Sand Sculpting

I don't quite get the drive to sculpt sand into fantastical shapes by my hat's off to the artists  who can turn sand into these astonishing shapes. And then tear them down...

The beach at the Casa Marina Resort is the location this weekend of this competition and I stopped by yesterday for a quick look on my way to work and it was well worth the detour. The weather lately has been perfect, a mixture of hot sun, fresh breezes, no humidity and deep blue skies. So standing around under the palms admiring the artists was no trouble at all. Actually I rather wanted a room number and someone to bring me a gin and tonic as I wandered around the people slicing and smoothing sand.

I have a friend in California who is a sculptor and talking to him about his creations, often cast in metal, the story I get is one of intense physical labor as much as artistic inspiration and the need to overcome technical obstacles like smelting metal and casting and refining the artwork. Sculpture requires base technical skills in large quantities and you can see this working with sand as well.

I love how the creations arise out of the sand, a particular well suit type which is imported from Miami and  stacked in forms then wetted down to create a true block as though of marble. Then instead of chipping the artists slice and smooth with builder's tools.

 It all looks very solid...

 ...and that is an illusion:

 Tremendous patience and an eye for detail:

There is a time limit according to the newspaper of 30 hours for the artists to sculpt their 100 tons of Miami sand. In deference to the deadline I suppose there was not much conversation going on and no banter between the doers and the watchers. Indeed I saw a lot of headphones and earbuds deployed to keep us watchers at a solid arm's length from the creators.

They were all business.

I heard a parent trying to explain the duality of impermanent life and permanent death to a small child. One more reason I figured I am designed to be child-free.

It is astonishing to see these figures emerging from their sand cocoons and the crowds wandering around did rather detract from one's ability to contemplate. I suppose I could have used ear buds myself!

I wondered what these figures would look like under the nearly full moon bathing the Keys in silver light this weekend...

 And slowly the figures emerge  from the boxed sand lumps.

 It was quite the setting for...

 ...the competition.

 Not too many hours left to finish.

And then destruction. Weird.

Sculpture Key West Botanical Garden

I stopped by the botanical garden on Stock island to see what I could make of the sculptures that are part of the annual winter exhibits in Key West and i didn't find much. I saw the sign to the chugs exhibit but apparently the Cuban rafts are not yet on display because Cheyenne and I dead ended into the golf course without seeing any of the so-called chugs. Perhaps at a later date, because I do find the boats used by Cuban emigres to cross the Gulf Stream to be quite fascinating. In our culture anything that is not ideally suited to the task is not even considered, whereas in Cuba under the embargo learning to make do is the skill they need.This dragonfly made from found items must be part of the permanent display as it has been around a while, and very charming it still is too.Cheyenne was getting ahead of herself as we patrolled the ponds at the back of the 15 acre garden. It's interesting to note that this place will soon celebrate it's 75th anniversary as it was built with funds set aside by FDR's stimulus programs in an effort to put people to work and get Key West out of it's Depression era bankruptcy. These days with our own 21st century Depression we prefer to tear everything down instead of even now trying to put our people to work to build lasting monuments.An energetic retiree from New York took this place in hand in the waning years of the financial boom and got grants and money to make things better. The original garden was 55 acres in size but nowadays thanks to development it is down to 15, well used acres.I guess these art works have been around for a few years too. I also spotted the chair with a ball on it from a previous Sculpture Key west exhibit. I took the Pond Loop trail to check out the turtles which apparently are making a comeback. They got wiped out in the unsupervised years because I am told certain members of the community liked to make soup out of them.

Cheyenne found their floating medium to be a delicious soup.

Some Muscovy ducks enjoying a placid afternoon floating.

This is my favorite tree in the Botanical Garden. For some reason I love the shape of date palms and this one is called a Canary Island date palm. I used to come and sit under it as a break while pedaling home from work back to my sail boat at Sunset Marina. I liked to listen to the wind whistling through the trees on windy evenings, none more so than this one.

Back on the boardwalk trail we came across this:

All the way from Maine this year.This next exhibit I liked a lot, in it's simplicity and it's apparent sense of humor. I can't help it that an artist from the Big Apple had to be the one to come up with this one...I use the phrase Up North in these essays with a touch of ironic amusement. Back East has it's own flavor:I find Down South to have some hint of hillbilly condescension in it......and when I lived in California I hated Out West. When I worked for radio networks based in the east (Back East!) I hated when I was referred to on air as Out West. I live in the west I said and I'm not gay nor am I floating in the outer galaxy. The importance of my stories was always, it seemed to me, limited by my distance from the east coast hub of the network.That sculpture struck a chord with me. Roosters were not part of Sculpture key West but lacking any further exhibits I figured they would do as well as anything. The n this dude strode up to me rather aggressively as Cheyenne and I paused on a bench (Cheyenne was at my feet). "Is that your dog?" he barked. "Yes" I replied. "I have her rabies certificate in my wallet." "Oh," he said. "We lost a yellow dog from the pound up the street." "I paid you lot fifty bucks for her," I said. I rather admired the fugitive wherever he was. I hoped he stole a motorcycle, not mine, and rode for the border like Steve McQueen.

