This example of the art of Andy Goldsworthy from the Autumn, 2009 CraniOcean.Calm Newsletter, from the film, RIVERS AND TIDES

what is it to blend with the environment?  can the environment respond?  and what is the experience of blending with another living being?

I recently wrote about the beautiful art of Andy Goldsworthy, and how it moves me. Natural materials adapted into new organic forms, his works are sometimes massive arches of stone or huge walls, and sometimes extremely ephemeral, a ‘throw’ of powdery snow into bright sunlight, an opportunistic ‘rain shadow’ or an ice sculpture that is at once both illuminated and destroyed by the rays of the rising sun.

After writing that post I was recommended to watch Rivers and Tides, a documentary by Thomas Riedelsheimer about the artist and his work in Nova Scotia, Southern France and near his home in Scotland. Today I had to travel to London and back for work, and I decided to watch the film while I was on the train. It was a beautiful and yet disorienting experience.

At times he seems a quiet, insular, almost isolated man, but then we see him with his wife and four children, a well-known member of his local community. Nevertheless, quietly-spoken, he evidently feels most at home when he’s working with ‘the earth’ and its materials, whether stone, ice, leaves, mud or wood. His work can be painstaking and painful, in that he works with ice in the crepuscular light on frozen riverbanks, or building precarious cairns of stone and wood that threaten to collapse (and often do).

Watching him work is a calming, meditative experience. By the time I emerged from the train at Paddington I felt distinctly out-of-place, almost unsure what to do next. The contrast between the raw beauty of his work and the peaceful environments in which he creates it was a complete contrast to the steel and glass and noise of the station.

But its images have remained with me all day: the gushing streams and bubbling white water, the pools filled with dandelion flowers, the immensely long chains of leaves, the ice cairns and arches. It’s truly beautiful, and I recommend it wholeheartedly. You can watch it on YouTube…

I’d seen it before. Brilliant then. Brilliant now.

Andy Goldsworthy is so charming, I’d be content to watch him read the proverbial phonebook, but to see

is to be in awe. So simple. So alluring. Intriguing. Compelling. Inspiring. A reality check through breathtaking creativity.

Not the least of my admirations of Goldsworthy is his superb ability to make conceptual art accessible. As a curator I often been asked to explain Why is that art? It can be a tough (but fun) question to answer. And one that Andy Goldsworthy does in the best of artists’ way, by showing more than telling.

Opportunity New Day Motivational Poster

Motivational Quote:

Create a path where there is none. A world of possibilities lies ahead.

Trailblazers

Did you know that Impressionism was once considered rogue, outrageous, and completely antithetical to true painting? Yes, ol’ “Haystack Monet” was a rebel and an outcast among the serious painters of his time. What we consider pretty, traditional, perhaps even boring was once radical.

How could these seemingly innocuous paintings be radical, you ask? Prior to Impressionism, realism reigned. People wanted representations of people, objects and nature because photography as we now know it didn’t exist. Although the beginning of modern photography can be pinned down to around 1825, color photography was not a viable option until 1907.

Claude Monet (1840-1926) revolutionized art by organizing an independent group of artists outside of the official Salon who exhibited their rejected canvases in a shocking show. Opening on April 15, 1874, one of the critics derogatorily dubbed the show an “Exhibition of Impressionists” which stuck, even though it was meant to poke fun at the new style.

New style? Yes, breaking light into small pieces of color, and translating that to canvas in short, quick brush strokes was unheard of. To us, over a century later, this seems on the verge of unbelievable because it seems so tame in comparison to the art of the 20^th and 21^st centuries.

A trailblazer of our time is Andy Goldsworthy (born 1956) who makes temporary and permanent art from nature. Whether arranging stones, leaves, flowers or ice, he has a unique vision that some may see as absurd. Look at some of Goldsworthy’s art and decide for yourself. A documentary of his life work entitled Rivers and Tides was made to better understand his art.

You don’t need to be an artist to blaze your own trail. You just need an idea that you believe in and the confidence to begin. Happy trails!

Did you know Successories originated the business motivational poster trend? View our numerous motivational poster collections including Corporate Impressions, copied the world over by fans and anti-fans alike.

