Picture this - sand sculpture
Thanks be to Jasus for photography. Otherwise my sculptures would be lost forever. I have always had an interest in taken pictures since seeing my father with his homemade cameras pointing them at us as children. I couldn't wait to be on the other side forming images of the world.
My first camera, which I cut grass for a whole summer to be able to afford was a Ricoh KR-5. Completely manual, so I learnt so much trying to get the best results. Developing my own Black and white and Slide film was a special sort of magic. Of course these old cameras and sand didn't mix too well and one grain caught inside would scratch along the whole length of negative as I'm sure you have notices in several of the images I have post previously. I was so happy the day I could afford my first 1 megapixel Kodak DC3200. No more scratches and not having to wait to develop photos to see if I captured a sculpture that was long gone.
There was a transition period where I carried both my 35mm SLR and my digital just to be sure to be sure. Now I think digital has the upper-hand for documentation of my work. But I will always love the analogue look and feel.
If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to take a picture does it actually fall?
I made this along with my Catalonian friend Nuria Vallverdu Vilagines in Cervia, Italy. It was my second time there and working in this volley ball arena with crowds watching from the stands was a bit surreal. We wanted to make something that was a bit hard to understand from afar and only made sense when the audience was allowed invade the pitch on the day of opening.
The many layers of relief carved landscape looked quite abstact until you looked through the lens which brought the whole scene together.
As a surrounding element we had a film strip of images showing how the location could be captured from other angles.
A picture of the future
Probably not my/ our most deep and meaningful work in sand but it was a great seed idea of sculptures to come where knowing that the sculpture would only live on through a picture did I begin to think of ideas which were playing with the idea of perspective and viewpoints.
Drivethru sculpture
When the sculpture was finished and the audience was allowed enter the field a long queue formed as people waited to get a view of our creation from that one sweet spot. It always nice to see the audience interacting with your work.
Ps
Thank you for joining me on this journey as I look back and document my work as an ephemeral sculptor. There are many more to come in both sand, snow and ice.
Below you will find some of my recent posts.
Dinotourist - sand sculpture
The Kiss - sand sculpture
Skin on Skin - sand sculpture
I hope you'll join me again soon and please bring a friend.
@ammonite
Maybe not deep and meaningful but what a great idea having to look through the lens to see the scene......that's pretty inspired surely.
Thanks Deirdy. Audience interaction is always nice to see and making sculptural sweet spots is something i've been playing with over the years.
Hi @ammonite. I just wanted to let you know that I featured you in my latest post: https://steemit.com/art/@beinart/inspiring-artists-on-steemit
Love your work!
Wow, thank you so much, that is quite an honour. I am also loving the work you bring to steemit.
Amazing. I like the concept to begin with and what you were able to do with the camera and the scenery. I hope you were well compensated for your efforts. A truly amazing work of art.
Is this something you do for a living? Do you do any other kind of sculpting that won't ultimately end up dissolving or otherwise falling apart? What would you say is your main motivation to using mediums that don't last? Environmental maybe?
At any rate, truly wonderful work. May there always be a camera nearby. :)
HI thanks for the comment. So much in there. Sand snow and ice sculpture is something I have been doing for a living for over 22 years. I work with other materials also be ephemeral art had been my bread and butter.
I like these materials because they are quite fast to work with and because they dont last it means repeat business. Coupled with that it is also the fact that it is a performance art.
Thanks again for you questions.
You are a very happy person, so what you see and experience is not convey in photos. It is beyond words. This is a must see. Here as in a good film - the degree of influence a work of art has on our immature brains depends on the screen and the amount of decibels in the amplifiers. That is, only watch live. This type of art is very popular and not because the sand is an affordable building material, on the contrary it has one important drawback - short-lived.
I agree. Sculpture needs to be seen live. The best works can't be distilled into an image.
My posts here on Steem are for documention and i hope in the future will become a work of something in their own right.
I have experiment with trying to capture them with other techniques and will make a post about this some day soon.
Thanks for your comment.
Far out! what a great idea through the lens view. The camera itself reminds me of a basic Praktica analog model I used to have.
Thanks. I love the old manual cameras. The designs were classical functionality and you used to really feel like you were taking a photograph.
these sculptures look awesome! :)
Thank you.
Wonderfoul, you are a fantastic artist!!!!!
Thank you Caroline.
:-D
These sculptures look amazing. A few days back, I looked some videos on youtube about sand sculpture. I will surely try to create a simple one whenever I go near the bank of rivers
Do try, but be warned it can be very addictive.
Sand art is awesome