THE END OF THE QUIET CITY: The “Parques Miradores” and a new perceptual paradigm for Santo Domingo
“The garden is always a problem of time. Time completes the idea.”
Robeto Burle Marx
As in many countries of Latin America, Modernism in architecture arrived late to Dominican Republic. In general, it expressed itself as a well developed cultural practice governed by the priority of form and traditional principles of Cartesian perspective. It was more involved with supporting the phantasmagoria of progress financed by the State than it was with real economic and social change. We have had our own World fair, our own “Ciudad Universitaria”, our own Hausmanian avenues and parks, but Modernity, as a set of philosophical, political, and ethical ideas grounded in utopia, we never have had.
The process of metropolization of Santo Domingo during the 70’s, brought with it all the maladies linked to “the desire for modernity”, class division, the destruction of local identities, uncontrolled population growth, etc, but it also introduced a new perceptual paradigm. The needs to grasp the city in its territorial scale as an object, required tools more concerned with motion and togetheness than they were with presence and isolation. With the creation of “Parques miradores” and a new green network for the city, the concerns on topography and geographic extension, speed and regional conections, produced panoramic overviews, shifting angles, alternating viewpoints and contradiction of scales and perceptions. The strength of cinematic representation was brought into the picture and the dimension of time and personal interpretation was set against the depiction of ideology.
Abstract de la conferencia dictada en el symposium:"Caribbean Modernist Architecture" organizado por el MoMA y UTECH, en Kingston, Jamaica.
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blogueado por Marcos Barinas Uribe a las 5:38 p. m.
2 Comments:
DR, as many latinamerican countries, was greatly linked to rural-based activities when modernism arrived. Migration to cities came from rural areas and they didn't understand the concept of parks the same way as planners.
Now it's a common practice for planners to sketch out parks in the city, but it's important to note that poor people (mostly in LA countries and other developing ones) will develop their social relations in any kind of environment, even if there's no park.
Parks are a good place to socialize, but also turned out to be one of the best ways to earn money for small 'private companies' in historically semi-corrupted states.
However, in a general way the conception of these parks should change in the coming years. It is expected that master planning switches to participatory planning within a strategy program. This could take place in 15 or 20 years -when old politicians die-; changing cinematic representation to a graffiti representation based on a community-based one (the broader middle-class -high and low- community willing to participate).
Marcos,
how great it is to find your blog.
I invite you to www.parededemeia.blogspot.com
and look forward to getting our conversatins back on track,
saludos,
Fernando Lara
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