Links in Valloire, land art in a land covered with snow.

An art tour by Steuart Bremner

Often we focus our attention on something because we know it’s not going to last. This something is just happening in this moment – an eclipse of the moon, the Tour de France passing through the Col de Galibier, or a monumental snow sculpture. In conjunction with just such an event, the 22nd annual International and National Snow Sculpture Contest in Valloire, artist Steuart Bremner is creating some temporary artworks using snow and the forest. The works can be seen by looking for snow cairns on the pedestrian trail while walking from the Pont de la Borgé toward Les Verneys. The works are concentrated approximately 300 to 500 meters from the first footbridge.

Links in Valloire is a series of small land art pieces – an art tour – that can take the tourist into nature and point out some wonderful sites to see. Interesting relationships exist all around us in the natural world and the artist has created a link between our eyes and a few of these interesting connections. These connections, relationships or links, while interesting, often go unnoticed because of the huge volume of visual information in the world today.

This art tour, Links in Valloire, is not a rigid tour with language delivered by an audio guide or a docent, minutely deconstructing the scene, but instead, this art tour is a series of visual clues that will assist the viewer in personally finding out about objects in nature. These clues, the artist hopes, describe a way of seeing that can be developed individually by each viewer to experience the objects on this tour. And in the future, these clues could serve as links to additional experiences with similar natural connections. These clues can open the viewer to seeing more beautiful and interesting things in nature, just as a hyperlink opens another page or idea.

One of the tools used to make these artworks are visual marks that isolate and highlight natural objects that are often unnoticed because so much is going on around them. The tour is a visual aid that will help a viewer see the “trees” in spite of the forest.

About land art or environmental art: Most artists are environmentalists – most humans are – and many contemporary artists are critically thinking about why they make “things.” Does the world need more things – things that take natural resources and energy to make and maintain? This questions flows from the eternal and primary question about why an artist needs to make art – does the world need art, or another piece of art when we have Chartres, or the Mona Lisa? As artists continually try to answer this question and then the questions about being environmentally sensitive, and more questions that arise from living in the present, they have created many relatively-new art forms like performance, conceptual, sound and land art. Some artists are recycling objects that would otherwise go in the landfill. This series of little artworks, Links in Valloire, takes very few materials, and all are natural. They are temporary and will have had very little effect on the landscape. Even if a horde of art lovers tromped to see them, they are accessible by an already established pedestrian path. This doesn’t mean all the questions about environmental impact are answered; it more likely means the work makes us think of more.

About the artist: Steuart Bremner has been making environmental sculpture since 1980 when he created a wilderness area – well defined and obvious – in his cultivated garden. He lives in Breckenridge, Colorado, USA, and makes sculpture in metal, wood, stone and ideas. He also draws and makes paintings, often of sculpture.

To see a slideshow of the project, please visit: www.SteuartBremner.com.