An autumn observance · Franklin, New York
Not Goldsworthy
Roam the land. Notice what is there.
Reorganize it for a while.
After a two-year hiatus
The urge remains irresistible.
The time has come to revive our observance of Are You Goldsworthy?—though, this time, under another name.
At a group show, children were encouraged to emulate Andy Goldsworthy’s stone sculptures, prompting him to object—quite rightly—that this trivialized his work. We will therefore leave his name out of it.
The urge to engage with nature in a manner inspired by that work remains, nevertheless, irresistible. So we will give it another try: attentive to this place, temporary in spirit, and emphatically not Goldsworthy.
One possible undertaking
Reveal the quarry.
One project we might pursue involves clarifying the site of the bluestone quarry: removing extraneous elements that presently obscure the face of the rock and the ways the stonecutters carved into it.
Not a restoration. An act of looking, clearing, and making an old human gesture legible again.
Past arrangements · 2015 & 2023
Works in stone.
At the quarry, fragments have been balanced, folded, gathered into rings, and joined with flowers gathered elsewhere on the land.
Beyond that—or perhaps closer
What the land offers.
We will roam and discover media for reorganization. Nothing imported. Nothing permanent. Begin by paying attention.
- 01 Flowers
- 02 Fallen wood
- 03 Brook stones
- 04 Springs
- 05 Hawthorns haws & thorns
- 06 Teasel
Found, gathered, reorganized
The land as palette.
Seed pods become a textile. Sticks hold a circle of water. Mushrooms, lichen, bark, and flowers find brief new relations.
Explore the complete 2015 album and 2023 album.
