Mark Smalley. “Words of Clay”

“I want to get under the surface. When I work with a leaf, rock, stick, it is not just that material in itself, it is an opening into the processes of life within and around it. When I leave it, these processes continue.”

Andy Goldsworthy is an artist whose work I have long admired. He is a sculptor for whom the natural environment provides his raw materials, his tools and the setting for his work.  For the last thirty years or so, Goldsworthy has been creating unique works of art from found materials such as stones, leaves, petals, twigs, thorns, tree trunks, even cow dung. Pretty much anything that you might find on a walk in the hills of northern England or Scotland may be incorporated into one of his sculptures, many of which are ephemeral, such as those he creates using ice or snow.

“Roof” by Andy Goldsworthy (Image, courtesy of Thom Watson)

Often, his pieces are more like interventions, where he simply incorporates new elements into the landscape, transforming it through the addition of a meandering line of leaves or petals, for example. One of the Goldsworthy pieces I particularly enjoy,  is a dry-stone wall, along the top of which a layer of sheeps’ wool has been painstakingly laid (shown in the Youtube video below). The light is shining from behind the wall and the wool glows like a halo, giving the scene a surreal and ethereal atmosphere.

The image below shows “Stone River”, created for the Cantor Center for Visual Arts, Stanford University in California.  Goldsworthy has said that this piece is as much about the light as it is about stone: “I call it a river, but it’s not a river. The sculpture is about the flow. There’s a sense of movement in the material, through the individual stones, so you just see this line.”

“Stone River” by Andy Goldsworthy (Image, courtesy of godutchbaby)

Goldworthy’s work often reflects the cycles of birth, growth, death and decay in the natural world, and since many of the pieces are temporary, he uses a camera to capture the work at its maximum intensity.  Goldsworthy said recently:  “The ephemeral work is the soul of my art. That is the food. All these other things that I do — the permanent pieces, the installations in museums — are like breathing out.”

Many of his sculptural forms incorporate round holes and enclosed spaces, which evoke multiple meanings. The small round holes (or “oculi”) at the top of the nine domes of his “Roof” sculpture suggest access to shelter, protection from harsh winter elements, or the entrance to a womb-like space. Equally, one may begin to think of ancient burial rituals, the fear and mystery surrounding death, or entrances to spiritual worlds and dimensions. The perfectly round opening he creates within a network of twigs may provoke questions about the nature of existence and the delicate cycles of life on earth.

In many ways, Goldsworthy’s art reveals the miraculous power and mystery of the earth’s elemental forces. But his work also celebrates humankind’s   infinite creativity and the determination to mould nature’s materials into structures which enable us to survive.