„ To dwell implies the establishment of a meaningful  relationship  between man and a given environment. (....) this relationship: consists in an act of identification, that is, in a sense of belonging to a certain place. (...) On the other hand, man is also a wanderer, he is always on the way, which implies the possibility of choice. He chooses his place, and hence a certain kind of fellowship with other men. This dialectic o fdeparture and return, of path and goal, is the essence of the existantial “spatiality" which is set into work by architecture.” ( The concept of dwelling : Christian Norberg-Schulz)  

In this workshop we explored the relationship between us establishing a temporary settlement, and the found environment by means of a narrative and an intervention in the landscape.

Personal Identity and the Landscape: In the first part each participant individually explored the environment, record  his or her experiences in a diary/sketchbook.The individual work  intends to culminate in an intervention which gathers our own personal understanding of the landscape and our relationship to it.

Settlement and Common Identity and the Landscape: In  the  second  part  we worked  as  a  group: On  the  basis  of presenting the individual projects to each other and further exploration we tried to arrive at a common identity and relationsship to our landscape. Here the issue of the human settlement, the collective dwelling as an internalized cultural sphere and its relationship to „natural" environment will be raised. We together create a structure which negotiated between a place for human gathering and its external environment.  

The Logbook  : The diary was a record of our work. Each participant contributed to the final Diary by creating his or her own chapter describing the process of establishing a personal retationship with the landscape and how this is expressed in the Intervention. Apart from having a chapter for each participant we also created a common chapter including a documentary of our collective work and findings as well as a conclusion.

„Phoenix": The workshop intended to be part of the „Phoenix" design workshop. lt has offered  a series of conceptual ideas in terms of Phoenix's Integration into the physical landscape and lts cultural environment.  

The camp started with a task l had given every participant. Everybody was asked to observe, study or get involved with our new environment as a means of establishing an initial individual relationship with it.  By means of drawings, poems and diaries these individual encounters were shared and discussed in the discussion evening on the second day of  the camp. The result was a diversity of responses and a lively discussion. discussion. The drawings exhibited different qualities. Among them were realistic drawings depicting  the actual physical landscape, idealized conceptions of „nature", drawings and diaries which were dealing with the issue of man 's influence on the environment on a general level but did not include any sign of a personal engagement with the actual environment around us, and complex drawings, collages ofthe personal reading of the environment. In the discussion participants from Belarus, Russia and Poland mentioned that they found this task very difficult as they were not used to draw conceptually but rather learned to use the pen and pencil to make accurate projections of the physical world onto the paper. Therefore this workshop turned out to be an interesting means of exchange between the different art practices in Western and Eastern Europe.    

2) Individual Responses to the Environment

After the individual environmental observations in which all participants of the camp were involved in the very first two days of the youth meeting, the members  the workshop „Gathering - Landscape and Identity“ continued with their individual observations of the expansive and diverse environmint around us, but now the emphasis was put on reflecting the own experience. In progress meetings we all discussed individual responses recorded by means of drawings and in dairies.

From these observations concepts for individual scultures which expressed these individual engagements with the environment were developed. The making of the sculptures in the landscape itself was an engagement with the environment. In progress meetings we all saw how the particular environment of the sculpture and the material used informed the concept and made people think about their concept in more detail. At the end of the phase of individual landscape responses, we all went out for a walk into the landscape to show each other the different sculptures which we finally discussed in the group.The discussion helped everybody to see their work differently and in relation to the other pieces of work.

3 ) The Common Sculpture:  

A Society and its EnvironmentsThe common sculpture contrast the nature of the individual sculpture. The individual is able to engage with his or her environment more directiy. A group or a society, creates its own cultural environment, the interhuman sphere of people gathering around a fire or the environ ment of human settlements such as villages and cities.This environment is self-contained, struggles with maintain ning an interactive relationship with the external environment. The common sculpture „Klatka" (The cage) intends to explore this relationship.

next : workshop "free sculptures"