永葆好奇：理解景观的真实复杂性——慕尼黑工业大学乌多 维拉赫教授访谈

采访：魏方 翻译：常湘琦 校对：李世葵

乌多 维拉赫是德国慕尼黑工业大学（Technical University of Munich, TUM） 风景园林和工业景观专业教授，也是一位风景园林师。早期他接受过园艺景观方面的培训，曾就读于加州州立理工大学波莫纳分校、慕尼黑工业大学，并在苏黎世理工大学完成博士论文。他曾在卡尔斯鲁厄大学任研究助理和讲师，于2002年任汉诺威大学的风景园林教授，并于 2006—2008年任该学校建筑与景观学院院长，自2009年起任教慕尼黑工业大学。他曾受邀参与在北京林业大学举行的2019世界风景园林师高峰讲坛。《风景园林》杂志社有幸对乌多 维拉赫教授进行了专访，以下是采访全文。

LAJ：《风景园林》杂志

Weilacher：乌多 维拉赫

LAJ：谢谢您愿意接受采访。我们很荣幸邀请您并和您有思想上的互动。首先，您能谈谈自己的教育背景以及选择风景园林作为职业的原因吗？您在工业景观领域具有很强的影响力，为什么选择聚焦这个问题？

Weilacher：我的风景园林之路其实有点复杂。小时候，我在“普法尔茨森林”（德语：Pfälzerwald，图1）长大，这里是德国最大的森林之一。我乐于置身森林，在这里，我度过了很多欢乐时光——徒步旅行、玩耍……当然也努力地帮助和支持伐木工人。所以，我的初心是成为一名林业官员，一名为州林业局工作的护林员，但并未如愿。当时的德国，每个18岁的男孩都必须服兵役，但我的内心对此十分抗拒，我拒绝服兵役，因此，我选了可以替代兵役的文职服务工作——在德国红十字会担任紧急医疗助理，对我而言，这是一个艰难的挑战。从事紧急救援服务轮班工作2年后，我发现由于自己内心拒服兵役，实际上是不可能成为某个州的护林员，因此，我不得不寻找别的与大自然有联系并为社会服务的工作。

1普法尔茨森林面积约1 770 km2 ，是德国最大的森林地区之一，覆盖着松木、山毛榉、云杉和橡树The Palatinate Forest (Pfälzerwald), covering an area of about 1,770 square kilometres, is one of the largest forest areas in Germany, covered mostly by stands of pine, beech, spruce and oak trees

2 在德国鲁尔区，只有少数几个工业基地仍然活跃，比如博特罗的焦化厂。这个地区的居民花了很长一段时间才把这些景色视为“景观”Only a few industrial sites in the German Ruhr area are still active like the coking plant Prosper in Bottrop. It took the inhabitants of the region quite a while to accept these sceneries as “landscape”

3 艺术家海克 穆特（Heike Mutter）和乌尔里希 根斯 （Ulrich Genth）在杜伊斯堡市附近设置的近20 m高的艺术装置“老虎与乌龟”（Tiger & Turtle），在很大程度上为现有环境创造了不同的视角Art installations like the accessible 20 metres high Tiger & Turtle near the city of Duisburg by the artists Heike Mutter und Ulrich Genth helped a lot to create a different view on the existing environment

4 如今，从117 m高的曾经的“奥伯豪森贮气罐”的顶部俯瞰工业鲁尔区，虽然改变了很多，却从未丢失其面貌Today the former industrial Ruhr area, here seen from the top of the 117 metres high former gas holder Gasometer Oberhausen, has changed its face a lot without losing its face

最终，基于对为人类和自然创造良好生活环境的浓厚兴趣，我决意成为一名园艺师并接受专业的训练。当我还是学徒时，一所专业学校的老师注意到了我的天赋并鼓励我申请大学的风景园林专业进行学习。作为普通工人家庭的孩子，我真的觉得自己资质还不足以接受大学的教育。尽管如此，我还是决心一试，并向慕尼黑工业大学提交了申请。最终我被录取，并于1986年开始在TUM弗赖辛校区（Freising-Weihenstephan campus of TUM）学习风景园林。学习之初，我的老师当中影响力最大就是彼得 拉茨（Peter Latz）。1983年，他被任命为TUM教授，当时他致力于废弃工业景观尤其是鲁尔区（Ruhr area， 图2～4）的改造，那里曾是德国实力最雄厚的工业区，20世纪70年代末一场严重的钢铁危机后，德国许多大型钢厂关闭，而重新定位这些大型棕地成了一项巨大的挑战。

因此，如果你问我是如何进入风景园林设计领域，尤其是与工业环境打交道，这就是我的方式。作为彼得 拉茨的学生，我们进行了多次实地考察，并在鲁尔区实践了许多设计项目，我着迷于景观可以呈现多样的形式和形状的想法。在第一学期，我对景观到底是什么有着天真的理解：我坚信它们应是美丽、和平且绿意盎然的，有草地、大树和潺潺流淌的河流等。彼得 拉茨、瑞士风景园林师迪尔特 基纳斯特（Dieter Kienast）以及许多当代艺术家让我明白迷人的景观是可以与刻板印象大相径庭的，工业景观所具有的独特美学特征与我所持的陈腐观念完全不同。我开始认识到，从风景中抹去所有工业遗迹并不总有意义，这样做反而毁掉了该地的身份特点。真正的挑战是要改变人们心中的景观图像，创造一种不同的景观文化共识。

