art, science, and nature

My favorite artist of all time has to be Andy Goldsworthy. A British artist who specializes in collaborations with nature, I first saw his work in an article in Discover magazine way back in the 90's when I was in high school. His work transcends reality - primarily because he exclusively uses natural materials in the area where he found them - that his art quickly reverts back to nature just makes it more beautiful to me. From his own webpage:

At its most successful, my ‘touch’ looks into the heart of nature; most days I don’t even get close. These things are all part of the transient process that I cannot understand unless my touch is also transient—only in this way can the cycle remain unbroken and the process complete. I cannot explain the importance to me of being part of the place, its seasons and changes. Fourteen years ago I made a line of stones in Morecambe Bay. It is still there, buried under the sand, unseen. All my work still exists in some form.

There is an excellent documentary about Mr. Goldsworth, title Rivers and Tides, during which you can watch him constructing an ice sculpture not entirely dissimilar to the one pictured above.

Yesterday afternoon, I was listening to a How Stuff Works: Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast (which I highly recommend) titled This is Your Brain on Art. The podcast was primarily about the relationship between art and neuroscience, but one of the examples that was brought up during the podcast was the curious Courting rituals of the Bowerbirds. I'd heard of Bowerbirds before (who hasn't?) and heard about the Bowers that the males construct to attract females, but listening to the podcast, and being in front of Google, I was finally motivated to look up these constructions.
And they are gorgeous. The birds themselves are gorgeous, particularly the Satin Bowerbird, which has the most amazing blue eyes (a bird with blue eyes - who knew?), but the bowers they construct, without the use of hands or thumbs - I was floored.

from the Birds in Backyards website - of a female Satin Bowerbird

photo by Barry Hatton, via Elmtwig

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image from ARKive

But these constructions - and you really should look them up and read more (the Satin Bowerbirds actually paint the inside of their bowers with chewed up berries and charcoal), remind me quite a bit of Andy Goldsworthy's work.

If I ever get back into sculpture - this is the kind of work I'd like to do. Now if only creating the kind of art you loved to look at was a guaranteed thing...