In Your Words

on the aesthetics of transience

As

Richard Donnelly

commented, everything is impermanent and all of us are mortal. Why then, when the intent is to create art that invites an acceptance of this transience, do we record it for posterity?

On the other hand,

Susie Mawhinney

asks whether documenting such events makes them less ephemeral:

I would perhaps say yes and then no! It is human nature to want to remember something with more solid prof than memory, perhaps if we can refine our ability to keep those memories safe and clear there would be no need to make a mirror image - sadly we are not built that way so we snap away, not realising that we are changing the whole sense or reason of what we are seeing in the process.

On more than one occasion,

Julie Schmidt

witnessed the creation of a Tibetan mandala. She admires “such intense concentration and devotion in the creating. The changing before hand, art as the meditation, then the ceremony wipes it away!” Like Susie, she also remarked on the existential lesson it teaches:

I have created nature mandalas and then left there to fall away on their own. Powerful to do this. And I took a picture. Still in a way a holding to it. A big lesson in the ephemeral ways of life.

Photograph by Walter Mason: Source

Invitation

After the first two posts of this series, I considered inviting everyone to create a work of ephemeral art in the style of Andy Goldsworthy. Then, I swayed back and forth on whether the challenge should include a photo to share. I became so indecisive it led to inaction. But now I would like to invite you to create a work of ephemeral art and to truly let it go. Tell us about the experience (either in comments or Notes), but not the work itself. The purpose of this is to not document it in anyway at all. If unsure where to start, this reflection from

Jenna Newell Hiott

may be a source of inspiration:

As writers, our work tends to be more concretized (or maybe that's just my perspective). Maybe if all our essays were written in chalk on a sidewalk, we'd have an idea of Goldsworthy's work. I have to admit that feels very unsettling to me, which means it's something valuable for me to contemplate.

Something valuable to contemplate, or perhaps discuss around a dinner table?

I wonder how many evenings have been spent discussing existentialism? Discussing theories of known existentialists Simone de Beauvoir, Albert Camus Jean-Paul Sartre? In France the philosophy exploded somewhere around the beginning of the last century and is still an important talking point around intellectual dinner tables.. the importance of confronting life’s meaning / meaningless remains…

Susie Mawhinney

Perhaps, this is our virtual dining table - the conversation deeply thoughtful and insightful?

Ephemeral art. I like the combination of these two words. Even though it does create a feeling of angst in me. Unease and sadness. But also relief, even joy. Safar, I appreciate the part in your post around the mourning that happens with ephemeral art. How it touches in on our own mortality. I have been on an internal journey with death lately. Which has been quite profound. Ephemeral art touching in deeply to our human existence.

Julie Schmidt

Ephemeral art, to me has always been a gentle way of seeking a higher understanding of understanding and even acceptance, whether that be to place, person or object. It can be taken in its most basic, the Valentines rose for example or in a far more complex and ritualistic fashion as of the deeply moving work of Ana Mendieta (I didn’t know this artists Safar - thank you) For which ever reason, the meaning and artistic license either meant (by the artist) or taken (by the viewer) will be remembered differently… or perhaps not at all and this may be even be intended, either way I think all who take the time to see and really understand the reasoning cannot fail to be touched.

Susie Mawhinney

What is it about the desert that prompts these megalithic ambitions ... obsessions? 50 years, 40 million dollars! … Having just spent a day at Marta Becket's opera house in the midst of nowhere, and thinking over the other passion/obsessions I've discovered along the way, I wonder if it has something to do with negative space, the need to fill in the blank spaces ... or a form of denying death?

Joyce Wycoff

As we moved from work that was fleeting in existence to more durable and longer lasting land art, many of you shared my discomfort with the nature of the materials used:

I am fascinated by these gigantic art works, their beauty (mostly) cannot be denied, though like you, I prefer not to see the landscape shifted and changed by concrete and machinery … I can see however the spiritual reasoning behind many despite choice of construction and materials…

Susie Mawhinney

As I digest it, I'm also of the opinion that art should not disrupt the natural landscape, but should blend and make as little impact as possible. But fascinating to read of these large scale projects.

