Earth, Wind and Fire

Plastic Garden

2008-12-11T16:32:00.003-05:00

Again, found this blog-hopping. Thought it was interesting. Kinda wish I'd thought of it!

All images from Lea Turto's website.

why I did it

2008-12-09T13:00:00.004-05:00

My final project was inspired by the work of sustainable and environmental artists. A lot of sustainable art, I feel, relates to cities and urban areas. I liked the idea of pushing the boundaries of where earth art takes place, so I planned from the beginning to do my project within the alleyways of Richmond. My goal was to further the idea that urban environments are equally legitimate locations for earthworks.

Next, I knew I wanted to use graphic design within this project. Inspired by Lucy Lippard, I decided to 'overlay' my passion for graphic design with my newfound knowledge and appreciation for earth art. Just like Lucy, I wanted to explore "the juxtaposition of two unlike realities combined to form an unexpected new reality."

So then I had to decide how much graphic design to bring into the project. At first, I had thought to recreate famous designs out of natural materials and then leave them around the city, but it was a daunting task and didn't have any meaning behind it. So I decided that one of my favorite parts of design is the typography. So I did some digging into other artists who have used type and lettering with the earth.

These are a few artists I found:
Diana Lynn Thompson

Lilian Cooper

Barbara Roux

I finally decided to mash up all these ideas (sustainability, design, text) and came up with my project.

The purpose behind it is to bring people's attention to the few remaining green areas in the city. I wanted to call this attention because I was hoping that people would open up their awareness and see that we're losing greenery in the city. But I also didn't want to use the scare tactics that a lot of sustainable works include. So I chose to give the environment a reassuring voice. It was my hope that these encouraging words would put people into action faster.

I hand-picked (off the ground) each leaf, pressed them, and stenciled approx. 220 pt Helvetica bold onto each and cut the letterforms out with an exacto knife. Then I took each phrase to the locations and glued them down with Elmer's glue. I chose Elmer's because it is water-soluble and deemed non-toxic as defined in the Federal Hazardous Substances Act. I didn't expect it to last this long!

the environment talks back

2008-12-09T00:28:00.007-05:00

I'd like to be able to give you all the reasons why I did this project and what it means, but because of the 2 exams I had today and the all-nighter last night, I will be posting the images now and the text tomorrow morning.

Here's a map of where you can find the three installations I did. Because I finished this project before the final date was pushed back, they have been up for a week now and I'm not sure of the state of the 3rd location at this time. Unfortunately, the day after I put the project up, someone destroyed the second installation, so all that's left are remnants of some of the leaves. However, I do know for sure that the first location is still whole.

Now here are the photos from the installation of my project! I will only post a few images here because I took so many, it would take forever to load. So please go to my Flickr page to see the rest.

Location 1:

Location 2:

Location 3:

Melting Men

2008-12-06T18:25:00.003-05:00

I found this while blog-hopping. I'm really loving the ephemerality of the piece.

And here's the blog I found it on. Sorry it's in Russian.

Environmental art

2008-12-03T23:16:00.004-05:00

I recently received a comment from Brad in response to my graffiti post:

"I am very interested on how you are going to connect graffiti with
"earth" art ... ???? It seems associated with architecture, albiet in many
cases the architecture is in disrepair, entropy setting in, but is the
dialetic between the decay and the graffiti or the decay and the
building???"

I guess I should have clarified more why I posted that as 'earth art.' I think, to me, the inherent quality to earth art is the interaction with, and creating of art using, the outdoor environment of the artist. This is what I feel makes earth art different from all other forms of art. It is also the fact that the artist is using what is available to them outdoors to create their piece.

Should that disqualify Paul Curtis's work simply because he's using dirt on a wall to create his art? Obviously, I don't think so. He's using what his environment has provided him. Just because his environment isn't fields shouldn't mean that the work he creates in the city can't be called earth art.

I know that for thousands of years earth art has been made by carving ditches in the ground and altering the earth in major ways. But our world has changed, and I think that our definition of what earth art is should change with it. A lot of earth art can be called 'environmental art' and I feel that this is the term we need to use from now on. This phrasing would encompass art in urban areas as well as in rural ones.

According to the Environmental Art Museum environmental art can be defined as:

"In a general sense, it is art that helps improve our relationship with the natural world. There is no definition set in stone. This living worldwide movement is growing and changing as you read this.

Much environmental art is ephemeral (made to disappear or transform), designed for a particular place (and can't be moved) or involves collaborations between artists and others, such as scientists, educators or community groups (distributed ownership)."

