Rivers And Tides Analysis

4:00 looking at the lines in the landscape- Goldsworthy said “there are always these obsessive forms…” and there is an implication that these forms and presences repeat in the site/place. Yet two minutes later, he travels and is “uprooted” and declares that he is a stranger to this tide (even if the tide is repeated all over the world). Q- What is being implied here…what are the nuanced understandings between familiar but strange/new?

The idea that is implied by Goldworthy here is that nature may repeat shapes and forms but the arrangement and characteristics of every place can be similar but nothing is identical. In much the same way that one beach can be like another, with sand and waves, they can also be vastly different by the details of rock locations, the veracity of the waves, the plant and animal life, and even the type of sand they hold.

 9:45 He begins to get excited about “discovering” something he could not expect when he first planed and worked on his project. He becomes excited about potential! Q What is he referring to and please discuss.

 When Goldworthy becomes excited about the potential of the new aspect that the sun gave to his ice sculpture project by illuminating it as it rose it is because the sun gave his project a new dimension that he hadn't previously considered. When unexpectedness occurs in art work that is done intuitively it creates an opportunity to see a new side of the work or a new possibility or dimension to the project that previously had been unseen. This can allow the artist to think of his/her own work in new ways that hadn't been considered before and often times expands the impact of the work. In Goldworthy's case the sun created a new visual impact for the piece that he had not expected and found quite exciting and pleasing to consider.  

10:38 – the very thing that bring it to life, causes its death Q: How does place/site give birth to possibility and also can destroy it? Examples?

The ability of a site to give birth and also destroy a possibility comes from the behavior of the site and the things that it includes. A site in nature can provide plenty of inspiration and material for working but it may also hold elements that will destroy it. In Rivers and Tides the perfect example of this is when Goldworthy is working with the rocks on the beach, trying to race time against the incoming tide. The beach provides the rocks to work with but it also can destroy the work with its incoming tide. Most of Goldworthy's work, in fact, is made from ideas that come from a certain area but are not meant to be permanent against the natural forces of weather or occurrences in nature.

  16:33 – “doesn’t feel at all like destruction” and 57:00 taking it to the edge of its collapse. Q: Discuss the difference between destruction and mutation/shifting/evolving in ephemeral works? Can you give some examples? What power is there in this edge? Can it reflect the human experience too?

In ephemeral works the idea of mutation is a required way of thinking about the project. Sometimes the way a piece evolves can be foreseen but it can not be guaranteed. In Goldworthy's work at the salmon pool he could predict that the current would carry the work away and break it back up into individual pieces of wood instead of a whole object but he could not predict the pattern or timing in which it would occur. Destruction in an ephemeral piece, to me, would have to come from an outside force that was unexpected. For example, if with Goldworthy's salmon pool piece had been destroyed by someone who was passing by and decided that they would tear it apart, that could be considered destruction. Since the piece was expected to drift away on the water the piece would not have been complete until it reached it's end and was destroyed by the environment. A destructive person would have been ruining the piece by not allowing it to reach the end of the intended life of the piece.

 19:30 he refers to time being the great teacher. 20:25 refers to security of the art college/working in cubicles Q: How has time taught him about place? How does being in place introduce insecurity/unexpectedness that can be powerful for art making

Time seems to have taught Goldworthy about the value of working within the constraints of the elements of a place. He does not try to stop the tide from coming in or move his project further away from the ocean to give himself more time. He instead tries to work within the constraints of the amount of time that he has. When he must start over he accepts that the best option to completing his project is to wait until he can try again after the tide has gone back out and, in doing so, he restarts his race against the clock of the tide again. The mention of the security of working in the cubicles of the art college versus the insecurity of working in a location explains his feelings of the uncertainty of working in an uncontrollable environment. In the video Goldworthy says that absolute control is the death of the art. While some artists like the control of the studio, Goldworthy values the unexpected and the challenge working in place brings him. His work would undoubtedly be less strong without these elements that are uncontrollable since he does say later in the video that he works intuitively.

 25:00 He refers to his failures teaching him, each failure giving him knowledge, teaching him about his materials and place. His actual experience in place gave him his knowledge that can be measured in growth of experience. Either comment or relate a similar understanding in your own progress.

Failures in life and in art can be either taken two ways. Failures can either be seen as a reason to give up or, as Goldworthy views it, a way to learn and evolve the way of thinking and working on the project. Those who do not learn from their mistakes, especially artists, will not become better at what they are trying to achieve. When it comes to my own work art school has a way of teaching from failures and has completely evolved the way I work from the place where I started from. Specifically in this class doing the walking exercises, if I don't find what I'm looking for on the first attempt, I keep walking until the idea has become more workable or evolved into something completely new. 

26:00 The projects are “markers” to his journey and places he’s attached to. How does that change when you see his project in a museum rather than in site? How does that shift?

I feel as if Goldworthy's work is changed completely by the location of the work. His work is based on where he choses to work in nature, therefore putting it in a museum is taking away some of the concept and impact of it. I feel like the impact of the location is a very important part of the way his work should be viewed. Without seeing the work in its intended location it simply does not translate well, even within photographs of his work there might not be the entire experience of his work. However, for me, photographs of his works in their intended locations are better representations of his work than his work alone in a museum.

 51:00 Sheep had deep impact on the land and how it looks, then refers how to get past the “wooliness” or our preconceived notion of this animal. How do stereotypes, or first impressions, fear, or wrong associations keep us from experiencing what is true and honest about a place, person, thing? What are some strategies Goldsworthy employs to get at the reality of how “sheep” impacts place? 

Stereotypes, first impressions, fear and wrong associations keep people from experiencing the truth behind a person, place or thing by creating a mental separation between ourselves and the true experience of a place. When a person is not willing to be open and accept something due to preconceived notions then they are not going to fully experience what that person, place or thing has to offer. Goldworthy tries to employ the impact of how the sheep impacts a place by drawing attention to what is absent from the land because of the sheep, instead of thinking about the land as it currently is.

 52:00 How can “absence” of what once was, be recorded in the landscape? Please look up Joe Sternfels “On This Site” for this aspect of the discussion.

 Absence of what once was can be recorded in a landscape by drawing attention to once was. Joel Sternfel's “on this site” does this hauntingly well. As he depicts sites that may be unremarkable to those who are unaware of what has occurred there, he brings the knowledge that something significant happened at these locations. He is drawing attention to the absences of identifiable markings of tragedy by pointing his viewer's attention to it and demanding that they take into consideration the events that happened there. Goldworthy was trying to do the same as he made work on the commentary of what impact sheep had on the land in certain locations. He pulled the audiences attention to what wasn't there on the land because the sheep took it's place.