SEPTEMBER 5, 2014: REFLECTING on 30 years of a changing architectural landscape – which is shaping and reconstituting modern South African cities – the Eastern Cape Institute of Architects’ (ECIA) latest exhibition, Excellence in Architecture: 1983-2013, celebrates how the region has morphed through architectural intervention.
WHEN Brent Meistre asked me to open this exhibition, I was dubious about my ability to introduce what he does to the general public, as the material, while visually accessible, carries the weight of a very particular philosophy and approach to landscape which is less easily explained. I am thankful that, for most of us, the experience of standing alone in landscape is relatively easy to do as we live close to the kinds of landscape which he has photographed. To be physically in landscape in this country is a primal sensation – it is literally where we’re grounded – where we develop a sense of place and belonging - and it is the space in which we conduct our lives and where we are buried.