Andy Goldsworthy and the “Loving Cup”

I receive most of my inspiration from three sources: nature, books, and music. One usually takes center stage; for example, a novel that invades my thoughts for weeks and makes me see myself differently. This past summer saw a confluence of two sources: music and nature, although nature was mediated through the eyes of the artist Andy Goldsworthy. I could say it was a confluence of art and music, yet Goldsworthy’s art is so “true” to, and not abstracted from, nature that I’m going to go ahead and chalk up one for nature’s power to inspire.

In July, just weeks back from Tanzania, still weak from malaria, and settling into my new home in South Carolina, I found comfort from two sources that seem to fit perfectly: the documentary on Andy Goldsworthy, Rivers and Tides, and the song “Loving Cup” by the Rolling Stones.

Goldsworthy first.

I think my wife Keely found the documentary on Netflix when she was browsing for something to stream instantly. We put it on and I was hooked, and I would replay all or parts of the documentary all through the summer (and still to this day when I need a boost). The film follows the artist as he works in a variety of locations and with different materials. As well, Goldsworthy likes to talk of his work and the natural world in a way I will describe as rustic Scottish Zen (I know he’s English but he’s been living in Scotland for a while and the description just fits).

I don’t recall when I first became aware of Andy Goldsworthy and his art. It wasn’t long ago. I have a vague memory of seeing one of his coffee table books in Argumento bookstore in the neighborhood of Leblon in Rio de Janeiro—probably around 2004. Until that point I didn’t know he existed nor did I know that his type of art even existed. Goldsworthy’s art is brilliant, and detailed and textured. Most importantly, it looks right to me. It is the intersection of human craft and the natural world without pretense.

I have always loved human elements, found in the outdoors, that have been taken over by the cycles of nature—the New England stonewall that once bounded a colonial farm but now lays wrapped by a vibrant forest. I like to see the edges of control worn down. In the grounds of the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna, Austria there lies the artesian well that gives the palace its name. In a place that is highly manicured, the original well—alcoved and bricked round—still maintains some small feel of flow. In the shaded area the trees and bushes are allowed a little more freedom and Greek statues are mossy and weathered.

Finding a wall or statue changed by nature seems to me to evoke a natural association between human art and nature. After all the materials did come from the earth, no matter how manipulated. And I see what Goldsworthy does as akin to nature’s working upon art. He recognizes the flow of time and the connection to nature as the canvas itself, and so his art emerges as simultaneously natural and crafted.

In the documentary he talks of time and of getting to know a place, and he truly evokes a pastoral feel. And this pastoralism, as I sense it, is Romantic even when acknowledging the dark, brutal aspects of the natural world.

Perhaps this pastoral feel is where I made an association with “Loving Cup.”

As for this song by the Stones, I’ve known it for some time; not decades, but I think I’ve owned Exile on Main Street for at least ten years or more. I did watch Scorsese’s Shine a Light last year or the year before and do remember Jack White joining the Stones for a rendition of the song. Maybe that stuck with me. Last year in Tanzania I had a colleague whose presence provoked me to revisit my listening to the Stones. Maybe that was the clincher.

I can’t put my finger on the reasons I started listening to “Loving Cup” as a single and why it stuck with me all summer. A year ago, Eddie Vedder’s “Hard Sun” dominated my thoughts—for valid reasons, but many of those reasons were hard also, full of self-doubt, midlife angst, and dangerous nostalgia about my twenties and paths I chose not to pursue. Vedder’s song has reflected many aspects of the way I’ve lived my life, but “Loving Cup” celebrates the way I can live my life.

Somewhere along my journey last summer, the Stones and Goldsworthy merged.

The footage of Goldsworthy, spending days and days outside toiling to produce art, matches the opening lines to the song: “I’m the man on the mountain, come on up/I’m the plowman in the valley with his face full of mud.”

Take a close look at the artist’s hands in the documentary and you see the hands that any stonemason would admire. He is a workingman. You see him in the fields collecting sheep’s wool that lies scattered and stuck to walls and bushes. Soon after, he will work hard to transform the raw material to art. He walks through his village picking tiny yellow flowers by the side of the road to then turn into a striking piece.

And Jagger sings, “I’m the man who walks the hillside in the sweet summer sun/I’m the man who brings you roses when you ain’t got none.”

The two together inspired me the way art is said to inspire—it lifted my spirits, it made me think, it made me look at the world differently, and it made me imagine.

And I need imagination, and I’m glad the dominant song this past year was “Loving Cup.”

“Oh what a beautiful buzz, what a beautiful buzz.” (Jagger and Richards)