PRIMA PAGINA
The theme-concept of this issue was debated within the «Tropism» Arhitext Festival, which took place on 9th, 10th and 11th of October in Cluj-Napoca. Within the event, prestigious Romanian and foreign architects presented their works and their theoretical principles through personal exhibitions or conferences, the young (future) architects presented their essays participating in the student-dedicated contest and the Arhitext Foundation awarded the best recent architectural works from Romania. A series of thematic debates animated the festival furthermore, inviting all the participants to dialogue.
Thus, the Arhitext 5 o’clock proposed the concept of «Tactical Landscape» for debate, engaging in discussion professionals from the fields of philosophy, sociology, architecture or landscape architecture. The concept launched for discussion is open to a multitude of approaches and interpretations. Thus, the points of view expressed maintained their individuality. The present issue thus gathers some of the opinions expressed within the discussion, along with other expositions of the Arhitext magazine collaborators, accompanying this (new) field of debate with a series of projects subsumed by the theme «Tactical Landscape».
To speak of landscape is to carefully relate to the different determiners which structure the social, political, economical etc. setting of an epoch. Today, we regard as extremely influential in structuring the contemporary life setting the mobility (of communications, of information, as well as of individuals, considering the development of transport routes) as well as the (natural) need for identity, affiliation and guiding marks. In an over-constructed – urban, economical, political – world (skillfully portrayed by Bogdan Ghiu) the tactical action seems to be the best answer for fulfilling the micro-social desiderata. Tactics, on one hand, as a way of eluding (see B. Ghiu) the (malefic) strategy and, on the other hand, as a way of implementing (see Ioan Andreescu) a coherent strategy. Sabin Bor[ proposes diversion as a way of circumventing a petrified (therefore) suffocating system. Adrian Mihalache makes an excursus towards the virtual world, to analyze the relation tactics-strategy, reflected in the landscape of simulated battles.
The notion of landscape traverses history on an interesting path: from natural landscape to man-made lanscape and, more recently, cultural landscape, a transformation permanently connected to social crystallizations. Rudolf Poledna presents, from a sociologist’s point of view, the complex relation between space-society-landscape, while Florentina Badea puts forward the problem of the authenticity of the (natural / genuine ) landscape, a theme connected to Ioan Andreescu’s exposition on English gardens. At the same time, I. Andreescu highlights the transfer of compositional devices between landscape planning and urbanism.
The projects that accompany the theoretical expositions illustrate, on different layers, the concept of «tactical landscape». The Pottersfields Park is a tactical – pragmatic and intelligent – answer to a difficult context, while the Serpentine Pavilion becomes a metaphor of taking space into possession, through delicate yet efficient means. Sami Rintala’s projects camouflage punctual and precise tactical actions inside a lyrical discourse, and the exquisite M`d`ra[ Chapel closes in a warm and detached manner the alert succesion of ideas and images which make up this exciting issue of Arhitext magazine.