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Legendary Norman McGrath Documents the Brine Garden

July 2, 2015 by Julia Brine 1 Comment

Norman McGrath, the Brine Garden

© Norman McGrath

Photographer Norman McGrath is shooting the Brine Garden in its 25th year.

Norman and his wife, Molly, had lunch at Duncan and Julia Brine’s home and toured the Brine Garden in the fall of 2014. Not long afterwards, Norman emailed,

“Very much enjoyed our recent luncheon and visit to your beautiful garden. The fruits of all your care and planning have produced a unique environment. Would you consider embarking on a year long study which would examine closely the seasonal changes which make it so special?”

The Brines were thrilled at the prospect of collaborating with such an exceptional professional.

Norman is best known as an architectural photographer and author of the definitive book, Photographing Buildings Inside and Out, which has sold over 47,000 copies. But, for the past decade Norman has been observing and creating images of the Great Swamp, part of which is just across Route 22 from the Brine Garden.

Born in London, Norman was educated in Ireland where he earned an engineering degree at Trinity College, Dublin. His father was the Australian-born architect and author, Raymond McGrath. Norman has lived in the US since 1956.

Norman has photographed the work of a wide variety of influential and well-known architects and designers, including Mies van der Rohe, Hugh Stubbins, Charles Gwathmey, Frank Gehry, and Philip Johnson. His work has been featured in every major architectural publication and a collection of his photographs has been acquired by the Library of Congress. www.normanmcgrath.com

Filed Under: Art, Brine Garden, Duncan Brine, East Coast, GARDEN LARGE, GardenLarge, Gardens, Hudson Valley Attractions, Images, Landscape Inspiration, Pawling NY, US Tagged With: Brine Garden, Duncan Brine, Hudson Valley, Landscape, Landscape design, landscape photography, naturalistic landscape designer, Norman McGrath, photography

“Plenty Good Room” for Obama Library

February 19, 2015 by Julia Brine Leave a Comment

“Plenty Good Room” for Obama Library

By Mary Pattillo
Published February 3, 2015

In the coming weeks, the Chicago City Council and the Chicago Park District will vote on using roughly 20 acres of South Side parkland for the proposed Obama presidential library. There is no good reason to use parkland. There are plenty of reasons not to. And, as the Negro spiritual says, there is “plenty good room” in which to accommodate everybody.

Photo of Washington ParkWashington Park, photo © Lucas Blair

I run in Washington Park. There’s a bridle path where Chicago’s “black cowboys” ride their horses, and where it’s very soft on my knees. I also run in Jackson Park in the Woodlawn community on a beautiful track across the street from Hyde Park Academy High School.

On my runs in Washington Park, I pass the older lady who always yells out “How ya doin’, baaaby!” and the group of older men whose debates about politics and popular culture are almost as vigorous as their walking pace. In the summer, there are softball leagues, South Asians and West Indians playing cricket, and hundreds of barbecues. And, I swear, half the people have on Obama T-shirts!

In Jackson Park, I loop around the Latino men playing soccer, with their families cheering them on, or high school football teams that practice there.

We love that President Barack Obama still calls Chicago his hometown . Obama’s presidential library should be on the South Side — where it would add vitality to blocks and blocks of empty lots. But, instead, the University of Chicago’s proposal to use parkland for the Obama library threatens to take away all of the local, unscripted, everyday life and activity I just described. It will curtail the use of the park through what I call the three Ps: perception, permitting and policing.

My research on urban development in Chicago illustrates that how people perceive things in a community matters for how they use them, or not. In the North Kenwood neighborhood, a community health center has struggled to attract clients with private insurance — who think the facility is only for low-income families. And in the same neighborhood, low-income residents thought the now-shuttered Hyde Park Co-op grocery store was for the more wealthy newcomers. South Siders of all types will surely embrace the Obama library and claim it as their own, but its fancy architecture and perfectly landscaped lawns will create perceptions for some people that they shouldn’t be hanging out nearby, shouldn’t play loud music at the family reunion, shouldn’t wear cutoff shorts, or generally shouldn’t be there doing what people often do in a park.

Photo of Cricket PlayersCricket Players in Washington Park, photo © Lucas Blair

The next step is permitting. A presidential library will add a level of scrutiny regarding the kinds of uses that are granted permits to be in the park. Will the members of the African-American fraternity Omega Psi Phi be able to blast “Atomic Dog,” hop, and bark alongside the Obama library at their fraternity picnic? Will UniverSoul Circus get a permit to set up in the park? It draws thousands of families every autumn, bringing with it smells of cotton candy, popcorn, pyrotechnics and horse manure.

And, the final P — policing. The Obama library will surely have tight security. Will littering, loitering, street vending and disturbing the peace escalate into arrests? Washington Park is already among the Top 10 and Woodlawn among the Top 15 communities in Chicago with the highest imprisonment rates. Zero-tolerance policing in either of these parks will add to the unjust burden black communities already bear for our lock-’em-up policies.

