Anxious Landscapes: From the Ruin to Rust

Translating Space: the Politics of Ruins, the Remote and Peripheral Places

“…In a sense, they act as sites of the ‘infra‐ordinary’, the mundane objects, buildings and routines that Perec () suggests escape our attention, yet may, on further analysis, speak to the richness of quotidian experience. The anonymity of these landscapes of unobtrusive ‘urban furniture’ (Picon, : 68) belies their complexity and their importance to the functioning of surrounding cities and regions. In these spaces we find the mundane networks of infrastructure (roads, logistics bases, electricity substations, corporate back offices and their consumer databases, etc.)…”

Exploring hidden narratives: Conscript graffiti at the former military base of Kummersdorf

“…Academic interest in contemporary ruins or ruins of modernity (Hell and Scho¨nle, 2010) might be considered one expression of what Picon terms our re-enchantment with the world as brought about by an increasing exposure to the anxious landscapes embodied by derelict industrial and arguably military complexes (Picon and Bates, 2000). In ways reminiscent of the renaissance cult of ruins, this re-enchantment has questioned the dichotomy of culture and nature and served to provide an aesthetic that enables the reconciliation of traditional artistic landscape conventions with an ever-expanding urban environment.…”

From industry to culture: leftovers, time and material transformation in four contemporary museums

“…Antoine Picon describes how technological landscapes inevitably become obsolete and wasted 'anxious landscapes'. 20 He compares how buildings once became ruins that progressively returned to nature, whereas contemporary objects, 'if they don't disappear all in one go, as if by magic, are instead relegated to obsolescence, a bit like the living dead who endlessly haunt the landscape, preventing it from ever becoming peaceful again. We have gone from ruin to rust, from trace to waste.'…”