~ Section 1 - The Ancient Foundations, Styles & Epochs of Art ~

“The Birth of Landscape and the Sacred Order of Nature”

The first landscapes were not designed for beauty but for meaning. In the ancient world, art, architecture, and the natural environment formed a single sacred geometry. From Mesopotamian terraces and Egyptian temple gardens to the early Persian paradises, humans shaped land to mirror cosmic harmony. The earth itself became canvas and temple—a dialogue between water, light, and divine proportion.

© This article references early LASD Studio, Yura Lotonenko white-paper research (2011 – 2017) exploring intersections between Art and Landscape Philosophy

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Video Episode of Section 1 — The Ancient Foundations

This opening episode of Styles & Epochs of Art that Influenced Landscape Architecture by LASD Studio traces how the earliest civilizations conceived gardens as sacred geometry. Through art, myth, and earth-building, it reveals how these origins continue to inspire modern ecological design and LASD Studio’s philosophy of living, evolving systems.

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The Epoch Overview

Historical & Cultural Context

Between 3500 and 500 BCE, early civilizations transformed raw terrain into ordered realms. Irrigation canals, ziggurats, and walled gardens symbolized power and cosmic stability. Nature was sacred—a medium through which gods communicated balance, fertility, and eternity.

Fine Art & Aesthetic Principles

Early reliefs, frescoes, and mosaics depicted stylized trees, flowing rivers, and birds in symmetrical rhythms. Geometry expressed unity; repetition evoked divine order. These first aesthetic systems became the blueprint for classical art and, centuries later, for architectural proportion.

Influence on Early Landscape Thought

Ancient gardens introduced spatial hierarchy—axis, enclosure, horizon. They established the idea that design could shape emotional and spiritual experience. The garden was the first philosophical landscape: a living diagram of harmony between human intention and the natural world.

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Key Artists, Philosophers & Landscape Architects

Ancient Egyptian Artists & Builders

Masters of geometry, procession, and cosmic alignment, Egyptian designers conceived gardens as extensions of temple ritual. Axial paths mirrored the east–west journey of the sun; pools reflected both sky and eternity. Symbolic planting — papyrus for Lower Egypt, lotus for Upper Egypt — expressed unity of realms. Their walled sanctuaries around Karnak and Thebes fused horticulture, water engineering, and spiritual order into one architectural organism, anticipating the discipline of landscape architecture itself.

Funeral Ritual in a Garden, Tomb of Minnakht – Thebes, Egypt (c. 1420 BCE)

Ancient wall painting showing a ritual beneath sycamores and date palms in the tomb of Minnakht. The ordered pool and tree rows reveal early Egyptian mastery of axial planning and symbolic planting, linking death, regeneration, and the geometry of the Nile landscape.

Hamilton Gardens Egyptian Court – Modern Interpretation of Ancient Design

Re-creation of an ancient Egyptian garden at Hamilton Gardens, New Zealand. Rectangular pools, lotus basins, and columned walkways evoke the harmony and ritual order of temple gardens at Karnak and Thebes—living diagrams of cosmic balance and seasonal renewal.

Ancient Egyptian Garden Courtyard – Symbolism of Water and Axis

Formal courtyard inspired by Egyptian palace gardens, featuring reflective pools aligned on a central axis. This composition mirrors the sun’s east–west path and the eternal rhythm between cultivated land and sacred water, principles foundational to landscape architecture.

Pyramids of Giza – Monumental Egyptian Landscape Architecture

Panoramic view of the Pyramids of Giza rising from desert sands. Beyond their architectural power, these monuments define the earliest dialogue between built form and horizon—geometry as spiritual landscape—shaping humanity’s perception of space, proportion, and eternity.

The Garden Fresco, Tomb of Nebamun – Thebes, Egypt (c. 1350 BCE)

Fresco from the Tomb of Nebamun depicting a rectangular pool surrounded by palms, papyrus, and fruit trees filled with birds and fish. The composition unites ecological observation with sacred symbolism—one of the earliest known representations of a designed garden as paradise.

