Introducing New TCLF Project Managers

We are pleased to announce the addition of two Project Managers to the Foundation, Dena Tasse-Winter and Spencer W Stuart. Collectively they will oversee the continued expansion of many of our signature programs including What’s Out There and Landslide.

Image

Dena joins TCLF with academic training in historic preservation and cultural heritage management (M.A., University of York, UK), coupled with experience in non-profit administration. Here she shares insight into her background and what drew her to TCLF’s work:

“I have always been fascinated by the ways in which people engage with the limited resource of urban land – growing up in lower Manhattan, one quickly learns the value of open space, and I loved observing the creative and memorable projects that shaped the landscape around me. My hometown has taught me that even within the confines of an urban setting, shared landscapes can be tiny or vast; they can be memorialized for their heritage value, or sympathetically adapted to serve new uses while retaining an impression of their history.

Image

I also had the great fortune to be part of a chorus that enabled me to travel internationally at a young age, performing on a variety of stages with all manner of people. While a shared love of singing was the impetus for our time together, an appreciation for the diversity of music and cultures present was the result. We performed in medieval churches, concert halls designed by architect Zaha Hadid, countless public squares, the courtyard of a Shinto temple, even, amusingly, in the frozen aisle of a supermarket in Iowa once – and as we sang the folk songs of different nations in these perhaps incongruous places, I would marvel at how we were activating them in new ways, adding another layer to their histories.

These experiences inspired me to pursue a career in which I could spend my time engaging with the public about places and the ways we inhabit them over time. I love that cultural landscapes are ubiquitous across borders, and how each site contains a multitude of stories ripe for interpretation. It is our duty to encapsulate these stories for future generations. The Cultural Landscape Foundation embodies this by striving to ‘educate and engage the public to make our shared landscape heritage more visible, identify its value, and empower its stewards,’ and I am thrilled to have the opportunity to help see this mission fulfilled.”

Image

One of Dena’s first projects at TCLF is to manage What’s Out There Indianapolis – she hopes that you will stay tuned in the coming months as we start to populate our database with entries from this region, and that you’ll join us for our What’s Out There Weekend in October!

Image

Spencer comes to us following three years with Bonhams Auctioneers in both their Toronto and New York offices where he worked closely with the Fine Rare Books and Manuscripts Department. He holds an M.A. in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute of Art as well as a B.A. in Art History & Film Studies from Carleton University, Ottawa. Here, Spencer also reflects on the path that led him to working with TCLF:

“At first, my awareness of Landscape Architecture and its histories took place on the periphery of my academic focus. Through the contemporary dance practices of Anna Halprin, the radical gestures of the early Land Artists, and the pictures of Claude Lorrain, Nicolas Poussin and Salvator Rosa.

Image

Independent of my academic pursuits, a deep interest in travel literature and memoirs from J.J. Rousseau to more contemporary figures such as W.G. Sebald inspired me to consider the spirit of place and the liminal relations that cities have with their ecological and geographic environs, how these sites store histories and bear witness to the passage to time. Over the years I have been fortunate enough to cultivate this sense traveling to over 30 countries.

Having lived in both London, England and Toronto, Ontario, two cities threaded through by green space has allowed me the chance to explore these relationships of open space to the built environment and the crucial role they play in the formation of public memory and community.

Concluding my studies at the Courtauld, I found myself retreating from discussions of digital technologies and their influences on our collective understanding of image culture which had been my direction at the time. Through discussion with my brother, a graduate of the Landscape Architecture program at the University of Oregon now in private practice, I began to immerse myself in the histories of horticulture, ecology, and landscape architecture, visiting sites and studying plans.

The opportunity to attend TCLF’s Second Wave of Modernism III: Leading with Landscape conference held in Toronto in May of 2015 not only enriched a holistic approach to discussions of landscape, but introduced me to a Foundation that aligned with my own beliefs toward education and the idea of a shared commitment toward our designed landscape heritage.

I am honored to occupy the position of Project Manager and am excited to be contributing my historical research methods to educating the public about the inter-disciplinary practices of Landscape Architecture.”

Image

Two weeks in, Spencer is already working closely with Team TCLF to encourage broad participation in the Landslide 2017: Open Season on Open Space, as well as our What’s Out There efforts underway for San Antonio in 2018 on the occasion of the city’s tricentennial.

We warmly welcome Dena and Spencer to the Foundation and look forward to the diverse perspective and expertise they will be contributing to our ongoing efforts to connect people with places.