The sun had set. The shadows were beginning to deepen. I found a lovely drift area where the wind had compacted the snow and carved it at the same time. It was about 5 below zero.
Can't work for too long without gloves on in conditions like that ! A quick spiral was attempted... a sketch really.
It was fun ! More will follow I'm sure once it warms up a little ! :-)
It has been so very cold here the past few days. Too cold to work with ice. I have a sculpture half done but had to wrap it up and hope enough remains when the temperature warms up again. It needs to be at least 10 F or so to use the techniques I use.
So, I went for a walk to see what other sorts of work could be done in this bitter air.
The wind had howled last night and had formed a lovely drift on the top and side of a large boulder here near the house. The snow was extremely fragile, one false touch and it would peel off the rock. So I worked very carefully and had fun accentuating the natural curves that were already in play.
I want to explore working with the shadow elements of the snow, they are so gorgeously deep and full of subtle colour when the sky is clear and blue. Unfortunately, my digital camera seems unable to record these colours as well as the eye can... but it will be fun to see what is still possible.
Stay tuned !!
Please Join me if you can, at the Vermont Flower Show on March 6.7.8 , 2009
There will be an entire display garden of Faerie Houses and I will have a booth there showing all my Environmental sculpture products ; calendars, prints, books and cards. Plus a house or two may be up for sale !
There is a link at the bottom of this page (scroll waaaaay down if your browser shows you a lot of postings, not just this one ) to take you directly to the show's webpage. There is also one in the Nav bar at the right.
I hope you can join us... it is always a welcomed treat to be able to smell lilacs and blooming flowers while there is still a lot of snow on the ground !
Please come if you can !!!!
I am VERY pleased to announce the release of my latest calendar, the 2009 Eartherials calendar with new images from sculptures created last year.
The last Eartherials calendar had just one image per month and a detailed description to go with each image. This year, there were simply too many good images to choose from. I hated to cut the list any shorter, so I put two images on each month page and made the descriptions very brief.
For my loyal blog fans, I am offering a special pricing and access deal. For the moment, the calendar can only be accessed by the special link at the top of the pink box to the right.
This special pricing and access is in effect for the just next week, till January, 15th. After that, the page will go public and the price will increase. This is a special offer for my blog readers and newsletter subscribers. If you order 5 or more calendars, the price drops to $14.70 each.
When you go to the web page, please give it a minute as the website is loading a full preview of the entire calendar for you to see. PLEASE note, the last page (December's) preview is just terrible... but this is not the case for the actual calendar. I just received my proofs and they look fine, the preview however looks fuzzy and out of focus.
I'm really pleased with this calendar and hope you will be too. When you go to the link above, you can also, if you wish, order calendars for friend and have them shipped directly to them. Just make separate orders and Lulu can print the calendar and ship it where ever you like. If you want to ship overseas, it might be better for US buyers to purchase the calendar here and ship it themselves... I'm not sure Lulu can ship calendars Internationally.
*** If you happen to be an overseas customer and would like to purchase these calendars and cannot, please contact me directly and I will work with you to make sure you get some ***
My other announcement will come this week-end.
I was cleaning up my archives from my work that was finished this past year and found a few more houses that did not make it to the blog page because this fall had just so many creative experiments !
This little house sits atop a large heart-shaped boulder. The geology of the site is what attracted me to this location first. This boulder is VERY old as it was embedded in the sandstone layers surrounding it. This streambed is not the usual jumble of boulders which have tumbled down off the mountains, this is old rock, laid down long ago... and yet, this boulder is there ... how truly ancient it must be !
All this thoughtful introspection called for a little Faerie spot to sit and contemplate...so I made this twiggy gazebo. There is a leaf-line bridge heading out from the shore for those who wish to walk to the spot- lightly, of course !
I loved this location and may return again next year, but it is a difficult spot for photographs as it is in a deep ravine with little sunlight able to filter in.... still, a worthwhile place to get to know a little better !
