LIGHT SPLASHED .......

Photo by Petra Cortright. See Petra's Flickr photo stream, here

A new day 
A fresh start 
The world awaits .....

Photo by Ineke Kamps. See website here   and Face Book page here

A poem by Stanley Kunitz fills me with anticipation .....

The Round
Light splashes this morning
on the shell-pink anemones
swaying on their tall stems;
down blue-spiked veronica
light flowed in rivulets
over the humps of the honeybees;
this morning I saw light kiss
the silk of the roses
in their second flowering, 
my late bloomers
flushed with their brandy.
A curious gladness shook me.
So I have shut the doors of my house,
so I have trudged downstairs to my cell,
so I am sitting in semi-dark
hunched over my desk
with nothing for a view
to tempt me
but a bloated compost heap,
steamy old stinkpile,
under my window;
and I pick my notebook up
and I start to read aloud
the still-wet words I scribbled
on the blotted page:
"Light splashed...."

I can scarcely wait till tomorrow
when a new life begins for me,
as it does each day,
as it does each day.

- Stanley Kunitz

Photo by Nicole Franzen. Visit Nicole's lovely blog here.

Rice grain porcelain bowls by Eeva Jokinen. Website here.

Sun-Kissed by Andrea Fettweis. See here

 Maple Sun by Richard Shilling See more here.

Photo by Kim DuPree. See website here.

Photo by nic*nilla on Flickr. See more photos here

Beautiful photographs by Ineke Kamps. See Ineke's website here   and visit her on Facebook here

Photo by Jane Fulton Alt. See more of Jane's photos here  and read about The Burn series here.

".... We must have
the stubbornness to accept our gladness in the

ruthless furnace of this world.... "  - Jack Gilbert

TURN WHEEL TURN

Jamie Newton's wonderful creation ... on wheels. See website here.

I sit in front of the computer,

captivated by images.

Minutes turn into hours.

It suddenly occurs to me that

my life is ticking away

while I sit transfixed.

Day into night into day

and though I sleep at the usual time

the next day finds me

back in front of the computer .

Should I be worried

that I'm perfectly happy

enclosed in a box,

while the world keeps turning

on the other side of these four walls ...

or so it seems.

Art Vehicle by David Smith.

Turn, turn, my wheel! All things must change

to something new, to something strange;

Nothing that is can pause or stay;

The moon will wax, the moon will wane,

The mist and cloud will turn to rain,

The rain to mist and cloud again,

To-morrow be to-day.

- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I'm loving the wheeled contraptions of Dina Merhav. Take a look at her website here.

Flight by Dina Merhav


Live Fence by Dina Merhav. See website here.

Magdalena Abakanowicz

Mari Skarp. See website here.

Dandelion by Jake Beckman. See more bicycle art here.


Look carefully for the bicycles in this piece by Arman. Website here.

Bicycle Shop in Germany. See more Bicycle Art here.

Sophie Munns. See Sophie's website here.

Tall Bird on Wheels by Sarah Jane Brown. See more of Sarah's delightful wire sculpture's here.

Turkana Toy. Photo by Ross Mcdonnell. See website here

Cucuteni-Trypillian cow on wheels, 3950 - 3650 B,C

Medicine Wheel: Whole school project inspired by the work of Chris Drury. Four Square Fine Arts'education programme. See here.

" .... this wheel of many parts,

that can rise and spin

over and over again,

full of gorgeous life" - Mary Oliver

Richard Shilling. See Flickr photo stream here.

Photo by Todd Bates on Flickr photo stream here.

TOWER, TOWERS, TOWERING

Safe House by Kim Schoenberger. Found objects, metal and clay. See Kim's blog here.

When I set out to do this post it was not with the Twin Towers in mind but it was difficult not to think of 911. David Nash did not set out to create a sculpture with Twin Towers in mind either but he found himself carving An Awful Falling 911, from a piece of beech wood. You can read a full post about David Nash on the blog That's How The Light Gets In.

An Awful Falling 9.11 by David Nash. See more of David's towering pieces here.

On to more positive imagery. I find Richard Shilling's land art very uplifting. Generally, landart overlooking a wide landscape gives me a good feeling, as do all the towering sculptures featured in this post. Scroll down to see the innovative work of Ken Munsie.

Land Art by Richard Shilling. See Richard's Flickr photostream here and his website here.

Iron House by Hao Ni. See Flickr photostream here.

Tower of Pans by Sally Mankus. I LOVE this piece! See Sally's website here.

Tower of Babel by Clifford W. Tresner. Photograph by scilit on Flickr, here.

Ceramic sculpture by Mary Fischer. See more of Mary's work here.

Ceramic Sculpture by Mary Fischer. See more of Mary's work here.

Ceramic sculpture by Christina Wiese. See website here.

Sculpture by Barry Smith. Rosegum and rusty metal. Height 1.4m. See Barry's website here.

Towered by Ken Munsie. Timber, metal and paper. See website here.

Chain Mail by Ken Munsie. Timber, metal and paper. See Ken's website here.

Sculpture by Dave Kinane. See here.

INSPIRED BY NATURE

Cherry Leaf Circle

Today I dicovered the work of Richard Shilling, a self taught land artist and sculptor living and working in Lancaster in the North West of England.

Cliff Pebble Stack

"My work usually consists of ephemeral sculptures made from natural materials found round and about where the sculpture is made. What comes from nature soon returns to it be it in a few short minutes, hours or days: everything is reclaimed by the sun, tide or wind. My work focuses on the structures, processes and forms of nature and the sculptures attempt to reveal a fresh perspective on what we know about the materials and processes inherent in nature. A particular tree during a particular autumn flush of colour may afford the land artist the opportunity to reveal all the colours of autumn. This chance may come only for a few days and during a particularly good season. Such is the work of the land artist – to attempt to reveal elements of nature at first unseen both to themselves and to anyone viewing their work."

Pebble Colour Bars

I've spent several hours browsing through Richard's work on his blog here and his flickr site here. There are a lot more amazing images where these came from.


Dam and Square



Vertical Stack



Frost Sun


Leaf Curtain

The most intriguing part of these leaf sculptures is that they are held together with thorns.

Autumn Fade

The leaves used in Autumn Fade are all natural colours. I had to look twice, wondering if some of them had been stained. After a wet summer the leaves are more vibrant than usual because of the extra sugars present. Read more about this piece here.


Leaf Spiral. Chestnut Tree leaves and thorns

Richard mentions that he copied Goldsworthy's leaf spiral in order to study the way that it is made. Read the blog post about it here. I think it is as complicated as it looks!

If you've enjoyed looking at Richard Shilling's work you might also enjoy the work of South African Land Artist, Strijdom van der Merwe, here.