"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms" (Where I Lived, paragraph 16).
"Our village life would stagnate if it were not for the unexplored forests and meadows which surround it. We need the tonic of wildness" (Spring, paragraph 25).
"Let us spend one day as deliberately as Nature, and not be thrown off the track by every nutshell and mosquito's wing that falls on the rails" (Where I Lived, paragraph 22).
"To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts, nor even to found a school, but so to love wisdom as to live according to its dictates, a life of simplicity, independence, magnanimity and trust. It is to solve some of the problems of life, not only theoretically, but practically" (Economy, paragraph 19).
"I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours" (Conclusion, paragraph 5).
The Concrete Jungle
It’s easy to see patterns that emerge in the natural world. The ripples on a sand dune, the symmetry of a maple leaf, the stripes on a tiger or spots on a cheetah. Visual regularities create order and organization in nature, a characteristic that has intrigued scientists and philosophers for centuries. Complex mathematics, physics and chemistry attempt to explain why patterns form, but the simple fact that they naturally exist is enough to tie much of the modern world to its organic roots.
In contemporary society, nearly every aspect of day-to-day life relies on patterns to function correctly and efficiently. Human settlements display millions of artificial patterns, and like their naturally occurring counterparts, these patterns are used to create order and organization. Power lines are arranged into grids, water systems flow through carefully placed pipelines and millions of commuters travel to work on complex networks of roads and highways, all working together to form a cohesive system that supports human life.
Fewer places exhibit this characteristic more vividly than the world’s rapidly growing urban ecosystems. On the average business day, Manhattan boasts over 150,000 people per square mile, making one of the most densely populated areas in the world. To control such masses, strict regularity is required, thus promoting the institution of seemingly endless patterns. Around the world, urban environments like those in New York closely parallel natural environments through the symmetry and arrangement of various objects, leading the keen observer to see that they may not be as far off from the world’s untouched nature as they seem.
Artist's Note
As evidenced in Henry David Thoreau’s masterpiece Walden, he was perhaps the most observant of the America’s 20th century authors. Although he was often appalled by the country’s industrial revolution and growing trend towards urbanization, he recognized the inevitability of the such a movement and (very) occasionally made statements that can almost be construed as praise for some of the movement’s positive effects. Irrespective of his take on the issue, a contemporary interpretation of his words in Walden may potentially lead a reader to a message that may not be as he originally intended.
I was lead in this direction. I see Walden not a social commentary or an environmentalist outreach or even as a transcendentalist classic, but rather I see it as a call to action to live life as nature intended for it to be lived. This rather vague sentence is intentionally so, as only the person doing the living can determine what path nature has set. Thoreau’s path involved over two years of solitary life, whereas mine is only now being discovered. I enjoy the city as much as I enjoy Thoreau’s “Nature,” so in his honor I plastered Walden-inspired symbols on a few common urban settings. The quotes are a few of my favorites that I believe apply in any context, regardless of whether your next adventure involves a subway ticket of a pair of hiking boots.
