Here are a few images if you have never seen any of his work before…
He’s quoted as saying ”I think it’s incredibly brave to be working with flowers and leaves and petals. But I have to: I can’t edit the materials I work with. My remit is to work with nature as a whole.”
I love the variety of the work he produces and the variety of textures, colours and scales he creates essentially from what’s lying around.
More than that though, what I think I really love about his art is the celebration of creation. The celebration of ‘nature as a whole’. And on top of that I love the fantasy, and where his sculptures take me in my imagination.
In one of my favorite books, Surprised by Hope, Tom Wright talks about the resurrection of Jesus. Specifically he talks about the resurrection of his body. His new body is his old body but renewed. He still has his scars from the crucifixion but he can walk through walls and some of his best friends can’t recognize him anymore.
Wright points us to the hope of the resurrection and the hope of our own renewed bodies and the renewed heaven and earth in which we will one day live. A renewed earth, which will perhaps still bare some of the scars of this age but will be renewed and glorious once more. Even more beautiful than it is now.
This is perhaps where Andy Goldsworthy’s art takes me in my imagination. It is this world, but it is somehow different. It is this creation but it can walk through walls.
