisturbed

A cigarette unlit will never be smoked

A smouldering atmosphere warns us

 unknown

We walk on

Memory still paces

space

The notion of the performance of a building ; the theatre; as the actor and the actors as a mere imitation as to what the building strives to create; let us debate the role of who is the audience? The building. Its users. The street? The dwellers? The rhythm of daily life and the impact  the perception of the individual has to allow the character of a building to form and function and flourish; is it possible to curate a warm space; what are atmosphere in spaces if no projection of the emotional content which is added by individuals?

 

A ghost space?

 

How can a conversation be scripted ? a conversation that allows social function and allows there to be a resonance that echoes in the space; again and again..

 

A space designed to conduct an enquiry? To curate and create space of tangible ability to allow some sort of function to begin to exist; then how can such experience form a documentation of the daily lived experience? Are we now in the realms of spatial research/ how can a photograph translate as a visceral experience?

 

The visceral experience of architecture which can then be translated in some form of expression into an image for even to choreography; but what is lost and what is made? How far can a space encourage a spatial visceral reaction which allow the totality of eth experience of the body in that space and time to be notated within the confines of the limitations of the human inability to express rational with intent made.

 

Towards a research

Ideas of a working approach: the typography of potential future city

 

How can a city be understood> why do we feel the need to comprehend urban form and is there a real purpose to a creative understanding and interpretation of urban life?

Does the city exist? Can the city be interpreted as a generational construct of personal narratives over lapping to allow some form of reality to take shape?

 How far does the approach of individuals towards urban form allow for urban progress> for example can one really compare Hausmanisation with Atget> and if these are added together; what impression do they generate of an identity?

 All representation of urban life is specific to time and locality so can a generic tool kit ever be a true impression of the notion urban progress when in reality minor individual projects will only add up to significance layer upon layer.

  • Field practice: the camera and the daily life: how far can a camera be used to make archival evidence as to the notion of daily life and can this then generate material for an archive of urban form which ultimately then becomes a social tool for collective urban memory
  • reassembling the norm: the relay of daily experience in relation to social use and potential ‘usefulness’ in the schema of regeneration and creative place making
  • tool kit for spatial exploration; how can creative exercise allow a deeper relationship to form with the city and generate the idea of the personal and the ‘normal’?
  • the viable norm of reality: what is the city> how can photography generate a collective schema for the urban life
  • generative form of failure: how can participoary planning become deep rooted success for the ‘new’ city development
  • an environment to narrate a history.. how can all of the above be displayed in such a way that allows the individual to form an approach to the urban life? Exhibition and seminar series TBC. The importance of sharing research for future proofing of the positive urban experience
  • a narration of spatial experience. How individuals experience the city and how these experiences are reflected and how such reflections can be explored / exploited to generate a scheme for urban development

 

Methodology: thoughts towards a potentail walk:

The camera

The spaces

The city

The conversations

The documentation

The books

The films

The everyday

: ‘What role can the physical experience of walking play within the discovery of urban photographic forms?

 

towards you

a thousand lost walks

•September 18, 2009 • Leave a Comment

walk

A series of a thousand walks;

they began as an unknown exercise to formulate paths through the city; to cultivate an understanding of the maze in which i mumbled though; now I sit; a thousand maps of charted realm; all notated. the body acts as a vessel for the memory of an imprint. The worn shoes; the hair thrown by the wind; the face smeared with dust. I carry rocks from the sea in my pocket; lest we should forget; lest we should forget.

This is a vulnerable stage. I have emerged in half form back to this island from Venice and France; where life had become an immersion; a daily practice; and now i reveal; my memories; my steps and what imprint they have dare leave. foot steps that bring an assertion of memory that clings like a strong force to moments where a camera becomes a weapon against the power to forget. I built  a road; i did not want this to exist past the moment in which it was made; now photographs haunt; a unwitting archive to what i hoped to be private action of body and space and time.

