Working with Artists
How landscape architects can best choose artists to collaborate with them on projects.

By Regina M. Flanagan, Associate ASLA

Brad Goldberg

Artists’ ideas have inspired landscape architects and have transformed the profession throughout the history of landscape architecture. In fact, many of the innovative works of landscape architecture and urban design seen in Landscape Architecture involve collaborations between practitioners and visual artists.

The public art movement of the 1970s and 1980s, first manifested in landscape works by Robert Smithson, Robert Morris, Nancy Holt, and others, was later advanced by artists such as Mary Miss and Richard Fleischner in works for urban settings. The efforts and social interests of artists, combined with publicly or privately funded programs for artwork in public places, laid the groundwork for the collaborative approach between the professions in practice today.

What can artists bring to your landscape architecture project? What is it like to work with artists? How can you select artists to work with you? The answer to these questions depends upon a project’s particular circumstances and scope.

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