Environmental / Nature Art

Andy Goldsworthy, images from www.chicagonow.com

I have spent the last two weeks researching and looking at environmental art. According to Wikipedia the term environmental art is:

"...used in a variety of different contexts: it can be used to refer to art describing the natural world, art that celebrates personal engagement with the natural world ("art in nature"), and to the practices of ecological artists, whose work directly addresses environmental issues ("ecological art" or "eco-art")[4][5] through educating people about the natural world, or intervening in and restoring the natural world."

As I feel much of my art is nature orientated and focused on the environment, I felt it was necessary to look into this art. Andy Goldsworthy is one of my favourite environmental or land artists and I have tried to make this kind of art on a small scale and take photographs of it. For example,

Wild Heart, Emma Arthur (2014)

Although Andy Goldworthy's art is striking, I feel that it is contrived. It is taking nature and manipulating it into something else. This is what I have done above - all the elements of the photograph are arranged. I had to find each part and arrange them. This point raises another issue. If you take a photograph of nature, then manipulate it digitally, is it still nature art? For example, the photograph below is a reflection of twigs in water. I manipulated it digitally afterwards. Is it still clear that the image is of twigs? Does it need to be? Is it still nature art?

Hidden Reflections, Emma Arthur (2014)

References

Weather Girl, (2014) Andy Goldsworthy, weather artist? Chicago Weather Watch Blog

[Online] 21 October 2014. Available at: http://www.chicagonow.com/chicago-weather-watch/2014/10/andy-goldsworthy-weather-artist/ [Accessed: 10 November, 2014]

Environmental art, Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_art

[Accessed: 10 November, 2014].