To sit in a busy cafe and taste the sea. To juggle on a bus clinging to the remaining strands of heather i collected; to narrate time after time where my feet fell; to create a dialogue that forces collaboration between here and now and gone; a tangible intrigue which falters.

walk me

This is a developmental body of experimental research collated from a series of reflections from a series of on going walks and journeys I have made in the past six months; from England; to France; to Venice; to home; to happiness; to sadness; alone; together. I have journeyed from city to sea; to forest; from retreat; to mass; to solitude. A walk to remember; a walk to forget; a walk to forgive; a walk to generate; a walk to emerge; a walk to pause; a walk to begin; a walk to question; a walk to fight; a walk to escape; a walk to love; a walk to memory. Each walk has been documented in a photographic journal; photographs allowing me to take possession of the spaces I have passed; an act of non intervention to capture practice; my walks have become a systematic realization for image gathering to form sociological impressions and personal cartographies of landscapes. I have further developed a movement vocabulary from the series of impressions and imprint each journey created and left on me; this now forms a physical notation of the journeys I made in a non linear dialogue between actuality; memory and impression.

I have sat now for some hours forming a language from such impressions; a notation through my body of the lands i have walked and climbed; a physical image through movement of experience.

This exploration will show at 15 Minute Factory next week: http//15minutefactory.blogspot.com/

Current train:

” to photograph allows us to take possession of space” Susan Sontag; so to dance allows that possession to form a new dialogue that stretches beyond traditional boundaries of expectation of the form of memory; if “the act of picture taking is an event in itself” (Sontag) then the act of seeking alternative source and inspiration from that picture becomes practice. I am notating the experience of the non linear counter intuitive dialogue which i form between my body; space and time; such relationship forms content in the ability to gage the affect and effect of spatial encounter.

I will be writing a publication of these 1000 walks to be released July 2010.

Potrebbe essere venuto presto? Una serie di sentieri attraverso la città di Venezia. 10054 immagini

•September 13, 2009 • 1 Comment

Una serie di sentieri attraverso la città di Venezia.

Tutto con lo scopo ed indica.

Tutto di essere documentato ed essere spiegato.

il sentimento ora conferendo poteri

10054 immagini; cadendo nella mia mente; la città esiste; porto l’immagine dopo che l’immagine di consentire che lui esistere; ripetere per formare una memoria.

Ma questa sera non posso guardarli.

completare con la mia propria memoria; non ha deciso ancora come esportare e dividere tale knoledge; come questo deve essere un rivelare di rivelazione così personale,

dico nessuno più, solo le mie linee sono qui sulla mappa

saturday paths

Una conversazione con la città: un che lavorando giorno a Venezia.

•September 12, 2009 • Leave a Comment

night

Per immaginare la città con le vene; un cuore; che pompa il sangue giù passaggi così stretti formando un’armonia ed un’esistenza che sta in piedi di indossare contro un che il ticchettando orologio.

Per visitare o a abitato; la città non commenta; indossa solo un’impressione. La riflessione può spiegare le cicatrici nei muri, una tipografia densa di abuso.

 history

 C’è tale poesia questo giorno; ciò come siedo qui nella conte y le ore attendendo l’alba di sorgere di nuovo e portare le strade ha armato con una coscienza che sveglia e mette all’erta qualcosa che ha temuto di mescolare per alcuno tempo.

support left

 

set one

 

trace us

weapon

flock herd

 

Il giorno comincia prima; l’alba gioca con la mia macchina fotografica e con io; ci deride; portando; dando ed il ‘marching ‘ che ci inoltriamo a un’indicazione di certa speranza.

new home

Questo è vecchio; temo che la sua morte come i greggi abusino le sue strade un giorno dopo l’altro.

show 1

 

set 2

 

Hans Peter Feldman Shadow play 1941 ( my image)

L’incarico Un: le persone di marca portano la stessa immagine dall’indicazione di Incarico di centro d’interesse due: la passeggiata nei cerchi ed entra nell’Incarico di maniera tre: porta sempre strada la più lunga e più
difficile. L’incarico quattro: porta le fotografie via dagli oggetti ed i luoghi che non sono mai mostrato nell’Incarico di guida cinque: le conversazioni di notate; le citazioni formano un manoscritto che dovrebbe essere
ripetuto e dovrebbe essere innestato la retromarcia di formare la sciocchezza.

citta

set 5

 

walking

….

Gli incarichi fanno la cartografia del labirinto sembra un po’meno ovvia e le mappe ed i segni possono essere licenziati.

herd

…..

