Andy Goldsworthy

Andy Goldsworthy was born in 1956 in Cheshire, England. He is a land artists. Goldsworthy always knew he was going to be and artist. He had lived on a farm since the age of 13. Living on the farm is what opened him up to land art. He produces site-specific land art which is art work created to exist in a certain place. Typically, the artist takes the location into account while planning and creating the artwork.

The materials used in Andy Goldsworthy's art often include brightly-colored flowers, icicles, leaves, mud, clay, pinecones, snow, stone, twigs, and thorns. (basically anything he can find).  He is also considered to be the founder of modern rock balancing.

"I want my art to be sensitive and alert to changes in material, season and weather. Each work grows, stays, decays. Process and decay are implicit. Transience in my work reflects what I find in nature." 

Roof

This is one of his permanent pieces, its called "Roof." A team of workers including four dry-stone wallers, installed the sculpture entitled Roof on the ground level of the East Building over the course of nine weeks in the winter of 2004/2005. The concept for the sculpture came from the artist's interest in the origin of Washington building stones, and evokes the natural sources of this urban center. The sculpture is comprised of nine, stacked-slate, hollow domes, each measuring approximately five and a half feet high and twenty-seven feet in diameter 

Stone River

"Stone River" is a 320 ft long sandstone sculpture located at Stanford University. He worked with  eight professional English and Scottish dry-stone wallers, who worked for 11 hours a day, six days a week for three-and-a-half weeks on the project. Though Goldsworthy's palms and fingers are callused and his fingernails are discolored from years of working outside, he didn't lay any stones himself!  The Sculpture is called stone river but Goldsworthy says its not a river but more of a flow and movement. A flow of energy from the rocks.

  

 

  Photography plays a huge role in Andy Goldworthy's art because most of his art isn't something that can be put into a gallery. Most of the art he creates out in nature is not seen by very many people. That's because his art is transient or very temporary. Some of his works my only last up to 20 seconds. It all depends on the environment its in. With his camera he is able to capture these moments and bring them to us so we can have a little taste of how he views the earth and nature.