Art Installations, Sculpture, Contemporary Art

Chris Booth: "Wurrungwuri", 2008 - 2011. Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney, Australia

The giant waveform, echoing the geomorphology of the landscape, is constructed from 300+ tonnes of sandstone incorporating gaps of many sizes to serve as wildlife habitat. Blocks of wood and adobe within the wave offer living quarters for Solitary Bees. The wave troughs are planted with local flora which will support insects and birds.

The site-specific creation summons the geological and cultural energy of this cove where the local Cadi people and European convict colony first encountered one another. A giant half-ellipse woven from 22,000 quartz stones recalls a shield of the Cadigal, thought to have been traded in 1788 with the new 'boat people'. Ochre coloured rocks from the Nepean River replicate the design on the shield, now in the Australian Museum. The shield is one of the few surviving Aboriginal artifacts from early settlement (many were lost in the Garden Palace Fire). Its remembrance here was created in close consultation with Allen Madden, Cadigal elder. In addition he named the land art work. The hollow quartz stone form is also created as habitat for endangered micro-bats.

www.chrisbooth.co.nz/

Chris Booth: "Echo of the Veluwe", Sculpture Park Kröller Müller, Netherlands, 2005

The artist Chris Booth from New Zealand has made this sculpture from 310 boulders. In request of the artist, an extensive geological research was carried out on the used boulders.

"The undulating shape of the boulders moves through and between the trees, like the wind moving the sand, like the glaciers of old that shaped the land and brought the boulders from Scandinavia. The shape refers to the waves of the sand dunes, characteristic of the area around the museum, and to the waves of the nearby ponds. The egg-shape of the work was inspired by the surface of one of the ponds. The work of art emphasizes the importance of water, that has become scarce on the Veluwe because of overuse. The spiral shape of the boulders was inspired by the currents of the wind, that changed the shape of the landscape over thousands of years. The work of art also deals with the descructive influence of man on the vulnerable land, by centuries of agriculture and other forms of overuse." Ch. B.

www.chrisbooth.co.nz/