ROUNDABOUTS AND MEDIAN STRIPS: INTEGRATION INTO THE LANDSCAPE

Art and Architecture: A New Dialogue for New Landscapes
by Marcella Tisi

New Milan Fairgrounds
Pavilion 1
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
4:00 PM – 5:30 PM

At the south entrance of the new Milan exhibition complex in Rho-Pero, two roundabouts have been designed and will soon be constructed, following different criteria from the usual approach to such spaces. The presenter of this workshop is also the author of these projects, and through her presentation, she intends to outline the motivations and theoretical steps that, drawing on her direct experience as an architect and sculptor, led her to these unique designs.

ROUNDABOUTS AND SQUARES: WHAT SIMILARITIES? WHAT DIFFERENCES?

The real shift for these spaces occurred when, to address increasing traffic problems and reduce the number of accidents, the rule of priority for internal circulation within roundabouts was introduced. This change first took place in Great Britain in 1966 and later in France in 1983, where these new roundabouts with priority given to the central ring were defined as à l’Anglais (roundabout, offside priority, modern roundabout).

The adoption of roundabouts represents a radical shift in traffic strategy, making it inevitable that, once this approach is chosen, transformations occur on a wide scale. In a city like Turin, characterized by large, straight thoroughfares running through the city, converting a traffic junction from a signal-controlled intersection to a roundabout does not allow for gradual experimentation with the transformation but instead requires rapid adjustments along the entire route.

In Milan, with its significantly different urban layout, a more cautious approach to such transformations reveals a policy focused on identifying a general strategy without a short-term, programmatic, and operational directive. The reality is that, in a city like Turin, the issue of integrating these spaces into the surrounding context becomes an essential theme for reflection and experimentation.

DOES THE CITY NEED THE ARTIST’S INTERVENTION?
HOW CAN THE ARTIST CONTRIBUTE TO THE DESIGN OF A PLACE?

The central island, which in some cases can be quite large, is now entirely inaccessible and thus represents a space removed from use. Its function remains purely aesthetic. The theory of landscape aesthetics, notably influenced by the landscape philosopher Rosario Assunto, has shown not only the presence but also the necessity of an inherent, autonomous aesthetic component in nature, with landscape as its best manifestation. In parallel, Assunto laments its gradual disappearance from cities, coinciding with the slow but steady expulsion of nature from urban environments. Gardens and parks are increasingly replaced by green installations that fall short of transforming and requalifying a place, as nature is a living entity and thus requires attention, care, and integration into daily human life.

The rising prevalence of leftover spaces—roundabouts, central and directional islands, traffic medians—not considered from a landscape perspective in urban projects, such as transport planning or the requalification of particularly problematic urban areas like suburbs, brings these reflections to the forefront.

The proposal here is to consider artistic intervention as the most suitable way to address these issues. I use the term intervention rather than work because, as previously noted, traditional artwork in the form of monuments, stripped of a strong emblematic function, is poorly suited to placement on roundabouts. Furthermore, much of modern and contemporary artistic research has profoundly reexamined and, in some cases, reversed the concept of sculpture as a mere object to be placed. It is precisely within these artistic practices that we should seek the potential contribution of the artist to the design of these urban spaces.

LAND ART AND ENVIRONMENTAL ART: THE ARTIST ENGAGES WITH THE PLACE

There exists a movement of artists who have made the site, and more broadly, nature, the essential component of their artistic practices, known as Land Art. It is important to note that, outside of specialized circles, Land Art often includes any artistic interventions that engage with a site without damaging the land but rather seek integration and dialogue with it. This misconception, or at least this imprecise and partial view, can lead to significant misunderstandings when assessing the movement and its meanings; however, it also highlights its truly unique and singular aspect within contemporary art.

The Land Art movement, which we can refer to as “historical,” emerged in America around the 1960s. Far from fading, it has instead grown, diversified, and expanded into a rich array of varied artistic proposals. Therefore, Land Art is an imperfect hyponym, meaning it is used in place of a broader term that lacks an appropriate equivalent, making it a subordinate concept. Another essential yet somewhat contradictory characteristic of this movement is that engagement with the site—currently the common thread linking all these diverse experiences within Land Art—was merely a secondary consequence of the motivations that led to the birth of historical Land Art.