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The above is an excerpt from the beautiful documentary about Andy Goldsworthy’s works, Rivers and Tides – Andy Goldsworthy working with time. The man is in tune with nature on a cosmic level. He is not so much a creator of things but an environmental collaborator. His works are of a temporal nature. He possesses the uncanny ability and pureness vision to [in]fuse organic matter with the energy of time and space. I am just thankful that we can appreciate his work through the power of media. I suppose the best way to experience his oeuvres would be to actually be there, to watch him play and witness the ephemera, and its interaction with the environment around it. But since this is usually not an option, we can only settle for the next best thing: video and photographs. He reminds me of a naturalist Christo.
I believe this scene takes place on the shores of Nova Scotia, famous for it’s drastic tides.
I hope you enjoy this as much as I did.

As a kid, I sat on the living room carpet and watched in awe as my mother opened boxes of children’s books hot off the press. She worked as a reviewer, and magazine editors sent her novels and picture books for free.

Writers can review an abundance of products, from books and CDs to movies, plays, and concerts. Four years ago, I worked with a journalism student who wrote about nothing but sports shoes for my class–he’s now a senior writer at Sole Collector, rumored to possess a closet overflowing with sneakers.

My first review was more social commentary on the Andy Goldsworthy documentary, Rivers and Tides. I reviewed it for Adbusters in the context of a story that had just broken in Ventura, California about a homeless man who built six-foot spires out of beach pebbles. The city bulldozed the latter artist’s work, while Goldsworthy received grants and international acclaim for his nature-based sculpture.

Later, I began reviewing books, including Tom Kealey’s The Creative Writing M.F.A. Handbook and Bonnie Henderson’s Strand: An Odyssey of Pacific Ocean Debris (pictured). On a cold, rainy morning, Bonnie and I drove over to the Oregon coast to walk the mile she patrols monthly for CoastWatch–an adventure which inspired me to write a short essay about the ethics of beachcombing, as well as the review for High Country News.

Think about what products you might want to review for magazines or newspapers, websites or blogs. Approach local authors with new books, local musicians with new albums, local designers with new clothes or furniture or shoes. Let them know that you’d like to review their product. Send the finished piece to editors and you might find yourself with a regular reviewing gig as well as some surprising freebies.

I don’t review cat-related items, but publicists found me from my days of writing for Cat Fancy. Now, they e-mail me press releases on every new feline-themed book and product to hit the stands.

One afternoon, I sat on my living room floor and opened a box that had just arrived in the mail. My kitties watched in awe I pulled out a cat bathing brush (ostensibly, you pour soap into a compartment and brush the cat who’s unaware that she’s being bathed), as well as a brand-new cat toy–a long-fingered glove with a catnip mouse clipped to the tip of each finger–sent to us for free.

That's Leeds alright!

My chosen site is Sugarwell Hill, in particular a scrap of land that nestles in the ‘V’ between Scott Hall Road and Buslingthorpe Lane which offers a pretty fine view of the north east of Leeds city centre.

If you Zoom in to GoogleMaps you can see circles in the grass where the tethered horses graze. occasionally, if i remember, I take an apple with me and feed them a half each.

View Larger Map
A number of images of Sugarwell Hill are available on Leodis.net, whilst the natural environment is recorded on leeds.gov. According to this site the hill is the site of a clear natural spring said to never run dry and taste exceptionally sweet, hence the name. It is also mentioned briefly here. Twin sisters Maureen and Margaret Dixon clearly remember bombs being dropped on the site in world war II. The Pins and Needles section of the Leeds Tapestry depicts a painting by Alphonse Douseau circa 1840 featuring windmills on the hill, and from personal experience I can vouch that it’s a very good place to catch the wind. Of course any curious leodensian would do well to visit Secret Leeds where i was able to find a number of brief references. The most interesting of these, if you believe the stories, is to a skirmish in meanwood valley during the civil war, after which two burial mounds were erected for those killed in the fighting, one on the hill and another on the other side of the valley.

Beggar by Mark Jenkins

My first initial idea was to make human figures out of wire and second hand clothes, similar to the street installations of Mark Jenkins, fill them with earth and seeds and then as spring progressed they would become a mass of shoots and greenery culminating in a flowers and then going to seed before dying away in the harsh cold of the winter as the year progressed. A photo-a-day stop motion would give a visual effect similar to the end scene of Darren Aronovsky’s ‘The Fountain’ or the dream sequence in “Clyde Bruckman´s Final Repose” (episode 4, season 3 of the X-Files or “the tenth greatest episode in television history” according to american magazine TV Guide. personally i’d rate it higher than that), where a psychic man dreams of his own death and decomposition.

