مجله منظر
پیاپی 14 (بهار 1390)

Ancient artefacts are full of motifs of celestial bodies, humans, animals, plants and rocks. A closer study of these motifs reveals broader concepts beyond their mere appearance. Evidence proves that these ancient motifs are rooted within a nation’s culture, religion, and tribal beliefs. A better understanding of these images requires a comprehensive study of artefacts and relics dating from ancient times.

Historical Iranian texts have referred to Sassanid landscape architecture and hunting-parks in the Kermānshāhān and Bisotun territories of Western Iran. Some of the oldest of these texts include Al- A’lāq Al- Nafsyya by Ibn-i- Rasta (290 AH) and Al- Masālik va Al- Mamālik by Estakhrī (c. 320 AH). These historical accounts are backed by archaeological evidence. The three royal hunting grounds, Tarāš-e Farhād of Bisotun, Tāq-e Bostān in Kermānshāh and the Anaitis temple of Kangāvar are the only and most outstanding examples of ancient Iranian landscape architecture discovered yet. Tarāš-e Farhād, a chiseled rock face on the Bisotun cliff, was part of a royal hunting-ground discovered among other Sassanid remains in the village of Bisotun. This hunting-park was designed on the basis of Iranian gardens. In Kermānshāh, the harmonic natural elements including water, mountain and forest as well as the remaining bas-reliefs introduce Tāq-e Bostān as a daskira or royal hunting-field. The stone remains known as the Parthian temple of Anaitis in the city of Kangāvar is actually a country pavilion and a royal hunting-ground of a Sassanid court.

One of the reasons man has created gardens is to rebuild heaven on earth. So far, a lot has been written about how Iranian gardens are meant to exemplify heaven and represent an attempt to realize the dream of life in paradise on earth. The idea of four heavenly streams has had a great influence on the structure and geometric design of Iranian gardens. This article adopts a critical approach toward the idea that the structure of gardens has been influenced by man’s beliefs about heaven with an emphasis on the influence of heaven as a concept rather than a form. Iranians built gardens based on a geometric four-part design. The general idea is that this design was based on the pre-Islamic belief in a four-part world and remained intact in the Islamic era as a result of the Islamic belief in four heavenly streams mentioned in the Qur’an. This article does not intend to analyze or rule out the idea that the structure of Iranian gardens was influenced by heaven as a concept rather it argues against the influence of heaven as any exact form. The idea of a world divided into four parts is based either on legend or on the Torah which considers the Garden of Aden as man’s first dwelling place. However, there is no written document to prove that Iranians believed in a four-part world in the pre-Islamic era. In fact, Zoroastrian religious teachings reveal completely different ideas.

The Musée Des Arts Premiers (the Primitive Arts Museum) was established in the summer of 1998 upon the request of the President of the French Republic Jacques Chirac as a place to promote dialog among cultures and display the forgotten civilizations of Asia, Africa, the Americas, and Oceania. In an agreement with the government of Lionel Jospin, Chirac chose a field of State located 29/55, Quai Branly in Paris (7th) for the implementation of the project. In the heart of Paris's museum land, neighboring the Louvre and the Musée d’Orsay, a few minutes from the Grand and Petit Palais, the Palais de Tokyo and the Musée d’art moderne de la Ville de Paris, the Musée du quai Branly has an exceptional location on the banks of the River Seine, at the foot of the Eiffel Tower. The Musée du quai Branly is an innovative cultural institution, museum, educational and research centre, and public living space all in one. Built on one of the last available sites in the heart of Paris, the architectural design of this original project is the work of Jean Nouvel. A commission was established to study the proper location, access, and city identity. It concluded the Musée du quai Branly be located on the banks of the River Seine with an area of 25,000 square meters. Designer Jean Nouvel allocated the major part of the land to open spaces and gardens. The museum complex contains several buildings and stands above the site’s surface. Gilles Clement1 was asked to design the exterior area of the Quai Branly garden. Best known as the designer of original public parks and gardens in France, Clement introduces the progression of ecology in his gardens using symbolism and metaphors as his plantings are designed to move with growth phases. “The main objective,” writes Clement, “is to encourage biological diversity, a source of wonder and our guarantee for the future.” This article is aimed at reviewing Clement’s approaches in designing this project based on his concepts in the Quai Branly Museum.