LAJ：看来，跟随彼得 拉茨学习改变了您对景观与风景园林的看法。

Weilacher：的确如此。他带我们游览荒废的工业区，棕地所具有的神秘、古老工业废墟戏剧性的美学品质极为吸引我。我被教导用一种不同的方式看待这些景观，我无法想象德国阿尔卑斯俱乐部（德语：Deutscher Alpenverein）最主要的活动内容是在北杜伊斯堡工业废墟上训练他们的成员以攀登阿尔卑斯山——这里曾是一家距离阿尔卑斯山 600多km远的钢铁厂，对于攀岩者来说，钢铁厂以前的工业结构是一种完全不同的景致，而我被这种创造性重释旧结构的想法所吸引（图5）。另外，从生态学的角度看，我们已经投入了大量宝贵的资源来建造复杂的工业景观，因此抛弃现存设施毫无意义；而从历史的角度看，抹去在此工作的人们的记忆并摧毁地方身份认同并非良策。因此，有大量理由让这些废弃的场地以某种方式继续存在或被适当再利用。这种思维方式在20世纪80年代初相当不寻常，传统的策略是清除所有痕迹并借停产闲置之由彻底摧毁这些工业“机器”。我们必须了解的是，即使场地原有的目标用途丧失，它对社会的作用仍是十分宝贵的。

LAJ：今天，考虑将工业设备进行保留已经成为常识，但在那时候是很具有创造性的。

5 在杜伊斯堡北风景公园的旧混凝土墙顶上，攀岩者竖立的山顶十字架上刻有“蒙特 蒂索”字样，清楚地显示了改造的成功The summit cross erected by rock climbers on top of the old concrete wall in the Landscape Park Duisburg North inscribed “Monte Thysso” is a clear indication for a successful transformation

6 不同变体的“花园”。这里所谓的用废金属建造的郊区花园在杜伊斯堡北风景公园中发挥着重要作用，它帮助人们改变其感知方式“Gardens” in many variations, here the so-called Suburban Garden built with scrap metal, play an important role in the Landscape Park Duisburg North, helping people to change their perception

Weilacher：其实即便是今天，对许多市民来说，要理解为何保留旧工业结构并非易事，同时我们还必须小心，不要把生活环境完全博物馆化，景观并非博物馆，试图保护所有遗存意味着我们改变环境的能力将备受限制。此外，我们还须关注一个事实，即维护老工业遗迹需要大量的资源、时间和金钱。在德国，一些社区会花费大量资金维护工业遗产，但这仍不可能让所有的废墟保持活力，事实上，这在任何地方都是不必要且不合理的。彼得 拉茨所提倡的新策略并非将棕地视为博物馆，而是对其进行重新诠释以获新生，为了达到这一目的，有必要重新调整人们对景观的感知方式，这是一个非常高明的方法（图6）。

当然，在德国也有受到法律保护的工业遗址，比如收录在联合国教科文组织（UNESCO）世界遗产名录里的，位于沃尔克林根市附近的沃尔克林根钢铁厂（德语：Vólklinger Hütte）。人们无权改变这个工业区的任何东西，这意味着工业景观将得到很好的保护，虽然某种程度上原本的工业景象已不复存在。这种保护在特殊情况下仍是有意义的，但只有不断变化的景观才是活的景观，而活的景观就不会沦为博物馆。

LAJ：您出版了许多著作，比如1999年的《风景园林与大地艺术》（Between Landscape Architecture and Land Art ），2005年的《在花园里：当代欧洲风景园林概况》(In Gardens: Profiles of Contemporary European Landscape Architecture)，2008年的《景观文法：彼得 拉茨与合伙人的景观建筑》(Syntax of Landscape: The Landscape Architecture of Peter Latz and Partners)，以及近年来许多有关生态和绿色基础设施的文章。是什么引导您改变您的研究兴趣？

Weilacher：我是个好奇心很重的人，我对许多不同的主题和问题感兴趣。对此，有些人会抨击我并忽略了我的关注点，他们想知道我的“标签”到底是什么，但老实说，我的“标签”是“没有标签”。

举个例子，当我还是一个青年学生的时候，我对当代艺术和风景画非常感兴趣。在20世纪80年代初，每个人都试图说服我们——解决景观问题的唯一途径是技术式的方法，我和我的同学们对这种片面看待风景园林的方式相当沮丧。时至今日，我所担心的是我们又随波逐流向同一个方向——对景观的研究有点过于注重景观技术和定量环境科学。

年轻的时候，我接触到了大地艺术并为之着迷，因为这是一种别具一格且更具创造性地应对自然和景观的方式。艺术家们用鼓舞人心的方式探讨风景——以一种独特的方式诠释它。对我而言，这就如同发现了一种新的语言，我突然注意到在景观中有着我从未见过的特质。艺术家们以全新的方式探索景观，他们也改变了我们对工业景观的看法。20世纪60年代，美国艺术家罗伯特 史密森（Robert Smithson）是第一批以不同眼光看待工业景观的艺术家。而在德国，贝恩德 贝歇尔（Bernd Becher）和希拉 贝歇尔（Hilla Becher）夫妇借助摄影创造了一种独特的工业景观新视角——早在20世纪70年代，德国重工业危机时，他们就开始通过拍摄工业遗址来展示这些奇特景观的美丽。我认为艺术为探索新的景观维度提供了强而有力的方法，而大地艺术尤其迷人，这就是为什么我获得了大地艺术和当代风景园林专业的文凭，我很想了解以艺术应对景观和专业的风景园林方法之间的区别。我基于自己的毕业论文进行修改并出版了第一本书《风景园林与大地艺术》。1993年在慕尼黑工业大学完成这篇论文后，我联系了13家出版社，问他们是否有兴趣出版我的作品，12家出版商拒绝了我，理由是我的作品并不聚焦，介于艺术与风景园林之间。只有一位来自瑞士Birkhauser出版社的老师注意到了作品的价值，并给我机会将我的毕业论文编纂成书。时至今日，这本书可能仍是我最成功的一本。

在瑞士著名的日报机构《新苏黎世报》（Neue Züricher Zeitung, NZZ） 工作了几年后，我出版了书籍《在花园里：当代欧洲风景园林概况》。出版商邀请我为他们的NZZ Folio月刊写一些关于当代园林建筑的短文，对当代园林建筑一直抱以的浓厚兴趣促使我十分乐意地接受了这项任务——我的好奇心与对环境可持续设计的热情致使我在研究和出版方面产生了兴趣上的变化。景观实在太复杂，不能管中窥豹，我们需要有更广阔的视角——把地球作为一个有机体看待。对我而言，这些原因促成了我自由选择关注的焦点——大地艺术、风景园林史、当代风景园林或工业景观改造。在我看来，这些话题为我们更好地理解生活环境的现实复杂性添砖加瓦。