However I’m also considering other options, for instance making an image that would be visible from space or show up on web mapping services that use aerial photography by either sowing grass seeds of a slightly different coloured strain, or by lacing the top soil with something harmless that might alter the pH, like rust or lye for instance, and therefore alter the colour tint of the grass and plants, sort of like a large stencil.

How about this – Andy Goldsworthy’s ‘Rivers and Tides’ is on google video. watch it if you’ve got an hour and a half to spare. you will be deeply rewarded, despite the poor quality

TWOK

and so I am led to another idea, which is to return to the site and study the naturally occuring media there – stones, plants, litter, the occaisional burnt out stolen car – and from that, craft something that is reflective of the history and possible future of the surroundings, whilst remaining simple, aesthetic and relatively vandal proof.

Finally I should mention that last year, on my way to college I was lucky enough to spot some wild deer that must have presumably wandered all the way down the green corridor of Meanwood Valley from Golden Acre Park. I occasionally have dreams where I encounter the magical and I am always disappointed when I wake up and I am not clutching an alien artefact, the plans for a working time machine, or a real life honest to god leprechaun. So I’m immensly glad I managed to snap this photo at the time:

Spot the deer

I love a good documentary film. I have enjoyed the format since I was young, when watching a movie – even if it was about reptiles or Degas – seemed like more fun than beating my math textbook into submission. I’ve always picked up the non-fiction books with the most photographs or illustrations, so the documentary film is a natural extension of that.

Thomas Riedelsheimer, a German director and cinematographer, made a fabulous documentary about Andy Goldsworthy, called Rivers and Tides: Andy Goldsworthy Working With Time. I watched it last week – fell asleep watching it in the evening after work, and then watched lovely chunks of it throughout the next couple of days. This seemed entirely appropriate.

Andy Goldsworthy is an artist who’s art cannot really be displayed in your home or sold or put in a museum. That is because he makes beautiful things out of twigs, beach pebbles, reeds, icicles, and anything else he happens to find. His works of art often disintegrate within the day, if not sooner. He photographs the finished piece, and then leaves it to blow away or tumble over or drift away down the stream or out into the ocean.

While he creates with a great deal of intent and purpose, I identified most with the playfulness of his work. I remember spending hours on the beach near my home in Kennebunk, rearranging the stones and building walls or nests. The forts in the woods that I wove out sticks and vines are not so far removed from some of the pieces Goldsworthy has built.

The fleeting nature of Goldsworthy’s art was the perfect subject for a documentary, and Thomas Riedelsheimer’s film captured both the man, the underlying thought process, and the works in an intimate way. The camera followed Goldsworthy, peeking over his shoulder, listening in on his quiet thoughts, for the most part unintrusive.

At other times though, it was almost as if the two men were working as a team. There were moments in the film where what Goldsworthy started seemed to be completed by the Riedelsheimer’s camera. A long ribbon of strung together leaves floats down the stream, let loose from Goldsworthy’s hand but followed by the camera as it dances in the water like a Chinese dragon.

One of my favorite parts was when Goldsworthy was building a man-sized standing “egg” made out of stacked slate, on a beach while the tide was out. Four times, as he reached the wide point and began to build it back inwards, it collapsed, imploding with a crunch. I couldn’t hold back a giggle, even though I could relate to the frustration. Goldsworthy took a deep breath and began again each time, finally completing the egg, only to have it be completely covered in ocean water not too much later. However, when the tide went out the egg was still standing.

It was wonderful to see an artist at work and at play, turning the childhood exploration of shape and form into glowing, almost magical creations, made from nothing beyond what was found beside the stream. Between the artist and the filmmaker, the film captured a sense of exquisite simplicity, and gave me a new appreciation for the moments of aching beauty that surround us constantly, if only we have the eyes to look.

Also, while Goldsworthy’s creations build upon and compliment the natural forms, it seems that to the mind behind the camera, a fluffy seed pod floating on a glassy pool, or snow being blown into ghostly dancers by the wind is equally beautiful.

Between the two of them, I am more eager than ever to play outside, and my fingers have started to itch with a desire to play with beach stones again.

