A new nature for exiled territories : the archaeology of beauty
Master Thesis
2012
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University of Cape Town
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A thing of beauty is defined by the way one apprehends it, by the reaction of and the experience it evokes in the participant. Two modes of approaching beauty are explored: the first is that of beauty being fundamental to a particular form, holding on to past idealized images; or secondly, that beauty is associated with an emotional experience or response, bound up with the senses. Integral to the design exploration of this preconception of beauty, is Ingold's dwelling perspective, that landscape is seen as an enduring record of what has been and what is left behind (1993: 59), our experiences become linked to the temporality of place. Or, alternately, our "perceptions of landscapes, influenced by the metaphors associated therewith (Spirn 1998: 24), greatly affect the way that they are experienced" (Prinsloo, 2012 a : 37), becoming the archaeology of experience. In exploring the concept of the perception of beauty in derelict quarry landscapes; the damaged site and geology is eroded, succumbing to the temporal processes. This change, the inducing of experience, is felt not only in the dramatic difference of the quarry face to that of the tenacity of the vegetation, but also a richer peculiarity : the original industrial function of place is re-imagined as a medium for biodiversity. This re-imagining of site evolves into that of 'wunderkammer' or wonder room, in which the differences between the wonders of nature and the artefacts of man can be juxtaposed. The concept of 'wunderkammer' provides a platform where ideas can be tested, making the place more capable of appearing; thus, the perception of beauty unfolds in the landscape becoming something in which we explore. The way in which the quarry retains itself, between the decay and revitalization, as a unique place is that it is an alternative to the current reality elsewhere.
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Hedley, P. 2012. A new nature for exiled territories : the archaeology of beauty. University of Cape Town.