Ho camminato dall’alba al crepuscolo; parlando e formando; facendo e creando; ballando e camminando; facendo quest’un mondo di viaggi della mente attraverso lo spazio. Sento esposto e vulnerabile; la mia mente ha esposto ora nei libri e nelle immagini; essere considerato.

expose

stage door

beauty

…..

Il progetto: i libri dal soffitto come le docce di conoscenza; il labirinto di canestri; posso trovare una nuova casa? Posso costruire una nuova strada?

… Una serie di spazi sono rapidamente costruite ed è distrutta; fatto e disfatto. Questo è la terra di dolore beato; una fantasticheria nelle menti ha alimentato con lo scontento.

light dance ap set

Sono armato con i miei attrezzi; la mia macchina fotografica; gli spazi sono la mia conquista; esportare la mente nello spazio; consentire lo spazio consumare e dettare.

relgion held

Ci sono delle discussioni sull’uso di lingua; lasciare il lavoro parla per sé; lasciare lo spettatore determina il destino.

Un uomo diventa l’amico; il viaggio dal luogo di situare; ciascuno sembra essere un po’più avanzato nel suo stato di decadenza.

Gli spazi spazi intermedi mi consumano; trovo i lavori meno. Meno.

Questa città ha riempito un incantesimo culturale. Ospita tutta l’arte; il giocatore principale nell’indicazione di qualunque nuovo talento. Sento che un ondeggia di delusione al familiare di viste ancora sconosciuto;

Una mappa dagli oggetti forma più narrazione di il turista guida.

Foto Rapida.

Le strade sono rivestite con le macchine fotografiche; dovrei aggiungere un altro? Guardo come dieci persone raccolgono ed immagazzinano la stessa immagine; l’hanno paura scomparirà? Affonda nelle profondità oscure della laguna proprio come i loro sogni può?

reflect

Perché questo è è la città di idillio? Entro l’aria di crepuscolo; la laguna porta un’aria di mare debole e le campane di chiesa squillano; una sposa cammina attraverso il quadrato; nessune parole qui; rimane nella lingua e nella conversazione del paesaggio; l’architettura e la luce.

Parlo ai viaggiatori crollati nel negozio di gelato; amano la città; sorridono quando parlano di tali emozioni.

La città di amore? Di memoria? Di un’illusione alla grandiosità come sediamo nel quadrato alla mezzanotte bevendo il liquore in Florien’ s; questo sbiadirà, ma per ora mi permetto in tale utopia.

?

 

home bound

Gioco con la luce ed esaurisce: formando le immagini per una serie.

 

...... generic ....

Ho viaggiato ora della grande distanza attraverso questa città; una mappa dettaglia un sentiero;

Ma dunque molte strade lasciate di essere camminate.

Un bisogno di consumare la terra prima che cade?

 

Friday on map

 

Dormire qui i tatti in vano. Un bisogno di respirare l’aria ed immerge ogni momento. Per consentire che la città e la mente incontrare.

Venice: Feild work: to repeat: to Exist.

•September 11, 2009 • Leave a Comment

Un settembre in Venezia

 

walk one

Un parallelo strano alla vita l’anno scorso; un marchio di cambiamento.

Arrivo e subito un taxi di acqua mi porta al palazzo che sto in.

Cammino il giorno attraverso.

Un odore del familiare ed un pensiero di certezza.

Questo è la città dove immagino nessuni muri.

Dunque molte viste che non posso elencare di bellezza così perpetua che fa me sempre un po’triste.

Dunque molti pensieri che consuma come la città diventa ancora una volta familiare; questo è la città che porta la mia mente.

Ho cominciato oggi. Sono qui al notate e rilevo la mappa la città; formare i passaggi che è scomparso dal radar del Disneyland che consuma i greggi che truppa attraverso le strade strette.

Oggi ho testimoniato tale bellezza che i miei occhi non possono riposarsi.

Invece ho fatto una serie di sentieri ed i passaggi attraverso il labirinto di cui sono così appassionato.

walk one ( 2 )

Una solitudine di strade solitarie nelle folle vaste; lavorando la città come un canovaccio; riempe e le linee liscie di agitazione.

