Genius Loci : place as a mean to develop inter and transdisciplinary skills for archtecture students

Abstract

Land Art ; The French government has a long tradition of supporting the Arts as well as collaborations between artists and architects have also long been supported. In the case of architecture education, expected skills and competencies are by nature multidisciplinary, as the practitioner never works alone but is always in contact with other professionals of the built environment such as engineers, planners, sociologists, etc. However it does not mean automatically that courses are multidisciplinary or even trans or interdisciplinary. This study is based on a ten year's land art workshop organized for second year architecture students and questions how inter or transdisciplinary skills for architecture students are developed through experimenting and learning about the relationship between art and the natural environment. Methodologically, the analysis was based on the systematic review of the produced outcomes, as well as trying to identify the variable factors that might have influenced them. Findings show that even if the course provide interdisciplinary skills, transdisciplinary features are not really present, unless a real critical reflection is actionned.