Author Description

Before architects and city designers can begin to make changes in the actual physical environment, they must create representations of their designs. These can range from two-dimensional maps, charts, and diagrams to computer models. Each presents an abstraction, reducing reality to facts that can be clearly conveyed. In Representation of Places Peter Bosselmann asks how the experience of a rich and complex world - both the world we know and the changed world designers envision - can be adequately communicated. The designers' representation of planned structures and their environment significantly influences what gets built. Can images accurately match a designer's conception to a future reality? In addition to providing a timely discussion for professionals of the relation between new technologies and strategies of visual communication, Representation of Places has much to offer the general reader interested in the form of cities. Peter Bosselmann outlines a critical, normative framework needed to evaluate representations of design.