Environmental Art stems from the same time period and impetus as traditional earth art and land art. What draws me to this definition is the external, rather than internal, dialogue involved. I'm not that comfortable with creating works of art that are deeply personal. I choose to make art that speaks to an audience about issues that I am passionate about. For this class, I'd like to be able to create work that uses what little greenery we have in the city to draw attention to our need to preserve the remaining areas of nature we have outside city-limits.

FInal Project-Locations

2008-12-02T15:59:00.004-05:00

I was scoping out places for my project fairly casually. My post entitled "This is my earth" is one example. I'll post here the rest of the images I took on my journeys that deal with locations.

The first was my post entitled "This is my earth" and this is my second.

Clean Graffiti

2008-11-29T12:00:00.003-05:00

In my exploration of what earth art "is," I feel that it's all been leading up to this. I've been holding off on posts like these until I felt I could adequately support why I felt they were earth works.

Last semester I was in a class called Creative Sustainability, where we looked at a lot of artwork that dealt with sustainable practices. Since being in Earth Art, I've been thinking about how the two aren't so different. Both deal with the artists place in the world. While earth art is about n artist's personal interaction with the environment and 'sustainable' art focuses more on calling attention to the environment around us, I don't see why they can't be viewed as kindred spirits. In the end, both involve an interaction between the creator and the space around them.

Another distinction, but not separation, between traditional earth art and what I'll call 'sustainable earth art' is that a lot of sustainable earth art is located in urban areas. I believe that this is because of what I mentioned perviously: sustainable artists want to draw attention to the plight of the earth today. But that shouldn't disqualify their work from being considered earth art. In fact, I hope it does qualify, for the sake of our final projects.

Well, on to the piece this post was created for.

In the UK, there is a 'Clean' or 'Reverse' graffiti artist named Moose who uses only a shoe brush and water to create his designs. Now, while this isn't the typical earthwork, I believe that is still counts. Moose is using his immediate environment to create works of art. Just because his environment isn't grassy knolls or woodlands makes no difference to me.

If you'd like to read further on this phenomenon, you can go here:
> A piece by NPR
> Another by Inhabitat.com

This is my earth

2008-11-25T16:58:00.003-05:00

Rice paddy art

2008-11-19T13:00:00.004-05:00

These are probably the most basic form of earth art. And by 'basic' I mean pictures made using the earth.

In Japan, there are a few rice-producing prefectures that have become famous because of their penchant for planting their rice crop in such a way as to make pictures when the rice grows. They use purple, yellow and green-leafed rice to make their pictures.

There's not much more for me to say, so I will include some links if you want to learn more about this phenomenon.

> Here's a time-lapse video of the rice growing.

> Problems with branding in rice paddy art.

> Images of the art harvest.

> More pictures with some explanations.

Here's a few images of the paddies from a ground-level view.

What is it?

2008-11-19T12:09:00.002-05:00

I know that the goal for the first week was to explore what we thought earth art was. But I've discovered a lot about my perception of earth art since then. Especially when I would go to post examples I've found. I felt I should talk about it now, before I start showing more examples.

As I went to write about pieces I felt qualified, I found myself questioning whether they really fit into the earth art 'category'. When I say 'fit' I mean follow the general definition Brad mentioned: "A work of art that has the element of the hand and speaks to the earth, its surroundings, and its environment." I first ran up against this wall when I posted about Christo and Jeanne-Claude.

I know that, yes, their pieces are out in nature, but I feel that sometimes simply being outside shouldn't automatically qualify a work as 'earth art.' This idea then led me to think about what else made Surrounded Islands and Over the River legitimate earthworks. And I came to the conclusion that their interaction with their setting is what made them earth art. most of Christo's pieces aren't simply forced onto the land. Usually, as in the case of Surrounded Islands, the materials reflect and harmonize with the landscape. If you refer to my earlier post, you can see how the fabric mimics the coasts of the islands.

Now, it's hard to really know what Christo's intentions are with his pieces, since he is adamant about each viewer drawing their own conclusions, but I like to think that what he and his wife are doing is celebrating the landscapes of the world by putting things in to make us look at our environments in new ways,or even look at them for the first time. When I visited The Gates in Central Park, the undulating, snaking saffron gates made me appreciate the way the existing pathways in the park moved with the hills and valleys of the earth.

Secondly, does it have to involve human interaction? Earth art, simply by its name, you would think that it is art of the earth. Or by calling it art are we inherently injecting the idea of human creation and involvement? I would argue that the leaf shadows are a work of earth art (but I guess I already did that by including them in this blog). I had no hand in that except for documentation. Does the lack of my involvement exclude them from being art? I say no. I feel that art is anything aesthetically beautiful, as defined by the viewer. And to me, these shadows were extremely beautiful, and were enhanced by their juxtaposition against the man-made concrete. Nature's effort to leave its mark on the foreign environment around it. Even in Overlay, Luck Lippard included a rock that was carved by nature (pp. 19, fig 6A). I will concede that many earthworks do include a human interaction, I don't think that it is absolutely necessary in order to be defined as 'earth art.'