 

walk one Venice september 10th 09

 

fury

 

una strada di tale avidità ed il caos è incontra tale calore come la furia sbiadisce e ci possiamo si riposare all’ombra di silenzio

refuge

 

per chiamare fuori da nessuno nome e non sperare essere trovato nelle mie anse attraverso i pascoli utopistici; cercando la pace; un nuovo calmo alla forma urbana

 

verso un’alba

reflections on a walk ( series of 34)

•September 4, 2009 • Leave a Comment

I undertook a series of 34 walks in the Northern climbs of Brittany. Staying in converted barn near Plurien; with my mother, father and a bicycle; I commenced a series of explorations and interventions of the vast expanses of landscapes I walked through; camera and I. A journey to nothing in particular other than open eyes.

walk 1 of 34

 

nous marchons.
parce que nous devons marcher.
je confine.
consommer des fascinations sans fin.
un paysage qui s’attarde.
fatiguer de vieilles chaussures
recueillir des images comme si les moments de clarté
un champ de vision
qui bouge pour considérer certainite
une tristesse qui traduit dans les pas pour former une série de passages.
un voyage à nulle part mais quelque part.
un rêve pour avoir du sens d’une telle crainte révérencielle.
une promenade
.

 

walk 1

I sit now in London; the empty an old concept; The land which I loved and lost; found and dismissed.

pre walk

A holiday?

walk 5 ( of 34)

A break from city walk to climb hills and lands that consume colour film.

 

walk 8 ( of 34)

 

A series of movements that gradually form and reform; potential and ideology.

I took a map and imagined journeys and drew them as lines which will remain un traced. To measure distance in footsteps and to wonder what a landscape can hold. This land holds wonder; solace; notions of a space that holds and can never be held; to walk to remember to walk to erase all memory with each foot step. To walk to think. When we sit; what occurs can take a form of muddled cacophony of voices; forged fragments; as the distance increases; the rhythmic patterning of a walk that forms a series of imprints that in time for a nostalgia for nothing and everything. A walk to frame the mind. A series of lands that create some narrative form to swift moving thought. I wonder that what impression I would leave on such desolate climbs where my foot prints are the first for some time; though thick forest; through fields of rock; to dreams; to a feeling of imagination that cannot help but soar to a seemingly empty sky.

 

walk 14 ( of 34)

 

 

walk 26 ( of 34 )

 

 

 

walk 19 ( of 34)

 

By moonlight the landscape becomes foreign; the darkness forms new corners for the mind to wander through long narrow passages; a journey that begins in sunlight; a bright fierce awakening; that ends in the dark silent sultry tone of the moon; the journey that begs description yet demands no words; a moon of a cycle of hope; a start and only a murmur as to the potential of an end.

walk 21 ( of 34)

 

 

walk 2 ( of 34)

 

 

 

walk 31 ( of 34)

 

Armed with my camera; almost another arm of conscious thought; I consume; greedy to form collections of collages of the life that breathes about my steps; images falling like tired confetti in the arms of strangers who do not know where it should scatter so collect it in hole lined pockets. I perhaps am lost without my camera; unnerved as to what to do with the images that I possess; formations and experiences of landscapes; the sensation of awe contained neatly in a 5 x 7 35mm. the struggle to document this paradise that heaves with the winds through old trees that know your secrets.

A walk through a place that does not have a name; and does not have an identity past the notions I cement in my mind; to become a place; to become an identity that shakes the root of all clause to definite geography.

walk 1 of 34

 This walk will remain a voyage; camera in arm; result uncertain

I sit now in London; the empty an old concept; The land which I loved and lost; found and dismissed.  

une fin qui n’arrivera jamais. 
une promenade qui ne sait aucune fin.
finir seulement pour moissonner une autre carte de possibilte
un pas à un endroit qui peut une fois avoir été une maison.
au pneu de chutes sans fin et les ruisseaux.
crier dans une forêt et une merveille qui entend.
marquer une pause et  plus calm.

walk 34 of 34

 

a brief pause

•September 4, 2009 • Leave a Comment

I have walked a road

my feet are heavy and my shoes weathered with tired holes

a series of images repeats of such vistas

the memory of being alone in bleak climbs that let the imagination fly on the wings of a bedraggled pigeon

this place is nameless

i built a road

i came home

home is falling

the footsteps still continue

a measuring pace

with no certainity.

walk fin

• ‘The city is a place of encounters, unexpected discoveries and social exchange where citizens are taken on a new journey time after time.’

