Two days of rain had taken a huge toll on the icefall.. still, it was holding on and lovely in the late afternoon sun. All along the nearby riverbanks the red dogwood was showing the blushing glow of early spring. The bark gets especially red in some plants as the spring warms the sap. I decided to work with these twigs as the contrast to the blue ice might make for an interesting sculpture.
As usual it was a race against the sun to get the piece in position before the last low angled rays disappeared behind the mountains... but the low angled light also gives the best shadows and colour to the ice. The rest of the week is forecasted to be grey, warm and rainy... this could be the last time I can work safely with this ice.... as it was a huge chunk fell off just as I was finished photographing the piece... always a reminder to stay alert around ice !
I have several houses that I had made just for the flower show that have not been photographed outdoors yet. One in particular was on my mind as needing to be done soon as the white world of winter has all but disappeared from here. I knew I was going to have to go up into the mountains to try and find a reasonable location as the house had a festive holiday type look with red berries and tiny Hemlock cones and it needed to look like it was in a wintry setting.
So I put camera and house and winter clothes in the car and headed up to find a location. This is not how I usually work but the season was past and I needed to improvise.
Along the road I found a stunningly beautiful icefall that was receiving the late afternoon sun. Water was pouring off the ice. It was spectacular. And dangerous to get near... the footing was rotten... I slipped thru once and my entire leg was swallowed up (good thing I had my waders on ) and with this amount of melt the ice could come loose from the cliff at any moment. But the beauty of it !!! It lured me in...
so.. this is the result... I'm not sure if this house actually looks its best here. But I knew we were in for 2 days of rain and the icefall may not be there when the sun returns for more photos... so this is what I have for now.
It is an odd feeling creating a house and then trying to find the right location.. I usually start with the location and build something to try and harmonize with the environment... so it is good to try something different from time to time. This house has a lot of lovely details that are not shown to best advantage here, but at least there is a wintery feeling.
I photographed many other areas of the icefall... it was such a lovely sculpture in and of itself.
Hi Everyone !
My apologies for it being such a long time since my last post. I had a huge mess to clean up after the Flower show and a lot of orders to process ! We had our final wrap-up meeting today and it was good to see everyone again and to get a final report on the show.
So now it is time to take a look back for a moment and say good-bye to Winter and hello to Spring. I feel like I barely touched winter this year. Usually it is one of my most treasured seasons for working with the landscape and the weather. The challenges of the cold are difficult, but the rewards of working materials so bright and gravity-defying are really something I look forward to. I feel as if somehow I missed winter entirely this year because I did not get to make many sculptures with snow and ice.
In Vermont and Northern NY we can usually count on fresh snow and cold even well into March. We have often had some of our biggest snowfalls this month and as kids we always took our ski camping trips near the official end of winter because the snow was deep but the days were long. But this winter has just faded away with hardly a whisper.
In my planning for the Flower Show, I would skip certain snow days in January and even in Feb. because I told myself there would still be March, and I imagined that after the show was over,THEN I would be able to focus on working with the ice and snow in earnest ... but not this year! It's nearly all gone now... s,o sadly... the season may be done and I have made only a handful of winter sculptures.... so sad.... I can't quite believe it !
We may have one more round of cold next week, but there is no more workable snow down here in the valley. There is only old ice along the lakeshore and a few places along the river banks, which can be interesting and perhaps something can still be done, but I feel so out of touch with it I'm not sure I'll even be able to make anything should conditions be right. I may just have to wave good-bye to winter... hence this image.
Birds are returning and soon the green shoots will be appearing... it might make more sense to look forward instead and focus on what can be made in the coming months. One thing is for sure.... more Faerie houses !! The feedback that I got from the show told me that people really want to see more of these creations so more are on their way ! In fact, I've got one nearly completed and will wait for the right location to reveal itself. It is a piece made for the Flower Show but will be lovely to see out in a more natural setting, so... I'm still here and working and I hope you will come back and keep checking in.
Thank you for being patient and for all your orders and special requests ! I hope I've finally got the last one out the door tomorrow... and then it's back to making more sculptures !!
Hi Everyone, If you are unable to view the video here, please go over to Youtube and check it out over there...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGbxcpUn1KA
PLEASE leave a comment if you have a moment...
many thanks !!
I'm working on putting together another short video from still images that I took... but this will take a bit longer to put together.
Enjoy !!
