Cityscape and the personalized experience

Artists have been depicting their natural and built environments and using their surroundings as inspiration for centuries. Observing and analyzing landscape paintings enable us to discover significant social, cultural, and environmental phenomenon over the course of time.

The Chinese landscape genre of painting that emerged out of the tenth century Song dynasty had a political impetus in addition to its aesthetic importance. These landscapes were a reaction to the warring and divided kingdoms, which became reunited during the Song era. The paintings exemplified the delicate beauty of nature throughout the country, in order to symbolize the peace, unity, and order (see: Landscape Painting in Chinese Art).

Landscapes have also communicated environmental concerns. Paintings of glaciers from the eighteenth century, such as Casper Wolfe’s The Lower Grindelwald Glacier with Lütschine and the Mettenberg (1774), have been compared to current observations of glaciers, in order to determine how big a glacier was and how they behaved prior to global warming (see: Zumbühl and Nussbaumer, 2018). Impressionist landscapes show the emergence of industry and its effects on the atmosphere. Paintings of sunsets have actually helped to determine how bad air quality has gotten over time. In a 2014 study, researcher Christos Zerefos noted that when artists paint the sun setting, “it is the way their brains perceive greens and reds that contains important environmental information.” (Zerefos et al, 2014).

Modern and contemporary landscapes are also important for documenting and symbolizing the social and emotional connection to city life, and the fluctuation of people, places, and events. Both Martin Wong and Romare Bearden created profound cityscapes of their respective city neighborhoods that express the vitality and persona of the residents and architecture.

Romare Bearden’s The Block (1971) represents the artist’s interpretation of a typical block in the neighborhood of Harlem, New York. His style was inspired by the Cubist technique of cut-paper collage and Dadaist technique of photomontage, which afforded him to show multiple perspectives within a single image. We can simultaneously see what is happening inside and outside of the buildings on the block, which reveals the intimacies and plurality of daily life. Bearden gives brick and mortar and city street a personal character that signifies to us that he is both an admirer and a participant within this vibrant community.

Martin Wong’s paintings of brick red apartment buildings signified the artist’s unique connection to his Lower East Side community. In La Vida (1988), Wong depicts a brick red apartment building similar to the many that exist in the Lower East Side, which features a diverse group of tenants, some of whom were his actual neighbors, and some of whom were figures within the arts community and the Downtown New York City community at large. Each individual in the painting is displayed as a portrait occupying a space within a window and is someone who has personal or historical significance to Wong. Some of the figures in this painting include the writer and poet Amiri Baraka, poet/playwright (and Wong’s lover) Miguel Piñero, and graffiti artist friends DAZE (seen analyzing the painting in the video below), Sharp, and LA2. Wong also included the celebrity, and inspirational figure, Mr. T, as well as some archetypal figures such as firefighters and policemen.

Within a visual arts curriculum in urban schools, having students observe cityscapes might be more appropriate than a rural or idyllic scene. Wong’s paintings of Lower East Side apartment complexes and Bearden’s mixed-media Harlem street scenes, may be especially engaging to students who are growing up in densely populated city neighborhoods.

The technique of landscape painting, drawing, and collage provides a great foundation for students to learn both formal aspects and techniques of visual art, while incorporating their personal history and prior knowledge in order to create a unique form of expression. By showing students work that has cultural relevance to their lives, an educator can challenge students to be astute observers and participants in their own community. Having students make their own cityscapes (this can be done in a variety of media, however, I prefer using cut paper and magazine image collage) or having them collaboratively contribute to a large-scale mural (to be displayed inside or outside of the school) of their city will open up the floor to a sharing of personal stories and memories, which may result in students better understanding each other and coming together through their shared life experiences.