Drawing Cities and Villages in the Landscape

Abstract

Studying the relationships that are established among the population nuclei, the territory and, in particular, the immediate landscape where they settle is one of the basic objectives of urban analysis. How to show these relationships? Which graphic media have traditionally been used to capture the relationship between the city and the landscape in a proper way? It seems evident that, above all, the most visual and figurative systems have been used. Their aim is to draw things in a natural way, to create compositions with a panoramic view that allow the connection of the different parts. Sectional drawings of urban settlements and their territory are commonly used, because they offer an interesting mixture between natural vision and dimensional rigor. But perspective drawing has found greater success in the field of representation of the inhabited nuclei and its surrounding territory. In this paper, the author analyses some representations of urban settlements in the landscape that have been done by architects and painters. His main aim is to evaluate a specific mode of drawing, typical of the “Architectural Graphic Expression”, which is essential and irreplaceable to understand certain mechanisms of urban processes.