Princes Park and the Persian garden: re-imagining urban parklands in Australia and Iran through online and in situ art practice

<p>In this practice led, art-based research I explore the hybrid online and in situ placemaking of Princes Park in Melbourne, Australia, and Bagh-e Eram in Shiraz, Iran. The project focuses on a comparative investigation of the complex processes of place-making that frame the intersection between nature and culture in both sites, and aims to contribute to new understanding of urban parks and gardens in the face of significant environmental change. Working with others and building on personal connections with both places, I developed participatory creative processes both online and in situ to produce the exchange of ideas through art. Key outcomes include the interactive, bilingual project website Cloud Parked Art and an interactive, cross-cultural work Garden Carpet as well as a series of workshops and informal interventions that facilitated a reconsideration of place-making in Princes Park. This project draws from a range of disciplines including, ecofeminism, landscape architecture, urban geography and the history of gardens. I also refer to theories of digital ethnography and place-making as an ongoing process through my framework of collaborative art practices. The project has an interdisciplinary base combining the creative fields of ecological art, and textiles, along with mapping and the storytelling of place.</p>