Los Dibujos de trabajo de campo de la Escuela francesa de Geografía (Paul Vidal de La Blache y Pierre Deffontaines)

Abstract

The field trip drawings of the French School of Geography (Paul Vidal de La Blache and Pierre Deffontaines). The French school of geography developed all kind of tools such as field diagrams, and drawings of profiles and of the scenery for the analysis of the landscape and particularly for the understanding of the relationship between human societies and their physical environments. Paul Vidal de La Blache was the pioneer in this field, practicing a very simple and constructive drawing, from topographic records to complex landscape analysis. Emmanuel de Martonne was the founding father of the cartographic school of the Sorbonne University in Paris, and a geography pedagogue using his canonic graphic exercises. Pierre Deffontaines followed De Martonne lessons and produced an enormous graphic legacy, often used in his publications. After a decline in these techniques caused by the introduction of the use of quantitative analysis and computers, field drawings is coming back with a new reading of the old masters, and by the renewed interest on landscape and a more sensible geography.