Interview fromA&B issue03|2023
In her book Memories of Non-Existence, Rebecca Solnit recalls the moment of being a performer in Ann Hamilton's work Privation and excesses this way: "As a child, one hears that one is not allowed to get dirty, not allowed to play with food, not allowed to make a mess, so dipping one's hands in honey up to the wrists felt like a wonderful transgression of these prohibitions, and a sensual pleasure besides." This sentence brings to mind all the prohibitions that accompany us as we explore an urban space in which we move with a purpose and whose manicured sidewalks, lawns and flowerbeds are admired while sitting preferably on a bench. We talk to Kasper Jakubowski about whether there is room for imperfection in the city and why it is so important in its ecosystem.
Kasper JAKUBOWSKI - landscape architect, graphic designer, activist, expert, author of numerous texts and publications. Since 2018, he has co-founded the Children in Nature Foundation, where he realizes himself as a leader and activist. In 2019 he defended his dissertation with distinction on the natural and social potential of urban wastelands and urban parks. Between 2012 and 2018, he researched European cities from their wild side, analyzing parks that look like "urban nature reserves," new environmental education centers, and urban nature restoration projects.
Edyta Skiba: Does the modern city, driven by an ultra-productive society, need wilderness?
Kasper Jakubowski: I think, as does Alastair Bonnett in his book "Beyond the Map," that we need places that we can rediscover. We need to come up with the idea of rediscovering spaces, for the reason that there are indeed virtually no spaces in the world anymore - and especially in cities - that are not controlled by humans. That's why abandoned and forgotten places are mysterious spaces for exploration that fascinate us by their inaccessibility. Urbanized areas reinforce in us the obsession with seemingly caring for, controlling or limiting nature, which makes these landscapes spontaneously colonized by nature, and it is in such a dynamic, living way that they gain additional value, become in some way independent spaces, and thus fascinating. We can find in them a substitute for a new wildness. The fourth nature is not a wilderness close to the original one, it is rather such a post-nature, in which one can find many alien species forming hybrid habitat systems, developing in their own way, creating scrub, bushes and bushes. These aspects and the fact that the fourth nature can be found in marginal spaces, not only spatially, but also mentally, expressed in the way of thinking about the city, make them gain a new aura. At the same time, they are proof that the city is inhabited by other species, not only by humans, that it is nature's response to changes made in the environment. The presence of alien or invasive species demonstrates the enormous changes we have made to the environment, and shows that nature is adapting to these changes on its own terms. Bonnett also noted that the more space we take away from nature, the more we try to control nature, the more fun it is to see evidence that nature cannot be completely tamed.
Fourth nature on the abandoned Forum Hotel in Krakow; a vertical garden from natural development
Photo: Kasper Jakubowski
Edyta: So it is not a "void", but rather a scarred wound created in nature by man?
Kasper: Perhaps. Certainly, the time it takes for these areas to regenerate makes them such biodiversity banks. Scientists are now talking about the concept of new ecosystems (novel ecosystems), in which even if alien species dominate at the beginning, they evolve, change, develop. Fourth nature areas form very dynamic systems and over time are also inhabited by rare species. They are also valuable insect communities. Paradoxically, the areas that we have destroyed and given back to nature - or rather, nature has taken them away from itself - are valuable for maintaining biodiversity, which is the most important topic in architecture and landscape architecture today.
Edyta: So how do you manage these areas in the city space?
Kasper: This is an extremely difficult but also important challenge facing landscape architects - how to manage spaces that manage themselves? Already in the very word "manage" there is an imposing direction leading towards the adaptation of such spaces. I think this is a fascinating process, showing that no design or minimal interference is also a great design tool to open up to ecological succession, to take advantage of colonization of degraded areas, to draw on ready combinations of ruderal plants that adapt well to urban heat islands. Personally, I am a proponent of a minimalist approach, although I realize that it will always be a design temptation to seek answers to the question of how much interference and how much protection there should be in fourth nature sites. It is very important to define on what terms and at what scale we should interfere in these areas. Today we are still looking for an answer to this question, so I like to refer to good examples. For me, the best and even model example of adaptation of the fourth nature is Berlin's Südgelände Natur-Park, which has excellently succeeded in adapting a successional forest that has been growing on the trackbed for more than seventy years. Artists were invited to create this new urban park, and they created a system of footbridges in a post-railroad aesthetic that allows one to walk above ground level through the most inaccessible areas of this forest, not subject to any human interference. Thus, one can observe the dynamics of change and transformation into a new urban forest. In addition, some of the park's grassland habitats were so valuable that it was decided to periodically graze animals on them. The contrast between the urbanized, organized space and this free, undeveloped, nourishing space located in the heart of the city is fascinating to me as a landscape architect. This park also shows that the experimental approach to areas of neglected nature by juxtaposing areas that are more cared for - preserving scenic connections, for example - with parts left to themselves, creating a kind of laboratory of nature where it can develop freely, is an ideal example in the search for answers to how to adapt areas of fourth nature. I also think that these places are a great inspiration for architects and landscape architects. Ruderal biotopes can provide a clue to designing more sustainable plant combinations that are less costly economically and in terms of resources. The aesthetics of the fourth nature are not that obvious at all, but when combined with careful, beautiful detailing, elements of art, anything that will expose the beauty of this ruderalism, it will make it more justifiable in the context of new architecture spaces as well. I am in favor of combining modern architecture precisely with the aesthetics of the abandoned landscape.
Berlin's Südgelände Natur-Park - an example of making succession available on a former trackway
Photo: Kasper Jakubowski
Edyta: So we should tame the aesthetics of the scrubland and instill it into newly created urban spaces?
Kasper: I think that currently Polish cities lack, above all, a pro-environmental aesthetic that builds a new bond with nature. We need time to understand that a lawn mowed to 2 centimeters is not at all the canon of beauty in garden art. At the same time, this doesn't mean that they need to be turned into unmowed and overgrown meadows of urban weeds, although these are very interesting communities. It seems to me that we need a new ratio between the share of landscaped and natural greenery, which should be defined for the whole city, but also for individual neighborhoods or even new buildings. As architects and landscape architects, we cannot currently propose greenery arrangements that need huge amounts of resources for maintenance. Rather, we need to work with nature and design communities that promote biodiversity or reduce water use for watering.
