¹English Department, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, USA

Correspondence: Carolyn Malcom, Carolyn Malcom, English Department, Rutgers University, 510 George Street, New Brunswick, NJ, 08901, USA. E-mail: carriemalcom@yahoo.com

Abstract

This field note brings a psychoanalytic perspective to a recent architecture exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City called Groundswell: Constructing the Contemporary Landscape, which showcased the rehabilitation of degraded landscapes. The author proposes a reading of Groundswell's degraded sites as communal "lost objects," taking the phrase "lost objects" from Freud's exploration of melancholia and mourning. In employing this shift of terms, the author moves from the language of public utility and progress embraced by Groundswell's curators towards a more complex consideration of the cultural meaning of landscape.