My Neighbor Totoro
Porco Rosso
Spirited Away
Kiki’s Delivery Service
Howl’s Moving Castle
The Cat Returns,
Floating Castle,
Nausicaa,
Princess Mononoke
“Grave of the Fireflies” is a post Hiroshima drama/heartbreak and
stands aside from the rest…

Nick Park’s Wallace and Gromit movies- the first 3 are shorter than 90 minutes.

A Grand Day Out
The Wrong Trousers
A Close Shave
Curse Of The Weir-Rabbit

More kids movies,

alphabetic order and including some additions over the annoted list below, because I haven’t caught up!

2001
The African Queen !
Avatar – the last air bender
Cars
Casablanca !
Chicken Run
Close Encounters Of The Third Kind
Creature Comforts
ET
Finding Nemo
Fly Away Home
Get Smart
The Great Escape
A Hard Day’s Night
Help!
Hoodwinked
Ice Age 2
Ice Age
The Incredibles
Indiana Jones, every one of them
Kit Kittredge, An American Girl
Madagascar
Mary Poppins
March of the Penguins
Men In Black
Monster House
Night At The Museum
Nim’s Island
The Princess Bride
The Pursuit of Happiness
Ratatouille
Rivers and Tides – Andy Goldsworthy Workinig With Time
Spy Kids 2
Spy Kids
Spy Kids 3
Toy Story
Tron
Wall-e
The Way Things Go
Winged Migration

Seasonal:

How The Grinch Stole Christmas <– Chuck Jone’s animated version.
A Charlie Brown Christmas
Elf
Miracle on 34th Street
Its a Wonderful Life
Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer – GE Theater stop-action animation, with the elf who wants to be a dentist.

A bit (only a bit) more grown up:

Bend It Like Beckham
Hellboy (I)
Le Mans
Pirates of the Caribbean I, II and III.
Raising Arizona.
Tampopo.
The Triplets of Belleville

RIght on the edge:

Bedazzled
The Lord Of The Rings trillogy- The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, The Return of the King
O Brother Where Art Thou
Michael Clayton
Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day
The Shawshank Redemption
Tropic Thunder

Not for kids, imho:

The Big Lebowski
The Constant Gardener
Fargo
No Country for Old Men
Saving Private Ryan

Annotated/capsule reviews:

My Neighbor Totoro <– An animated, Japanese, Winnie The Pooh… Truly a child’s film, and beautiful to watch. One for my desert island DVDs list
Porco Rosso <– Beautiful and disorienting 1930s fable of Adriatic air pirates… Also for the desert island
Spirited Away <– An abandoned theme park contains an alternate reality which includes some dark stuff and some very odd stuff too.
Kiki’s Delivery Service <– A young witch must spend a year away from home, Charming. Neat cat subplot.
Howl’s Moving Castle <– Really cool but hard to characterize in a sentence… you’ll have to trust me, if you liked any of Miyazaki’s other films, this one is worth your time too.

Kit Kittredge, An American Girl <– Jean and Benjamin saw this and liked it a lot

Nim’s Island <– A girl and her widower father live on a jungle island with friendly animals…

Ratatouille <– correct spelling. What a wonderful film! Life, art, cooking. Can’t beat it.

Mary Poppins <– Good whenever things look too bleak. Sing along with “Chimchiminee”!! And, if you don’t see this, how can you get the “Juuuulieeee Andrewssss” (in the rich, fruity, voice) that Peter Cook uses for abracadabra in the original Bedazzled?

Monster House <– Effectivly scary, engaging, good lessons blah blah. Nice movie.

Avatar the last Air Bender<– this TV animated show comes in season and movie length servings. Good stuff.

Get Smart <– I was cringing as we went in but it turns out to be faithful to the spirit of the Don Adams/Barbara Feldman original without trying to channel them. A pleasant surprise.

Madagascar – if you can watch it for free, the penguins are worth your time.

The Pursuit of Happiness – Will Smith shines in this gently but firmly told story of a medical equipment salesman who looses his job and makes his way, homeless, with his young child, back into employment. If you don’t smile at the end you have no heart. Serious drama, suitable for all.

Men In Black. Tommy Lee Jones as the tough lawman he seems to have been born to play, Will Smith as the new guy, and its the True Story of the Aliens All Around Us. Jones and Smith are trerrific fun playing off each other, the New York locations are fun, the gags, gimicks and awesome weapons are thrilling. Of course they win in the end. A complete treat.