We had a great time last week... the girls from a local Girl Scout troop offered to help make some Faerie houses for the Faerie Forest display in the upcoming Vermont Flower show. They did a GREAT job ! There are 5 houses total,( one of the girls was not present the day we shot this photo... a rare warm day for us, but her house will be in the show ) and the girls collectively decided upon the name for the village... "Periwinkle Valley "
What I loved was how each girl tackled the project with gusto and creativity. There are tiny signs welcoming the Faeries, benches, porches, gardens, ponds and pathways. Each girl made a wonderful creation and they will all form a special little village at one end of the Faerie Forest.
I apologize to my regular readers... I've been posting so little lately and I hope you don't feel too neglected these days... but this show is just taking every ounce of my creative juices and energy right now... and I promise to share photos of the structures, but after the show is over !! But for those who can come, be sure to watch for the Faerie Stonehenge with the lighted (!) spiral moss path leading up to the hilltop henge !!!
Less than a week to go now. Moving day is Monday. Set up will begin on Tuesday... and will really be in full swing on Wednesday and Thursday we finish up and oh, by the way, that day we also set up our vendor booths out in the exhibition hall !! So I'm pulling double duty getting that ready too as I've never had a vendor booth for my artworks !! Then Friday the show opens and runs thru Saturday and Sunday till 4:00 pm. I really hope people come and support the artists with sales. We are a totally volunteer force as far as putting on the show. We get paid nothing to build these incredible displays... our only income comes from the booth sales, so please come out and support us if you can !!
Hi Everyone, I've just finished updating ALL of the calendars. They now will begin with the month of March 2009 and end with February 2010... so you will always get a full year's worth of images with any calendar... plus, with this new feature, you won't be scrambling in late December trying to find something suitable for next year !!
There is a glitch in the system over at Lulu however... they are unable to show the cover images at the moment. The previews do work, but the cover thumbnails are not there at the moment. I have been assured that the calendar covers are printing fine, it is just the thumbnails that have gone on vacation. If Lulu is unable get this fixed any time soon, I'll try posting cover images elsewhere on my storefront.
But the good news is, the calendars have all been "refreshed" and will now give you a full years worth of pages for your purchase ! I will re-set the calendars every quarter so they will continue to be useful on an ongoing basis.
At the VT Flower show there will be a Faerie walkway that is designed to float over the heads of the human visitors below... the walkway will wind thru the tree branches and go from place to place within the Faerie Forest.
People have asked me why do Faeries need a walkway when they can fly? The answer is quite simple... they need a place from which to bungee jump.
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Nahhhhh !!!!! ;-)
It's so they can take the little ones out for walks, silly !! Sometimes it's not safe for baby faeries to fly so much, so the walkways are there to make it fun to get from one tree to another. The rooftop of this one particular Faerie house has a secret attic... this will be where one of the walkways starts from as it heads out up and over the human paths that go thru the Faerie Forest !! Hoping you can all come and see for yourselves !!
Ok... I'll admit it ... this is probably going to make some people a little upset with me. First of all, I'm not showing you the whole sculpture/Faerie house. Secondly, I'm using (gasp) ribbons and silk leaves !! (the flower is a real dried flower kindly given to me by my neighbour who grows lovely strawflowers and other goodies in her organic garden).
So what am I doing here? well, I've been working non-stop for over a month now preparing for the VT. Flower Show that is happening in early March, and I thought that it might be fun to share a few teaser photos from some of the work I've been doing. I can't show any of the entire houses as that would spoil the surprise... so over the next few days I'll try to share a few close-up shots and maybe some descriptive details.
I will say that this house has probably the best roof I've made yet... the lines of this house were inspired by an icicle structure I made last year...but this one is made of twigs, bark, moss and yes.. ribbons and silk flowers. I just had to work in a little extra fun and colour.
The show is called "Child's Play" so I feel I can go a bit more festive and relax and have some fun with these sculptures. Here is the poster for the show... yes, I am very pleased to say that they are using one of my houses as the featured art work !! This is going to be a very big opportunity for me, so I may not be posting as often in the next 2 weeks... but I'll do my best. I will also post lots of photos from the show when it is completed for those views who will be unable to attend.
I hope you can come !!
Another image from this past autumn. One of my favourites. This big ball is hollow inside. A willow branch frame is covered with 2 layers of leaves sewn in place. It took about 8 hours to sew all the leaves in place, which I did over the course of 2 days. The reason there are two layers is because I did the first layer hoping to shoot the sculpture the next day.... but the weather did not bring the bright blue sky I needed for this shot. So I had to wait. The leaves, the yellow ones in particular, deteriorate quickly once sewn in place and loose their brilliant colour in about 24 hours. So.. I had to wait a few more days till I could be sure we would get the full blue sky. That meant that the four + hours of work I had previously done were basically useless.
