Someone read this and just tell me in short words about what is says. Art can be made out of anything, including ordinary things we find around us.
Everyday objects that we usually throw away, such as metal cans or bits of
newspaper, can be reused to make sculpture, jewelry, or musical instruments, for
example. Their value depends on the artist’s ability to see how their shape, color,
material, or design can be used in a new way. Some artists even recycle images and
materials from other people’s art, adding personal touches or altering the original
artwork to make their own statement.
A patchwork quilt is sewn together from scraps, remnants, and rags. Quilters,
often working together, combine these irregular bits and pieces of cloth into a new
pattern. In rural America, the traditional quilting bee gave friends and neighbors a
chance to get together and exchange news and gossip.
Public places can become art spaces. Artists on New York’s Lower East Side
have transformed an old gas station into a gallery, sculpture garden, and performance
space. They turn abandoned cars and other urban debris into a community work of
art that continues to grow. . . .
The German artist Kurt Schwitters (1887–1948) used discarded objects to create
a style of art he called Rubbish. Schwitters walked the streets collecting torn pieces
of paper, ticket stubs, and bits of string—anything someone had thrown away—and
used glue to combine them on a plain background. That kind of picture is called a
collage, from the French word for paste. . . .
With a little imagination, any object can be used for art. During World War II, raw
materials of all kinds were in short supply. The famous Spanish artist Pablo Picasso
(1881–1973) hoarded “junk” such as bicycle frames, mattress springs, and gardening
tools, which he made into sculptures. Bull’s Head, created in 1942, is made from a
bicycle seat and handlebars cast in bronze.
Musical instruments can be made from recyclables. American composer Harry
Partch (1901–1974) turned large glass bottles called carboys into an enormous set
of hanging gongs. Partch named his instrument the Cloud-Chamber Bowls in 1950,
when he found the tops and bottoms of carboys that had been cut in a laboratory . . . .
Doing some experimenting of his own, he discovered ways of striking the bowls to
produce beautiful and complex tones.
Have you ever stacked stones in a huge pile or built a fort out of sticks? Then
you’re an Earth Artist. You don’t need paint or paper to make art: in fact, Earth Artist
Andy Goldsworthy started out with a simple rule: he would work outside and only use
materials he could find nearby. That meant using thorns to pin dried stalks together
and spit to paste leaves to rocks! “I splashed in water, covered myself in mud, went
barefoot, and woke with the dawn,” Goldsworthy says in the book Hand to Earth. He
also got rained and snowed on a lot, sometimes on purpose! To make a “rain shadow,”
Goldsworthy lies down on the ground when it’s just beginning to rain, then gets up
once he’s soaked and takes a picture of the man-shaped dry spot he left behind.
Home is in Scotland, but Goldsworthy has worked in the United States, France,
Australia, Japan, and even at the North Pole. His finished works made of stones,
sticks, leaves, ice, sand, or mud look astoundingly simple and beautiful, but the
process can be filthy and even frustrating. The purpose isn’t just to make a nice piece
of art—it’s a way of learning about the world. In his book A Collaboration with Nature,
Goldsworthy says, “I stop at a place or pick up a material because I feel there is
something to be discovered. Here is where I can learn.”
Gluing Icicles
A man with white hair, a white beard, and a Scottish accent rubs his freezing
hands together before picking up a piece of icicle, dipping it in snow and then in
water, and holding it against another bit of ice. Then he waits patiently until the two
pieces freeze together.
Andy Goldsworthy is being filmed in action for the documentary Rivers and Tides.
The curving line of ice he’s working on looks as if it weaves through and around a
point of stone. If a piece of icicle doesn’t fit quite right, he chews the end until it does.
His hands are cold and dirty, but he can’t feel the ice properly with gloves on. “It’s
hard going and it’s hard on the hands. . . . All effort is going into trying to make
something that is effortless,” he says.
Finally, the Sun rises and shines through the curving ice; it seems to glow. “I never
had any idea that would happen!” Goldsworthy says with delight, going on to point
out that “the very thing that brings the work to life is the thing that will cause its
death.” The ice will melt in the sunlight, and the sculpture will be gone.
Balancing Stones