Night At The Museum <– The first Ben Stiller film I really liked. He plays deliberately unlikable characters, a discovery that he can make comedy without being likable (Mary, the Fockers, etc.)

A bit (only a bit) more grown up:
Pirates of the Caribbean I, II and III. Johnny Depp is an astounding conceptualizer – taking a theme park ride and a one-liner (“pirates were the rock stars of their day…”) as a point of departure and creating three well made films and a zillion dollar licensing empire. It works big because it works on a small scale first and foremost. He’s completely serious. Funny as his basing Capt. Jack Sparrow on Keith Richards is, having the real Keith play the Captain’s father in the third film, successfully, is a master’s touch. Coulda been awful. Instead its great fun.

Hellboy (I) I can’t vouch for the second film but the first one is Way Cool, and the role of a lifetime for the star. The action plot didn’t do much for me but I could have watched the characters for another hour or two. Its Stephen King in reverse- the plot is just a skeleton to hang terrific characters on.

Speaking of Stephen King, The Shawshank Redemption is based on a story of his and is the one piece of his work I like. The movie has violent and unpleasant moments, but its a classic, lovely to watch, and some (not all) bad deeds are punished. Its eye candy and the story is told straight forwardly by and of guys who’s clothing identifies their characters standing in one place or another…Very old fashioned in that way. For when you get tired of computer generated animation. A “real movie”.

Bend It Like Beckham – Two girls in London are friends and very good soccer players- against the (different) wishes of both sets of parents. Two parallel family comedies with a sports-friends story mixed in. Of course there’s an older sister’s wedding and a thousand complications. Very, very, nice. Happy ending, of course!

Raising Arizona. <– the opening sequence is the funniest Nicholas Cage has ever been and apparently ever will be. Holly Hunter is sweet and completely winning as the cop who loves him, and their mad scheme to kidnap one of a set of quituplets is a left turn straight to Toon Town. All ends well, and Hunter and Cage’s characters visibly grow in wisdom. They make an awesome screen couple- they make it look SO easy. My brother knows people who bought only Huggies for their kid because of this film.

Tampopo. <– One of my top 10 movies of all time. I have to think about the other 9, but this is one without question. It has two ‘false’ beginnings before you really see the main character (Goro) and his assistant driver (Gunn) ride into town on a rainy night- they stop for noodles in a bad part of town, stopping bullies from beating up the son of the restaurant owner and chef. The rain pours down. The noodles are not very good, and the bad guys hanging out in the restaurant start a fight with Goro, the older man, which he loses. (you’ve seen this Western, yes?)

As he prepares to ride away, the next morning, the restaurantier, a widowed woman who’s husband started the restraunt and then died, asks Goro to teach her to cook noodles correctly, and he agrees. What follows is something
sorta like Seven Samauri or The Magnificent Seven, as experts in all fields of ramen are gathered together to teach Tampopo (Dandylion) the craft she aspires to. Frequently, someone will cross the screen and the camera will turn and follow them into a food-related subplot… The gangster from the first ‘beginnning’ re-appears. All is resolved. And the two truck drivers drive off into the sunset…

Michael Clayton <– If the Gray Suit Maker’s Association of America isn’t buying George Clooney’s wardrobe you can’t tell by looking. Damn! The man is a Movie Star, never more so than when things seem against him. Really, really, enjoyable stuff.

O Brother Where Art Thou <– a take on the Odessey, sorta, set in the depression era South. Its so good Clooney’s character can’t steal the whole thing. Glorious. Hilarious. Liberating.

Fargo. Not for kids- very dark, but VERY funny. William Macy is an unlikable auto dealer whose financial shenanigans are coming unglued. He hires a couple of bad, bad, guys in a harebrained plot to make big money, quickly, and things go wrong immediately. Frances McDormand is the chief of police, a cop’s cop, also pregnant, and a rich mix of subplots appear as she solves the crime and brings the malefactors to justice.

Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day. An able and good hearted woman who is a bit of a square peg, awkward, without friends, recently fired, muscles her way into a personal secretary’s job for a classic 30s screwball comedy socialite and actress. With an outsider’s clarity, and the the stark realization she has nothing to loose, she be comes
indespensible, untangling her employer’s life, finding her own feet and a very happy ending. McDormand is just a joy to watch when she has a good part, like this.

