Commemorate the First Angelinos – through a Landscape Museum Approach
Los Angeles is nourished by a robust economic vitality, diverse ecology, and multi-cultural groups. Serving as a transnational hub for several generations, its history remains buried under the concrete. Though the Gabrielino-Tongva were not the first people to inhabit the Los Angeles region, they were the heirs to the non-European cultural tradition that had evolved in this region over thousands of years (McCawley, 1996). Before the Spanish colonists arrived in 1769, they were believed to be the “wealthiest, most populous, and most powerful ethnic nationality in aboriginal southern California” (Sturtevant, 1978).
The first Spanish Mission (San Gabriel Mission) was established on September 8, 1771. During the depriving time, the Gabrielino-Tongva’s art, music, and traditions were gradually expunged from history. With the city’s expansion and evolution, their human patterns have been overwritten by time. Observing these gaps, a new commemorative landscape project is proposed in the central area of San Gabriel City, at the ring of the historic San Gabriel Mission. As we claim urban landscapes as public history, the project will create a landscape that reveals the hidden history of Gabrielino-Tongva through active learning that will take place in the site by introducing the notion of “museum pedagogy” to landscape.
Advisers/Committee
