The pictures here are from the writen part of my A2. I had to study a couple of artists and then write an essay about them. The artists I looked at were Andy Goldsworthy and Chris Drury who both work with the land to make art.

Below is a scanned in version of the essay I wrote, due to my poor handwriting it's not easy to read so there is a transcript below.

Artists such as Andy Goldsworthy and Chris Drury make their art not by bringing foreign materials into an area, but by using what they are able to find there and "rearranging" them to a less natural form, whether it blends with or stands out from its space, it does not change the overall feeling of the space.

Andy Goldsworthy uses raw materials, such as sticks, pebbles or fallen leaves, to create his art; he brings them together from the confusion into which they have fallen to create order. Goldsworthy avoids the use of tools in his work; normally letting nature take its course such a with icicles freezing into the place they are held. However when tools are a necessity he will yet again use what he is able to find around him, sticks to carve a path in earth or thorns to hold leaves in place. By doing this he is creating artificial figures in nature but it is in no way unnatural, the shapes his work forms are formed in nature, lines, circles and egg shapes.

A frequent feature in Goldsworthy's work is the hole, surrounded by pebbles, rowan leaves or flowers. These works could easily be passes off as just having fallen to the places they are in, it isn't until the mind of the observer realises the chances of pebbles falling from light to dark, or a progression of colour in the autumn leaves around the hole, is minute, that it is noticed and is analysed by the brain, the hole reminds the viewer of the pupil of the eye, as though something is looking back from the ground, the mind is both curious and fearful. Goldsworthy plays on the way people both want to know about something new, but are at the same time fearful of what it might be.

Through his art, Goldsworthy doesn't seek to craft objects with a use, nor to simply please the eye. He, instead, silently looks to criticize the industrial method of production, preferring to take his time to make a unique construction, in contrast to the modern way of mass production.

Like Goldsworthy, Chris Drury works with found materials, however Drury not only uses natural products, although it is the main material used, but also has plastics in his work. He has also worked on a much grander scale to that of Goldsworthy, having built cloud and wave chambers, one wave chamber totaling 81 tons.

Drury is known for reintegrating basket making and weaving buck into the art world. He often works alone in scarcely habited places to do his work. However, he has also worked with communities in Europe, America and Japan, making work to fit the needs of the community while working with the landscape.

Drury not only works in the natural environment, but has also worked in galleries. He has made site-specific installations such as kayaks woven from willow, mud paintings of fingerprints and mounted mushroom spore prints. Although they are in an unnatural environment, Drury still uses natural materials brought in from the land. This shows how he recognises mans connection to nature, the fingerprints, widely thought to be unique to humans, in mud on a wall, when nowadays man will rarely work with the mud as this suggests. The human relationship with nature is also shown in Drury's outdoor work, notably with the fire cairns, although fire is a natural phenomenon it is considered man made as it is often started at the will of man.

In his work, Drury tries to show that, despite peoples want to run from the trees they came from, they are a part of nature. He wants us to question the ways we interact with the world around us and to show that without the natural world we would not be where we are today. We wouldn't have many of the modern products we rely on if they hadn't evolved in design from the materials and inspiration nature provides us.

Andy Goldsworthy's work is only based in the environment, whereas Drury will work both in and out of a gallery setting. Goldsworthy's work could not be brought into the gallery because it would take away from the appeal of the piece. It is intended to object to the materialistic way of modern life, so would be out of place in any other environment other than in nature. Drury's intention, however, is to show human connection to nature, so it is possible for such work to be not only in the natural world but also brought into the human environment and not seem out of place.

Land art of the seventies sought to "free" art from the confines of the art shop and bring it to everyone, both to view and to create. It wanted to escape from the capitalistic world of the galleries. The work of the "great maters of art" can still be viewed today because it is made of enduring materials. Land art, however, is made of degradable materials, that disintegrate over time. Therefore this art was in truth not accessible to all. Chris Drury and Andy Goldsworthy's work has its roots in the land art of the 1970's. Both have over come the problem of making their work last after it has eroded away through the use of film and photography. This way it is available to all, not on a gallery wall but in a book, with a cost relatively small compared to the cost of the journey and entrance to a gallery.