And, finally, it’s just not necessary. According to the City’s Web site, there are over 3.4 million square feet (almost 79 acres) of vacant city-owned land in the Washington Park community area, and over 2.7 million square feet (roughly 63 acres) in Woodlawn, where Jackson Park is located. Of course, all of these lots are not contiguous but anybody who drives through these neighborhoods will know that there is ample space to build a library, and then some. Indeed, the University of Chicago owns an 11-acre vacant lot directly across the street from the Washington Park land it wants to seize. Why take land that is being actively used by parkgoers, instead of building on land not being used for anything?

The Obama presidential library belongs on Chicago’s South Side. And so do the black cowboys, the Latino soccer players, the high school football teams, the woman who calls me “Baaaaby,” and whoever wants to just hang out with a makeshift cooler and a rickety lawn chair.

Luckily, with the abundance of available non-parkland, there is plenty of good room for all of it.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mary Pattillo is a professor of sociology and African-American studies at Northwestern University. She is the author of two books about Chicago’s South Side: Black Picket Fences: Privilege and Peril among the Black Middle Class, and Black on the Block: The Politics of Race and Class in the City.

A version of this post appeared in the Chicago Tribune’s Opinion and Commentary section on Jan 30, 2015.

Filed Under: Architecture, Cultural Landscape Foundation, Cultural properties, Design philosophy, Garden Blogs, GARDEN LARGE, Midwest, Museums, Public Gardens Tagged With: Cultural Landscape Foundation, Public Gardens, Public land, Public Parks

Duncan Brine to present at Peconic Land Trusts’ Lecture Series – Bridgehampton, NY

February 22, 2012 by Duncan Brine Leave a Comment

  • Peconic Land Trusts Kicks Off Its Third Annual Lecture Series At Bridge Gardens – Bridgehampton, NY – Hamptons.com

    Long Bridge at the Brine Garden, Pawling, NY

    © gardenlarge.com
    • • Sunday, March 18: “Naturalistic Whole Property Design”
      Brine, principal landscape designer of Garden Large, and instructor at the New York Botanical Garden along with the New England Wild Flower Society, will expand upon an article he wrote for the American Horticultural Society’s “American Gardener” while focusing on the six-acre Brine Garden in Pawling, NY.
      Anne Raver featured the garden in the New York Times, and the recent book “Gardens of the Hudson Valley” compares Duncan to Russel Wright of Garrison, NY’s Manitoga.
      Discover how this designer finds inspiration in existing conditions and elicits ideas from the prevailing nature of a place.

Filed Under: Bridge Gardens, Brine Garden, Design philosophy, Design Technique, Duncan Brine, Environment, Hamptons, Images, Julia Brine, Landscape Inspiration, Native Plants, Naturalistic, Nature, Public Lands, Speakers, Structured Naturalism, Sustainability Tagged With: Brine Garden, Duncan Brine, Environment, Hudson Valley, Julia Brine, Landscape design, naturalistic landscape design, Nature, Pawling NY, Principles, Public Gardens, Public land, speaker, Sustainabilty, talks, The American Gardener

Photographer Norman McGrath Honored at the Library of Congress

March 16, 2016 by Julia Brine Leave a Comment

Norman McGrath, who has spent the past year documenting the Brine Garden, will speak at the Library of Congress regarding their acquisition of an archive of his work.

Prints & Photographs Division of the Library of Congress presents a lecture by Norman McGrath:

What Makes Architectural Photography Different?

Norman McGrath discusses the challenges in modern architectural photography and the transition from film to digital media.

Thursday, March 17, 12 – 1pm
Pickford Theater (limited seating)
3rd floor, Madison Building
Library of Congress
101 Independence Ave., SE
Washington, DC 20540

Contact: Mari Nakahara
(202) 707-2990
mnak@loc.gov

Filed Under: Architecture, GARDEN LARGE, Speakers Tagged With: Architectural Photography, Brine Garden, landscape photography, Library of Congress, Norman McGrath, speaker, talks

Photography in the Style of Traditional Chinese Painting

December 7, 2011 by Duncan Brine Leave a Comment

  • Photography in the Style of Traditional Chinese Painting by Don Hong-Oai | Retronaut

    Here, photography jumps into, and, dreamily, clarifies traditional Chinese painting. The effect is startling and unique; the images create a median between a far-off reality and a composed ideal.

  • This series of images was brought to my attention by a college friend now living in the northwest.
  • Brine Garden dreaming of Chinese painting

Filed Under: Art, Asia, Birds, Images, Landscape Inspiration, My editorial comment, Naturalistic, Nature, Parks, Private Gardens, Water, Wildlife Tagged With: Asia, Chinese painting, favorite, Landscape, landscape photography, naturalistic landscape design, Nature, Principles, Private Gardens, Wildlife

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