It's a bit quiet here, so since I've just been to the big AG
exhibition at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, I think a posting is in
order.

First, some minor news. Amazon UK are listing AG's new book
"Enclosure" as available from 27th October - there's a pre-release
copy on eBay right now, so that may well be about right.

YSP are selling a reprint of "Parkland", you can get it online at
www.ysp.co.uk

Not available online, but at the exhibition, is "Andy Goldsworthy at
Yorkshire Sculpture Park" (ISBN 1 871480 60 4), 164pp for £15. Lots of
photo documentation of the outdoor and indoor installations, plus a
long interview by Tina Fiske. Printed with a slightly pale tint to all
the photos, which is mildly disappointing (the same as on the
exhibition's postcards). No idea if/when it will become available
online, but you can always email YSP to find out - I'd guess not until
the exhibition ends in January.

The Underground Gallery is an excellent space for AG's work - a series
of large rooms suitable for large-scale installations. The last thing
I saw there was an excellent set of pieces by light-artist James
Turrell (who like AG, has a permanent work in the YSP's grounds).
These are all essentially repeats of earlier pieces - a log cairn; a
leaf-stalk screen (very impressive but very similar to one I first saw
at Edinburgh Botanical Gardens many years ago), a set of stone domes
(similar to those in Washington), cracked-clay walls. My favourite was
the "Wood Room", an internal dome made from coppiced logs, which you
walk inside. Hard to figure out whether it was oppressive or calming,
although my 6-year old thought it was "spooky".

This gallery also has a set of photos of "burn dams", a small stream
near AG's home dammed by stone-and-wood walls which eventually
collapse as the water rises. Maybe it's because I'm a civil engineer,
but I really enjoyed these.

Outside are three "striding arches", shortly to be relocated to
Cairnhead, a small community near AG's home in Dumfries & Galloway. I
found these somewhat artificial, a less direct experience than much of
what was inside.

The nearby Bothy and Garden galleries offer retrospective photos,
small sculptures etc. All very interesting, and certainly including
plenty that has never made it into AG's books. My favourites were
several of the artist's notebooks showing development sketches, and
photos of a submerged "stone river" somewhere on private land in the
USA, which looked quite amazing when the water reached the right
level.

Out in the YSP estate are three "hanging trees" in stone enclosures,
plus the "Outclosure", a circular drystone wall too tall to see
inside. This latter was interesting as it's a political statement
about the enclosures of land which took common land into private
ownership - something still relevant today given the extreme extent to
which most British land remains in often inaccessible private
ownership.

The Longside Gallery features a surprisingly pretty and only slightly
smelly picture made from cow dung on the window, plus a set of
sheep-dung and hare's blood drawings. I like these because they're the
less "arranged" end of AG's work, an openness to random process to see
what results. The gallery is dominated by a set of sheep-paintings,
made from sheep walking repeatedly on canvas, which for me had a
similar attraction.

The exhibition is still open until January 6th, and I imagine that
if/when the snow falls much of it will look quite different. This
includes the "shadow stone enclosure", a working sheepfold (the YSP is
pretty much carpeted with sheep droppings) with a stone on which
visitors are invited to lie to cast "shadows" from the rain or snow.

Overall, the exhibition works well as a retrospective, there was
little idea of any new direction in AG's work, but much of it remains
beautiful, spectacular, or just thought-provoking.

Cheers,

Brian