I’ve been exploring, studying the work of Andy Goldsworthy for a couple of decades, really. I was struck, immediately, by the work.

What I found compelling was the idea of finding patterning in pattern. That is, if you see something striking in nature, it’s a surprise, a revelation, an epiphany. And maybe this can last only for a moment or two. Sunlight, just glinting — glimmering on water. Mist appearing in a moment. Stones stacked by some random beauty. Driftwood like calligraphy on the shore. And that patterning can be seen anew — if you take the time to dig into those arrangements. Play with them. Tune them. And to be willing to simply let that arrangement move on, shift with time. Like everything else.

That is the key learning, for me, in watching the evolutions of Andy Goldsworthy over the course of the last 20 years. That movement has been steadfast. Beauty full, in its strength of conviction and rich character.

I’ve woven some Goldsworthy here, and some Timothy Shaw Girvin, in the intermingling of the imagery shown below. I’m sure that you can tell which ones are which.

And some Girvin, and some story.

I’d been at TED, this past month — this time in Aspen. I wrote some things there, that you can find here: http://blog.girvin.com/

And being there, that experience, renewed and reconnected me with Andy Goldsworthy.

He’s an artist lauded by the Aspen Institute. So there’s art by him all around. Perhaps a show of his works, that filtered the grounds. Here are some photographs that I’d taken at the Institute:

And the nature of the making, that he does — is simply about looking for the right place, the right alignment, the right objects. And a willingness to create something of beauty that will, truly, not last.

From the history of my life, I started stacking stones maybe about the same time that Goldsworthy did.

Perhaps before.

Andy began in the 80s.

Where I’d seen this was up in the mountains. And what you’d experience, is to come wandering across some opening snow field — where the scree is hard to find from the snow covered path — and where the snow obscures the way. And then people will put up the cairn as a kind of marker. This cairn building doesn’t need to be on a snowfield either. Scrambling paths are similarly — vague.

And you can get lost. Cairns fit in. But they tell the way, as well.

Actually, I didn’t think that this was something that was about marking, more about something that was there — as a kind of art. Something kind of mysterious. Who made them, and how? Why?

Is, still mysterious, I suppose.

That’s part of the history, for me, of putting things up. Putting anything up. Getting it out there.

I’d written about that, here: http://tim.girvin.com/Entries/?p=391 And I’d written about my daughter, here: http://tim.girvin.com/Entries/?p=317

But Andy, born three years after me, is far more than just about the idea of stacking stones: it’s more about how to create entrancements in nature. And that is about looking at patterning in patterning. An arrangement of wood is not only the small collection of objects, but perhaps the larger stream of driftwood that lies around it, which is framed in the longer view of the beach, and the shoreline…extending outwards.

Things that are patterned, a kind of natural rhythm, merely belie other things that vibrate to other patterns. So it’s about patterning that you find on one level, that is also speaking to other patterns, that lie on another level, in turn — that lie on another level.

And another.

Entrancements — for me — it is about the idea of creating entrances to seeing. You look at something, there’s surprise, and you’ve seen something that you’d not seen before. You are suddenly seeing a patterning that you didn’t see before; it’s like hearing, or sensing, another rhythm that reaches into you in a new way. I’d written about the concept of enthrallment — http://blog.girvin.com/?p=693 — being enthralled is a kind of enslavement; you’re experiencing a new entrapment.

I suppose, for me, it’s about that.

Dawn Clark, AIA

That curiosity for me is about:

compulsion — with the pulse of a new force or rhythm
passion — I’m drawn into the moment, the momentum of pain and commitment
bewitchment — I’m magically transformed; I don’t see the way I did before
surprise — the prize that is beyond, the next level
transmigration — I was there, now I’m here.

I find that this is the place that is best for me: in change — surprise | transformed view | something opening that is just like beginning, anew | and that’s a good thing:

beginner’s eye.

I believe that Andy’s curiosity is all about that exploration.

Beginner’s eye.

More soon.

Stack something. Yourself.

tsg | decatur island
—-
I’d gathered some other treatments by Goldsworthy, that expand on the ideas of arrangement. And color. And patterning.

And some of them, I’m sure that you’ve seen.

Others, perhaps not.

It’s a rich legacy of work — all made by hand, all shot by Goldsworthy.

All beauty, found in seeing into the patterning of nature.

And you can do that, too.

And maybe you have.

Maybe you can tell me about what you’ve done.

?

I contemplate: metus | fear.

Things are arranged; then they are rearranged. What do you hold to, that which is arranged, that which is not? Is there beauty in symmetry? Or, symmetry skewed, the chaotic fracture?

I contemplate:

Imagery photographed at DIA | Beacon, NY

I had a client once who told me about his love of doing things that he was afraid of. Interestingly, however, I never saw, or experienced, once, this truth. Another friend mentioned, “do one thing every day that you are afraid of.”. But what is that? Crossing the street? Being in an elevator? Or risk, exposures, dangerous thinking — actions that are bold, things that stride out past where you are comfortable. Being fear full is a two sided affair — one part, to the willingness to risk everything to get across to another vista; you climb the impossible, to reach a new view. And, too, to fear — you are exposed to the liability of losing everything.

Robert Bly, the poet, spoke of poems that take the leap. Read on. You jump somewhere, you take off, when you read them — they push you over the edge. Flight, you are aloft. To someplace new. Another way of seeing. Another form of being.

There is, to the nature of fear, a way of being timid in everything. A kind of living that puts everything neatly in its place, but allays the character of the incessant emergence of chaos.