LAJ：《风景园林和大地艺术》这本书改变了人们看待艺术介入改变景观的方式，您是否认为这是风景园林领域的一项重要运 动呢？

Weilacher：如果是这样的话，那真的很棒，但我从未想过引发何种运动。我写这本书是因为我的好奇心以及我想与其他我觉得有趣的人分享我的见解，我急于更好地理解艺术之于景观的真正价值。一般而言，我写书的初衷是为自己厘清复杂的问题，并试图尽量简明扼要地传达我的发现。如果其他人也对我的研究结论感兴趣的话，我会很开心，因为创造和分享知识对于文化进步和社会发展很重要。

例如，我为2019年在北京林业大学举行的主题为“韧性景观”的会议（2019世界风景园林师高峰讲坛）所准备的演讲：“多孔性：城市生态系统架构原理”（Porosity — A Structural Principle of Urban Ecosystems），这是我之前从没演讲过的题目，我专门为这次会议进行了准备。我不是这个课题的专家，所以我很好奇“多孔性”在风景园林中到底为何意，因此我对这个问题做了深入的研究，试图了解“多孔性”作为一个概念对我们行业的真正影响潜力——多孔性”只是一个新的流行词还是蕴含了重要的知识？我在大学也是如此教授：我试图用最简单的方式向我的学生解释复杂的问题。因为在现实生活中，任务本身会趋于复杂，与其用过于复杂的解释迷惑学生，不如让他们理解简单的基本关联，我试着让他们有实践行动的能力。此外，在我的出版物中，我也遵循这些原则。

LAJ：在处理工业景观时，贝尔纳 拉叙斯（Bernard Lassus）的“最小干预”、彼得 拉茨的“文化循环”以及詹姆斯 科纳（James Corner）和艾莉森 希尔祺（Alison B. Hirsch）的“深描”（thick descriptions）等设计理念有多重要？在我看来，他们都是把新旧因素、历史和现状结合、组织起来。您怎么认为？

Weilacher：我想你基本上已经回答了这个问题，因为你提及的这些同行普遍认可这种新旧结合的价值观念，这正是我们在改造棕地时所践行的。时至今日，我们并未发明任何全新的东西，而是在已有事物上建立新事物，没有“空白”景观一说，所谓“空白”的背后都有经济、生态和社会存在。人类世（Anthropocene），人类的时代，现在已再无未涉足的景观——人类影响了一切，因此，我们如何对待现存事物成为一个非常根本的问题。

每一种文化都建立在过去的基础上，针对现存之物如何融入未来之发展，拉叙斯、拉茨、科纳、希尔祺等众多知名专家提出了不同的解决方法，于我而言，这些方法就像用来分析和组织复杂性的不同工具。亚伯拉罕 马斯洛（Abraham Maslow）的“工具法则”（Law of the Instrument）告诉我们对于那些手中唯一的工具就是锤子的人，每个问题都如同钉子。也就是说，如果理论是一个强大的工具箱，而你的工具箱里仅有一个工具，那么你很可能总以同样的方式处理每一个问题。

在许多情况下，这并不会带来好的结果。所以，工具箱中有许多不同的工具至关重要。有时，学生认为一个设计问题只有一个特定的分析或设计“工具”，显然这种想法有失偏颇——每一个问题都可以用许多不同的“工具”解决，而设计师选择使用哪项工具至关重要。

我欣赏贝尔纳 拉叙斯的方法，因为他教会了我们在景观当中如何利用最小干预获得巨大改变，即仅通过添加一小条新信息就改变人们对景观的解读。例如，我们不必为创造新的事物而彻底摧毁一个废弃的工业景观，有时，适时适地地添加一点新的元素便足以引发对既定环境完全不同的理解。最小干预旨在以人的感知与使用者脑中的景观为目标。

7 这座种植有黄杨（Buxus sempervirens）和绣球（Hydrangea macrophylla）的花园被置于一个旧的工业混凝土仓内。其设计的灵感来自意大利著名的文艺复兴花园。在工业背景下，它讲述了一个新的故事This boxwood and hydrangea garden, planted in an old industrial concrete container, was inspired by famous Renaissance gardens from Italy. Presented in an industrial context, it tells a new story

例如，彼得 拉茨使用最小干预的方法在一家废弃钢铁厂的旧工业设施里设置了一个小型树篱花园（图7）。拉茨在杜伊斯堡北风景公园这片占地约230 hm2、在德国足以被称为大型公园的场地上使用最小干预的措施改变了人们对棕地的看法，如那个珍贵的树篱花园。最小干预是一个非常有趣且强大的“工具”，当然，为了弄清现有问题，第一步肯定是做好场地分析，然后再决定最小干预法是否为解决现有问题的正确方法。

彼得 拉茨提出的文化循环是一个能有效保持场地身份的“工具”。借此，我们不会破坏场地上现有事物的信息，许多以前工业地上的建筑元素，只要我们不将其粉碎成小块，便仍有诉说的可能。例如，通过混凝土碾磨机回收混凝土墙时，我们从中获得了碎石，但这个碎石不会再讲述这个场地的故事。文化循环让我们可以重新利用大块混凝土元素，让这些砌块继续诉说它们的故事。这是一个维持原有场地身份的叙事方法，该方法深刻理解景观、尝试解释各层次的含义并将新旧融合。

9 罗德尔景观事务所成功地将现有的交通基础设施融入这块毗邻市中心的公园设计中，从而让人们享受到精心培植土地所带的质朴之感Loidl Landscape Architects managed successfully to incorporate existing traffic infrastructure into the park design, and people enjoy the cultivated roughness of the location near the city centre

10 在柏林的居民密集区，轨道公园的巨大开放空间是一个奢侈品，不过度设计这个区域而让人们自由使用场地显得尤其重要In the urban density of Berlin, the vast open spaces in the Park am Gleisdreieck are a real luxury, and it was important not to over-design the area but give people a chance to use it freely

