Every year for the last decade I’ve done large outdoor art installations (earthworks, or “weatherworks”) on a frozen lake. Here’s the 2023 edition. (See some earlier ones at my Substack HERE. Editioned prints available: contact.).
They are usually done in very cold weather (-20). They take anywhere from 10-25 hours to make and document. They usually last for about 30 minutes after completion—I work as long a I can in the daylight hours until the sun starts to set before I have to photograph them. They never last overnight because snow, wind, rain, etc destroys them.
Except this time.
It didin’t snow overnight, and the weather warmed up the next day, melting the snow, which allowed the colors to mix together, and the textures I’d created to morph. The work went from matte to gloss, and some parts showed became translucent, adding visual depth. This was perfect, because chance, change, and ephemerality are major themes in my work.
I photograph the work in ways that obscure scale and perspective. The images could be taken from a sattelite over Jupiter, a drone over a coral system, a closeup of moss in some exotic rainforest, an electron microscope examining microorganisms.
The works are physically arduous — squatting, leaning, extending, but also frozen fingers and numb fingers. But it puts you in tune with the environment, because you have to watch the clouds coming in, pay attention to the light, feel the direction and strength of the wind, place your feet right on the ice. This year the ice was really noisy, weird and very loud warping sounds (like a whale call? or giant steel rubber band?) that would sound out, and at least a couple times let to audible and visible cracks.
