Farming rock art
Iceland was denuded of trees a thousand years ago, and more than a hundred years afforestation has been difficult and of limited success. One problem is the sheep eat the trees, so all forests must be fenced in, and this cool conveyance allows hikers like myself to cross the barbed wire unscathed.
My Impressions enhance texture. The imperfections and cuts of the drawings mimic the natural aesthetics of the original carving .
Here’s the Moose Rock with the Aspy Bay and Cape North in the background. My intention was to carve fish and fishermen, but my host argued that people there ate as much moose as fish, so I carved this moose.
Below, shows the carving painted for printing and a rice paper impression made from the carving.
Philosopher and author, Alva Noe, characterizes my work well:
” The very project, then, is a social experiment; the artist works with rock and carving, but he also works with this more immaterial material of delicate social relations and community. This is no less the stuff of his art.”
Read more about it here :
http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2016/04/23/474717276/making-art-from-life
This carving features a working cowboy, Morris Ware, from the community around the carving, Jerry Brown had invited some funeral directors out to Ingomar to stay at the Bunk n’ Biscuit, ride horses and push cows during the day, and hang out at the Jersey Lily at night. I tagged along one day while they pushed cows closer to the ranch for the fall roundup.
The best part of the day was lunch at the Newman’s ranch.
This carving was made for Bettina Hubby’s “Eagle Rock – Rock N Eagle Shop”. It was carved at the terminus of the a limestone quarry in New Hope, PA. The fissures in the rock made it a challenge, but the piece is sheltered and well protected.
All around the carving I made pictographs of concentric circles and emblems. The patron of the piece *did not like* the pictographs, but they are my favorite part of the piece, so we compromised and most remain.
After seeing my Fish Petroglyph at the Grand Rapids Public Museum, during ArtPrize 2014,this is a piece commissioned by the Community Development Foundation of St. Clair County in Port Huron, MI. The piece is along the Blue Water River Walk.
The St. Clair River as it pours out of the south end of Lake Huron is a unique color of cerulean blue, and the snorkeling around the barge dock next to the rock is some of the best ever: big cat fish, giant schools of minnows, musky, bass, big carp, and more. The community engagement facet of this piece was unique since it is intended to honor the history of the Native Americans and First Nations of the area.
In the Berkeley Petroglyph, I used triangles as compositional devices to unify the top and bottom of the frieze. The top panel was aerospace images and the lower frieze was a view of the Bay from the rock. This sailboat is the apex of the bottom triangle which is formed by three sailboats. This was a vintage racing boat. The purple rain color is residue from the printmaking process.
