It's tasteless, odorless, formless and invisible but living on an island off Europe 'Wind' is something we know quite well. One day I remember my four year old son asking me 'Who makes the wind?' and I told him 'Thermodynamics' in a off the cuff, I'm too busy right now sort of way, Oh what joy I had when I heard reports for his preschool that he was telling everyone that 'Thermodynamics makes the wind' yes I have such a genius of a son.
As a theme for a sand sculpture project it is quite a difficult challenge but one we were faced with for the 2006 Neusiedl am See festival in Austria. Of course approaching a subject like this head on would be difficult so, we had to tack and find a more navigable approach. It is really an element that can only be observed by it effects so we had to think of something more tangible to represent it.
The sculpture was the demo pile on this project with around ten other solo sculptures dotted around. I was working with around eight other carvers on the piece, this was many too be honest. lots of carvers hadn't much to do. Our idea after a long discussion was to make a Jinny Joe being blown by some lips.
Two sides of the same coin
I worked on the lips and dandelion along with Metta Mai Langer (Always loved her name). The others found themselves something to do on the other sides of the sculpture, We had enough to concentrate on on our side and as long as we were all working towards the same goal I really didn't mind what they were up to but I do remember they had a very tough journey with all the strong egos in their group. Metta Mai and I had a nice time working together playing with form and texture to try and make things look delicate.
The dandelion was a difficult thing to make delicate in sand and so we opted for a more graphic stylized version. It probably didn't really look like one but was the best we could come up with.
A big hand holding it and then some leaves below finished the composition on our side.
Natures addition
It was like our sculpture called it into being, just as we were finishing up the wind also picked up and a close by field of dandelions freed their seeds to the four winds and filled the air with floating Pappus ( that's what they are called) the little bristly umbrellas which allow them to fly. Scientist think that these create a little vortex around them allowing them to stay airborne for long periods. It was quite beautiful to see them floating around our sculpture and many came to rest on it. It was like they were attracted to the mother of all dandelions.
I was pleasantly surprised when i saw what the rest of the team were up to on the other side of the sculpture. It was like a big graphic showing the wind direction through the sculpture all pointing towards a tiny cut-through in the lips.
Everything else was a haze about this project I just remember that I had a wonderful time in the great weather and working with Metta. We seem to click our ideas together very easily.
Ps
Thanks for reading. I use Steem to document my work as an ephemeral Sculptor of sand, snow and ice, among other things. This will hopefully give it a new life on the Steem blockchain. Below you will find some of my recent posts.
Perpetual Evolution - ice sculpture
Disjointed - ice sculpture
The bold and the beautiful - ice sculpture
I hope you'll join me again soon
@ammonite