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4th Quarter Challenge – Land Art

4th Quarter Challenge – Land Art

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I didn’t think I’d ever find time to do the 4th Quarter Challenge. When I chose Land Art, I thought it had a really good scope for some interesting felt sculptures. I really liked the work of artists using twigs and branches, whether they were abstract, patterns, designed by colour, or like Tom Hare’s work in willow, sculptures of plants, leaves, seeds, or even a sliced apple. I really liked this lotus seed head: http://www.tomhare.net/files/cache/6241679806767b541ec85e7977677c16_f44.jpg

I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it. Something sculptural based on the things I’d seen with holes and stems and curves. I even thought I might do a series. Well, time was running out and I hadn’t started, and I was thinking about what I could do to take part that wouldn’t take as much time. For a few weeks I’ve had a piece of felt with a balloon inside, hanging in my living room doorway, it was the result of me thinking I’d try felting a winter woolly hat, and it ended up looking more like the start of a balaclava or fetish mask! So, I thought I’d improvise and use that. It wasn’t far off the shape I’d pictured, and though I would have preferred to work with wet felt not fulled, I thought it was worth a try. So, I started cutting, wetting and shaping, and I was happy to see it was starting to look interesting! I rinsed it and put another balloon in to keep it’s shape while it dried. I thought it looked really good, it was nice and firm and kept its shape without the balloon. I attached some string to get a photo, and this is what I saw when it spun around:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAA ribcage! My fancy felt sculpture was meant to look plant-like, but it looked like a carcass! I took the string off and put it on the table, but it sunk a bit and that didn’t look less dead either!:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI reshaped it, the way it was meant to be, and that looked much better! I know it doesn’t look like any plant or seed in particular, I wasn’t copying anything, I just had a vague idea of shape, lines and holes:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERADifferent angle:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIt does look much better hung up, less flat and more round. While I was messing around taking photos, I stood it upside down and squashed it, and that looked really interesting!:

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My First Attempt at Land Art – 4th Quarter Challenge

My First Attempt at Land Art – 4th Quarter Challenge

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I was planning on posting an update about my appliqued caricatures but then Zed posted her 4th quarter challenge. I have always been inspired by nature and have done a few rock cairns but nothing very exciting. So I was excited by the challenge and my mind was full of ideas. But then when I was walking the dogs, I noticed the ever present Tamarack pine needles that appear on our driveway in the autumn. Perhaps  I could use those as a basis for land art. Then, since it was a nice day, I needed to finish up filling the cracks in the driveway. To do this, I needed to blow all the pine needles off the driveway. So I donned the backpack blower and started.

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As I was blowing off one driveway, I started pushing the pine needles together and then started shaping it into a tree shape. Once I got as far as the photo above, I turned off the blower and got a small whisk broom.

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And I made this tree. I stood on top of the picnic table to get the photo. The tree is about 25 feet tall. I wish I could have gotten up on the roof to take a better shot but I don’t do heights and I would have fallen off and landed in the hospital or something.

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It was fun shaping the tree and drawing with the pine needles.

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It didn’t take me very long and since I knew I was just going to blow it off the driveway, I didn’t stress about how it looked.

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As you can see, there are still pine needles on the ground in between branches and I didn’t worry about getting them all aligned.

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So, this is my first attempt at land art. It has now been blown off the driveway and is only in digital form at this point. If it was just me, I would have left it on the driveway for a while and taken photos of it as it disintegrated. But hubby was having none of that! I know this has little to do with fiber unless you count pine needles as fiber. But it was fun and I really enjoyed my first foray into land art. Thanks for the challenge Zed!

Fourth Quarter Challenge 2014

Fourth Quarter Challenge 2014

Comments 30 comments

For this Quarter, I have chosen ‘Land Art‘. I was initially going to choose a specific artist for this challenge, but in the end I just couldn’t choose just one, the whole ‘movement’ is so inspiring. In case you haven’t heard of it, Land Art – according to Wikipedia ” is an art movement in which landscape and the work of art are inextricably linked. It is also an art form that is created in nature, using natural materials such as soil, rock (bed rock, boulders, stones), organic media (logs, branches, leaves), and water with introduced materials such as concrete, metal, asphalt, or mineral pigments. Sculptures are not placed in the landscape, rather, the landscape is the means of their creation.” (i.e, not Christo)

colleen proppeThere are so many inspirational artists, one I really like is Richard Shilling, a flickr search gives you lots of great photos, have a look at this link: https://www.flickr.com/search/?q=richard%20shilling  He has inspired others to create land art too, such as Colleen Proppe, who made the Leaf Flag in the photo above. Andy Goldsworthy is another name many people might recognise. Scott Robinson was inspired by him to make this Leaf art:

Scott Robinson
I discovered the work of Tom Hare while I was looking up land artists and sculptors, he does some gorgeous work. This is his website: http://www.tomhare.net/portfolio This is a photo of one of his willow sculptures, a Horse Chestnut breaking open, taken by Jodie Brodie:

Tom Hare
Have a search on google for Land Art and Land Art Artists, I can guarantee you’ll be inspired! Feel free to post your work on the forum in the 4th Quarter Challenge thread: http://feltandfiberstudio.proboards.com/thread/1788/fourth-quarter-challenge-land-art  Have fun!