Things happen, things come into play that can’t be anticipated. And fear merely lets them in. Chaos reigns in the perceived management of hopeful harmonies — but that is the harmony, in a way — knowing that in the most carefully orchestrated serenity, discord can barge in. Knowing fear, looking at it, allows for the observant placement of objects, in time — that you know might be swept away, in a quick gesture of surprise. Arrange, like the balancing of stones. But know that the earth shifts and they can, and will, fall down, to a new arrangement.

I contemplate:

meticulous \muh-TIK-yuh-lus\ adjective
marked by extreme or excessive care in the consideration or treatment of details

“Meticulous” is derived from the Latin word for “fearful” — “meticulosus” — and comes from the Latin noun “metus,” meaning “fear.” Although “meticulous” currently has no “fearful” meanings, it was originally used as a synonym of “frightened” and “timid.” This sense had fallen into disuse by 1700, and in the 19th century “meticulous” acquired a new sense of “overly and timidly careful” (probably influenced by the French word “méticuleux”). This in turn led to the current meaning of “painstakingly careful,” with no connotations of fear at all. The newest use was controversial among some usage commentators at first, but it has since become by far the most common meaning and is no longer considered an error.
© Merriam Webster

Fear. Care less. Care full. Fear less. Fear full.

That’s what I know. What about you?

As I stand

As I stand
out
in the silence
of this morning

there is nothing
to suggest that
I am any thing
less, than alone

A breeze begins.
Distance beckons
and I can feel
just the beginning

of drops, that
come, falling
on my bare
shoulders.

But it is the
sound that is
most compelling,
from that inevitable

quiet, comes that
sound — far out,
reflected on the
island, lying

across from me,
sliding sound of
one million drops
that comes

closer to me, in rain
that shifts to the
leaves, the old
roof, the moist ground

and tells me of
travel — where I
shall be, where I have
been, shall go.

And while I’m here
I’m really there, over
the water, listening
for more.

decatur island | 4.44am

tsg

Krink 3.3.08

Earlier in my life, I’d done some work with graffiti.

Sometimes, I used a spray can — but never unless I was paid. That meaning: that I’d do that for advertising sets, props and installations. And for movie titling treatments. Then I came up with this idea of doing graffiti in bathrooms — especially incredibly funky stalls. But instead of lewd jargoning, I’d write things like — Awake!

Wildly and elegantly calligraphic, in strokes of metallic gold and silver, using special dense brushes from Japan which used a highly toxic xylene fluid with metallic particles in suspension. I still have some, but rarely use them. These days. These graffiti expressions, particularly in NYC, gathered a kind of reputation. I remember people talking about them, in the Village, other spots. Other places. Bear in mind that these were particularly rank locations, bar stalls. Interesting — quick in, quick out.

Now I just use my finger on the glass.

Like this:

But then I heard about Krink. And it all came back. Alan Ket. And the character of the vandal, street art (and Marc Ecko).

http://www.youtube.com/alan_ket

There are some stories to sort out — in the balance between the man, Alan Ket, the graffiti walls of Marc Ecko’s gallery show and installation, angst in NYC (and the reasonable despising of marked and marred city property) and the intrusion of street art.

I will say, however, there’s something incessantly fascinating to me about the raw materials of art. For as long as I’ve been in the space of making things, making art — I’ve held a profound love of the materials. The inks, the handmade paper, the brushes, boards, pigments, ground pigments, compass scribes, scoring tools and bone folders. For now, and for ever. Krink has another spin. And it’s memorable. Scent, touch, texture, the character of the drawn stroke…

More to explore, here: http://www.krink.com/

While I’d never condone graffiti, nor practice it, there’s a legend there; it’s a craft, it’s a statement.

Message found. Story told. Materials intrigue.

Sometimes
I run, when
darkness
abounds

and I see
things like
this. So
quiet, mist.

What can
be seen is
some times
not there.

Other times, what
is not there,
is seen, found.
Next.

I’m looking for that.

tsg

Last light 2.20.08

The light, seen
from afar, transforms to
many radiant spheres
of expression. Flair, lens.

Your eyes are out of
focus, and you can’t quite
see what is there, because
of the brilliance: it is

so blindingbright,
that the rayed
luminosity, so
eyefilling that you

can barely see
any thing. Any
thing, found — ground.
Anything, sought, dark.

Seeing that, you
might see more.

I’m looking for
that, light that’s
found – without.
Within.

tsg (good night)

This word keeps popping for me. And I’m wondering why. One thing I’m thinking about is that when you are looking for something, looking for the right thing, it appears. I’ve been writing about truth, seeking trueness. And I’ve been turning that gaze to my self. How true am I? What I say, how true, shown freely, is the offering?

echt (ekht) adjective

Authentic; typical.

[From German echt (genuine, typical).]

Visual Thesaurus: http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=echt

“I’m trying to find the character that is about the real heart of things, it’s one of those living elements — something that has the right echt quality — of what’s being in the true soul of that search.”

tsg

I think about love 2.14.08

Some times
in the lonely haul
of working long
and hard, you still
need to remember
that love, found,
drives every thing.

Holding.

The point of beauty,
of finding that passion
that takes you into
entrance of where you
are rediscovered –
finding that which you came
from, that which you
are, and there – where
you are going.

Doing this, goes
back to the heart
of that connection.

Your nexus, two curves, transect one.

Mind full, love – that is.

tsg