Dürer was the 'rock star' of the German Renaissance

Allbrick Dürer was one of the first painters to seriously explore cross-hatching techniques that facilitated the creation of many of the first and best woodcut and engraving prints in Europe. Again, I wonder, given his label, 'rock star' (by smarthistory.org), if this accomplished artist too might have thought about actually getting into stone and rocks, as well.  

The wonderful way he creates that sense of light and shade in his prints is worth musing on.  Is it possible, since his works are so realistically shaded, using that classic, stippled, scratchy-line, 'hashtag' shading effect, that he might have thought about taking up a point, or a crandall or a bush hammer, and see about quietly dressing the large smooth, sawn blocks of stone bordering the municipal horse-and-buggy parking lot, in order to make them seem more natural and less man-made.  

When he was finished, the stones in the first drawing might have ended up looking like these ones - as if they were in one of his lovely engravings, 

But then again maybe if he lived in our era, he would have been more successful doing the reverse - grabbing a respirator mask, a pair of safety glasses, ear protectors, and have a stab at making #modernrockart. 

 

Graphic artist considers taking his tessellation skills to a new Escherlon!

What if Maurits Escher turned to dry stone walling?  What if he shaped his ducks and lizards and fish out of stone, making sure that every one had exactly the same shape? Would they be as easy to lay then as bricks or squared blocks of stones? Or would it be more difficult? I wonder. 

Would it be just one big boring puzzle? And more importantly, would the repetition of the pattern drive clients crazy? 

Now that I think about it, probably Escher knew to stick with drawing impossible interconnecting shapes rather than trying to make them in the three D world, and then end up having no one that impressed. Sometimes an impossible creation, that's taken an impossible amount of time, no matter how perfect it is, is not as interesting as something that merely involved fitting random stones together skillfully.

Rather, for the rest of us wallers, whenever an opportunity presents itself, keep striving to do the improbable, . You could surprise yourself how well you do and, hopefully, it won't look cookie cutter perfect. 

What if painters expressed themselves using stones instead.

 

Connecting Random Dots and Thoughts

Why is it that stones, when they get into groups, seem surprisingly eager to communicate recognizable geometric shapes and alignments. At some point after the first few are laid, the stones seem to start lining up more along a plane or a contour of something recognizable . This works with curves and spirals too. It may be too, that human eye, is only too eager to see planes and straight lines and curving alignments in otherwise fairly random arrangements of stones.

 

Stones really know how to Keep in Shape

 Unlike humans, stones, even if they hang around doing nothing, don't get out of shape too quickly. In order to keep their shape, they vehemently resist the forces of time and weathering, and the various forms of mechanical tampering that men have come up with through the ages. Yes, in the end they might sometimes have too submit to crushers and the indignities of huge splitting and sawing machines. But I suspect, if they had their way, if they had their choice, they'd like to be appreciated for the shapes they come in, the way God made them. An authentic dry stone waller, if he's being true to the nature of the material he is gathering, tries not to change the shape of the stones he's been called upon to use. A little chipping here and there, a splitting by hand, of larger  (overweight?) stones is acceptable. Generally however, if not exactly what is needed, the shapes they come in, almost always suggest how they could become 'fit' enough, with just a little human coaxing (coaching?), and only by 'exercising' enough restraint on our part.

Make no Mistake

 Sometimes rocks look like food - a melon perhaps , a loaf of bread, eggs, candies, chocolate or popcorn.

We need the inner nourishment of stone. For those of us who love stones and rocks, it's not something we can do without. Thankfully there is usually enough produce along the road side that we can get our fill. Sometimes it's a pick your own operation. Our eyes may often be bigger than our vehicles, though. 

Quarries are like big rock grocery stores. We can pickup all kinds of 'produce' there and bring it fresh to our garden. I've always said that a garden without stones is like a BLT with out the bacon.

Unlike food, stones are always in season and never go off. They never over-ripen or become soggy. Leftovers are always useful and often worth keeping around indefinitely until you can use them with other grains and scraps, in some sort of dry stone combo. 

Mushrooms are my favourite.  They pop up everywhere, and look good to eat even in winter. They're best on top of walls. The thing is, none of these rock/foods will make you sick. You can't make a mistake.You can always identifying it's a 'rock' even if you don't know what type it is. And really, if you think about it, they are all magical!

 

 

Reflecting on/under Bridges

 

Two Types 0f Stones

Sometimes it feels like there are only two types of stones.

Landscapers here in Canada often use something called 'Armour Stone' to do terracing and retaining walls. These are much bigger 'freezer sized' stones than we like to use. They don't need to be that big to hold back the soil. 

The word 'armour' makes it sound like they are at war. When you see all the heavy equipment they use to put them in, and the saws, drills, and sometimes grinders and other powerful weapons, it does look like a bit of a battlefield until they are done. 

Dry stone wallers are not at war. Many of us love what we do. We love each other too,
The stones we use could well be called 'Amour' stones. Oui?

Still Thinking we are not over Thinking yet.

 

Remember your password, people !

These are just a bunch of random characters who, if you remember them properly, will 'let you in'. Let you access your hidden self. Let you see your history, allow you to check in and put your life in order and do some personal accounting . Yes, these letters and numbers are real characters, and even though they are a bother, they really are not trying to make your life difficult. 

Without them, your life would be visible to everyone. Your past words, your mistakes, your faults, your inconsistencies would all be exposed to the world. Therefore to keep the busybodies, and the rift raft away, to keep your secrets from anyone seeking to do you no good, you’ll need a few chosen characters to help you.