Mesopotamian Architects & Relief Carvers

Between the Tigris and Euphrates, land and water were sacred technologies. Mesopotamian builders engineered ziggurat terraces and canal networks that defined early landscape infrastructure. In low-relief carvings, palms, date clusters, and flowing rivers were rendered as rhythmic patterns of divine stability. These images were not decoration but cosmograms: visual systems that mapped fertility, hierarchy, and celestial harmony. Their terraces became prototypes for both agricultural and ceremonial landscapes across millennia.

Ab Rahe Pasargadae – Ancient Persian Water Channel System

Ancient stone water channel at Pasargadae, Iran — an early example of engineered irrigation geometry that defined Persian landscape architecture. The precise axial alignment symbolizes harmony between land, water, and divine order, prefiguring the Pairidaeza garden concept.

Assyrian Bas-Relief Depicting Sacred Rivers and Palms, Mesopotamia

Stone relief from ancient Mesopotamia illustrating palm trees and flowing rivers — a symbolic representation of divine stability and fertility. These rhythmic patterns express the earliest aesthetic of landscape order, where art and irrigation merged into sacred geometry.

Fin Garden, Kashan – Classical Persian Pairidaeza

The Fin Garden in Kashan, Iran — a masterpiece of Persian garden design where four water channels meet at a central fountain. Its geometry reflects Zoroastrian cosmology and the eternal balance of nature, architecture, and human spirit in arid landscapes.

Hanging Gardens of Babylon – Mythic Mesopotamian Landscape Wonder

Artistic reconstruction of the legendary Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Terraced gardens and engineered irrigation symbolized harmony between human invention and natural abundance in early Mesopotamian design philosophy.

Fin Garden Pavilion – Intersection of Water and Architecture

Interior view of Fin Garden pavilion, where vaulted ceilings and reflective pools embody the Persian belief in paradise as a synthesis of architecture, light, and water. A living symbol of ancient ecological intelligence and sensory harmony.

Pasargadae Archaeological Site – Ancient Garden Axis and Structure

Aerial view of the Pasargadae archaeological complex showing remains of palace and garden layout. Early Achaemenid engineers combined hydraulic infrastructure with geometric design, creating the prototype for future paradise gardens across the Persian Empire.

Kakh-Ekhtesasi – Ancient Persian Garden Terrace Ruins

Ruins of the Kakh-Ekhtesasi site near Pasargadae reveal the earliest integration of terraced landscape, stone channels, and plant corridors. These structures represent the technical and spiritual roots of Persian garden planning — a dialogue between geometry and water.

Persian Garden Makers

Persian visionaries evolved the Pairidaeza—the paradise garden—as an earthly reflection of cosmic perfection. Water, divided into four channels, symbolized the rivers of life described in Zoroastrian and later Islamic cosmology. Axes intersected at a central fountain or tree, uniting geometry and spirituality. Shade, scent, and enclosure created microclimates of peace in arid terrain. The Persian paradigm introduced the universal idea of the garden as a moral and ecological model—a balanced world within the world.

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Main Landscape Architectural Features of the Epoch

Design Principles

Order, symmetry, and celestial orientation defined the earliest design grammar. Terraces rose toward the heavens; courtyards enclosed silence and ritual. Every axis carried symbolic weight—north to south for sovereignty, east to west for life’s journey. Water was the generative line, mediating between the physical and the metaphysical.

Materiality & Plant Palette

Material choices reflected permanence and renewal. Clay brick and stone for structure, polished marble and carved basins for sanctity. Vegetation was both utility and allegory: papyrus for knowledge, palm for life, lotus for rebirth, cypress for immortality. Fragrance and color became invisible architecture—soft systems that guided the senses through geometry.

Evolutionary Interpretation

For LASD Studio, these early landscapes embody the first evolutionary systems. The adaptive irrigation channels of Mesopotamia and the climatic intelligence of Persian courtyards prefigure today’s responsive environmental design. What began as sacred geometry now translates into data-driven ecological choreography—where soil, water, and structure evolve together as one living, intelligent organism.

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LASD Studio Interpretation & Works

Designing Landscapes as Evolutionary Systems

At LASD Studio, we reinterpret the sacred geometries of antiquity through contemporary sustainability and digital precision. Projects such as Mediterranean courtyards and arid-climate sanctuaries echo these origins—balancing minimal water use with poetic form. Our “Evolutionary Intelligent Systems” translate ancient order into living, data-driven ecosystems that respond to climate, biodiversity, and human emotion.