Tracing Lines : Scene Seam Script

The studio explores the complexities of Indian rural landscapes situated in the bio-culturally rich foothills of Western Ghats. The ways in which communities associate to their native landscapes range from the purely pragmatic to the non-physical. These understandings of landscape develop over long periods, becoming embodied in ritual customs and cultural histories. The resultant nature-culture interfaces can be described as a landscape palimpsest comprising of many complex layers that combine to form the landscape experience. These layers might also be described as scripts. The studio begins by working to decode the ‘existing scripts of a landscape’ using documentation methodologies that classify the innate attributes of the physical and cultural layers of a landscape that have developed over time. We will be using many forms of spatial and anthropological mapping techniques in our research including emic readings, experimental data, anecdotal interviews, mapped systems & ecological analysis, and imaginative readings. From the analytical stage, the studio then attempts to develop the scripting process further, to guide the design of context-specific landscape interventions with a strong sense of place, empathy & engagement with the landscape ecology, culture, and community.