Cloud and Constellation Benches at Carnewas, Cornwall

The National Trust have now sited the benches and sent me these photos, they had to raise them on oak blocks as they were worried about Adders lying underneath the benches.

Koli Environmental Arts Festival

Details of my time in Koli Finland from the Koli website:
http://www.koliartfestival.fi/2015/06/30/michael-fairfax-wiveliscombe-uk/

Making of Cloud Bench and Star Bench for National Trust

Two Benches commissioned by the National Trust to be sited at Carnewas in Cornwall, one is a cloud bench which lists 10 cloud formations carved into the surface and the other is a constellation gazing bench with three constellations carved and represented by holes drilled and glass marbles inserted for the brightess stars within the constellation. The idea is you lie one these with your head on the wooden headrest and look at the sky night or day.  They are surprisingly comfortable to lie on.

Making the benches from oak

The cloud formations carved onto the wood

Burning the words

Burning the benches

The Constellation Bench

Detail  of the Constellation Bench

Habitat Hotels

I am working on a project for Bellway homes in Cardiff to create a number of Habitat homes for the wildlife on the new site at Culverhouse Cross, the old ITV site.  I have come up with a number of maquettes and ideas for the project to include homes for birds, bats, butterflies, bees, hedgehogs and insects. These are my ideas to date.

Butterfly Home

House Sparrow Home

 

Koli Environmental Arts Festival

The Environmental Arts Festival in Koli, Finland.  My home for three weeks in June.

The residency takes place mainly in the national park at Koli and with that permissions to create pieces and site pieces must be given.  The first five sites and ideas I went with weren't given permission due to the delicacy of the fauna near the locations I wanted to site pieces and the footfall of visitors would undermine their safety.

In the end I found nearby at Heikke's place (wood yard)  The roots that I needed to create my work, three roots from Spruce that had fallen in the past month in high winds, their roots still in the ground but partially exposed, I knew I could work with these if they could be removed.  Heikke got to it and the next day three roots awaited me, all I had to do was remove the earth, site the pieces and then piano wire them up.

The first one was a monster, some 5 metres by 5 metres, I removed as much of the soil as possible whilst it sat on the ground, revealing fantastic roots and tendrils.

It then had to be raised so I could remove the soil from the underside, health and safety wouldn't have been happy as I worked beneath this massive structure, but I did and the earth came away to reveal the beauty of the root structure

The root was later transported to Ukko Koli, the tourist attraction at Koli. a tractor with trailer took it the 3 kilometres from the woodyard to the site, most of the roots poking out, we drove in convoy to keep people safe! The tractor positioned the  root in the only possible place so as not to inconvenience the local services and I strung it and played it.

An audience soon gathered to hear the sounds emanating from the roots of the tree, and what a great sound it was the roots did a great job in amplifying and adding a special resonance to the sound, people soon where on the floor lying down listening whilst I played.

And of course others played to, the instrument sound not to dissimilar to a local instrument called a Kantele, so many people felt at ease playing the roots.

 Another root was sited at Satama, the harbour nearby, this root is a much smaller root, but had this lovely heart shape

The tree in the ground prior to lifting 

 The root at the woodyard being cleaned

Sited at Satama

The heart shape strings

Another root went into Koli village, sited near the visitors centre and the church, this one looked like it had slithered out of the wood and onto its site.

The roots being cleaned

Sited 

Sited

Strung

I created one other piece for the festival, I found this fantastic silver birch tree symmetrically broken on a walk and was thrilled to discover it was on private land so we had no trouble with permissions.

Called Betula Kantele it needs no introduction

What I first saw

The natural split

Tuning pegs

Stringing the two branches

The tuning pegs for tightening the strings

Strung

The finished piece

My time in Finland was fantastic, the place, the people who run the residency and festival, the local community all helped to make my time thoroughly enjoyable.  I was there at the same time as a Finnish artist Kimmo Peltola a truly wonderful person and sculptor, he made my time there special and the piece he created was terrific.  I was also helped throughout by Teijo Karhu who looked after my every need and made sure all was possible and a truly lovely person. Chrys Allen an english artist I have worked with in Britain who told me about Koli in the first place and has a place in Koli with  her partner Simon, they made sure I was stocked with Miles tea and just cared for my being in a lovely way.

The Sauna was brilliant after my initial scepticism and Kimmo again helped me through that passage so that in the end I grew to love them. Liisa and Jukka for support and their community sauna on wednesday, a traditional wood smoked sauna that is wonderful.  And a huge thank you to all I came across who made me so welcome and have made me want to return.

Thank You Koli.

Change of email adress

For years I have been michaelfairfax@eclipse.co.uk
as from thursday my new email will be michaelfairfaxstudio@gmail.co.uk
please use this address

Koli Environmental Arts Festival

I am now in Finland, Koli in Northern Karelia. It is stunning, forests and lakes for the first few days the sun shone and it was hot as I thought about what I might do and where things might go.

As it is a National Park permissions are needed to site any work. The first few sites I chose were not permitted due to the delicacy of a number of plants in the vicinity, a shame but I carried on, talking with Teijo one of the organisers, eventually we found at a local wood yard some fallen Spruce where I could use the roots to make Root Harps, we decided on three of these, large, medium and small sizes. These will be sited at various points around Koli, by a church, in the Forest and the large one at the visitors centre Ukko Koli

Today Heikki used a tractor and ropes and pulled the roots from the ground ready for me to use. 

These now need cleaning away the debris and some arborteching before applying the piano 

strings. Of course today is the first day of rain.

Prior to awaiting permissions and the like I made a small Violin Stick for fun, which has gone done well and people have enjoyed playing, listening to the silk strings within the Aspen wood.