LAJ：您认为公众对改造后景观元素的感知和专业人士的认知有何不同？一位设计师在从专业视角对废弃景观进行改造时，应该如何将公众的感知和观念纳入设计过程？

Weilacher：当然，我们必须考虑人们的感知，因为风景园林师的职责即为人设计。一个经过设计的景观只有在人们真正接受并欣赏的情况下才能长存。如果你设计人们不欣赏的景观，可能会遭遇很多蓄意破坏；如果人们喜欢他们的生活环境，便不必花很多钱来维护，因为人们会更悉心地对待他们的景观。可持续的风景园林必须与人们的感受、意见和思想紧密相连。公众的感受和专业人士的看法有什么不同吗？结果是肯定的，因为设计师受过专业的教育，拥有专业的感知过滤器。事实上，每个人都有由教育与以往经历共同构成的不同的感知过滤器。感知实际上是一种发生于人头脑中的创造性行为，今天我对工业景观的看法与我在青年学生时期是不一样的。我被教导要以不同的眼光看待棕地，但一般公众对这些地区仍保有非常传统的看法，这对风景园林来说是个挑战，因为我们必须花费相当多的时间来理解人们的看法，并试图找到能与这种看法建立联系的方式。

LAJ：是的，所以了解公众对改造景观的感知是具有价值的。

Weilacher：我认为这不仅值得尝试，而且是绝对有必要的。每一位优秀的风景园林师都必须认真考虑人们的行为、思想和愿望，尽管在某些情况下，一些著名的设计师有时会表现出忽视他人意见的倾向并获得成功。我不认为自己只是一名为艺术而艺术的风景园林师，我欣赏那些创作出对人类社会有价值且产生现实利益的景观项目的设计师。使一个项目登上一本光鲜的风景杂志封面并不重要，重要的是要为人们的生活创造一些有价值的东西。

LAJ：但是不同的人会有不同的感受与认知，将所有这些信息不经取舍地纳入设计过程确实具有一定难度。

Weilacher：没错。这就是为什么德国的公共项目有时需要很多年才能实现的原因之一。比如柏林一个名为“轨道公园”（Park am Gleisdreieck，图8～10）的原铁路车场的改造项目开始于1974年，直至2011年公园一期才对公众开放，这个奇妙的26 hm2的公共公园由柏林的罗德尔景观事务所（Loidl Landscape Architects）设计，设计师的目标是让这个新公园尽其可能地为社区服务。不同年龄、宗教和文化背景的人使用公园的同时，也参与着公园的设计，其参与过程花费了大量时间——市民们被邀请参加工作坊、展览和研讨会等，以确保他们的想法被完全纳入设计过程中。一般来说，你需要耐心地听他们讲一段时间，直到逐渐明白什么会打动他们。在我看来，一个民主的规划体系要想让公众项目得到妥善的完成并获得认可并无捷径，如果你试图加快规划进程，就很有可能失去人们的认可和支持。

这在欧洲是一项艰巨的挑战，因为我们地区的一些环境问题需要尽快地得到解决——全球气候变化并不会等我们。在紧急情况下，时间是一个非常关键的因素，而同时全球环境状况日益严重。

有时候，德国的规划过程实在太慢，但最终它总是表明真正可持续的项目往往需要大量时间才能按照人们接受和支持的方向发展。在某种程度上，中国的发展速度，比如在公共交通向更环保的系统转变方面，给我留下了深刻的印象。在德国，这种变化则需要很多年的时间——相比被迫做出改变，人们要希望被说服以采取必要的措施。

要真正说服别人需要很多时间。

LAJ：在您最近的风景园林方面的出版物中，经常提到人类世，讨论人造元素和自然元素之间的关系。您还引用约翰 布林克霍夫 杰克逊（J. B. Jackson）的话：“景观并不只是自然风景，而是一个合成的空间，一个叠加在大地表面的人造系统空间。”[1]您是如何将这一概念融入目前的教学和研究中？

Weilacher：当我第一次看到约翰 布林克霍夫 杰克逊这一前沿定义时，我震惊于景观不是关于自然而是关于人造空间系统的说法。在对这个概念做了更多研究后，我开始明白这是一个非常高明的定义景观的方法。首先，如果我们接受景观的这个定义，那么就不必再问风景园林师是否应该设计城市、基础设施、森林或田野，这并不重要，因为如果我们接受了景观是一个人造空间系统，那么我们就要对所有方面负责。这个定义需要一个非常广泛的整体性理解，并可释放巨大潜力。如果有人问我为什么一个风景园林师会谈论城市化、基础设施规划或农业系统，我会指出一个事实：于我而言，这些系统只是景观被理解为复杂空间系统的不同变体。基于这一定义，我觉得应取消那些对风景园林职业的传统理解，诸如过于关注绿地、花园和公园的设计。

在德国，很长一段时间里，我们在风景园林方面的工作都是基于对景观的一个非常浪漫的定义：景观是原始的。但我们从彼得 拉茨那里了解到，景观也可以是棕地；我们从迪尔特 基纳斯特那里了解到，城市之自然不仅是绿色也可以是灰色的。过分专注于对自然和景观的传统理解会限制我们的视野以至于忽视我们必须面对的真正挑战，人们很难接受工业景观作为景观就是因为他们太过执着于传统的景观定义。“自然”也是一个有着广泛含义而很难深入理解的术语，以至于我们在使用这个术语时总要解释我们真正的用意。我的一位朋友兼同事表示：术语就像手电筒可以照亮世界，当我们使用它，它亦会突显我们思维中的特定方面，所以，如果你用错了手电筒，你将看不到我们这个世界足够或具体的方面。一个好的术语能够帮助我们理解生活中非常重要的方面，这就是为什么反复讨论和质疑“景观”或“自然”的含义对我来说如此重要。

现如今，我们谈论了很多关于人类世、人类的时代，这个术语要求新的思维概念。我坚信作为风景园林师，我们一直知道自己所处的环境深受人类影响，但我在过去几年中了解到这种思维方式对于其他许多行业是崭新的，以至于改变了跨学科合作的基础。这就是为什么德国的风景园林学教授正在集中精力研究这方面的问题。正如我所说，我是个充满好奇心的人，我想知道人类世的意识在多大程度上会改变我们的行业。

