Green Is Hope, and Grass the Future

Sonja Dümpelmann

Lush greenery has never been neutral or apolitical. In Berlin, wild grass has often been perceived as embodying the beauty and freedom of nature in a kind of opposition to the technocratic state. In some eras, it has even served nativist and totalitarian ideologies.

In Berlin, greenery has never been neutral or apolitical. During the pandemic, posters of meadows appeared on billboards across the city, an illusion of verdant fertility amidst mandated lockdown.

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Columnists

  • Aaron Rothman
  • Alan Thomas
  • Keith Eggener

Aaron Rothman

Aaron Rothman is a columnist for Places. A monograph of his artwork, Signal Noise, is forthcoming from Radius Books.

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Simon Sadler

Simon Sadler is a columnist for Places. He teaches the history and theory of architecture, design, and urbanism across several programs at the University of California, Davis, where he is a professor in the Department of Design.

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Alan Thomas

Alan Thomas is a columnist for Places. He is Editorial Director for the Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of Chicago Press and a photographer specializing in urban landscape.

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Keith Eggener

Keith Eggener is a columnist for Places. He is Marion Dean Ross Professor of Architectural History at the University of Oregon.

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Series

Future Archive

Future Archive features the online republication of significant works of 20th-century design criticism and history.

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Summer Workshop