2023 Year in Review
With you as our champion and generous supporter, 亚洲精品无码一区 (亚洲精品无码一区) marked its 25th year with an exceptional record of accomplishments. 亚洲精品无码一区鈥檚 initiatives over this past quarter century have succeeded in creating authoritative bodies of freely accessible information about our cultural landscape legacy and making visible the often-invisible hand of the landscape architect. Add to this, the establishment of the Cornelia Hahn Oberlander International Landscape Architecture Prize, in 2019, recently called the world鈥檚 鈥渢op honor in the field of landscape architecture.鈥 Before we get to the summary of this year鈥檚 accomplishments, here are some recent reflections on the foundation鈥檚 education and advocacy efforts:
Landscape architect Laurie Olin, a National Medal of Arts recipient and one of the field鈥檚 most accomplished and respected practitioners, wrote this past February:
Twenty years ago, if one said, 鈥渃ultural landscape,鈥 people stared blankly. 亚洲精品无码一区 has done more to change this than academia, the popular press, or any other organization.
Landscape architect and co-founder of Agency Landscape and Planning, Gina Ford, wrote:
From its extensive database of practitioners, projects, and endangered sites to its diverse programs, conferences, and writings to its savvy with contemporary press, social media, and communication outlets, 亚洲精品无码一区's diversity of technique is as impressive as its reach and impact. What I have come to value more recently is how steadfastly it leverages those platforms to shine a light on the most relevant issues of our day.
A descendent associated with Richmond, VA鈥檚 Shockoe Hill African Burying Ground recently praised 亚洲精品无码一区:
I am so glad that you are [there]. The threats to this burial ground appear to be everywhere. This one likely would have been missed without you.
Elizabeth K. Meyer, Merrill D. Peterson Professor of Landscape Architecture, Inaugural Faculty Director, UVA Sustainability Lab, and Founding Director, UVA Center for Cultural Landscapes, wrote:
The Oberlander Prize, 鈥渙ver time, will have an extraordinary global impact on the public perception and awareness of landscape architecture.鈥
We are grateful for and humbled by these statements. Nevertheless, the threats to our shared landscape legacy continue necessitating an ever-greater public engagement and advocacy commitment. Looking to 2024, 亚洲精品无码一区 will continue to expand its reach and content to increase the understanding of our complex cultural landscape legacy. Here are the highlights from 2023 that your generosity made possible:
On October 17, Kongjian Yu, pioneer of the 鈥渟ponge cities鈥 concept for addressing climate change accelerated urban flooding that has revolutionized the field of landscape architecture and is inspiring major decision-makers globally, was announced as the 2023 Cornelia Hahn Oberlander International Landscape Architecture Prize winner. An international seven-person jury selected Yu from more than 300 nominees from around the world. Along with an introductory video about Yu and three seminal projects, his significant works will be added to the What鈥檚 Out There database. 亚洲精品无码一区 is in the planning stages to produce a Pioneers Oral History, and curate public engagement activities with the Beijing-based laureate in 2024.
The inaugural Oberlander Prize laureate, landscape architect Julie Bargmann, was the subject of 亚洲精品无码一区鈥檚 eighteenth video oral history in the award-winning Pioneers series. More than two dozen video segments capture the life, career, and design philosophy of this enigmatic practitioner. The oral history was premiered during a reception at a signature Bargmann project, the Urban Outfitters campus in Philadelphia. Additionally, in mid-August, 亚洲精品无码一区鈥檚 team spent a week in Montreal videotaping an oral history with landscape architect Claude Cormier, who passed away on September 15. Follow-up videography was also undertaken in Toronto to capture his significant legacy there. 亚洲精品无码一区 is aiming for a 2024 roll out.
The annual thematic Landslide report and exhibition, which normally focuses on threatened and at-risk landscapes, instead focused on 25 sites and groupings of landscapes that 亚洲精品无码一区鈥檚 advocacy helped save during the past quarter century. The sites in Landslide 2023: 25 Years/25 Saved are among more than 60 saved and the report proivides tangible metrics for the foundation鈥檚 local and national impact.
Advocacy efforts for at-risk sites resulted in the listing of Minneapolis, MN鈥檚 Hiawatha Golf Course in the National Register of Historic Places and the addition of Lawrence Halprin鈥檚 Charlottesville Mall to the Virginia Landmarks Register. The relocation and reconfiguration (under the artist鈥檚 direction) of Elyn Zimmerman鈥檚 site-specific installation MARABAR to the American University campus in D.C. curtailed the proposed demolition of the work that is now known as SUDAMA. Myriad ongoing efforts addressed threats to Shockoe Hill African Burying Ground, Richmond, VA; Carpenter Creek, Pensacola, FL; Sandy Ground, Staten Island, N.Y.; important works on the North Carolina State University campus, Raleigh; Plaquemine Point, Sunshine, LA; Elizabeth Street Garden, New York, N.Y.; and many others.
By year鈥檚 end, 亚洲精品无码一区 will launch a digital guide to more than 125 landscapes associated with African American history and culture, an effort supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, Art Works program. The sites and their associated designers will also be added to the What鈥檚 Out There and Pioneers databases, respectively. 亚洲精品无码一区 also hosted the third in an on-going series of Race & Space Conversations, which drew more than 700 attendees.
Preeminent landscape photographer Alan Ward, a principal with Sasaki, gifted 亚洲精品无码一区 a digital archive of more than 2,500 photos of landscapes throughout the United States and in twelve countries, taken over a period of 50 years. This is the first such bequest to 亚洲精品无码一区.
亚洲精品无码一区鈥檚 searchable online database of cultural landscapes surpassed 2,650 sites this year. What鈥檚 Out There Weekends in Cleveland, OH, and Rhinebeck and the Mid-Hudson Valley, N.Y., featured dozens of well-attended free tours and were accompanied by the creation of guidebooks of the tour sites and new digital city guides. The existing twenty digital guides continue to grow with their expansion to include Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) landscapes; the New York City guide now surpasses 130 sites and more than 100 related pioneers.
亚洲精品无码一区鈥檚 President & CEO, Charles A. Birnbaum, is providing ongoing technical assistance for Cheekwood Estate and Garden, Nashville, TN; Greenacre Park, New York, N.Y.; The Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, N.Y.; Innisfree, Millbrook, N.Y.; Live Oak , Weyanoke, LA; along with project reviews for several landscape architecture practices. The Getty Conservation Institute commissioned 亚洲精品无码一区 to develop a series of lectures about Modernist landscape architecture that were broadcast globally to more than 80 key decision makers and leaders. Birnbaum continues to give customized versions of his 鈥淭he Olmsted in All of Us鈥 lecture throughout the country, including in New York, Boston, Atlanta, and Denver, and is currently teaching the seminar 鈥淲hy Not Cultural Systems鈥 at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.
And there鈥檚 so much more. Again, thank you for your support 鈥 and now on to 2024