Eye candy is underrated!

[paul albanese]

EYE CANDY -- I do agree that it is becoming an overused and simplistic way to "insult" a design.  

Someone hit it on the head when they said "everyone's definition of eye candy is different" -- and that is the truth -- and that is what makes art and architectural discussion so interesting.  

Obviously, some people believe "eye candy" to be any bunker (or other feature for that matter) -- that does not directly influence the "playability" of the hole.  And, that is a valid opinion -- that just happens to be how they like their golf courses.

And, there are others who believe that bunkers that do not come into play, are  vital elements to the creation of great golf course.  Bunkers that fulfill the visual part of the golf course experience.  

For those who believe that no bunker should be around except for those that come into play -- it is easy to determine "eye candy" -- it is almost scientific and the argument simply relies on a statistical analysis of "how many people would really hit it there".

For the second group -- those that understand bunkers may play a role above and beyond simple playability --the task of determining "eye candy" is much less exacting and relies much more on understanding "art" and "beauty".  And, as you will often hear -- beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  What makes one person a better "art" or "beauty" critic than the next?

May I refer you to the recent movie named "Pollack" with Ed Harris playing Jackson Pollack (the modern artist of post WW11) -- I found the movie facinating and it reinforced this whole idea about "art" criticism.  The art critic that made Pollack famous, was also the same guy that stopped liking his work, and brought him down.  Listening to him describe Pollacks work (which is very interesting) will give a clue as to how to properly describe all art -- including golf course architecture.

I guess what I am trying to impart is that people have been critizing art for a long time -- and that is essentially what we are doing when we try to discuss "eye candy" -- take a look at art critic books, and I think you will start to understand what is "eye candy" and what is not.  

An example of eye candy -- again too me -- is Long Bay in South Carolina -- an early Nicklaus project -- the mounding on that project is an example of "eye candy ad naseum" -- there are simply way too many mounds-- way too sweet.  Exactly how many would have been correct, I don't know -- but, I do know that when I stand on the tee or see a picture -- that there is just too much going on visually -- the composition is trying too hard to be something it is not.  When something tastes bad, you often add sweetener.  When you have a bad piece of ground -- we architects add sweetner -- but, sometimes we over do it -- knowing when to stop is the key.

Well done eye candy? -- most of what Mackenzie has done -- he had a wonderful eye for "art" as well as strategy.  

this is a great discussion -- look to the art world for even better ways to discuss these principles

[THuckaby2]

VERY well said, Paul.  As usual though, MacKenzie himself had something to say about this:

(taken from an Editor's Note in GS' Masters of the Links, p. 125)

"It is an interesting fact that few hazards are of any interest which are out of what is known to medical men as the direct field of vision.  This does not extend much further than ten to twenty yards on either side of the direct line to the hole.  Hazards placed outside these limits are usually of little interest, and are simply a source of irritation.  Hazards should be placed with an object in mind, and not one should be made which has not some influence on the line of play to the hole."

Sounds like the Good Doctor was not much one for eye candy... if it exists on his courses, it surely was not intentional.

TH

[Mike_Cirba]

Paul,

For what it's worth, I really enjoyed some of the thematic bunkering that you and Ray Hearn placed at Sea Oaks, including the real conversation piece set of foreshorted bunkers about 50 yards from the tee on the par three 4th.  

I also thought that the incredible WIDTH of that hole and green complex for a medium length par three was a cool and novel concept.  

[Mark_Fine]

Tom H,
Nice quote from the good doctor.  I just wonder what he would have done with a site like Shadow Creek's, or Talking Stick's, or Whistling Straits for example??  One where as Paul says, the architect felt it needed a little sweetner.  We'll obviously never know.  My guess is that he might have softened on his "line of play" definition a little bit  
Mark

[Slag_Bandoon]

BarnyF, Candy does not grow on trees.

Jeremy, To say that art is candy for the senses is like saying the object of golf is to score low. It may be true but there is a deeper meaning to be found beyond optic nerve vibrations and simplified objectives.

[THuckaby2]

Mark - I'm with you... but perhaps a MacKenzian scholar like Doak or G. Shackelford could weigh in here.  

In any case, it's no surprise he held this principle, is it?

Great topic, btw.  We have SO much "fluff" at our newer courses here in CA, one man's eye candy is another man's annoyance, in any case... I have no doubt that "superfluous hazards" (a neutral term I thought of for eye candy) could be done very well, and contribute to the "art" and the "sweetening" as Paul describes... Our problem here in CA is that we have SO MUCH of it, it's more of a constant than anything interesting...

Check out Miller/Graves/Pascuzzo's Eagle Ridge in Gilroy, CA... this has to be the superfluous hazard capital of the world.  It is not good.

TH

TH

[paul albanese]

Great quote from the good doctor regarding his philosophy -- although I tend to think he was a better artist that he actually knew.