A few more gleanings from last year's work will be posted here shortly... but in the next day or two I am going to have 2 announcements to make so stay tuned !
This image is actually an experiment.
I had an idea about creating an over-sized snowflake sort of sculpture...but I wanted to make just half of the sculpture and let the other half be created by a reflection. The lake has been very windy lately so it was not going to work as a location. The rivers are all frozen and most of the ponds have snow on them... where to go to get that elusive reflection?
I found a spot today out in my west field and decided to give it a try. The work progressed fairly well but sadly, the day began to really deteriorate the last hour before sunset so all the lovely sunset glow that I had hoped to capture in the ice looked like it was not going to happen... so I went up to the house and made a cup of tea to wait for dark.
All of a sudden, the western sky went ablaze with brilliant red light. I grabbed the camera and RAN... forgetting my tripod !! ACK !!!!
By the time I made it down to the sculpture and set up the camera on some quickly arranged snow chunks, the light had really faded... sadly, all the shots were blurry except one, which has too little light to make it very useful but it hints at what is possible if I get lucky with the light next time:
After the reds fully faded and the twilight began to really progress (at 15 F brrrr ) , I lit the small candle I had originally intended for the sculpture and used one of the snow chunks as a blocking shade to hide the actual candle... to get a better exposure.
I still did not have a tripod, so the image quality is not so great...but as an experiment, it is a good start. I see now, design-wise how I can improve certain elements and next time I'll remember to grab that tripod ! I hope to try this again with better icicles and better sunset light... and it gave me a few more winter house ideas too ! Watch this space ! :-)
Happy New Year to All !
May the new year bring Peace, Prosperity and good health to All !
Wishing everyone a safe, happy holiday.
See you next year !
This simple sculpture was not made this year but it was made for a previous Winter Solstice sunrise.
It is given to the landscape as a prayer for the Earth. May we who have lived so disruptively upon the landscape learn new ways to live more respectfully, more sustainably and with the long view towards stewardship rather than exploitation. This new day is beginning to dawn all across the globe in small and large ways. I encourage everyone to find just one way to make a change in your own daily living here on this beautiful planet...find just one thing to do differently, and then do it...and when that change has become part of your routine, add another change...and keep going.
Happy New Year Dawning to everyone !
As some of you know, Pomegranate Communications has become my primary publishing partner this year. I wanted to send them a special "thank you" and so I experimented with creating Faerie Houses out of actual pomegranates - organic, of course !
Originally I had hoped to send them the real, dried little houses, but I learned that pomegranates don't look so wonderful when they are hollowed out and dried... and they get much smaller. So I sent them the image instead. They loved it.
I wanted to try it again and see if I could improve on the design, which is what we have here.
My sister had given me some clever little battery-powered, LED tea lights and I affixed one inside the roof of the house and waited for dusk...
Happy Holidays to all and to all a wonderful New Year !!
(Some, like myself, see the year as renewing itself on the Winter Solstice)
Sometimes you just have to go with the flow, embrace what is going on all around you and jump in as best you can... getting the house all decorated and ready for holiday merriments seems to be the order of the day...and it is no less so in the Faerie Worlds.
They are tuned into the great turning of the year, the Winter Solstice. Around these parts it is a very big deal because the days are so short now. That means that there is so much more scurrying and bustling during the limited daylight hours for wee folk of all description, as everyone gets ready to welcome the sun back on its return journey from the southern edges of our horizon line. We still have to go through the coldest months, but at least it will be with increasing daylight. Nature does make compensations sometimes!
Coming up soon... more festive Faerie Houses.
It is hard to believe, but as of last week, I've been posting on this blog for just over a year...amazing !! What a year it has been too ! It was difficult for me to pick a single sculpture to share that carried the feeling of celebration and yet stayed true to the festive season and turning of the solar year that is nearly upon us...but this sculpture does it well I think... and it looks a bit like a birthday cake too !
