Imagine a work of art that is so ephemeral it is itself almost not there, and yet the very nature of the work brings what is there into focus, making it more present, more “there”— communicating this presence more than words ever could, communicating meaning sometimes playfully, sometimes forcefully, but always primally, instinctually.
I recently viewed a pair of documentaries on Goldsworthy, a British environmental artist and sculptor: Rivers and Tides, from 2001 and Leaning into the Wind, from 2018, both directed by Thomas Riedelsheimer.
The documentaries are a great way to accompany him into these landscapes, watch him work, listen to him struggle to define what he does, and then let the work speak for itself, in its own language, mute or deafening loud, proclaiming a foreverness in stone or a soft,fleeting thing taken by the breeze or washed away by light drizzle. Photographs are the recordings of the ephemeral works, and there are many published books I’m discovering as I scratch the surface on what he’s done.
He uses found items in situ, the leaves, branches rocks, water, ice, clay, and either gives them spirit or releases their spirit in a way that we can share, I’m not sure which.
Goldsworthy is the guy that walks through the landscape, forest or jungle or mountainside, and notices things. He has a sense of time that seems exponentially off from the modern world. He is interested in spaces made by nature and people moving through those spaces and waking us up to them. If nature is a component to the spirit of a place, Goldsworthy wakes us up to that spirit, gently, bringing out through his work what I would call the humble sublime. You could think him childlike, the way he plays at what he does, the way you sense that there are no boundaries or rules to his play, the near innocence of it. But what he does is not a child’s game, not when the result is at turns this beautiful or heartbreaking or breathtaking. You do have to slow down your modern sense of scheduled time, with its calendar notifications, with its itineraried agendas and general impatience to get things done. Goldsworthy seems to show that if you can do this, you will be rewarded.
On a bright Sunday in April, days after the azaleas and dogwoods have blossomed, I walk down the path in the garden and notice the moss that we’ve let spread over the pavers. So green. Greener than the grass. The reds and pinks of the flowers are startling next to this green. So, Goldsworthy-style, I sit down and lay the azalea blossoms down, picking out the stamens (?), tearing the ring of petals once so I can lay it flat on the stones, circling a patch of green moss. Red closest to its complement the green, then fuchsia, then the pink with the fuchsia spray, then white. You begin to notice the stems and green cup where the petals spread, and the yellow tip where the pollen sits, and the actual dewdrops on the petals. Birds perch nearby, wondering what I’m doing. As does the dog, confused by my stillness. The sun has moved a bit into late morning, and then spotlights my wreath. I take a picture before the playful breeze carries it away.