LAJ：那么，人类世的设计与风景园林设计中的结构主义方法有什么关系呢？

Weilacher：我不知道你对结构主义有多熟悉，但最重要的一点是：风景园林是一种语言，我们用它与人们就全球生活环境的质量进行非语言交流。法国哲学家吉尔 德勒兹（Gilles Deleuze）指出语言之外没有任何结构，因此结构在风景园林中也起着至关重要的作用。

新生入学时，我总是提醒他们不仅仅是在学习如何设计空间或如何种植树木、树篱和花卉等，更是在学习一种新的语言——风景园林语言。每一种语言都有某种结构和一系列的关系，在这些关系中，单个的词可以改变而叙述的意义基本保持不变。任何学过外语的人都知道光靠词汇是不行的，我们需要学习如何把单个词汇连接起来形成一个句子，而连接的规则反映了句子的结构。每种语言都有一个特定的隐藏结构，汉语的结构与德语或英语的结构有很大的不同，如果我们承认风景园林设计是一种非文字式语言，那么就必须有一种结构以适当的方式连接所有的设计元素。学生要学习如何在特定的文化、生态或经济背景下，组合设计要素以创造意义。如果你创作一个风景园林设计项目，你必须关注上下文，因为它不仅关乎运用什么设计语言，且受制于原址上存在一段以自身叙事结构阐述的历史。你需要弄明白这2种结构——现存的和新设计的是否兼容。

LAJ：您最近也提到，都市有机体中的多孔性需要结构支撑。

Weilacher：没错。在这里，我想谈到一位非常重要的国际风景园林师俞孔坚，他的海绵城市理念真的很有价值，不仅是对中国有价值，比如联系到海绵城市理念，探讨多孔性就应该建立在探讨物质结构的基础上。景观结构既是物质实体，也是概念对象。通过不同的沟通形成了结构——诸如物质、信息和能量的传播与交流，因此视觉联系也在景观中发挥重要作用，通过建立交流纽带从而形成结构。

LAJ：非常感谢您接受本次采访！

Weilacher：不客气。我很荣幸。

图片来源：

图1～10由Udo Weilacher提供。

录音整理：朱艺宁

（编辑/王一兰）

Udo Weilacher is a professor of Landscape Architecture and Industrial Landscape at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), and also a landscape designer. He has received a gardening and landscaping training in the early stage. He studied at TUM and California State Polytechnic University Pomona/Los Angeles, and did his doctorate with distinction at ETH Zurich. Prof. Weilacher used to be a research fellow and lecturer at the University of Karlsruhe and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich. He was an appointed professor of landscape architecture and design at the University of Hanover in 2002. He served as the dean of the Faculty of Architecture and Landscape Sciences from 2006 to 2008. In 2009, he accepted the position of full professor at TUM. He was invited to participate in the 2019 International Landscape Architecture Symposium held at Beijing Forestry University.Landscape ArchitectureJournal Periodical Office has the honor to interview Professor Udo Weilacher. The following is the full text of the interview.

LAJ: Landscape Architecture Journal

Weilacher: Udo Weilacher

LAJ: Thank you for being willing to do this interview. We are honoured to have you here and be inspired by your thoughts. First of all, could you please talk a little bit about your education and why you choose landscape architecture as your profession. You are very influential in the field of industrial landscape, so why did you decide to make so many efforts on this subject?

Weilacher:My pathway to landscape architecture was actually a bit complicated. As a young boy I grew up in the “Palatinate Forest” (German: Pfälzerwald, Fig. 1), which is one of the largest forests in Germany. I loved to be in the forest and I spent a lot of time there hiking and playing, but also working hard supporting the lumbermen. So, my initial wish was to become a forest officer, a ranger working for the state forestry administration, but this did not work out. In Germany at that time, every boy at the age of 18 had to do his military service, but as a conscientious objector I refused to do this. So, I did an alternative civilian service and worked as an emergency medical assistant at the German Red Cross, which was a tough challenge for me. After two years of shift work at the emergency rescue service, I had to find out that it was virtually impossible to become a state forest officer as a conscientious objector. So, I had to find another way to work with nature and for society.

Finally, I decided to pursue professional training as a landscape gardener because I was always very much interested in creating good living conditions for man and nature. When I was a gardener apprentice, a teacher at the professional school noticed my talent and encouraged me to apply for a landscape architecture study at university. Coming from a rather simple worker's family I really thought I would not be smart enough for a university education. Nevertheless, I decided to give it a try and applied at the Technical University of Munich. I was accepted and in 1986 started to study landscape architecture on the Freising-Weihenstephan campus of TUM. One of my most influential teachers right from the beginning was Peter Latz. He was appointed as professor at the TUM in 1983 and at that time worked a lot on the transformation of derelict industrial landscapes especially in the Ruhr area (Fig. 2-4), which was once the most powerful industrial region in Germany. After a severe steel crisis in the late 1970s many big steel mills were shut down in Germany and it was a challenge to requalify the huge brownfield sites.

So, if you ask how I got into landscape design, especially dealing with industrial environments, this was my way. As students of Peter Latz, we went on many field trips and worked on many design projects in the Ruhr region. I became fascinated with the idea that landscape can take on many different forms and shapes. As a first semester student I had a very naive understanding of what landscapes are all about. I was convinced they should be beautiful, peaceful and green with meadows, big trees, flowing rivers and so on. It was Peter Latz, and later also the Swiss landscape architect Dieter Kienast as well as many contemporary artists, who taught me that fascinating landscapes can look much different from the stereotypical images in my mind. I learned that industrial landscapes are characterized by distinctive aesthetics, completely different from my clichéd ideas. I began to understand that it does not always make sense to erase all remains of the industrial history from the landscape and, by doing that, destroy the identity of the place. The real challenge was to change the image of landscape in people's minds and create a different kind of landscape cultural understanding.

LAJ: Studying with Peter Latz changed the way you are thinking of landscape and landscape architecture.

