Rhein Romantik | Koblenz Germany | TOPOTEK 1

Rhein Romantik | Koblenz Germany | TOPOTEK 1

Like a pool of water reflecting the sky, placed at the castle of Ehrenbreitstein, creates a flux of images incorporating the walls and building. Creating a heightened experience of its surroundings, it involves the beholder in a game of perception, intriguing to find the «right» view of the motif. Ever since French landscape painters like Claude Lorrain and Niclas Poussin defined their ideal of the landscape in the mid 17th century, gardeners and architects had the task of creating the Real World inspired by these framed images – something that today almost appears as an inverted reality.


Rhein Romantik | Koblenz Germany | TOPOTEK 1
In the early 19th century the painters of the romantic period utilized a convex dark mirror in order to paint the landscape as these masters did.

Rhein Romantik | Koblenz Germany | TOPOTEK 1
Looking at the landscape through the mirror created a framing, a muted colour-range and a special curvature of the motif. This was also the era of the Rheinromantik leading the first travelers to the Rhine-valley around Koblenz to admire the castles and the scenery framed through a pocket size Claude-Glass. Certain apertures of landscape are cut out and saved in the consciousness of the viewer.

The development of the camera, and ever more so, the instant reproduction through the digital camera change our experience and the way we look at the surrounding landscape.
Rhein Romantik | Koblenz Germany | TOPOTEK 1
Rhein Romantik | Koblenz Germany | TOPOTEK 1

Client: Garden Show Ehrenbreitstein, Koblenz

Construction: 2011

Photographer: Hans Joosten

Plan/Section Image: TOPOTEK 1

About Damian Holmes 3245 Articles
Damian Holmes is the Founder and Editor of World Landscape Architecture (WLA). He is a registered landscape architect (AILA) working in international design practice in Australia. Damian founded WLA in 2007 to provide a website for landscape architects written by landscape architects. Connect on Linkedin at https://www.linkedin.com/in/damianholmes/