Realistically you need at least 8 characters to have a proper up to date password. You can choose them if you insist. But likely the password would be a lot ‘stronger’ if you let total strangers do the job of maintaining your privacy.  Characters chosen from a line up selected for you by A.I. or friends of AL Gorithm are the safest.  

The difficulty of course is remembering characters that essentially (technically) have no correlation to your personal life.  They can’t have any connection with the date you were born or your favourite dessert, or the name of your first dog either. 

It’s better too, if most of them are not just names, like Jay or Kay or Vee.  Better to have your life protected by characters that are also symbols. Some or them can even have accents. There’s less risk if you use Asterisk too ,or names that have confusing word associations like Hash, Pound ,Colon or Parenthesis.

Remember don’t ever reveal your password characters to anyone.

But how are you going to remember these individual characters, and how will you keep these rascals in their proper order? Fortunately for you, we can teach you a special technique for not forgetting any of the characters in your password. First click on the window below and then just type in your password.

口口口口口口口口

Reverse Stepnology

Looking at my footprints, backwards in the snow

Not worrying what's behind me, trusting where I go

Put my best foot backward, then stepping back again.

Judging where I'm going, by seeing where Ive been.

Get the body tuned to, travelling in reverse.

Purposely unwinding, things that last come first.

 

The Paths We Carve

We get comfortable with the paths we've carved that we travel everyday. Sometimes it is time for a new path. Sometimes it is easier to use the path someone else carved out for you. And sometimes it is just easier to walk through less snow.

Stono-Mobius Erectus

 

Dots

Believe it or Not.

 In Canada, a well-built dry stone wall along a busy residential street can often act as a kind of 'aesthetic speed bump' and be a calming antithesis to the frenzy of traffic activity wizzing past. Where an ordinary speed bump only barely slows down traffic to a safe speed at the actual buMp, a good looking wall gives a visual signal, along its entire length, to slow down, inviting drivers to enjoy a safe drive, while keeping the car's suspension from getting wrecked, and also helping maintain a delightful suspension of disbelief.

 

Newness delights in the activity of being here. Each bundle of life arrives eager to discover new ways to celebrate their being invited to this space and this time. Yes this old thing we call reality is a unique cosmic portal  for all kinds of fresh goodness to come to, and through . Embrace this newness as it arrives , in every form. The beautiful new and the happy now are not very far away or far apart . 

Thanks to the old year for providing that place now for the next newness to thrive. And Happy new year to you all. 

Thirteen Foot Span

The river splashes and gurgles under the temporary gangway as work is being done to add rows of suitcase size/shape voussoirs over the arc of the wooden former. 

There are few things as exciting as being involved with building a dry stone bridge. Watching it being built is fascinating enough to merit making it a televised event.

Matt Smith's talented crew.

Thirteen feet is not an unlucky span because the arc the stones pass over is actually a distance of more like fourteen feet plus.  (I haven't done the calculations).

 

Building dry stone bridges is really cool.

One thing you can be sure of if you take on a bridge project – You're going to be close to water. So even if you decide you might have to schedule one in for June or July or even August you know that if it gets intolerably hot, (and it will) you're always close enough to water to just stagger into the river any time during the build, and let that cool water soak that aching hot body of yours.

 

Nature Loves Bridges

While we were in Asheville N C Mary and I went with Matt Smith to visit the Franklin Bridge just outside a place called Sandy Mush . I had not been back there since we’d built the bridge (run as a workshop ) five years earlier, and I was more than curious to find out what, if anything had changed, or if it was indeed as charming a structure as I remembered it. 

It was going to be helpful for Matt to see it too, as he had a somewhat larger dry stone bridge project going on at the time an hour and a half, in the other direction from Asheville. The settings of both bridges are similar. Both beautiful properties in the rolling hills of the Blue Ridge Mountains . Both bridges have smooth ancient bedrock to build off of and both span lovely year round babbling mountain streams. Matt's project would be his first bridge and I’d been called in to give him an experienced hand, not so much a physical hand, as handy bridge building advice.  

Even after five years and a lot of water flowing under it, Franklin Bridge looked as splendid as ever. The moss had crept over much of the walking surface and lichen had started to grow in patches over the craggily granite voussoirs. The span looked convincingly in tact. Except for a few cobbles that looked liked they’d shifted on the top walking surface ( due to a big flood two years prior)  the bridge looked as sturdy as ever. Thankfully it still possessed that pleasing rustic look I associate with some of the old footbridges I’ve seen in England and Scotland. 

Enchanting is the best word I can think of to describe the scene as we approached along the narrow path that led through the woods to the bridge. This was the same winding path we used to carry well over 12 tons of random shaped rock, all by wheelbarrow, to the site of the bridge.

I can’t imagine a more agreeable enhancement to a walk in the woods than coming across a stone footbridge carefully 

integrated into the landscape , spanning the splashing watery path made by the babbling mountain stream.

Matt's new bridge will be (is being) built in a singularly beautiful location which I’m sure will inspire fantasies of magical days of old. A well-shaped and well-weathered collection rocks will be worked into the bridge mix. Hopefully moss will eventually cover everything in a feathery green carpet.

A maiden could step across this future bridge and step into the past. Two people may meet in the middle and find their soul mate . 

Proper footbridges are not to be so wide that mechanized vehicles use them. These dry stone bridges are for hikers and lovers and children.

A bridge is not a dam either. It doesn’t stop the flow of nature. It gently rises over and connects us with the other side without hindering the connections of nature in other directions . 

There is a reason to bridges. And the answer is beautiful. It is the great agreement, a working collaboration between the human ingenuity and the beauty and flow of Mother Nature .

Comparison