INTERVIEW: Artist Andy Goldsworthy through the lens of Thomas Riedelsheimer, again
Photo: Thomas Riedelsheimer and Andy Goldsworthy are the two creative forces behind Leaning Into the Wind, a Magnolia Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures. Photo credit: James Glossop, all rights reserved. Provided by Film Forum press site / Magnolia Pictures press site.
The partnership between filmmaker Thomas Riedelsheimer and artist Andy Goldsworthy produced the acclaimed documentary Rivers and Tides more than 15 years ago. That intimate portrait of Goldsworthy and his unique art-making still lingers for many fans of the film.
Now the two have teamed up again. This time their film is called Leaning Into the Wind, and it’s set to open Friday, March 9 at New York City’s Film Forum.
In the movie, Riedelsheimer follows Goldsworthy and the artist’s daughter/assistant, Holly, as they continue to make unique pieces in a number of unconventional mediums, including mud, leaves, sheep, rocks and clay.
“I think I realized that I’m not done with this man,” Riedelsheimer said in a recent phone interview. “He’s just too colorful and too interesting for me to leave it alone, and we haven’t been in touch since we finished Rivers and Tides in 2001.”
The director found himself in Goldsworthy’s part of the world (Scotland) shooting for another project. He decided to call the artist after the 15-year gap and see what he was working on professionally.
“It was like, I don’t know, a very old acquaintance, a good friend, and we immediately got along very well again,” he said. “He told me about his work, his most recent things, how it developed, and it felt as if we just said goodbye the other day and 15 years have just passed. So after a couple of weeks, we both admitted that it would be nice to think of another film again, and I think there’s different reasons obviously for me and different reasons for him. I think he found Rivers and Tides a little bit too pastoral, so this kind of romantic view on nature, and I was very interested in this kind of new way of using the whole body as an artwork, so more in the performance style, if you want to. So we decided to give it another try, and, of course, we were quite reluctant because of the success of Rivers and Tides, which is, of course, marvelous. But it’s also kind of cursed for anything that comes after that.”
The cursed part of Rivers and Tides is that so many people have seen the documentary, and Goldsworthy continues to grow in popularity, for his site-specific, nature-based installations and his successful coffee-table books.
The artist’s work is wonderfully iconic and evolves as the outdoor projects face the changing rhythms of Mother Nature. For example, Goldsworthy’s stone wall at the Storm King Art Center in the Hudson Valley of New York meanders through the woods on a wondrously implausible journey that follows the scatterings of trees in the area.
It’s likely that audience members seeing Leaning Into the Wind will have experienced the art of Goldsworthy already. This legacy and prominence mean that the new documentary has to contend with a celebrated past.
“People are not fresh anymore,” Riedelsheimer said. “If they saw Rivers and Tides, they will probably compare the two films, and Andy, of course, is I think best known for his coffee-table books, for the colorful leaf works, for all these ephemeral nature things, the delicate things. And I guess that’s not what is in the new film, so I was a bit afraid of that, how the Andy Goldsworthy fan community will react to seeing him working with machines and stone and digging and all that stuff.”
Still, despite the change in focus, Riedelsheimer was thrilled to watch Goldsworthy’s art-making again, especially out in the elements. In many ways, Leaning serves as a new piece of art about the process of making art. Both the artist and the filmmaker recognized this reality.
“When I start recording it, we bring in another perspective, which is my perspective, and I think he’s pretty aware of it,” the filmmaker said. “Of course, what you see in Leaning Into the Wind is a new interpretation of what he’s doing, in that, if you wish, it’s another piece of art done, which both of us created, but it was not a difficult thing because he’s very relaxed to work with. But that, of course, is because we had the time together with Rivers and Tides, the first film, so we know each other very well. And I know what he would not like, and he knows what I like. And he’s very happy to bring in suggestions and to suggest things that work for the film — especially well, I have to say. He also thinks in terms of film and in terms of how the artwork develops.”
The interpretation of the film and Goldsworthy’s work will bring in an added element when audience members view the documentary at the Film Forum.
“They bring their lives into the film when they go in a cinema, and they have all their background and interpret what they see,” he said. “Andy was not involved, for example, in the editing, so he did not say anything how the scenes should be edited, which scenes should be used in the film. He was totally out of the post-production process, and the only thing we decided was what kind of artworks we wanted to film, what kind of projects I should maybe come with him. I had some suggestions. He had some suggestions, so that was kind of an easygoing process how that happened. And I think there’s still a lot of freedom for the audience to interpret the work, and, of course, in a way it’s my interpretation as a cameraman. And I think that is maybe what I’m wanting to do with the film for cinema. I want to use the big screen, and I want to make an emotional experience, not so much an intellectual [experience], not so much a film that explains a lot of things, but a film where you can probably feel how the work is linked to one another.”
He added: “There’s endless variations how you can link Andy’s work. Everything is linked in a way.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Leaning Into the Wind opens Friday, March 9 at the Film Forum in New York City. Click here for more information.