In the late 1980’s in France, a new urban renewal policy was adopted to address problems arising from uncontrolled industrial developments in urban areas. These developments threatened the environment and affected the social life of citizens, thus the new urban renewal policy was aimed at simultaneously tackling the physical, economic and social aspects of urban life. The André-Citroën Park was formed as a result of this policy and became a starting point for the renewal process. The main idea was to transform the polluted urban wasteland (in this case the area housing the Citroen Company) into a healthy and social space. This avant-garde project turned its relatively unknown creator, Gilles Clement, into a famous global landscape architect. Today, this project - situated in the heart of Paris – is considered a global post-modern design and is the perfect place to perceive Gilles Clement’s ecological concepts including his idea of “Garden in Movement”. As the designer of the park’s northern landscapes, Gilles Clement has displayed his unique ideas in various sections of the park including the White Garden and the Black Garden, the Garden of Senses and the Garden in Movement. Clement, who has a background as an expert gardener and ecologist, creates designs that are concerned with sense and movement. These designs are displayed in his six-themed ‘sense’ gardens and Garden of Movement. The area is also adorned with two greenhouse pavilions. Lastly, an unkempt garden displays wilderness amongst the maintained. His counterpart designer Alain Provost1 showcases modern geometries and sculptural plantings. This method of landscape designing provides order in contrast to the wild designs of Clement. However, Clement’s ecological approach against Provost’s strictly architectural designs has created a timeless work of landscape art. This article is an attempt to introduce and analyze the various sections of the André-Citroën Park and review the approaches taken by its creator based on his concepts as a landscape designer.

During his professional career, Gilles Clement has introduced and applied four distinct ideas and concepts on landscapes and ways to intervene in them. The concept of Gardens of Resistance is his most recent idea and a result of his activities over the past several years. The following is a translation of Gilles Clement’s article titled “Les jardins de résistance”in which he has strived to introduce the concept of Gardens of Resistance. In this charter, Gilles Clement offers an epic and romantic description of his idea through a narrative compiled of seven acts. What Clement means by Gardens of Resistance is a multiple complex of spaces, which he describes as gardens acting as resistance points across the face of the earth to protect its natural and green resources against dangers facing humankind. He regards the intertwined and complex system resulting from this idea as a source of hope for the earth’s survival. In fact, through his theatrical histrionics, Clement attempts to picture the earth’s natural ecosystem pitted against capitalism and human greed. He outlines an effort to restore the human tradition of gardening and introduces gardens as points of resistance against the move to destroy natural resources and thus humankind. Remarkably, Clement stresses that these resistance points are separate entities. In fact, his proposed system is comprised of independent resistance points that finally form a unified whole in conjunction with his idea of Planetary Gardens.

Public participation and mutual inter- related activities of people and government are mostly considered in every economic, social and cultural development program. People participation can draw the centralization of government organizations in making the fundamental decisions and hand it to the local levels of society. Achieving the main objective and the conformity of development programs and the social needs can only be obtained through participation. Governmental programs mostly lack this process in the planning and construction of many projects and less attention is payed to people as a member in the process. This matter could be improved by considering the solutions given by the local people and associating them with designing goals to select the best related decision to the main objective. The current paper includes the renewal experiences in Nemat Abad urban decayed sector in the 19th district of Tehran during the years of 2009-2010 and the people participation the renovation and the reformation of the mentioned region. Hypothesis: considering public points of view and studying the solutions offered by people while categorizing the information thematically can lead to a reasonable and related solutions and suggestions based on the main goal.

The latest theories of inter productive development emphasizes on the necessity of inner city regeneration. The urban structures are basically categorized into valuable and invaluable ones. The latest general restoration approach based on the contemporary theories is to rely on the existing heritage of valuable the urban decay and to integrate the economics and culture to create a sustainable regeneration in historical context through their performance in the city structure. Tourism approach is one of the most common approaches in urban planning. The current article discusses the creative development alongside the tourism approach. Therefore Public Archaeology at the Thaddeus Stevens and Lydia Hamilton Smith Site in Lancaster and Clark Waterfront are discussed as case studies to conclusion for achieving the creative development and defining some of its principals. Hypothesis: Urban decay regeneration can promote the environmental qualities, community outreach and tourism through a creative development.

During the current era, the lack of determination in confining the decayed structures has lead to urban decay growth especially in run down parts of the cities. Recent procedures such as “urban decay regeneration and renovation”, “urban decay crisis special design”, “structural reorganization “and “urban improvement design “, focus on development stimulus strategies in the process of studying and present projects as a development stimulus in urban decay regeneration. Therefore, the assessment of the existing approaches in renovation of urban decay and evaluation of effective factors in development stimulation in a framework of urban regeneration and renovation is the main objective in the current paper. Hypothesis: new inter productive structures are the main development stimuli in the urban decay.

People move to cities for many reasons but better life prospects – jobs, higher wages, access to education and a perception that urban areas are where modern life takes place – feature highly. Quality of life can be measured using a wide range of criteria: levels of income, health, educational attainment, access to cultural facilities and so on. Among these is the availability of opportunities for recreation in gardens, parks, woodlands, other natural areas, along rivers or lake shores, if available. There is increasing evidence that conveniently accessible green and open spaces – meaning close enough to where people live to permit them to go whenever they wish without the need to use transport or to have to walk for a long time – helps people to overcome their stress, to increase levels of exercise and allows children to play freely (see a literature review I did for Greenspace Scotland in 2008, www.greenspacescotland.org.uk).