Am 27. April 2017 begrüßen wir Prof. Dr. Graciela Silvestri (La Plata) am Forschungszentrum Gotha für einen Gastvortrag über „Empathy and distance: two forms of understanding fluvial landscapes“. Die Veranstaltung, in Kooperation mit der Laborgruppe Kulturtechniken, beginnt um 17.15 Uhr im Seminarraum, der Eintritt ist – wie immer – frei. Über zahlreiche interessierte Zuhören freuen wir uns. Der Vortrag wird auf Englisch gehalten.
Eine kurze Einführung auf Englisch:
Ten years ago, what appeared to be a minor conflict nearly drove Argentina and Uruguay to the point of severing relations: the confrontation between the cities of Gualeguaychú and Fray Bentos, on opposite shores of the Uruguay River in the La Plata Basin, over the construction of two cellulose processing plants. The confrontation highlighted environmental concerns that had been making the rounds at the time: the identification of water as a “scarce resource”, a central topic for South America – its great fluvial basins (those of the Orinoco, Amazon, La Plata), as well as its wetlands and acquifers, comprise the greatest reserve of potable water on Earth. It also made it clear that progress and sensitivity to ecological issues do not always go hand in hand in our countries. But in this lecture another key aspect will be analyzed, that, whether it was evident in speech and images that spread in the media, was barely considered: the aesthetic perception of the aquatic landscapes.
The hypothesis that aesthetic appreciation of the landscape was the spark that ignited a sizeable political event gives center stage to the old notion of natural beauty. The idea that something like “natural beauty” exists is shared by very diverse social and cultural sectors and stands firm, if we are to give credence to images on the www that claim to be visual evidence of the dangers of technological intervention. Related to this issue, and in close relationship with the ways in which we experience, enjoy, transform and represent water landscapes, Graciela Silvestri will focus in the two key notions in the aesthetical reception that inspired the title of her lecture: Einfühlung (empathy in the English version) and estrangement (ostraniene in the original Russian).
Graciela Silvestri, Architect and PhD in History (Universidad de Buenos Aires); Senior Researcher of the National Council of Scientific and Technological Research (CONICET, Argentina), and Professor of Theory of Architecture (Universidad de La Plata, Argentina). She has been Robert Kennedy Professor of Latin American Studies (Harvard University/David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies); and Visiting Professor in the Graduate School of Design (Harvard University); the Maestría en Teoría e Historia, Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura, Universitat Politécnica de Catalunya; the Doctorado en Arquitectura y Estudios Urbanos, Pontificia Universidad Católica, Santiago, Chile; the Escola Da Cidade, Sao Paulo, Brasil; the Facultad de Arquitectura, Universidad de La República, Uruguay; and Visiting Scholar in the Centre of Latin American Studies (Cambridge, UK), and the Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut (Berlin).
Abbildung: A sign in front of the bus terminal of Gualeguaychú, Entre Ríos, Argentina, that reads NO A LAS PAPELERAS – SI A LA VIDA – „No to the paper mills, yes to life“, by Pablo D. Flores – Own work, 12. 07. 2006, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=951278