Landscape image sketches of forests in Japan and Russia

Abstract

With increased economic and tourism interests in both Japan and Russia, culturally different meanings of ‘forest’ need to be understood for future cooperative environmental management. In this study, we propose Landscape Image Sketching Technique as an original, practical methodology to externalise an individual landscape image as a scene sketch aiming to represent the viewer's fundamental way of seeing the landscape. To discuss different perceptions and interpretations of forests in a cultural framework, we conducted cross-national research in Japan and Russia. A total of 325 respondents were asked to make a landscape image sketch of an imaginary forest and to include keywords and text. The sketches were analysed by means of four aspects: ‘linguistic knowledge’, ‘spatial view’, ‘self-orientation’ and ‘social meaning', which were represented by landscape elements, the shape of elements, the subject's standpoint and the combination of the elements in the framework. As a result, landscape image sketches revealed differences between respondents in Japan and Russia. The typical landscape images of a forest were represented objectively, as aesthetic scenery in Russia and subjectively, as a practical place in Japan. The results suggested a fundamental difference in ways of seeing the landscape through individual perceptions rather than normative views on forests. This methodology for visualising ways of seeing a landscape can be useful in understanding different assumptions about environmental issues, not only for a global environmental discussion regarding each locality, but also for local environmental management and public participation.