The primary themes driving the first Land Art artists were social critique of consumerism, opposition to the art market system, the commercialization and fetishization of artworks, and a sense of distrust toward modernism, progress, and industrialization.

Early Land Art works engage with the site as a search for unconventional spaces for artistic expression, addressing site-specific challenges not “a priori” but on a case-by-case basis as just one of many issues to tackle for the artwork’s success. Robert Smithson epitomized this approach, especially with his Non-sites series, which became a fundamental reference in debates around the expansion of urbanized areas and the resulting creation of urban and extra-urban spaces devoid of quality and identity.

Subsequently, and depending on varying artistic approaches, engagement with the context gained greater importance and significance; in some cases, the place-intervention relationship was completely inverted. Richard Long’s artistic work exemplifies this aspect, characteristic of a certain type of environmental art that places the relationship with the site—and nature more broadly—at the heart of its productions. His work also relates to various recent activities and movements centered on the recovery of walking as an artistic practice.

Numerous interventions also focus on raising awareness about a more human-scaled environment, a notable example being German artist Joseph Beuys, with his 7,000 Oaks project in Kassel in 1970.

ARTIST AND ARCHITECT: WHAT BOUNDARIES? WHAT COLLABORATIONS?

The final aspect to address is determining how, and with which specific skills, the artist can contribute to the design of a place and engage with other professionals involved in shaping the territory, particularly the architect, with whom they share, in certain respects, the components of creativity and ideation. This opens up a vast and boundless field of exploration, yet it is often approached by discussing the affinities and mutual influences, which, rather than fostering collaboration, tends to heighten competition and lead each into the other’s domain.

Here, I would like to propose a personal attempt to identify roles and define a boundary—where the two sensibilities, and therefore competencies, begin and end—drawing upon the ideas of two great thinkers from the past.

Starting from Vitruvius’s definition of architecture, we can emphasize how the architect’s role has been tied to visions of the future and progress since its origins. This characteristic has not only remained but has intensified over time with the acceleration of technological and scientific discoveries. Today, the best contemporary architecture results from a combination of technological innovation and artistic creativity, with architects increasingly patenting construction systems and new materials. Urban planning, in turn, continues as a discipline aimed at anticipating changes in future cities and, through its tools, proposing the best ways to manage and plan for these developments.

Artists, who for centuries connected their work to progress and science with an enthusiastic and optimistic vision of the future (it’s worth remembering that the separation between these disciplines is recent, making it meaningful to emphasize their divergent approaches since), shifted their perspective when industrialization, urbanization, and mass consumption began to degrade both the environment and the individual, leading to a loss of faith in a better future. This does not imply that artists have clung to traditional means or past materials while rejecting any innovation; current artistic explorations clearly demonstrate the opposite. Rather, I am referring to an attitude, a sensitivity, and a mindset that shape the artist’s work and inevitably define a specific role for them, especially within the field of environmental design.

The theme of pietas, a central conceptual core in Walter Benjamin’s thought, is rooted in a compassionate attitude toward what is marginal, past, or finite. It is an attitude of respect—of pity, in a sense—toward what is gone, valued not because it contributes to building the future, but as a witness and trace of lived experience. Contemporary society, marked by diversity and the rapid succession of events, risks losing the image of its complexity as it moves into history, unless it pauses to capture transient, fleeting events without distinguishing between the small and the grand. Artistic experience uniquely fulfills this role, as it preserves things in their exact nature, holding them against the tide of forgetting.

In constructing new landscapes, the contribution of both disciplines becomes essential: the architect, with creativity and a forward-looking vision, guarantees the projection of the place’s future image; the artist, by including in their projects a regard for what may be irreversibly erased, safeguards the image of the same place as it was and as it will never be again.

Arch. Marcella Tisi
Corso Moncalieri 213 bis – Torino
Tel./fax 016612840
e.mail marcella.tisi@tiscalinet.it

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RINGRAZIAMENTI
Si ringraziano per la collaborazione e la documentazione fornita:
I Comuni di Milano, Pavia, Peccioli (PI), Torino.
La MM di Milano.
La GGT di Torino.
Lo studio Comaschi di Milano.
L’arch. Marco Corongi di Torino.
Le cantine sociali di S. Maria La Versa.