Rivers and Tides

Thomas Riedelsheimer, Germany, 2001, 90 minutes

A man dressed in a thick wool sweater painstakingly places the last stone on a giant cairn; his dirty, weather-beaten hands firmly, but carefully, place the rock atop an elaborate, pine-cone shaped sculpture. We see a look of worry cross his face as he eases this final piece into position, the realisation that it’s too heavy and that it’s too late to do anything. The sculpture shifts, slowly sinks and collapses into just a pile of stones - its natural entropy restored. Hours of hard work moving, shaping and placing have been lost. The man slumps to the ground with tears in his eyes and starts reassembling his work.

Andy Goldsworthy is acknowledged as one of the most influential sculptors of the last thirty years. He organises natural objects - leaves, stones, sticks, wool, hair, petals, icicles - into almost mathematical patterns, graduated by tones and hues, or merely their shapes. His pieces are beautifully simple and yet astoundingly complex, each one taking hours to complete and often lasting only a matter of minutes. There is a sense of play involved; Goldsworthy makes sculptures that are simply for his own enjoyment, done for the satisfaction of creation.

Thomas Riedelsheimer’s documentary focuses on the creative process, showing the full life cycle of a piece, starting with the search for the perfect location and materials, through the delicate, time-consuming assembly, and finally the decay. The overall tone is one of quiet beauty, celebrating the slow pace of the work and the rigorous, devoted effort that goes into completion of each sculpture. Visually the film is near flawless, managing to capture the tranquil beauty of Goldsworthy’s work which, along with the excellent soundtrack, transports you into the awe-filled world that he inhabits.

Review by George Williamson
Written for EUFS Programme Autumn 2004