Such is the nature of this work.
When the day did finally come, I knew where I wanted to hang this sphere... a lovely large boulder I had spotted upriver last year. The boulder was in the middle of a pool and reflected the surrounding trees beautifully. I arrived in later afternoon when the sun cast deep shadows. I set up the camera and figured out what angles to shoot and then tried to "hang" the leaf ball off the overhanging edge of the boulder. This boulder is huge... a glacial erratic. It is easily the size of a SUV only taller. I had the leaf ball on a spool of black thread and tried several different ways to anchor the thread so the ball would hang..no go. There was not a way to tie off or anchor the ball. The sun was going down and I was beginning to get a bit annoyed... I did not want to waste another 4 hours of sewing work ! I said a little prayer for some help with this situation and looked again for a possible anchor spot.
As I went around to the backside of the boulder, I removed some leaves that had collected in a little ravine. There, much to my amazement, was a perfectly shaped hole in the stone... it was exactly the right size and shape to receive the spool of thread... in fact, it sort of "snapped" into place as I pushed it gently into the hole. I went back around the boulder to see how the leaf ball was hanging, made a few more adjustments and then began shooting. The sun was no longer on the ball itself, but that actually made for a better shot. The sun lasted for only about 10 more minutes but it was enough to get the image I had imagined the year before when I had found this spot. Little did I know then how perfectly suited this particular boulder would be for this sculpture!
For me, it was a humbling reminder, of that old song... that we don't always get what we want, but if we try sometime, we just might find... we get what we need !
This image was from last fall. The day was warm and seductive.. one of the last delicious days of autumn. The leaves that look crimson in this image were from a decorative plum tree of some sort... I was visiting a friend in the village and these leaves were littered all over the sidewalk... they were too beautiful to leave there, so I picked up bunches of them ( enduring the stares of passers-by ) and brought them home. The colour was so inviting... a rich port red. The colour does not show so well in this image because the setting sun is shining thru the leaves... I'll post another image soon of the front sides.
This past week has been exciting and daunting... getting ready for the Vermont Flower Show... I am building a HUGE structure with multiple houses on it... I just hope I can pull it off and then move it !!! The technical challenges are many but I am enjoying them ! I will try to take some "in-progress" photos later this week... the sun is supposed to be out but it will be cold... far from the heady days of last September in all it's golden glory !!
Stay tuned !
I have been working a lot indoors this past week. Creating plans and structures for the Vermont Flower show that is coming up on March 6-8. But the week before we had some gentle snows and I decided to finish a sculpture I had started last fall.
Remembering how a windless snowfall can stick to the smallest of branches, I took a single weeping willow branch and wound it around till it formed a pleasing spiral form. I had to do this in an indirect way by pinning the branch to my mossy lawn with small twigs till I had the shape I liked. Then I carefully used thread to apply tension and counter tension till the shape held in place when I picked it up. It looked a bit like a spiders web at that point. Then I set the whole thing aside in a dark, dry closet in the basement so it could dry out holding this shape.
After several months, I removed the thread and the dried willow branch was now holding the spiral all on it's own. Now I just had to wait for the right snowstorm... which we had last week.
I put the spiral out and misted it lightly. It cooled quickly and a fine layer of ice formed on the spiral... now it was ready to receive the snow. I set the spiral against one of the two largest Maple trees on the property. "The Grandmothers" I call these trees... they must be over 250 years old. I crossed my fingers and went to sleep.
The next morning was grey and gloomy but there was about 2 inches of fresh snow. It was very cold and dry so the flakes were particularly large and frosty looking. I snapped a few photos just as the wind was beginning to pick up. Soon all the snow was falling off the branches from above and knocked several bits off the spiral (and down my neck !).
So something that was imagined in November finally takes form in January. It was a good week... and yes, I do realize the double meaning. Cheers!
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.
Two days of rain had taken a huge toll on the icefall.. still, it was holding on and lovely in the late afternoon sun. All along the nearby riverbanks the red dogwood was showing the blushing glow of early spring. The bark gets especially red in some plants as the spring warms the sap. I decided to work with these twigs as the contrast to the blue ice might make for an interesting sculpture.
