embodied landscape: to give a body to (or spirit) all the visible features of an area or land, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.
Earth and human are one. Everything that is human comes from and belongs to the Earth. Our stories and pasts are told in the shapes and scars of the landscape. When we die, our bodies return to the Earth. In most simple of terms, we cannot exist without the Earth; Earth gives us life.
We experience aliveness through our own aliveness, our body. We know we are alive as we feel blood rushing through our veins, oxygen flowing through our lungs and as our hearts pulsate; we know the Earth is alive as rivers rush to the ocean, as trees bloom with leaves and magma boils below the surface. Aliveness is interwoven and moves through all things.
To exist as a human means to modify and create. Modify here does not necessarily carry negative connotations, but to be alive requires interaction with and consumption of the environment. Therefore, altering landscapes is inherent to humanity's existence. The question at play is about how far we have taken this practice and the widespread and pervasive environmental predicaments these alterations have caused.
We have reached a point where our government is a corporation, our education is a product, and our bodies are commodities; the landscape is mechanized, the soul is dying.
"the imperative to be beautiful often creates astonishing ugliness"