Debs Stott

I wonder what is the impact on wildlife large and small, and if there is disruption of the tree roots and life below the soil?

Jo

The picture of the cave painting from Australia is exquisite. Making this really hit home that art in nature must at the same time come from a place of respecting nature. The artist alongside the creator of the Mother.

Julie Schmidt

For reasons of environmental disruption, whether that be to fauna, flora, or any other of natures own art, unless these (rather incomprehensible) errections, coverings and earth movements are constructed in complete harmony and sympathy with the nature surrounding and living upon it, I see it rather like the hunter glorifying his kill by asking for a photo of said dead creature laying in front him and his weapon. I cannot condone such behaviour. Likewise with these vast works of art(?), whilst I find some aesthetically pleasing, at what cost?

Susie Mawhinney

Having shifted from the moral affront of some land art, the discussion shifted to whether land art can be considered an aesthetic affront.

Richard Donnelly

considers it from an artist’s perspective:

"Aesthetic affront" would not be Christo's favorite term. Clearly he means the opposite. I see his work as temporary or performance.

Although calling his work an aesthetic affront is itself an affront to the artist, it doesn’t mean that it was not an aesthetic affront to nature. However, judgement of whether it is an affront or aesthetically pleasing is largely subjective.

Helen Reynolds

is a landscape architect who expands this point:

The profession was thought to be ‘being the advocate and spokesperson for the landscape’, os writing reports on whether something was or wasn’t an affront to the aesthetics of nature was part of the job. And of course the landscape was pretty mute on its own aesthetic potential.

I always found the clash between the aesthetics of the landscape and the functioning of the landscape odd - for example the public would often object to something like a barrier that kept invasive species out because it was ‘ugly’, and interrupted the landscape. Yet it was improving so many of the ways the landscape was creating habitats for endangered animals,,say.

This reminded me of a former neighbour who found an aesthetically pleasing (to me) plot of wild meadow ‘untidy’, so supported plans for housing development as it would make it less of an aesthetic affront (to her).

Helen also shared a story about creating ephemeral art as part of a university project:

I made a sort of a pile of fallen weed species flowers with a wrapping of some shiny paper (which I was going to remove at the end of the day). Then I hid to see what would happen. The first person to come across was a man who was instantly enraged and hit its repeatedly with a stick until everything was scattered. He definitely thought I was committing aesthetic affront.

Coincidently, that week, I received a gift of wild flowers wrapped in shiny foil from my father’s neighbour. I didn’t perceive it as an aesthetic affront, but according to the logic of that letter, it probably was. While on the subject of the ephemeral beauty of weeds, I will end the compilation with this thought from Susie:

… ephemeral art I see daily in nature.. Mother Nature being arguably the greatest of all ephemeral artists; I’m thinking clouds, mist, sunrise, sunset, flowers that bloom for but a few hours before dying… the way a flock of birds fly over a building, in every day life ephemeral art is everywhere if we just stop and think about it for a second.

Embers

During the course of this series,

Pipp Warner

joined others who expressed their gratitude for learning about an artist they had not heard of before. Additionally, some of you shared other environmental artists and even your own work. Links to all of these are shared in the Community Area, in the posts entitled Reasons for Hope.

Thank you also to those who offered support and well-wishes during a sad time for me, those who restacked my letters or otherwise drew attention to The Fiertzeside, and also a big welcome to new subscribers - hop on over to the Introductions to discover the many talents of this community of readers.

Up Next

I found myself entangled in the web of beauty, and so plan to sit with the spider to contemplate the subject from a variety of perspectives: philosophical, mathematical, psychological, poetical … I hope you continue to join me at The Fiertzeside for a discussion of Beauty.

Thank you for reading!