Weilacher:Absolutely. He took us on excursions to derelict industrial areas and it was the mystery of these brownfields, the dramatic aesthetic quality of old industrial ruins, that immediately fascinated me. I was taught that there is a different way to look at these landscapes and I could have never imagined that the largest section of the German Alpine Club (German: Deutscher Alpenverein) would train their members in alpine climbing in the industrial ruins of Duisburg-North, a former steel mill and more than 600 kilometres away from the Alps. For the climbers, the former industrial structure of the steel mill is a completely different kind of scenic landscape and I was fascinated by the idea to creatively reinterpret the old structures (Fig. 5). Also, from an ecological point of view it simply doesn't make sense to dump existing infrastructure, because so many valuable resources were invested to construct the complex industrial landscapes. From a historical point of view, it was not a good idea to erase the memory of the people who worked there and destroy the identity of the place. So there are many good reasons for keeping these derelict sites somehow alive or reuse them appropriately. This way of thinking was rather unusual in the early 1980s. The conventional strategy was to clear all traces of the past and destroy the industrial “machine” completely, because it did not work anymore and lost its primary purpose. What we had to learn was that even if the purpose of a site was lost, the function for the society was still very valuable.

LAJ: Today it is common sense for us trying to keep the machines, but at that time, it was a creative movement.

Weilacher:But even today for many citizens, it's not so easy to comprehend why to keep old industrial structures, and we also have to be careful not to totally turn our living environment into a museum. Landscape is not a museum and we simply cannot protect each and every single derelict industrial site because this would limit the capacity for change in our environment. In addition, we should keep an eye on the fact that the maintenance of old industrial monuments takes a lot of resources, time and money. The responsible communities in Germany are paying quite a lot of money to maintain their industrial heritage, but it is not possible to keep all ruins alive and, in fact, it's not necessary or reasonable everywhere. The new strategy that Peter Latz promoted was not to keep the brownfields as museums but to reinterpret them and fill them with new life. In order to achieve that, it was necessary to recalibrate peoples' way of perceiving the landscape. That was a really intelligent approach (Fig. 6).

Of course, we also have industrial sites in Germany which are protected by law such as the Völklingen Ironworks (German: Völklinger Hütte), a UNESCO world heritage site near the city of Völklingen. You are not allowed to change anything in this industrial area, which means that this landscape is well preserved, but in a way not alive any longer. In exceptional cases, this protection makes sense, but only a changing landscape is a living landscape and a living landscape can hardly be a museum.

LAJ: You produced so many publications, like Between Landscape Architecture and Land Art in 1999, In Gardens: Profiles of Contemporary European Landscape Architecture in 2005, Syntax of Landscape: the landscape architecture of Peter Latz and Partners in 2008, and many interesting articles on ecology and green infrastructure in recent years. What guides your changing research interest?

Weilacher:You know, I am a very curious person. I am interested in many different themes and questions. Some people criticize that and they miss my focus and want to know exactly what my “trademark” is. But honestly my trademark is that I don't have a trademark.

For example, I was extremely interested in contemporary art and landscape when I was a young student. At that time, in the early 1980s everybody was trying to convince us that the only possible solutions for landscape problems are technological solutions. My fellow students and I got very frustrated with this one-sided way of looking at landscape architecture. And I am afraid that we are currently drifting into the same direction again, looking at landscape a bit too much focused on landscape technology and quantitative environmental science.

When I discovered Land Art as a young student, I was fascinated because I found a different and much more creative approach to nature and landscape. Artists have such an inspiring way of talking about landscape, interpreting it in a unique manner. For me this was like the discovery of a new language and I suddenly noticed qualities in landscape that I had never seen before. The artists explored landscape in completely new ways, and they were also the ones who changed our view on industrial landscapes. Among the first artists who developed a different look on industrial landscapes was the American conceptual artist Robert Smithson in the 1960s. In Germany, it was a very important couple of photographers who coined a distinctive new view on industrial landscapes: Bernd and Hilla Becher. Back in the 1970s, when a crisis hit the German heavy industries, they began to photograph industrial sites, showing the beauty of these peculiar landscapes. Art I think offers very powerful methods to explore new dimensions of landscape, and Land Art was for me especially fascinating. That is why I obtained my diploma in Land Art and contemporary landscape architecture. I was curious to understand the difference between the artistic approach to landscape and the professional landscape architectural approach. The first book that I published,Between Landscape Architecture and Land Art,was actually my revised final thesis. After finishing my thesis at the TU Munich in 1993, I contacted thirteen publishers and asked them if they would be interested in publishing my work. Twelve publishers refused, because my work was too much “in between” — neither focused on art nor on landscape architecture only. Only one lector from Birkhauser publisher in Switzerland noticed the value of my work and offered me the chance to elaborate on my diploma thesis into a book. Until today, this publication is probably still my most successful one.

The bookIn Gardens. Profiles of Contemporary European Landscape Architecturewas developed after I had worked several years for the “Neue Züricher Zeitung” (NZZ), a renowned Swiss daily newspaper. The publishers invited me to write short essays about contemporary garden architecture for their monthly magazine, theNZZ Folio. Since I was always interested in contemporary garden architecture, I enjoyed that task. So again — what guides my changing interest in research and publishing is my curiosity and my enthusiasm for all different aspects concerning the sustainable design of our living environment. Landscape is simply too complex to concentrate only on single elements and aspects. We need to develop a broader understanding of earth as a living organism. That's why it is important for me to freely choose the focus of my attention — land art, history of landscape architecture, contemporary landscape architecture or the transformation of industrial landscapes. From my point of view, all these themes carry important building blocks for a better understanding of the real complexity of our living environment.

LAJ: The book Between Landscape Architecture and Land Art changed the way people see artistic interventions in landscape. Don't you think this is an important movement for landscape architecture?

Weilacher:If so, it would be fascinating, but it was never my aim to start some kind of movement. I wrote this book because — as I said — I was curious and I wanted to share my insights with other interested people. I was anxious to better understand the true value of artistic approaches to landscape. Generally, I am writing books primarily to clarify complex questions for myself and I try to communicate my findings as simply as possible. It would really make me happy if this should also be interesting for other people, because creating and sharing knowledge is important for the cultural progress and the survival of our society.

