Mill Creeek Earthworks: Engineering + Artistry + Banalities
A life-ambition was fulfilled last weekend when I visited Herbert Bayer's renowned Mill Creek Earthworks Project for the first time. While every description mentions its location at the confluence of two rivers, none reveal that it is also situated in the confluence of several highways. They literally exist as 'high' ways because this renowned water restoration project lies far below the thoroughfares on two sides, an apartment complex on the third side, and a distant view of the town on the fourth. The pure shapes of a refined artistic sensibility exist in the midst of ceaseless traffic and banal architecture.
Instead of compromising their purity, they seem to underscore it. The undulating curves that are created by sculpting the land wind horizontally (along the surface pathways) and vertically (ascending as concave mounds and descending into convex pools). The rhythms and proportions of these hills and hollows are functionally determined because they act as catchments for varying flood water surges. I discovered another reason why this land art project is heralded as a modernist masterpiece. Its artistic formalism merges seamlessly with hydraulic engineering and resists being compromised by common banalities.