No Country for Old Men. Tommy Lee Jones, again, this time in a riveting, dark, story, impecibly acted, written and filmed. You can’t look away, although its not always nice to watch. Xavier Barden’s bad bad guy in a bad hair cut is One Scary Dude, and Josh Brolin, at the center of the story, is compelling and sympathetic, with a controlled
intensity that keeps hope alive.

The Big Lebowski. ANOTHER Coen brothers movie, with John Goodman and Steve Buscemi as memorable supporting characters. Jeff Bridges IS the slacker named The Dude (Lebowski), possibly the best performance of his life. When bad guys ruin his rug, mistaking him for the BIG Lebowski, a millionare, he enlists his bowling buddies to help him sort it out. “Aw, that rug pulled the whole room together”. A Paen to slackers. I don’t think Bridges ever wears long pants.

Buscemi is unique, as always (will he and the Coens ever run out of ideas?) and Goodman’s haunted, Vietnam
vet shows every gratuitus PSD sufferer on screen the door. Its amazing how one good role and performance can completely wipe away a generation’s lazy short-hand for character development. LIke all the Coen’s movies I’ve seen, this one celibrates the individual and those who strive to do good in a world they’ll never completely understand, or master.

Tropic Thunder <– the second Ben Stiller movie I like- again his character isn’t that likable, but the ensemble acting, the comedy and the drama mixed in with it are absolutely first rate. Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. are superb, and if its all not quite politically correct enough for some, sorry ’bout that. This is what “Hip and ireverant” was originally meant to convey.

Saving Private Ryan <– War movies are necessarilly part of indoors and bad weather. It doesn’t hurt to be reminded that freedom isn’t free, perhaps especially at the holidays. Speilberg can’t stop himself from making this a bit of a comic book, and I hold that against him, but Hanks and the rest of the cast and crew are superb.

Seasonal:
Elf <– Every scene is perfect. He can really act, its nothing like his sports comedies.
How The Grinch Stole Christmas <– Chuck Jone’s animated version. Right length, perfect in every respect. Pair with:
A Charlie Brown Christmas <– The actual Christmas story, great music, superb characterizations. Nothing wasted.
Miracle on 34th Street <– Kris Kringle IS Santa Claus. Pair with
Its a Wonderful Life <– Another great holiday tradition

Max y yo tenemos poco tiempo para ir al cine, así que cuando lo hacemos, nos gusta ir sobre seguro. Esta última vez, muy bien aconsejados por un gran amigo, nos dirigimos a uno de los cines con más solera de la ciudad a disfrutar, en sesión nocturna, de “Ríos y mareas“.

En este documental se muestra el proceso creativo del escultor escocés Andy Goldsworthy, miembro reconocido de la corriente artisitica del “land art“. Utilizando exclusivamente materiales que encuentra en la naturaleza y con sus manos como única herramienta, Goldsworthy crea sus magníficas obras efímeras en pleno bosque, el cauce de un río o la orilla del mar.

Para los que. como nosotros, no tengáis mucho tiempo para ir al cine, aquí podéis mirar algunos trailers.

¡Cuánta belleza e inspiración!

Si no viste el documental, confórmate, que no es poco, con este delicioso tráiler de Rivers and Tiders, un paseo inspirado en la obra efímera del escultor  Andy Goldsworthy.

Y si crees en  que cualquier ser humano puede hallarse en medio mismo de las olas, tal vez te guste saber que el mar se ha convertido en escuela. En el proyecto Urdaneta, las palabras vienen del mar. Puedes escucharlas…

My introduction to the work of Andy Goldsworthy took place through coffee table books of his photographed works at some point in the early to mid ’90s. Then still employed in geology, and at the beginning of an ongoing struggle with the how, when, why, and where to nurture and apply my creative impulses, I harbored an initial response of being very impressed and inspired, but at the same time being totally naive and unfair: picture me smacking my forehead, thinking to myself: “of course. why didn’t I think of that?”

The 2001 documentary Rivers and Tides chronicles Goldsworthy’s global travels, life in Scotland, and his work: for lack of a better term, sculpture, rising from the materials and forces that are available for use at the particular place (stone, wood, leaves, water, ice, trees, sheep wool, diurnal tides, gravity, etc.) and at the particular time within which he happens to find himself working.

More than plenty has been written in print and online in reaction to this film. I pretend to shed no fresh light on the subject here. But having had the recent opportunity to see this movie for the fourth time, I’ve decided that I really need to just go purchase a permanent copy. It has transformed into a touchstone.