That is probably why I like his work -- I am not a big fan of "superfluous hazards" (that is a tactful term for "eye candy" -- although I recognize their importance when done well.  But, my tastes in general stem from a "less is more" type of philosophy -- and, that is why I probably enjoy the visual compositions created by A.M -- In my opionion, the best visual compositions are derived from simple, yet stong gestures.

(Thanks for the Sea Oaks compliment, too)

[RJ_Daley]

Going back to Ran's early post about features that are "constructed" to provide mere visual appeal and are costly to maintain, and have no meaningful effect on strategy yet boost the cost to play are not just underrated eyecandy, they are objectionable in my view.  However, if they can conceivably come into play by some level of player, like Ross said about no bunkers being misplaced is valid.  Thus, if they don't exessively add to the experience due to cost to construct them passed on to the golfer, and can conceivably come into play for someone, they aren't mere eye candy.  Examples I can think of are not only the top shot bunkers that most players easily carry - but are in the mind of the player sometimes prone to the topped shot, and the bunkers that are placed so far afield in rough areas, 300 yards from the tee that very few have the power to reach on a wildly errant shot.  Two good examples of the latter where bunkers are so far from fairways are at Arcadia Bluffs and Whistling Straits.   Watching the Club Pro Championships, I witnessed one of our local club pros who is a gorilla of a driver, actually get into a couple of those bunkers more than 300 yards off the tee and way off of the fairway.  Thus they are visual for most who couldn't possibly carry that far afield, but the rare fellow that can stray that far had a play/strategy situation to deal with.  

An example of objectionable eye candy is found at the RTJ Jr course at SentryWorld.  There, we can find flowerbeds that if they were large bunkers or waste areas would be very intimidating and very possible to trap a players ball not all that far errant of a shot.  One such is the greenside flowerbeds at a par 3 (I can't think of the hole #).  The course rule is that you may not play your ball in the flowers where it lies.  If it were waste area or bunker you would deal with it where it lies.  That is egregeous eye candy and costly to maintain to boot.  

If a lake has to be dug for water retention capacity, and construction feature shaping material, and gains some aestetic value and strategy to boot, it is not eye candy.  But, if a floating Buick and waterfalls from a high cap well source are built into a backdrop it evolves to become additive eye candy.  

Taking out a tree to open a distant view for integration of that pleasing view, or planting one for a pleasing backdrop isn't really objectionable eye candy because it isn't a significant feature construction issue.  It is a related design issue at best.

Candy is fattening, and in golf design that is the unnecessary additives that fatten cost to build and maintain, to the detriment of the broad playing public.  It is like a health issue as in Americans are perceived as too fat, like their golf courses.

[THuckaby2]

Paul - right on the mark and thanks for the explanation.  I remain fascinated by all things MacKenzie... so while I don't intend to hijack a thread (again) this is very interesting to me.

Simple, yet strong gestures... what a GREAT way to put this!

TH

[Ben Cowan-Dewar]

Tom Paul,
Thanks for your response, you hit it right on the button.  

It would seem the random bunkering approach has even more value in the classic courses today.

Such specific bunkering that RTJ used, is basically useless today to anyone of medium length playing from proper tees.

[Lou_Duran]

Mr. Albanese:

Your description of the Nicklaus course in SC as having too many mounds brought to mind the scene from the movie "Armadeus" where Mozart's patron dismissed one of the composer's great efforts as simply having too many notes.  As noted earlier, beauty is in the eye (or ear) of the beholder.  I do not use the term "eye candy" because it means so many things to so many people.  When I do see it on this site or in the literature, my inclination is to take it to infer those things relating more to art than to function, and generally in a positive context.

Re: MacKenzie- the doctor was particularly attuned to the importance of the visual aspects of the game as evidenced by his attempts to intergrate camaflouge(sp) techniques in his work and his acknowledgement that making a hole look more difficult than it actually plays results in more exciting golf. From my standpoint, MacKenzie was an artist and though he and his associates were well versed in agronomy, construction, and maintenance, his courses did not look to have been "engineered".

I believe that aesthetics have a great deal to do with why PB, CP, NGLA, ShnkH, and PV are "top 10" golf courses.  To the extent that it is perceived that mother nature was largely responsible for the aesthetic qualities of a course, we laud it here.  Whereas if an architect, particularly one on the "shit list", attempts to create beauty where none existed before, we have a tendency to turn our noses up and dismiss the finishing touches as over-sweetened, fattening eye candy.    

[paul albanese]

I enjoy talking about "why things look good" -- it is very important to try to understand why it is that something is visually appealing.  

I liked the analogy of a song with "too many notes".

Referring again to Long Bay -- when I tried to understand exactly why my eye did not like it -- all I could think about was that it looked like "the landscape broke out in a rash".

Art and architectural critism can be interesting, and good critism often melds wit and humor with well founded reasoning -- that, to me, is the essence of good critism.