For my dear colleagues at Peking University:

Like all of you, I was so deeply saddened and heartbroken upon learning the news of the tragic death of the landscape architect Kongjian Yu in a plane crash while filming a documentary on sponge cities near the Pantanal in Brazil. I remember first meeting Kongjian with my former colleague and friend Michael Sorkin, when he was presenting his “Big Feet” lecture at the New York Botanical Garden. Kongjian’s approach to landscape as one deeply steeped in the long cultural and agricultural traditions of China was inspiring and radical. We had just spoken on the phone this summer while I was in Shanghai, discussing our hopes for his selection as the landscape architect for the transformation of the east entrance of the Louvre in Paris. Kongjian was also to have been the keynote speaker at the symposium on Designing Change at Longwood Gardens, near Philadelphia, and I was looking forward to seeing him again. He transformed and expanded our discipline in so many ways, and his work at Turenscape along with his writings and research were an inspiration to a generation of landscape architecture students and professionals. In my own work on coastal resilience, I was inspired by his attention to the long arc of Chinese wisdom in understanding water and flood management. Through Kongjian, I discovered Yu the Great, of the Xia Dynasty, who established a new approach to flood management based on a wise agricultural approach to land management: create more shallow channels, low dikes, and multiple pathways for riverine waters to meet the sea, rather than creating singular, massive dams in an attempt to control nature. Kongjian Yu was our contemporary Yu the Great: a leader, a visionary, and a man of service and dedication to his rapidly developing nation and our collective planet. Kongjian’s ideas will continue to resonant into action by all of us in the discipline of landscape architecture and beyond. My deepest condolences to all of you, and my heartfelt sympathy to his family and friends. We have lost one of our greatest.

Catherine Seavitt

Meyerson Professor and Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture, University of Pennsylvania

译文:

致北京大学的亲爱的同事们：

同你们所有人一样，得知俞孔坚教授在巴西潘塔纳尔附近拍摄关于海绵城市的纪录片时因飞机失事不幸逝世的消息，我深感悲痛，心如刀割。我第一次见到俞孔坚教授是在纽约植物园，当时我的前同事兼好友迈克尔·索金（Michael Sorkin）也在场，他正在那里做关于“大脚美学”的演讲。俞教授将景观设计深深植根于中国悠久的文化和农业传统之中，这种理念既令人振奋又具有开创性。今年夏天我在上海时，我们还通过电话，讨论了我们对他被选为巴黎卢浮宫东入口改造项目景观设计师的期望。俞教授还本应是费城附近长木花园（Longwood Gardens）举办的“设计变革”研讨会的主旨演讲嘉宾，我本期待着再次见到他。他在景观设计领域以多种方式推动了学科的发展，他和土人设计的实践以及他的著作和研究激励了一代又一代的景观设计学生和专业人士。在我的沿海韧性研究工作中，我深受他对中国智慧的长期关注所启发，这种智慧体现在对水和洪水管理的理解上。通过俞教授，我发现了夏朝的大禹，他提出了一种基于明智的土地管理方法的新的洪水管理方式：创造更多的浅水渠、低堤坝，以及让河水流入海洋的多条通道，而不是试图通过建造单一的大型水坝来控制自然。俞孔坚教授就是我们当代的大禹：一位领袖、一位远见者，以及一位致力于服务他迅速发展的国家和我们共同的地球的奉献者。俞教授的思想将继续激励我们景观设计学科以及更多领域的人付诸行动。我对你们所有人致以最深切的哀悼，也向他的家人和朋友表达我发自内心的同情。我们失去了一位最伟大的人物。

凯瑟琳·西维特

宾夕法尼亚大学景观设计系主任

Meyerson讲席教授