I remember catching in a local print article, at the time that I saw the movie upon its release, that Rivers and Tides saved San Francisco’s Roxie Theater from closing. On the precipice of having to shut down, they’d had the film on their schedule (if I recall correctly, they were the only house in the city to run it), it packed the house, repeatedly, and they extended its run for several days. (Great story. Hope I’m recalling it correctly.)

My naivety described above was totally dissolved upon my initial viewing of the dedication, the early starts, the disappointments, and—here’s the real deal killer for me—the necessarily solitary nature of what he does and how he approaches it.

But what continues to really touch me, to my core, about his work is the keen focus on aiming to understand the nature of the materials available as a necessary foundation to his creating art that reflects an understanding of the place he works in, and especially of how time, soldiering on as it will, is a constant presence and force that works upon that place.

Impermanence figures prominently, as an usher, guiding new forms and new life to their seats.

This post’s title is a quote Goldsworthy offers in the film in a moment of self-reflection on his aims and efforts. It hit me, upon most recent viewing, as a worthy mantra.

I was very pleased to be able to watch Rivers and Tides (even though no matter what I did the movie continually skipped) as this was not my first time experiencing this movie. I think that Goldsworthy is absolutely fascinating as a person and as an artist as well. The way he handles the landscape around him is incredible. It seems that he really treats it as a part of his own self and sense of being with every meticulous placement of nature. I feel he is very persistent too because not only does he spend an almost endless amount of time and effort into his pieces but the problems that he encounters with time and nature are almost self inflicted. Yet he always manages (or at least I think) to figure out a way through the obstacle and create a piece of art through nature that will not last. It is this specific aspect to Goldsworthy’s pieces that I find the most fascinating. For lack of better words he puts his blood, sweat, and tears into molding the earth’s surface and bountiful resources into something that lasts only a short while until mother nature takes it away and smoothes it back into the surrounding landscapes.

During the film Goldsworthy makes a comment about an obsession with forms that are repeated throughout sites yet when he travels he feels “uprooted” and becomes a stranger. Although this seems somewhat like an oxymoron it makes perfect sense because although these “obsessive forms” are constantly repeated throughout nature Goldsworthy himself becomes a stranger due to the change in time and location. This new time and place is unfamiliar to him and he must reacquaint himself with these forms within nature that he knows so well. He also talks about how he shakes hands with the place as to get to know it all over again due to this sense of unfamiliarity he encounters. I would compare this idea to that of déjà vu in a way because it is evident that something is very familiar yet there is an amount of uncertainty and newness to it. Therefore these forms and tides of the new site are triggering that familiarity within Goldsworthy’s mind and being yet he must pay particular attention to this new space as to not miss anything.

When Goldsworthy was building his ice sculpture along the stream he mentioned that he had a discovery during his work with something occurring that he had not originally planned when he began this project. He further discussed the potential that this little discovery, or accident if I may, was unveiled. I could completely sense this discovery of his because it was at that exact moment that I found myself expelling a small ‘gasp’ in awe of the beauty of the light hitting and shining through his ice sculpture. I believe that this is one of the many goals of art to make the viewer experience these little moments of awe and wonder. It is these moments that inspire people and truly unleash the potential of expression through art. I also believe that you can not force these moments but they must just naturally occur during the process of a piece as it did for Goldsworthy. Usually these moments of potential happen purely by accident or through a mistake made by the artist but as you can see by the example in the film some mistakes are good mistakes. They make you think in a way you had not thought of before.

Goldsworthy comments on the fact that many times that the thing used to create the piece is what ultimately ends it—or as he put it “the very thing that brings it to life causes its death.” I think that this concept is almost surreal and touches on thoughts of equal existence between life and death. Although I’m not sure they really can be experienced at the same time they can be experienced by the same factor, which is kind of depressing yet beautiful if you think about it. It is a way of living life that comes full circle and as corny as it made sound it is indeed the ‘circle of life.’ On one hand this idea of giving life and causing death by one solitary thing expresses and expands the idea of potential and yet at the same time it squashes it. I believe it is all a matter of how we as humans explore this idea in order to show its true potential in art and life.

