In the beginning there was landscape, then came life, then life developed rituals (Dogs going round in circles before lying down, Elephants visiting the remains of dead relatives), then creatures made things and altered the landscape (nests, burrows, display sites), then humans started taking these things a lot further.
We have been altering the landscape and making art since pre-history. The sculpture park is a piece of altered landscape, that is a display site and a piece of show-off theatre, that is now also a place to see works of art.
I am just about to start giving Art and Landscape tours of the Park again. Here is the old document for the tour. A new one is on its way.
There is a sycamore tree down the garden that was built into the platform. Now we have a bigger variety of native trees, we have decided to try to stop the sycamore growing and give the others more chance. It is currently turning into a carved pole with a tawny owl at the top. Having had fewer pheasants over the summer, a family of six suddenly appeared and have been back all the time since. In such a big garden it is often hard to keep up with general maintenance, especially when health problems interfere, Now we have some help and have started to catch up again, cleaning and retreating decks steps and home made furmiture.
Before the gardeners arrivedGarden September 2020Seated Man detailWhat are you looking at?
Designing a garden, painting or sculpture, or even looking at one, involves choices. Do you open everything up to view straight away or do you keep some things temporarily hidden? Do you make it obvious or do people have to make an effort?
Today I had a quick wander round YSP to see some spots I haven’t visited in a while and it made me think about layers of vision.
Sometimes people ask about the views in our garden and the top two pictures here illustrate how it has changed. In the first, you can see hills beyond clearly, but there is nothing really in the foreground to hold your eye. In the second, the foreground is so complicated that it is possible not to notice the hills. The foreground now has its own layers of detail and hints of other views. To see the hills more clearly you have to walk down to the shelter that can just be seen bottom right in the second picture. The whole picture has become richer.
Similarly with the Seated Man sculpture from YSP. It is often depicted from the side or three quarter front, giving a clear view of who it is. While I was up there today. I noticed that the man is actually not looking at YSP at all, but at Emley Moor mast, which adds a new dimension to the thoughtful face on the sculpture. Similarly, if you pause and look closely, you can see the hairs on the man’s chest, which takes some doing in a huge solid object like that. The level of detail in this representational piece is there to make you think about the object in a more complex way.
The sculpture itself takes some effort to get to as well. I used to point people to a previous sculpture on this spot from right across the valley, but, despite its size, you can’t really spot this one easily from that far away. This means that like the garden and YSP itself, you have to walk around and give it time to disccover more.
