Landscape, photography and architecture

Abstract

Conceptions around landscape are already an institutionalized part of the Chilean architectural discourse. However, the idea of landscape has not always been present. Architecture recognizes the notion of landscape as an operating instrument when modern architecture is installed in the country. It was photography that spread the notion of landscape as a category of local architectural culture. This article analyses the photographic record of three apparently minor works linked to free time, leisure architecture: the house designed by Luis Mitrovic on the slope of Manquehue hill, the summer house designed in La Reina by Hector Valdes, Fernando Castillo and Carlos García Huidobro and the summer house that Emilio Duhart and Héctor Valdés made on Alvarado hill for Mrs. Labbé in 1941. Images of strong pictorial and visual contents by photographers Guillermo Castro and Antonio Quintana stand out on the record. These cases show clear indications of the presence of landscape as a conceptual tool for the development of architecture.