Landscape as Art

Is a garden Art? Can we analyse an historic garden in the same way that we do a painting? While gardens are the most fugitive of art forms, they were often created by artists, architects or designers and conform to the aesthetic or ‘style’ of a particular period, incorporating many of the same visual and iconographical elements found in painting. The meaning and materials of a garden are both permanent and fleeting (like some modern art), but the study of gardens – through their remains or contemporary visual images and descriptions – provides insights into the culture in which they were created. Gardens reflect and are revealed in literature, drama and painting. Yet, experiencing a garden was and is different from all other art forms, engaging all five sense and demanding movement by the viewer. Gardens were the first form of ‘performance art’.