For example, my lecture about “Porosity — A Structural Principle of Urban Ecosystems” that I prepared for the “Resilient Landscape” conference 2019 at the Beijing Forestry University is a lecture I never presented before. I prepared it specifically for this conference and, since I am not really an expert on this subject, I was curious to find out what “porosity” in landscape architecture really means. That's why I did intensive research on this issue, trying to understand what the true potential of “porosity” as a concept might be for our profession. Is “porosity” just a new buzzword or does it convey an important knowledge? That's also how I teach at university. I try to explain complex issues in the most simple way to my students, because in the reality of life the tasks will get complicated by themselves. Rather than disorienting students with far too complicated explanations, it's better for them to understand simple basic correlations. I try to give them a capability to act. Also, in my publications I try to respect these simple principles.

LAJ: When dealing with industrial landscapes, how important are the design concepts “minimal intervention” by Bernard Lassus, “cultural recycling” by Peter Latz, and “thick descriptions” by James Corner and Alison B. Hirsch? From my point of view they are all trying to combine and organize the old and the new, the historical elements and the current situation. Do you agree with this?

Weilacher:I think you almost answered the question yourself, because you pointed out that all mentioned colleagues generally believe in the value of combining the old with the new. That's exactly what we are trying to do when working on the transformation of brownfields. Today, we are not inventing anything completely new, but we always build on top of something that's already existing. There is no such thing as a “blank” landscape. There is always an economical, ecological or social context. In the Anthropocene, the age of humans, there is no untouched landscape anymore — mankind influenced everything. That's why the question of how do we deal with the existing is a very fundamental one.

Every culture is based on something that existed before. Lassus, Latz, Corner, Hirsch and many other renowned experts developed different approaches to the solution of the same question on how to integrate the existing into the future development. To me, these approaches are like different tools that you can use in order to analyse the complexity of the world or synthesize the complexity of a design. The “Law of the Instrument” by Abraham Maslow says that for someone who's only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. Which means, that if you have only one tool in your toolbox — and theory is a powerful toolbox — it is most likely that you will treat every problem always in the same way.

In many cases this will not lead to good results. So, it is important to have many different tools in your toolbox. Sometimes students think there's only one specific analysis or design tool for one design question but that's wrong. Each given problem can be solved with many different tools, and it's essentially the choice of the designer which tool to use.

I appreciate the approach by Bernard Lassus, because he taught us how to make great changes in a landscape with only very minimal interventions. It's about changing the reading of a landscape just by adding a small new piece of new information. For example, we don't have to destroy a derelict industrial landscape completely to create something new. Sometimes it's simply enough to add a little new element in the right place at the right time and this immediately sparks off a completely different understanding of a given environment. The minimal intervention aims at the perception of people, at the image of landscape in the head of the user.

When Peter Latz, for example, installed a small hedge garden in an old industrial bunker of a derelict steel mill, he used the minimal intervention method (Fig. 7). Landscape Park Duisburg Nord has a size of approximately 230 hectares, and in Germany we call this a large park. With his minimal interventions like that little precious hedge garden, Latz changed the perception of the brownfield. The minimal intervention is a very interesting and powerful tool, but of course you must first always perform a good site analysis in order to clearly identify the existing problem. Then you can decide if minimal intervention is the right method to solve the given problem.

Cultural recycling, a tool proposed by Peter Latz, is also very useful in order to keep the identity of a landscape. In this case you do not destroy the information of the existing material on the site. Many existing building elements on a former industrial site can only speak if you don't grind them into small pieces. For example, when conventionally recycling a concrete wall by dumping the material in a concrete mill, you get gravel out of it. But this gravel is not telling the story of the site anymore. For cultural recycling you would reuse big elements of concrete, allowing them to still tell their stories. That's also a good method, a narrative approach for keeping the identity of a place, if needed. It's about getting a deep understanding of the landscape, trying to explain the layers of meaning, combining the old with the new.

LAJ: Do you think that there is a difference between the public perception of transformed landscape elements and the professional approach to transformation? How shall a designer take the public perception and conception into account when professionally redesign a derelict landscape?

Weilacher:Of course, we have to take people's perception into account, because we are designing for the people as that is our duty as landscape architects. A designed landscape can only survive in the long term if people really accept and appreciate it. If you design landscapes that people do not appreciate, you will probably see a lot of vandalism and destruction. If people like their living environment, you will not have to spend a lot of money for maintenance because people will treat “their” landscape more carefully. Sustainable landscape architecture has to be closely connected to people's feelings, opinions and thoughts. Is there a difference between what the public feels and what the professionals see in designs? Yes, of course, because we have been educated professionally and, therefore, we have our professional filter of perception. Actually, each individual has a different filter of perception, formed by education and previous experiences. Therefore, perception is already a creative act, happening in our minds. I am looking at industrial landscapes not in the same way today compared to when I was a young student. I was taught to look at brownfields differently, but the general public still has a very much traditional view on these areas. That's a challenge in landscape architecture, because we have to spend a lot of time to understand peoples' perceptions, trying to figure out how to relate to this kind of perception.

LAJ: Right, so it's worth trying to find out how the public feels about transformed landscapes.

Weilacher:I think it's not only worth trying, it's absolutely necessary. Every good landscape architect has to take peoples' behaviour, their thoughts and wishes seriously into consideration. Very famous designers sometimes show a tendency to ignore people's opinions and in some instances they are very successful with this attitude. But I don't understand myself as a landscape architect who simply creates art for art's sake. I appreciate landscape architects who are creating projects that have a meaning and a true benefit for our human society. It should not be important to get a project on the cover of a glossy landscape magazine but to create something valuable for peoples' lives.

LAJ: But different people have different thoughts and it's difficult to take all this information into consideration.