Overall I would say the term “destruction” is a negative one and is associated with less than desirable objects or people. I definitely would not consider what happens to Goldsworthy’s pieces as destruction by any means but rather a form of recycling. In my eyes this “coming apart” of his pieces is simply a part of the art process. It demonstrates the different stages of his creations as it is melted away back into its environment. In reference to one of the pieces within the movie, the wooden cave by the salmon pit, I would classify destruction of that piece as putting explosives in the hole and blowing it to smithereens. However what Goldsworthy did was much more quiet and peaceful and was the exact opposite of destruction. The process of the piece was only continued as it floated down the stream slowly coming apart piece by piece and stage by stage of its life. I would definitely say that human life can be related to this idea. For starters we can really only live one day at a time, no matter how hard any overachiever/workaholic can try. One single twenty four hour period is a stage in our lives and our lives are obviously made up of several days one after the other revealing each stage of our being little by little. Granted there are those who manage to cause their own self-destruction but as far as destruction versus mutation go in life, well that’s just the individual’s own desires and choices.

Goldsworthy mentions that his failures teach him. I think that this makes perfect sense. There are so many different sayings about this exact idea about learning from your mistakes—or even those of others around you. Although failure is not exactly uplifting I believe it has the most impact on who a person is and how they work. Without mistakes no one in the world would ever learn because nothing would ever be considered “wrong” or not effective. Thus, the world would be a stale and boring place to live—I know I would not want to be a part of it because growth is achieved through experience, change, and most importantly, mistakes.

As far as Goldsworthy’s comment about how his projects are “markers” of his journey, I think that without the backdrops of nature in which they reside, the pieces would mean next to nothing. If I saw one of his pieces in a museum I probably would have no interest in it because there is no story to it, and without a story there is no meaning. In a museum, one of these pieces would be just an object rather than art, at least for me. This is because the core of Goldsworthy pieces is about the atmosphere in which they are created and the process it took to create them. Additionally, the importance resides within the cycle of its birth and death rather than just the object itself.

During the film Goldsworthy touches on the ideas of stereotypes and preconceived notions we have about things before we actually take the time to get to know whatever the thing may be. He specifically talks about the sheep in the area and how important they are to the landscape. He mentions that the reason there aren’t any trees is because of the sheep—though I wish he would have gone into much greater detail about that. Personally I feel that stereotypes hold the human race back as far as human potential goes—it holds us back from the truth. I find this ironic in a way because it seems as if most human beings strive for truth whether it is within themselves or through other people. So, the idea of stereotypes and misjudging a person, place or thing is painfully sad for me. Therefore, it was pleasing for me to watch Goldsworthy create this piece about this topic using a jagged rock wall lined with wool from the sheep. This unexpected juxtaposition seemed to say to me “take a closer look” before you judge what is going on. Watching this portion gave me the desire to make art about the flaws within stereotyping and forcing viewers to take a closer look—maybe if more work like this existed it would help alleviate all of the pain in the world caused by stereotyping.

The idea of recording the “absence” of what once existed in a location is very intriguing for me. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to find a very good source of information of Joe Sternfeld or many examples of his work but what little I did manage to find was fascinating. I’ve never really thought about recording or documenting the past of something in that manner. I have personally used my own past experiences to create art yet it was still about the here and now as well as how I feel now about this past experience. I’m not really sure how one would go about recording what once was within a landscape other than a few obvious things such as the path that is carved out by water (the Grand Canyon is a huge example of that) or maybe even places that have drastically changed due to something that happened in the area. I think it would be very interesting to record the past or even the void of something. For me it is a very thought provoking idea and makes me wonder about documenting things that are indeed there but are not visible to the human eye.

There are so many more ideas from the film that I could continue to discuss but I think that the most important thing is the experiences I gain from this film every time I watch it. I seem to notice something different each and every time I watch it, whether it be how Goldsworthy approaches something or something he says. He always manages to make me think—sometimes without even talking.

Made it to Minnesota. It’s like an arctic tundra here… plus traffic and interstates everywhere. Cold and snow and salt.

I love traveling… the people, the activity, the relaxing flights. I had two lay overs today, so three separate flights. I started reading Taliesin, by Stephen R. Lawhead… So good! Reading about early England, the bards, the life at that time… to the soundtrack of some new celtic tunes… it was wonderful.

Near the end of my travels I started watching the documentary of Andy Goldworthy, Rivers and Tides. This is one of the most refreshing and profound documentaries I have seen. Here are a few clips for you to enjoy.