Parks and Public Space in Madison

press release:

This presentation will look at the changing cultural landscape of Madison, focusing on the shifting use of public and greenspaces since the time the city was platted in 1836. It will pay particular attention to public parks, Capitol Square, and other spaces of public assembly. It will also examine John Nolen’s “visionary” plan for Madison from the early twentieth century and how the city has (and has not) accommodated aspects of that plan in the last 100+ years.

Anna Andrzejewski is Professor and Chair of the Department of Art History at UW-Madison. She has taught courses in the history of American architecture, especially vernacular architecture and cultural landscapes, since 2000. She has published Building Power: Architecture and Surveillance in Victorian America as well as numerous articles and walking tour books of Madison and the region. Anna is currently completing a book on the Madison-based builder/developer Marshall Erdman.

“The Cultural Landscape of the UW-Madison Campus”

The campus cultural landscape refers to those exterior spaces that have been formed through human effort and action. While landscape architects have consciously designed many of them, other spaces reflect the presence and siting of nearby buildings and structures. The presentation will begin with an overview of the landforms developed by Native Americans, and then cover several periods of campus landscape history from the early 1850s to the present. Special attention will be given to the landscape associated with the College of Agricultural & Life Sciences.

Arnold Alanen is an Emeritus Professor of Landscape Architecture who taught landscape history and cultural resource preservation at the UW-Madison for thirty-four years. He has written extensively about the cultural landscapes, settlements, and vernacular architecture of the Midwest, and served as a cultural landscape advisor to the National Park Service in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Alaska.

$10 general admission | Free for members