Thursday, 14 November 2013

Systems and Deep Ecology


What does it mean by deep ecology? When we think of ecology, of course what comes to our mind is organisms and the natural environment. It is in fact the relations between the two, and in contemporary theory it is their "holistic" relations that makes up the word 'deep ecology', it is a deeper phenomenon once looked as a bigger whole than the meaning of each separate parts.

Nothing is orthogonal because nothing is created independently. Every form comes from a system and as a relation of another, i.e. its surrounding context. Take Frank Lloyd Wright for example, in his works like the Prairie House, is a reflection of its context. One interesting detail is the stained glass that projects the trees outside, on the opposite side of the window, in geometrical simplification. The stained glass then becomes a symbol of transition between the outside and inside that is smoothly put together. The house is trying to relate to and communicate to its natural surrounding, which results in a wonderful continuity in the aesthetics.

Stained glass with tree-like pattern in Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie House


Deep ecology can also be applied to other matters as well because everything is created in relation of something, there is always something, a reason, that influence our thinking and consequently the product of our thinking, which is what makes the world we live in now and it is bound to change over the course of time. It is not only applicable to physical implications but also theoretical and ideological concepts like the topic of topos and the variations; utopia, heterotopia, and dystopia. Each variation doesn't and couldn't just exist on itself. Like Michel Foucault has mentioned in his text, he chose to explain the relations of the different types of places and no-places as a relationship of an object, its reflection and the mirror in which the reflection is reflected upon. Obviously, all three things have to exist as a whole system, a reflection couldn't exist if there's no mirror or object. So in the same manner, the idea of a utopia wouldn't exist without the perception of the actual place and hence a heteropic ideal. The idea of dystopia, a bad-no-place, is not so clear and understandable if there is no clarification of what is a good-no-place or utopia, therefore dystopias cannot exist independently without a utopic vision well because they are created in relation of one another.

Man, reflection, mirror protrays the idea of topos, utopia, heterotopia respectively

No comments:

Post a Comment