I can feel myself rambling and losing my focus, so I will end this post with a list of questions regarding our (as in society's) definition of what earth art is:

> Should/could there be a commentary on the earth (as in Jake Galle's I Want to Hear the Last Days of the Earth, which doesn't include Jake's physical interaction, or the ground/dirt/etc. I feel that is a work of earth art because of its commentary on the symbiosis, or lack there of, between humans and nature)

> Does the piece have to physically involve the earth? As in dirt/grass/nature/elements. (Think Ana Mendieta)

> Can a piece be considered earth art if it interacts with its surroundings? Even if those surroundings are an urban environment, like NY City? (I say yes. I think our definition of earth art needs to evolve as our society evolves. I think interaction with the environment the piece is in is a very significant reason for a work to be called earth art.)

> Does a piece have to have evidence of the human hand in it? (See paragraph above for my thoughts.)

Leaf Shadows

2008-11-18T02:22:00.004-05:00

While I was walking back form class last Thursday, I came upon these marks on the concrete outside my apartment. As I got closer, I noticed that all the marks were in the shapes of leaves. In total, there was at least ten feet of these leaf shadows on the ground.

They reminded me of the shadows of Hiroshima. A final imprint of a once-living presence on its surroundings. One last reminder that these things existed. Here is an image of the shadows of Hiroshima:

I believe the leaf shadows are made when the leaves get wet and deteriorate so much they simply disintegrate. What I found interesting was that, even though it had been raining for a while before I found them, none of the shadows looked as if they were about to be washed away.

I think that this idea of representing something through its absence is very intriguing. Does it hold more weight because it no longer exists, but has left its mark on its environment? This might be a possible direction to take my final project.

During my search for leaf shadows, I happened upon another blogger who had a much more eloquent appreciation for this phenomenon than I could express. You can find the post here. Who knew anyone else has seen this!

Interaction

2008-11-11T12:48:00.008-05:00

To me, pieces of art that interact and work with their outdoor surroundings can also be considered earth art. The artists who is epitome of this type of work is Christo and Jeanne-Claude. This husband and wife team have been creating large-scale earth works since 1968.

The goal of all their pieces is to interact with, and enhance, the surroundings they are placed in. One of my favorite pieces, aesthetically, is their "Surrounded Islands"

Miami, Florida, 1980-83

The fabric that the artists used was breathable and let light reach the ground beneath it, so it ensured that there was minimal impact on the environment. In fact, the manatees that lived in the area loved the fabric so much they spent most of their time under it.

But my absolute favorite piece overall is their "Over the River" piece. As of right now, it is still in the concept phase, but the planned location is the Arkansas River is Colorado. Once the piece is up, you will actually be able to whitewater raft beneath it.

The most amazing part about this installation is it will continue to help the environment after the art is long gone. A serious problem facing the Arkansas River today is erosion of its shores. What "Over the River" will do for that problem is during installation of the canopy, metal rods will be permanently installed in the river banks which will help keep the soil in place.

That's what I enjoy about Jean-Claude and Christo's projects, they always seek to be a sustainable as possible while celebrating and showing off nature.

The Nasca Lines

2008-11-06T12:42:00.008-05:00

Nasca Lines. Nasca, Peru. 500 CE

The second thing that comes to mind when I think of earth art are the Nasca Lines in Peru. When I first saw these beautiful drawings in the ground, I couldn't believe they were created in 500 CE. Some of the drawings can reach 800 miles of lines that are created by scraping away a top layer of pebbles to reveal the lighter ground beneath.

This is the power of earth art. These lines in the dirt have been around for more than 1500 years. Paintings have been lost, burned and stolen. But the simple work of the Nasca artists have lasted this long, and will continue to exist, as long as we do our part to control urban sprawl.

What is Earth Art

2008-11-04T23:08:00.007-05:00

Spiral Jetty, Robert Smithson. 1970. Rozel Point, Box Elder County, Utah.

I've studied art since I was in 6th grade. Over the past ten years I've come to love the baroque, and appreciate the chiaroscuro in Caravaggio's paintings. I've even learned to understand why the practitioners of DaDa do what they do. But one of the aspects of the art world that I haven't had much exposure to, or at least I didn't think I did, was Land Art.

The little that I did know about earth art consisted of works much like Spiral Jetty, by Robert Smithson. When I first thought about earth art, it was this famous piece that jumped into my mind first. I can see now that it was a very narrow view to take. I will take the next few posts to outline a few artists that I feel represent what earth art means to me.