Ideas of the earth

Das Lied von der Erde ("The Song of the Earth"), is a musical work by Gustav Mahler (1860-1911), a composition comprised of six songs sourced from ancient Chinese poetry rendered into German. The poetic songs reflect the vision of earthly beauty and transience. Such a vision has influenced cultural practice throughout the ages and, as a philosophical concept, can be found in, for example, the Japanese aesthetic, wabi-sabi, which holds that beauty is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete" in nature, and where transience itself is beautiful. And so too in contemporary design where modernity and tradition come together in an interchange of cultural learning resulting in material objects and artefacts inspired and influenced by nature, craft and technology which are all aspects of the same global whole. And more so in an age demanding sustainability, healthy ecosystems and environments. Indeed ideas of the earth.