This book intends to demonstrate how landscape represents an interpretation of
a process of meaning, a product of the relationships between man and his places.
The work starts from the hypothesis that it possible to describe these connections
transposing the Vitruvian triad of utility, solidity, and beauty: firmitas is associable
to the environment, because the same is as solid, as healthy, not polluted; utilitas is
owned by territories, useful for man, at the front of his social, economic, and political meaning; and venustas can be linked to the landscape, in the relationship between man and context connected to perception and beauty as a critical interpretation of the vision. If the territory (from Latin terrere) is something linked to the possession,
if the environment is something connected to life, the landscape is close to the eye
centrality, and in natural elements, all these aspects are woven; also, they are not
explicit. Landscape is unavoidably connected to environment and territory, and the
center of gravity of this triangle is the sustainability of a place. The three elements
cannot be considered as separate, a condition of complexity and contradiction of
landscape. In the center it is possible to find the dimension of man, according to
Leonardo da Vinci and his Vitruvian Man.