Exhibition April 1st to April 30th, 2025
Circular Drawing
Long-lasting water landscapes made by indigenous people are mapped and documented using the illustrative method. This method has been developed to describe the relationship between landscape and human-made systems and illustrate people’s engagement in making, using, worshipping and managing these water landscapes over decades. One could say that people who create and adapt water landscapes daily are true landscape architects. They understand the rhythm of the weather, seasons and landscape, including flora and fauna and act accordingly, considering that the land will be passed on to the next generation. Being part of such a community is hard work since the system mainly feeds its people without making a profit. Circular Drawing is one of the most comprehensive drawings within the series of maps.
A curated selection of works from the exhibition, including contributions from this lab and short interviews of the designers in their language, is featured at the Venice Architecture Biennale, Italy 2025, underscoring the increasing significance of Indigenous knowledge in shaping forward-looking design discourses.
Xiaolei Ma, Tobias Macchione, Carolina Estefania Marquez Luna, Kanako Inai, Camila Rosado, Nicola Vollmer, and Houxuan Zhang (CWS-lab #7 from left to right) sitting in front of their Circular Drawing.
The exhibition was held at the Orange Hall of the Faculty in April 2025.