A lovely, curiously inspiring appreciation of Goldsworthy's unusual artistic vision.
Andy Goldsworthy - Rivers and Tides: Working With Time (2003)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:70
Fresh:69
Rotten:1
Average Rating:8.1/10
Consensus: Andy Goldsworthy and his art are beautifully captured in this engaging documentary.
Theatrical Release:Jun 26, 2002 Limited
Synopsis:
RIVERS AND TIDES, Thomas Riedelsheimer's mind-blowing new film which won the Golden Gate Award Grand Prize for Best Documentary at this year's San Francisco Int Film Fest follows renowned sculptor...
RIVERS AND TIDES, Thomas Riedelsheimer's mind-blowing new film which won the Golden Gate Award Grand Prize for Best Documentary at this year's San Francisco Int Film Fest follows renowned sculptor Andy Goldsworthy as he creates with ice, driftwood, bracken, leaves, stone, dirt, and snow in open fields, beaches, rivers, creeks and forests.
Andy Goldsworthy knows that most of his pieces will not last long because of where he makes them. Some of his works stand and remain in the landscape; others decay, melt or are blown away. His work's transitory nature, in fact, is a central part of the sculptor's creative efforts to understand the energy that flows through him and through the natural landscape that nourishes his vision. In this contemplative and beautifully insightful film, we see Goldsworthy as he works to understand that energetic flow, represented often by water, by wind or simply the passage of seasons. Both carefully composed and fluid, RIVERS AND TIDES keeps its focus on the artist's vision and work, giving us room to ponder our own relationship to the energy coursing through the natural world.
The director worked with Andy Goldsworthy for over a year to shoot this remarkable film. What he found was a profound sense of breathless discovery and uncertainty in Goldsworthy's work, in contrast to the stability of conventional sculpture. There is risk in everything Goldsworthy does. He takes his fragile work right to the edge of its collapse, a very beautiful balance and a very dramatic edge within the film. RIVERS AND TIDES captures the essential unpredictability of working with nature and, like Goldsworthy's suclpture, grows into something beyond the simple making of an object. It touches the heart of what Goldsworthy does and who he is. It is a film that allows "you to see something you never saw before, that was always there but you were blind to." -- © Roxie Releasing
Starring: Andy Goldsworthy
Starring: Andy Goldsworthy
Director: Thomas Riedelsheimer
Director: Thomas Riedelsheimer
Composer: Fred Frith
Studio: Roxie Releasing
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Reviews for Andy Goldsworthy - Rivers and Tides: Working With...
It is impossible to be unmoved by both the beauty of artist Andy Goldsworthy’s work and his undying commitment to it.
Goldsworthy is meticulous, eccentric, and very talented. Who knows? This may just inspire you to lie down in the road and make 'rain angels'.
[Goldsworthy's] art is meant to be evanescent, like the nature he reveres. We are privileged to see it documented by the filmmaker's camera.
Mr. Goldsworthy's work is meant to be photographed -- 'photography is the way that I talk about my sculptures,' he says -- and Mr. Riedelsheimer rises to the occasion.
A memorable account of an artist's life, achievements and sacrifices.
Riedelsheimer constructs staunch compositions using a photographer’s eye as good as Goldsworthy’s, of which truly focus on the art and the artist’s persistence and creativity.
Andy cuts an eccentric but likeable figure genuinely at a loss to explain where his inspiration comes from.
Assumes a meditative, Zen-like quality that sends the viewer floating away, like a leaf.
We grab at beauty while simultaneously realizing it never can be possessed, a feeling brilliantly captured in this thoughtful and rewarding movie.
The sort of film that sounds completely kooky until you see it. At which point it's still pretty kooky, but you realize just how cool kooky can still be.
The greatest triumph of the film is Riedelsheimer's ability to offer the audience the artist's perspective.
Beautiful photographt contextualizes his ephemeral artwork; but shows us little of the "crazy like an OCD fox" stirrings that take him there.
It's a film for those who want to see an artist unobtrusively seeking enlightenment.
Riedelsheimer captures this aspect of Goldsworthy's work and holds up a many-faceted mirror to its beauty. That is what ultimately makes the film so seductive.
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| 45% 45% | Shorts |
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