This was made last winter and as the twilight fell, the candlelight inside brought the whole crystalline palace into such astonishing beauty that I could hardly believe it. The experience of creating this blog has been a bit like this as well...at fist a quiet glow, but as time has passed, it has surprised me how deep and rich the process has been.
It has been such a pleasure to share my work with you all and to know that there are people all over the world who are tuning in and seeing these sculptures..it is an amazing feeling to know that the connections are being made. Thank you for all your kind comments and support - both emotional and financial... it all means a great deal more than you can know.
THANK YOU !!
This is the same sculpture taken just at sunset. What is fun to think about is that the moon and Venus ARE in this sky as well... we just can't see them because the sun's light is so overwhelming... but reduce that influence, and subtler things are revealed.
This image was created last year during another New moon and Venus close encounter, taken about 30 minutes after sunset. There was still enough pink in the sky along the horizon line to get picked up in the ice... I love that about ice...it captures and reflects all the subtle details we might normally miss.
This image is in my new book.
I am very pleased to announce that this image is now available as Greeting cards and also as fine art digital gliclee prints.
The prints have been proofed for both editions and they look great. The cards are 5 x 7 in and come with white envelopes.
You can order:
1-24 cards for $ 2.80 each (less that what you'd pay in the stores) + Ship
25 cards for $ 2.48 each + Ship
50 cards for $ 2.05 each + Ship
100 cards for $ 1.75 each + Ship
The digital giclee prints come in two image sizes:
8 x 10 inches $30 + Shipping
or 10 x 13 inches for $45 + shipping These prints are archival quality and are printed on 100% acid free cotton rag paper.
Larger sizes available on request and prints on canvas also available on request.
Please contact me directly for more information if you are interested... use the contact link to the right. I'll set up your order for you till I can get the links and pages for direct ordering up. Some people wanted these cards "ASAP" and so this is what I can do at this moment.
Thanks Everyone for your interest !!
I am very pleased to announce that my second book is now finished and available ! 56 full colour pages in 8.5 x 11 format, perfect bound. I just received my proof copy and it looks great !!!
If you want to see it, cut and paste this URL:
http://www.lulu.com/content/5176717 or click on the lulu storefront link on the right side of this page>
Those of you who have been following my blog will recognize many of the sculptures, but there are more surprises within the pages of the book that you have not seen before. Just in time for holiday giving... choose the "Priority mail" shipping service and you should get it in time.
Welcome to the enchanted world of Environmental art and Faerie Houses sculptures created by Sally J Smith. Here you will find photos of the artist's unique art-forms and hear some of the stories from behind the scenes as she shares with you her creative process.
I was cleaning up my archives from my work that was finished this past year and found a few more houses that did not make it to the blog page because this fall had just so many creative experiments !
This image is actually an experiment.
This simple sculpture was not made this year but it was made for a previous Winter Solstice sunrise. 
As some of you know, Pomegranate Communications has become my primary publishing partner this year. I wanted to send them a special "thank you" and so I experimented with creating Faerie Houses out of actual pomegranates - organic, of course !
Sometimes you just have to go with the flow, embrace what is going on all around you and jump in as best you can... getting the house all decorated and ready for holiday merriments seems to be the order of the day...and it is no less so in the Faerie Worlds.
It is hard to believe, but as of last week, I've been posting on this blog for just over a year...amazing !! What a year it has been too ! It was difficult for me to pick a single sculpture to share that carried the feeling of celebration and yet stayed true to the festive season and turning of the solar year that is nearly upon us...but this sculpture does it well I think... and it looks a bit like a birthday cake too !
This is the same sculpture taken just at sunset. What is fun to think about is that the moon and Venus ARE in this sky as well... we just can't see them because the sun's light is so overwhelming... but reduce that influence, and subtler things are revealed.
I am very pleased to announce that this image is now available as Greeting cards and also as fine art digital gliclee prints.
