Ioannis Savvidis
< Athenscope Athens A
Title of the research Project:
The Transformation of the Concept of Parks and Its Planning Using the Example of the Elaionas Area (Olive Grove in Athens) from the Beginning of the 18th Century to Today.
No other undeveloped area in an urban environment has experienced as many and as diverse interpretations of the relationship between urban environment and nature as the Athenian olive grove. The Elaionas area was already a metaphysical terrain before antiquity and has remained so to this day.
As is well known, the olive grove has been and continues to be a symbol of unity: a union of naturalness and the human desire to appropriate and incorporate it; a union of the farmer with the scholar, and ultimately a union of the Dionysian with the Apollonian.
Today, the Elaionas serves not only as a mundane recreational area but is also still regarded as timelessly sacred. There are still ancient olive trees to be discovered, but they now represent a small minority in the fauna of the area. This park owes its current
reputation primarily to baroque planning, autocratic style, and also to interventions from the modern Greek period. A significant date in the repurposing of the area is 1718, when a imperial decree transformed the vast agricultural land into a hunting forest. The
Study, Drawings, and Photography: Ioannis Savvidis
The tree panels as part of Athens A
gardens of Versailles near Paris served as models for the redesign, as did Schönbrunn in Vienna and the Sanssouci area in Potsdam. Following the fashion of the time, large, straight sightlines were created that led to palaces or pavilions. Nevertheless, the Elaionas also has its own peculiarities: The significance of archaeological finds, such as the Academy of Plato, is directly linked to the imperial court through architecture – the emperor as a descendant of Plato.Not only are the consequences of the "introduced" opening of the imperial residence towards "planned nature" in the service of power examined here, but also its influence on an urban consciousness regarding recreation and green spaces.
The three printed panels forming the Transformation of the Concepts of Parks
Photographies shown on the printed panels (see above)
Simulation of a historic construction drawing of the "New Palace" a as printed on one of the presentation panels (see above)
Simulation of a reconstruction of the Elaionas -Area as bird's eye view as printed on one of the panels (see above)