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March 02, 2003 - 8:32 p.m.
Art and Nature
I saw an awesome film today! Rivers and Tides is a documentary about an artist named Andy Goldsworthy. I first encountered his work in a friend's coffee table book and really liked it. His art is primarily sculptural and he uses all sorts of materials and objects from nature. He creates things from driftwood, ice, leaves, and stones, often in the midst of lanscapes that are already breathtaking on their own. What he makes is often in contrast to the surroundings either in color or texture, but at the same time it often calls attention to the natural beauty of the area.
His works are also quite dynamic. They may take him days to arrange or construct, but because they are set in a natural environment, they are subject to the forces of nature. More often than not Goldsworthy intentionally exploits that. For instance, he constructed a sort of driftwood hive in tidal areas and observed the tide coming in and washing the structure away. The interaction between his man-made creations (of natural materials) and nature itself is a key component of his art. What I find particularly interesting and moving is when his work serves to highlight and draw attention to forces of nature. One such case in the film involves a long streamer made of leaves connected end to end which he then floated in a stream. The interaction between the pretty chain of leaves and the current of the stream made the current visible in a way it hadn't been before. This play between his work and time and nature also makes his art particularly well suited to film.
Another interesting aspect of the film was seeing how hard he works to create his sculptures. He uses no glue or mortar in any of them, as far as I can tell, yet some of his creations are remarkably delicate or precariously balanced. The film documents a day in which he was trying to construct one of his slate cones (actually more of a pinecone shape than anything) on a Nova Scotia beach. The structure collapsed four times that day - probably a humbling reminder to him of how tied to nature his work is.
It was a fascinating documentary. I highly recommend seeing it if you like Goldsworthy's work. To see some lovely photos of some of his art click here and here. So gorgeous.
today's project: pre-trip reading of the Venice guidebook
musing about: art and nature
Twitter away!�
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