Weilacher:That's right. This is one of the reasons why public projects in Germany sometimes take many years before they are realized. For example, the transformation process of a former railway yard in Berlin for the so-called “Park am Gleisdreieck” (Fig. 8-10) started in 1974 and the first part of the park was opened in 2011. It is a fantastic 26 hectares public park, designed by Loidl Landscape Architects in Berlin, which is used by many people of all ages, religions and cultural backgrounds. Especially the participation process took a lot of time. The citizens were invited to public workshops, exhibitions, discussions and so on in order to make sure that their ideas are thoroughly included in the design process. The aim of the designers was that the new park serves the community as successfully as possible. These participation processes take a lot of time. Normally you simply have to listen patiently to the people for quite a while until you gradually understand what moves them. From my point of view there is no fast way in a democratic planning system to get public projects done properly and accepted by the users. If you try to speed up the planning process, you are running a high risk of losing the acceptance and the support of the people.

That's a real challenge in Europe, because some environmental problems in our region should be solved a lot faster — global climate change is not waiting for us. In case of emergency, time is a very crucial factor, and our global environmental condition is getting more and more serious.

Sometimes, planning processes in Germany are simply too slow, but in the end it always shows that really sustainable projects need a lot of time to be developed in way that people accept and support the result. In a way I am really impressed by the speed of development in China, for example when it comes to necessary changes in public transportation towards more environmentally friendly systems. In Germany, these kinds of changes take many years because people don't want to be forced to make changes, but instead they want to be convinced to take the necessary measures.

To really convince people takes a lot of time.

LAJ: In your recent publications on landscape architecture you are referring frequently to the Anthropocene, discussing the relationship between manmade elements and natural elements. You also regularly quote J. B. Jackson: “Landscape is not a natural feature, but a synthetic space, a manmade system spaces superimposed on the face of the land”[1]. How do you integrate this concept into your current teaching and research?

Weilacher:When I came across this cuttingedge definition by J. B. Jackson for the first time, I was shocked by the statement that landscape is not about nature but about manmade spatial systems. Doing more research about this concept, I began to understand that this is a very intelligent way of defining landscape for several reasons. First, if you accept this definition of landscape, it's not necessary anymore to ask whether landscape architects should design cities, infrastructure, forests or fields. It simply doesn't matter, because if we accept that landscape is a manmade system of spaces, we are suddenly responsible for all of these aspects. This definition is asking for a very broad holistic understanding and opens up a huge potential. If people ask me, why a landscape architect talks about urbanism, infrastructure planning or agricultural systems, I simply point out the fact, that for me all these systems are just different variations of landscape — understood as a complex system of spaces. Due to this definition I feel legitimized to doing away with the traditional understanding of our profession that focused too much on the design of green spaces, gardens and parks.

In Germany we based our work in landscape architecture for a very long time on a very romantic definition of landscape. Landscape was something untouched and pristine. But we learned from Peter Latz that landscape is also brownfields. We learned from Dieter Kienast, that the nature of the city is not only green but grey. Being focused too much on a traditional understanding of nature and landscape limits your view and you might overlook the real challenges we have to take on. People had a big problem to accept industrial landscapes as landscapes, because they were too much fixed on a traditional definition of what landscape was all about. “Nature” is also such a very difficult term with a wide range of meaning, and we always have to explain what we really mean when we use this term. A friend and good colleague of mine stated that terms are like flashlights with which we illuminate the world. If we use them, they highlight specific aspects in our thinking. So, if you use the “wrong” flashlight, you will not see enough or only very specific aspects of our world. A good term is helping you to understand very important aspects of life. That's why repeatedly discussing and questioning the meaning of “landscape” or “nature” is so important for me.

These days we talk a lot about the Anthropocene, the age of man, and it's said that this term asks for new concepts of thinking. But I am convinced that as landscape architects we always knew that we are working in an environment that is very much influenced by man. But I learned in the last years, that for many other professions this way of thinking is new, and it changes our basis for interdisciplinary cooperation. That's why we, the professors of landscape architecture in Germany, are concentrating in our current research on that aspect. As I said, I am curious and I would like to understand to what extent the awareness of the Anthropocene will change our profession.

LAJ: So what is the relationship between designing in the Anthropocene and the structuralistic approach in landscape architecture.

Weilacher:I don't know how familiar you are with structuralism, but the most important aspect is that landscape architecture is a language in which we communicate non-verbally with people about the quality of our global living environment. The French philosopher Gilles Deleuze pointed out that there are no structures outside that which is language, and therefore structure also plays an essential role in landscape architecture.

When our new students arrive at university I always remind them that they are not simply learning how to design spaces, or how to plant trees, hedges, flowers and so on, but they are learning a new language — the language of landscape and landscape architecture. Every language has some kind of structure, a set of relationships, in which the single words can change, but in such a way that the meaning of a narration will basically remain. Anyone who has ever learned a foreign language knows that you cannot do a lot with vocabulary alone. You need to learn how to connect the single words in order to formulate a sentence, and the rules of connection reflect the structure. There is a specific hidden structure in every language. The structure of the Chinese language is very different from the structure of German or English. So again, if we accept that landscape design is a nonverbal language, then there has to be a structure that connects all design elements in an appropriate way. Students need to learn how to combine landscape elements, given a specific cultural, ecological or economical context, in order to create meaning. If you create a landscape design project, you always have to keep an eye on the context, not only with regard to the design vocabulary you use but also because there is always an existing story out there with its own narrative structure. You need to find out whether these two structures, the existing one and the new one, are compatible.

LAJ: You said recently that there is no porosity without structure in the urban fabric.

Weilacher:That's right. Yu Kongjian is a very important international landscape architect and his idea of the sponge city is really valuable, not only in China. The discussions about porosity, for example in connection with the idea of the sponge city, should be based on the discussion about structures. The structure of landscape is not just something physical but also something conceptual. Structure is established by communication — communication of matter, information and energy. Therefore, visual connections for example can play an important role in the landscape, establishing communicative links and therefore structure.

LAJ: Thank you so much for this interview!

Weilacher:You're welcome. It was a pleasure.

Sources of Figures:

Fig.1-10 © Udo Weilacher.

Recording Collector: ZHU Yining