Extra Credit: Megan

The Kiang Gallery’s “After the Suburbs” exhibit describes many of the complex issues that affect the relationship between human interaction and the environment. One of the most prominent themes is the artificiality of the suburbs and developers' attempts to reconnect suburbanites, frustrated by cramped and hectic city life, with nature. Thus, the suburbs have been used as an escapist destination in metropolitan areas longing to reclaim authentic elements of nature. Two pieces in the exhibit—a model residential monument and a set of computer generating monument names—reveal this theme. Monuments, such as the Evergreen Gates one featured in the exhibit, attempt to create unique borders around residential areas and give the illusion of privacy and exoticism. The names of subdivisions reflected on monuments like these typically use a formula which exhibit curator Karen Tauches describes as “a natural feature plus an Anglicized noun.” Names like Evergreen Gates or Lakefront Estates suggest that residents in these neighborhoods have a connection to nature, even if most of the evergreens have been cleared or the lakefront is gone. Their names reject adjectives used to describe the city, by emphasizing the neighborhood’s abundant landscaping and winding, irregular streets which distinguish it from the urban environment and city grid. The second picture featured here, however, shows how trivial the process of labeling subdivisions can be and how empty in meaning they can actually be. This piece randomly generates dozens of subdivision names using the formula that Tauches suggested; this piece shows just how methodical the process of creating suburban areas really is. The monument names essentially give suburban areas a theme park like effect in that they attempt to synthetically transport the public to another place by using careful planning techniques that try to replicate the natural environment, despite the fact that the authenticity of nature in the suburbs remains weak in most places.