Dumbarton Oaks Art Installation

It's pathetic how many photos I have of Dumbarton Oaks in the fall and winter, and how few I have of the spring.  I suppose it's indicative of how busy folks in my field are each spring.  But yesterday, for Easter, I actually took the afternoon to enjoy a visit.  

Perhaps the most lovely surprise was the new art installation, Cloud Terrace, by Andy Cao and Xavier Perrot.  It's placed on the Arbor Terrace and composed of chicken wire and Swarovski "Elements" (according to the info sheet the Gardens' provided).

On such a bright sunny day, seeing the dense gray "clouds" of the wire made a marked contrast.  But sadly, photos don't accurately capture the dazzling rainbow of colors reflected by the crystals, which are tethered to the wire.

The black reflection in the pool highlights some of the ruby and sapphire hues that were twinkling when a breeze lifted, but photos don't do it justice.  Definitely check it out between now and autumn!

Strange Art

Yesterday, I was heading back to DC after a weekend in NYC and southern New Jersey.  I was giving my mom a lift back to DC as well and we had to stop to take pictures of this funny little sculpture.

I think it's part bunny, part Max from Where the Wild Things Are.  In any case, it's a strange surprise to encounter on a relatively quiet rural road in south Jersey.

Datura metel, and Botticelli

Posting yesterday's pic of the stone bench in Giverny made me a bit wistful for Paris and so I began browsing some of my photos.  I realized I had not yet blogged about Datura metel, an annual I photographed at the Jardin du Plantes. 

 Datura is a lovely annual, reaching about 3' high and at the gardens here it's mixed with Verbena bonariensis.  However, it is dreadfully toxic when ingested.

Most species of Datura are toxic and recently when art historian David Bellingham hypothesized that  D. stramonium is featured in Botticelli's Venus and Mars.   He noted a strange fruit in the hands of an imp surrounding Mars and had it identified by a botanist at Kew Gardens as Datura.
 

The story at NPR on this is terrific - as it elaborates on the plants toxicology and touches on the debate about whether or not Datura stramonium could have possibly been cultivated in Italy during Botticelli's time (there's some speculation on whether or not the plant is native to the new world and India, or only the new world). 

Microbiota decussata

In November, I made a reference to Louise Bourgeois's spider sculptures.  Now you can decide for yourself whether or not that big katsuratree in Dumbarton Oaks resembles one of her sculptures.  I still think it does.  

In any case, this isn't an art blog, so we won't spend too much time on the actual sculpture.  Instead, we're noting the groundcover beneath it: Microbiota decussata, or Siberian cypress.

Siberian cypress was discovered outside Vladivostock in 1921, growing above the tree line of nearby mountains and withstanding temperatures below -40° F.  Since then it's been a favored cypress family groundcover, less common than Juniperus and just a tiny bit more tolerant to light shade. It also (similar to blue rug Juniper) changes color.  In the winter, as you can see it has a dusky rose tint, but when the weather warms up, it will turn green.  If you read my NYPAOS post on fall color, you will know that this change in color means that the chlorophyll is no longer being produced and thus the green pigment in chlorophyll is not abundant, providing opportunities for the anthocyanins in the plant to be reflected in the color spectrum.

Though the plant can handle a touch more shade than Junipers (the only other Cupressaceae genus with popular groundcovers), it is demands of good, well-drained but moist soil.  This is also about as far south as the plant can be.  In zones 8 and warmer, it simply does not survive.
 

The Lawn in Landscape Design

Check out Todd Haiman's great post today on the evolution of the lawn.  Like most landscape architects today, I try to help clients on establishing their lawn areas as sensibly as possible.  Too often, an estate has a lawn that seems to roll endlessly along hillsides and besides pastures.  These clients, I think, were heavily influenced by Merchant Ivory films like Howard's End. Which in turn were loosely documenting the English Garden landscapes of Capability Brown and Humphry Repton.  Those two, among others, were largely influenced by the picturesque landscapes of Claude Lorraine.


Now, don't get me wrong, a lawn is a wonderful part of any landscape - it provides a place for vista, scale and play.  My only goal is that when a lawn is designed, it's established with sensible boundaries.  Those boundaries can be programmatic (i.e., you simply don't want to mow too much lawn), ecological (you don't want to use too much fuel for your mower or water for irrigation) or physical (because, really: who wants to mow a lawn that is on a 3:1 slope?). 

The lawn in American landscapes is indeed iconic and not at all a bad thing.  But when we look at a picturesque landscape (perhaps, most famously Stowe House in Buckinghamshire), we should temper our reaction to the gorgeous landscape with the knowledge that countless numbers of workers (both animal and human) are hiding behind those copses of trees, waiting to furiously fight back the turf's growth.

Millennium Park Crown Fountain

Since I already posted some of my folks' pics from Millennium Park yesterday, I thought I would keep up the theme for this afternoon.  Today I'm sharing some of their photos of the Crown Fountain, designed by artist Jaume Plensa in collaboration with Krueck and Sexton Architects.

 

Water is a wonderful feature in any park where the summers are hot and Chicago is no exception.  97% of the water in this fountain is successfully recycled as well.  The fountain is comprised of two 50' glass towers on each side of the pool.  The towers collectively consist of 22,500 glass blocks. 

 

Video portraits of 1000 Chicagoans appear on the towers.  They are modern-day interpretations of the gargoyles that acted as downspouts on gothic cathedrals and at the end of each cameo, a spout of water streams out of one's "mouth" and into the pool.