If I created a venn diagram of my teaching passions, Andy Goldsworthy would sit squarely in the middle. His work is equal parts visual art and nature adventure, but there's also an element of storytelling, if you care to look closer. Stories about space and time and creation and destruction.
Goldsworthy is perhaps the best known land artist, who continues to create primarily in the countryside around his Scottish home. He is endlessly creative and interesting, and you can visit his website to see new pieces pop up each month. For a nice overview of the artist and his work, a quick visit to The Art Story lays it all out.
Exploring his work is an approachable introduction to environmental art, ephemeral art, and ecological art. It's perfect for toddlers, preschoolers and early elementary age kids. Looking at his process also provides a wonderful lesson in risk taking, planning, patience, frustration, and flexibility. One of my favorite things about his work is how precarious most of it is - there's a high probability of failure as he creates, and that's both exciting and scary. I want my kids to learn to take risks, fail, figure out how to improve, and then patiently work on new ideas.
I consider this Goldsworthy preschool art unit a launching point. It has planted the basic ideas about process that I believe the kids will take out with them each time we head into nature. Rémy already had started making small sculptures out of dirt and sticks and leaves and calling himself Andy Goldsworthy. So I expect that "being Goldsworthy," may just become one of our regular practices.
The unit followed out typical path of storytelling, exploring, playing, creating, reflecting. Here's the breakdown:
STORYTELLING
I introduced Andy Goldsworthy to the kids through several stories. I used a peg doll to represent the artist, and then acted out his adventures through the Scottish countryside as he made art.
These stories contained most of the "teaching" about process. They all follow the same narrative structure, helping to solidify ideas about how the artwork is created. In each story, Andy would walk through the countryside and observe the world around him. He then would find one natural element to focus his attention on for the day. There was planning and preparation that followed, before he starting to build or sculpt. During his work, things would fall apart or change and then the Goldsworthy character would have to adapt.
Here's an interactive storytime that may help get your ideas going:
EXPLORING
When studying Andy Goldsworthy, it's not as easy as heading over to your local museum and seeing a piece or two. Almost all of this stuff lives out in the wilds, and not the wilds of Southern California. Most people will never get to experience viewing a Goldsworthy in person, so we have to enjoy the work through photographs.
I placed out a couple Andy Goldsworthy books containing countless works of land art. The kids browsed through them whenever they felt like it. Rémy felt like it about once a day for a month. Which leads me to a small side note. It's so fascinating to watch which artists a kids takes to. Sierra became Kehinde Wiley's biggest fan during our Kehinde Wiley Unit. For Rémy, Goldsworthy has resonated in a huge way.
There are many books that present Andy Goldsworthy's art, we looked at a couple: A Collaboration with Nature, and Enclosure. The ideas for most of our creations were pulled from the ideas in these two books.
PLAYING
The play element of this unit couldn't be easier to set up - a nature loose parts invitation. To create the invitation, I gathered as many small natural elements that I could find in our yard or during hikes. I then presented the loose parts at an Andy Goldsworthy station that included books and printed out pictures.
I gave a small introduction to the station and the items housed there, then invited them to play. Rémy used the pieces to create little designs and mini sculptures. Sierra simply liked to gather and look at each of the pieces.
Some days, Rémy would say that he wanted to create a specific Goldsworthy design, so we would open the book and talk about how to recreate it with the parts. Then inevitably the designs would morph into something new and unique to Rémy.
CREATING
There are two types of Andy Goldsworthy projects that we created. The first are those pieces that directly reference one of the pictures seen in the books. Almost every time that Rémy looked at a book, he would pull me over to show me which piece of art he would like to make. Some were not possible. There's no ice here. We don't have enough man power to build rivers of logs. But many are very possible, if not downright simple in their construction. All you need it time and the will to make it happen.
The second type of project was created by following Goldsworthy's process and interests, not by imitating any one piece. These were developed by looking at our surroundings and thinking about what we had available. We tried to extend some of the big visual themes that Goldsworthy revisits again and again - holes, enclosures, walls, snaking movement, arches, and color contrast and gradation.
Here are our projects with very brief process descriptions:
Flower Enclosure
We gathered bight yellow flowers growing along a dried creek bed, being careful not to gather too many flowers from any one plant. We found a large rock and encircled its base.
Rock Wall
Goldsworthy loves to create walls using professional stone layers. The kids and I found a snaking ridge of dirt and tried our best to create our own wall by carefully stacking and filling in cracks with smaller rocks.
Acorns in Trunk Trough
This was about using what was interesting at the site. There was a hollowed out, decaying part of a tree that the kids and I filled with acorns growing nearby. This one tied in nicely to our Acorn Unit.
Wet Wool on Rock
On the cover of the book Enclosure, there is a mesmerizing picture of a rock surrounded by water with a whirlpool like design on top. This was made using wet wool. So we pulled apart pieces of wool into strips, found a rock, soaked the wool strips, and added them to the rock. This was the most delicate and difficult of our projects.
Floating Leaf Train
The initial idea was to create a long leaf sculpture that moved along the stream like a snake, reminiscent of Goldsworthy's snaking pieces. But then the project shifted gears and the snake became a train to suit the interests of the kids. We made several of these trains and watched how far they would go before getting stuck on rocks.
Acorn Hole
This was another one that tied into our acorn unit. It is a fairly simple project, but requires a lot of foraging for acorns. Once we had enough, we set a bucket for our hole and built up a circle around it. Once we used all the acorns, the bucket was removed to reveal a hole Goldsworthy would be proud of.
3 Leaf Color Plays
Two of these projects were color gradation works where we gathered leaves, I created a very rough gradation, and then I asked the kids to fill the leaves in where they thought they should go. I was shocked at how well they were able to do this with no instruction at all.
The other leaf project played with the idea of color contrast. We gathered a pile of green leaves off a fallen branch, and then found a perfect yellow leaf for the center to provide contrast and impact.
Leaf Lined Holes
Holes play a huge part in Goldsworthy's work, and we had seen a few pictures where leaves surrounded or emerged from dark holes. This was our version. We dug a couple holes in soft, wet sand, then encircled the holes with leaves found floating in the stream.
Tree Hole with Leaves
We gathered a large amount of gorgeous yellow leaves and brought them over to an oak tree with a large hole in the base of the truck. The kids filled the deep hole with a bucket full of bright leaves.
Wet Shadow
Goldsworthy has created beautiful pieces where he lays down during a rain storm and creates a dry shadow of himself. That seemed a bit much to ask of Rémy and Sierra, so we opted for the easier version. We created a circle shadow (always with the circles) with our trampoline. When removed, it revealed a dry ring.
REFLECTING
This wasn't our average art unit. Instead of one or two larger projects, we filled our time and imagination with lots of little projects. Our reflection was also quite different. Instead of one big reflection, we reflected briefly after completing each project.
I asked what we had done, what they thought about it, what they liked or didn't like. Then came the urge to destroy or break down the art. Often times, I was lucky to get a couple pictures in before the two of them would jump on the art, or throw it, or lay in it.
We talked a lot about how Goldsworthy loves to see how his art changes over time, as nature takes its course. I guess they haven't quite developed that level of patience yet.
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