This set of six works from Andy Goldsworthy’s ‘5 tree drawings / snow smeared on bark / melting / then freezing at night / slowly fragmenting / Dumfriesshire’ series perfectly captures the artist’s approach to site-specific works. Traveling around Dumfriesshire, a county of Scotland, Goldsworthy embraces the trees and winter landscape as his canvas, creating an intricate and ephemeral design from snow packed against the trunks. Speaking to the fleeting moments of transient beauty seen throughout the natural world, Goldsworthy creates a stunning display of object verses space, allowing the visual interaction of his work to allude to the evanescent aspects of man’s impression upon nature and his place in the world.
British sculptor and photographer Andy Goldsworthy (b.1956) produces site-specific sculptural works that reflect and are created by materials found in the surrounding environment. As many of his works are ephemeral, Goldsworthy photographs each piece, documenting the artistic process of creation and in turn, captures the developing interaction between the made object and its location. Goldsworthy also creates more permanent works, for which he employs machine tools to better the sculptures’ chances of withstanding the elements.
Goldsworthy studied fine art at Bradford College of Art (1974–1975) and earned his BA from Preston Polytechnic (1975–1978) in Preston, Lancashire. Goldsworthy also was given an honorary degree by the University of Bradford in 1993 and is an A.D. White Professor-At-Large at Cornell University. Other honors include the North West Arts Award (1979), the Yorkshire Arts Award (1980), two Northern Arts Awards (1981, 1982), the Scottish Arts Council Award (1987) and in 2000 he was appointed officer of the Order of the British Empire. Goldsworthy has produced and exhibited works all over the globe, his work has recently been shown at Galerie Lelong, New York, NY (2011); Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY (2010); Villa Giulia, Centro Ricerca Arte Attuale, Verbania, Italy (2009); Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia (2009); and Lime Tree Gallery, Fort William, Scotland (2009). In 2001, Thomas Riedelsheimer directed a documentary film about Goldsworthy called ‘Rivers and Tides’.
Select Public Collections:
Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, Italy
Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Fine Arts, Tochigi, Japan
Gulbenkian, Lisbon, Portugal
Leeds City Art Gallery, Leeds, UK
Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, UK
Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, La Jolla, CA
Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase, NY
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA
1.
5 tree drawings / snow smeared on bark / melting / then freezing at night / slowly fragmenting / Dumfriesshire
1996
Framed: 25.2 x 12.1 in
Paper: 22.9 x 9.8 in
Photo: 9.5 x 7.5 in
2.
Cadfanoch Dumfriesshire
January 1996
Framed: 25 x 12.2 in
Paper: 23 x 10 in
Photo: 19.5 x 7.25 in
3.
Drumlanrig Dumfriesshire
April 1996
Framed: 25.1 x 12.1 in
Paper: 22.75 x 10.2 in
Photo: 19.5 x 7.75 in
4.
Drumlanrig Dumfriesshire
April 1996
Framed: 25.2 x 12.1 in
Paper: 22.8 x 10 in
Photo: 19.5 x 7.7
5.
Cadfanoch Dumfriesshire
January 1996
Framed: 25.1 x 12.25 in
Paper: 23 x 10 in
Photo: 19.3 x 8.25 in
6.
Penpont Dumfriesshire
January 1996
Framed: 25.2 x 12.25 in
Paper: 23 x 10 in
Photo: 19 x 7.75 in