Sculpture Key West Fort Zach

Sculpture Key West is in trouble. And why wouldn't it be when the Arts are just one element of our former prosperous life going down the drain of economic contraction?The parking lot at Fort Zachary Taylor was lined with small campers from Quebec, the annual winter migration of French speakers to our island, now with their loonies worth more than the dollar and thus empowered they can spend all day in the comfortable bum-free zone of the state park. Indigenous Park used to be their hang out but these are prosperous days for citizens of a country with well regulated banks, a housing bubble and energy to sell abroad. Oh and no health insurance worries either. No medical bankruptcies in Canada and you know this lot has their provincial health cards with them so Canada pays our outrageous health care costs should a Canadian fall ill or injured while in the US.Down here in the land of the free with unemployment at Depression era levels, millions on food stamps, millions more off the assistance rolls altogether and tens of millions with no access to health care, it happens that the Key West Symphony has gone bust and has left musicians with unpaid wages. The number of exhibits at the annual Sculpture key West display is down to seventeen from a high a few years ago in the mid 50s according to the Key West Citizen. The open space shown above used to be littered with artworks. The views across key West Harbor are nice though and I've peppered a few through this essay owing to the dearth of Art.Please keep coming to Key West and spending money. Please. The Fort is a splendid viewing spot. However I had no time to visit as I was going to see True Grit at the Tropic after my dog walk in the park. I'm sorry to say the Coen brothers' version of the classic John Wayne version far outshines the original. Jeff Bridges is totally excellent as the marshal and the Coen brothers' script struck me as flawless. I spent a delightful one hour and fifty minutes at a movie I expected not to enjoy as I am not a Coen brothers fan. On to the static art of the afternoon.
This artist is a local apparently. He made it through the rigorous jury selection process and apparently some of the decline of the exhibit is blamed on the strenuous efforts to keep local artists out for fear they might in some manner no explained "lower the tone." We are supposed to see more locals next year, if this fading show even actually returns, which is something I am starting to doubt.
I rather liked the contrast of the tanbark foresail on this traditional cruiser spanking along in a strong north breeze across the turquoise harbor waters.We were not alone as Cheyenne and I strolled the grounds. Tourists I think, with their neat clothes, trim white socks and not a food stain between them.

Aeroplane!This next exhibit was spinning like a propeller. It came all the way from Virginia they say.

It's hard to imagine how awful Key West based entries must have been to have been booted out by a length of metal spinning on a metal pole.I offered Cheyenne an opportunity to go wading at the formerly nude beach tucked away next to the Outer Mole. Instead the furry whore when hunting for their lunch. They said they lived in key West though how they could be nude in the chill north breeze I do not know. They are probably from Minnesota, them and their cute French accents.

Er, okay. What is it? An ostrich in such a vast spacious nesty sort of place? Surely they mean "Birds nesting".

Mirrors on the horizon.This is reportedly Square Wave from Fairfax Virginia, which, as it is on the western or inland side of the nation's capital makes it a noted authority no doubt on wave formation. I thought I looked rather swishy reflected in the wave, my hips rather more gay and flexible than might be the case in real life.

Cheyenne politely refrained from falling over laughing.

A rather lonely wave, square or otherwise in a sea of empty grass.This next one got a thumbs up in the paper.

A local effort. Rather like an out sized souvenir pen from CVS.The irritation felt about this past couple of years' exhibitions has been over the fact that the display has been spread over three locations, the West Martello Tower and the Key West Botanical Garden on Stock island (whence comes tomorrow's essay). The organizer announced in a letter to the paper that the reason for the change was that the park management was unfriendly and the Civil War reenactors want more room and so on and so forth. So they spread the exhibits out at a time when the rest of the planet noticed money and credit were drying up everywhere and Bernie Madoff wiped out most South Florida charitable efforts.This year's Big Effort came from half way round the world.

I rather wondered if the noisy people who hold sway over the Arts in little Key West weren't miffed that the sculptures weren't drawing too much attention to the lowly state park and wanted a piece of the action. In getting it they seem to have sounded the death knell on this stressed out piece of fun that is Sculpture Key West.Sculpture Key West has been good for the state park in light of the recent fracas over proposals to murder the casuarina trees near the beach. That idea got rolled back amid horrid anger citywide, and now the sculptures, a highlight of winter, are fading. They used to have concerts in the park too but the Chorale last year preferred the sterility of an indoor Christmas Concert at Tennessee Williams, and so it goes. Thank God for the Korean Caterpillar else there would have been precious little to fill the void.

The Florida Keys in large measure live a charmed life compared to places Up North. When people fall off the employment rolls here they simply disappear Up North to eke out a life with their families. Until our new robber baron Governor took office Florida's state budget wasn't in the awful shape we read about in other large states like California, Illinois and new Jersey. We can only hope the true conservatives in Tallahassee hold the line as they have indicated they intend to on proposed crazy ass tax cuts, but in any event Key West is doing okay in the midst of the world economic meltdown (known as a recovery to the White House).

We float along on a cloud of tourist income and good weather and even though the demographic is getting markedly older (and testier) we are lucky to be on the edge of the meltdown Up North.

Still, people should guard their treasures with greater concern and awareness, because if they don't what Arts exist here will be washed away. If organizers can't get their shit together this exhibition will fade just like the symphony has, just as art galleries have up and down the city streets.

That would be a shame.

I parked Cheyenne in the shade on Simonton Street, fed the meter and walked to the Tropic. True Grit was showing in the new Peggy Dow theater and very comfortable it was too. As we waited for the lights to go down a couple of the older demographic snowbirds were discussing their impending death. "I can give $600,000 to the kids tax free...?" one querulous voice asked loudly. "Yes,' came the reply. "The other one point four million you get taxed on even if it's in the trust," replied a younger voice. They rattled on for a while discussing inheritance tax rates and trusts. One younger voice (an inheritor perhaps?) grumbled about the reversion to former tax rates and iniquitous death taxes and so forth. All I could think was, we should all have such problems.

But I'm lucky, with no children to worry about, a secure job, I think, health benefits and time enough to take a sunny February walk to enjoy what I hope is not a last lovely art exhibit allowed to fade away and die like an abundant inheritance through lack of care and attention.