•August 12, 2009 • 2 Comments

babylon a rise

This is home

he coughed a little

then returned to his haunt

a warmth of hiding in the dark

this city know no one

it wont ask a name

we seek softness

in created places

forged realities and half notions of blundering success

the adverts tell us we need more

we buy more

we feel less

its get thrown away and made into a new castle

Awaiting notice

I stumbled here and stepped tentaively into a world I was not welcome

suddenly a camera was seen a dangerous weapon allowing an imprint of these lives to be taken

life in a pea green boat

a sea of dirty clothes

next to paradise forum

no map negates

site walks LABAN 09

a playground?

a stage?

A home?

a new flat block?

Is it possible to create creative spaces? An evaluation of the role of observational practices in the creation modern public spaces in urban environments.

As urban populations increase there is becoming a necessity in development to utilise spaces that previously would have been cast aside as wastelands, such spaces are becoming prominent communal spaces in the city, often temporary spaces with functioning arts projects for sometimes often a few months, but such projects in temporary spaces encourage creative use of the city and encourage the scope for creative intervention.

Creative Space can be constructed in any pocket of the city where there is the resource physically and creatively to maintain it. This does not have to be defined to specific architectural projects or even temporary space projects, it can simply be a small intervention within existing space that encourages thought and causes space users to review their surrounding habitat more closely due to added external stimuli ‘at all levels of society people use urban space creatively and often such creativity is bought about through adversity or diversity.’

I am currently making a study based on William H Whyte;

Whyte. W. H. (1980) The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces. USA. Project for Public Spaces. Edwards Brothers

——————————–

Whyte’s observations of Public Space: The command of thought and vision

Through an in depth analysis of Whyte’s The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces.  I am able to present a further example as to how observation of urban life can have successful and useful contributions to town planning practices.

Whyte’s investigations as to use of public space by inhabitants form conclusive statements as to the impact of space design on the choreography of daily life. Through extensive observation periods using minimal technological he creates detailed and sustained accounts as to how activity in public space fluctuates, and how observation of such flux can be utilised in urban planning.

‘We started by studying how people use plazas. We mounted time lapse cameras overlooking the plazas and recorded daily patterns.’

Collecting an abundance of documentation the ‘intensification of the natural choreography of place,’   the; ‘tendency towards reciprocal gestures in street conferences, the rhymes of the three phrase good bye’  he habits of daily existence, these records were used to support particular theories of public space use, but can also be used as interesting pieces photographic art inspired by daily life. This has very similar output as to the work of Atget, and could be considered a modern day continuation of his practices.

Whyte’s observations have taken place in many different parts of the city, observing the social functions of particular city design features through simple documentation of observation. Such contributions aid the understanding of the choreography and even scenography of the urban landscape. With meticulous detail in his observations

Crucial to Whyte’s practice was his sense that he needs to inform and educate others as to effective means to establish their own observational practices to continue his legacy of vision. This was done through papers, newspapers, journals, and published materials. This is seminal to an appreciation of the impacts of observation to artists, readers and town planners alike. He commands; ‘watch these flows and you will appreciate how very important these steps can be’ encouraging active appreciation of the street as means of resource.

Whyte’s creation of the theory of ‘Triangulation’  forms an articulate example as to power of street art to divert attention to creative thought for the mass, encouraging interaction through observation from passers by. He explains’ the stimulus can be physical object or sight’.  The effect of such creative activity has measurable and certain effects and can itself form a part of the naturalistic place choreography of the street.

‘A virtue of street acts is their unexpectedness. when people crowd around an entertainer, it happens very quickly, in 40 or 50 seconds, they look much like children who have come upon a treat, some will be smiling in simple delight.’

The majority of Whyte’s investigations occurred in well populated areas of the urban landscape, as his main agenda was to determine how city dwellers used popular public space.

‘We see what we expect to see and have been so conditioned to see crowded spaces in certain city that is often difficult to see empty ones, but we looked, there they were.’

I am keen to relate his theories of the use of well populated space to wasteland and derelict areas of the city, and to study how such wilderness is used by city dwellers, through means of observation and photographic study, I am forming case studies of particular areas and the means in which they are utilised socially and creatively.

My study of Whyte’s practice has been an invaluable contribution to collating aspects of town planning theory into my own practice.

move along to home steads