This paper examines the pastoral ideal and its legacy to landscape design. We have had the routine convention of experiencing natural beauty from the picture-like nature. We, who would liken a scenic view to a picture, often equate natural beauty with superficial representations of nature shown in pastoral literature and traditional landscape paintings: the lush of towering trees, the field of endless green, the soft babbling flow of the river and the crisp clear sky. It is not a portrayal of nature as it is, but in fact a conceptual expression of its ideal form. The ideological root of that natural beauty can be retraced to the pastoral ideal, so eagerly longed for by people of the western world. A pastoral landscape graciously marked with leisurely peace and subtle harmony is what we identify as beautiful nature. In fact, however, it is no more than an artificial refuge in contextual isolation from its surrounding, and a by-stander's nature seen purely through the eyes of the outsider. The tradition of pastoralism, reaching its peak in the 18th century with its English Landscape Garden style, was transplanted into the real world through the practice of landscape architecture. Landscape design in such a form is just a static means of decoration devoid of meaning and process. And we simply identify the green ornamentation with nature.

• 배정한 | Pae, Jeong-Hann