Abstract

Cities have always had close relationships with water: the availability of water sustained life, agriculture, and commerce; the aesthetic and visceral qualities of water have been used to represent political power; and the destructive qualities of natural water processes have been catalysts for change throughout history.  Human interventions developed across cultures and centuries to harness the power of water for the benefit of society. Throughout modern history, fountains have been incorporated in public and private spaces to communicate messages of power. Today, massive infrastructure projects control the flows of rivers and oceans to protect cities from the destructive forces of water.

With today’s focus on sustainability, we are beginning to realize that changing the course of natural processes may not benefit cities in ways we once thought.  Instead, we are beginning to understand that cities must work in unison with the natural environment and natural processes, not fight them. The idea that the natural environment should be part of the city has been around for a long time; it is displayed most notably in Fredrick Law Olmsted’s work. Recently, urban designers and landscape architects have once again brought the idea directly into the city, integrating natural processes into the city itself, turning their attention to the ecologies at work within cities and using artistic interventions in public spaces to re-awaken urban natural processes.

How do modern water features in public spaces embrace natural processes to make cities more sustainable? Can the experience of environmentally focused public art contribute to our understanding of sustainability and lead to more sustainable cities?

This project focuses on contemporary artistic interventions that integrate water features into urban public spaces both to support sustainable development and to engage the public with urban nature. This website concentrates on three cases:

• Town Hall Square, Hattersheim, Germany
• Lindenplatz, Gummersbach, Germany
• City Garden, St. Louis, Missouri

All three projects use water as the means to connect public art and urban water processes. The artistic interventions create experiences that illuminate hidden natural processes at work in the city. The goals of the projects are not only to create sustainable public spaces, but also to use aesthetic experiences to engage the public with and to educate the public about sustainable design. This website looks at how these projects integrate art, water, ecological design, and education and how successful each intervention is at achieving its goals.