1st August, 2010 - Mt Kenya Fine Line Project sculpture completed
In June and July 2010 Philippa and I travelled in East Africa riding mountain bikes from Nairobi to Dar es Salaam. Some of the off road tracks took us through territory rarely visited by travellers enabling us to meet with the tribal people of the land and witness wildlife outside game parks.
The main purpose of the expedition was to make the eighth of The Fine Line Project sculptures on one of the peaks of Mt Kenya, Pt Lenana, altitude 4985 metres.
The sculpture was made with the help from our porter James Mwangi Gathoca by gathering frozen snow from patches remaining in the shade of the summit rocks. It was left overnight to freeze again so that it could be shaped before dawn next day when it was photographed.
Due to climate change permanant snow and ice on equatorial mountains like Mt Kenya is disappearing fast. This is bringing devastating consequences to the surrounding ecology and human populations that rely on the water from the mountains.
1st June, 2010 - New Fine Line Expedition
We leave on June 3 for an expedition to make another sculpture on our Fine Line Project. It will be the eighth of the twelve sculptures to be accomplished.
To truly experience Africa we are first joining a supported bike tour from Nairobi to Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. This 2 week journey involves mountainbiking 550kms of back roads and tracks.
29th May, 2010 - Interdependence
A privately commissioned permanent sculpture was installed on 27 May in a lake on a property on Queenstown. A helicopter was used to airlift the 600kg steel sculpture from Wanaka where it was built by engineering company Metalworks, and lower it into position.
“This large permanent work marks a development in my art practice which is concerned with the relationship between nature and culture. While continuing to make my signature ephemeral works I am also working on a number of other large scale pieces, both as commissions and for public exhibition,” says Martin Hill.
1st April, 2010 - Limited Edition Prints
For the first time a selection of Martin Hill works are available as authenticated fine art limited edition prints. To view our Limited Edition Print gallery click here
18th December, 2009 - Our studio/gallery is open
After preparing all winter we are at last able to welcome visitors to our studio to buy from our collection of 20 images available as Fine Art Limited Edition prints. In most cases appointments to visit are booked in by the lodge or hotel here in Wanaka or Queenstown, either driving here themselves or brought by a local tour guides.
Booking is important as we are not always available – if the light is right we may well be out making sculptures. We are enjoying meeting collectors from all over the world very much.
For enquiries email philippa@martin-hill.com
12th November, 2009 - Green Museum selects Stone Circle for calendar cover
The 2010 Green Museum Environmental Art wall calendar features Stone Circle on the cover. The image is also featured for December. Each year environmental art projects are drawn from the global network of greenmuseum.org, a not-for-profit online museum. The calendar promotes the role of art in the creation of a more sustainable world culture.
5th November, 2009 - Fine Line sculpture in Iceland
In August 2008 Martin and I climbed to a site on the Wisshorn above Zermatt, Switzerland where we made a work from gathered rocks with the Matterhorn – one of the world’s most famous peaks – beyond.
A summer snowstorm transformed the landscape and sculpture overnight for a magical dawn image.
30th July, 2009 - Festival of Arts sculpture finds a new home
The Martin Hill sculpture What is Life commissioned to express the theme of Pouwhenua, or Markers on the Land, has found a permanent home in the foyer of the Lake Wanaka Centre. The work uses tensegrity – one of nature’s universal designs – and is a response to Hill’s concern with ecological sustainability.
28th July, 2009 - Group exhibition at Gallery 33
In conjunction with the Pouwhenua project, Markers on the Land for the Wanaka Festival of Colour, Martin exhibited art prints of recent sculpture works alongside the works of Simon Kaan, Michael Tuffery and Areta Wilkinson who were the invited artists in the weeklong project.
15th May, 2009 - Kosmos Journal
Martin’s commissioned article” Learning to live by nature’s design” was published in the Canadian Fall/Winter issue 2008 of Kosmos Journal along with an eight page gallery of his sculpture photographs.
12th May, 2009 - Pouwhenua: Markers on the Land
A commissioned project for the Wanaka Festival of Colour, New Zealand May 2009
Martin was one of four artists invited to participate in a residency in Wanaka during the week of the festival with an introduction to the history of the land and its settlement by experts in Ngai Tahu history Matt Ellison and Brian Allingham. The other artists were Simon Kaan, Michael Tuffery and Areta Wilkinson.
Martin, being a resident in Wanaka was able to begin his research earlier.
Wanaka was named by Maori as a place of higher learning, so Martin decided to learn something new about nature’s design and incorporate it into his work for Markers on the Land. After much research he began work making sculptures using natural materials and nature’s universal construction principle known as tensegrity. This term was coined by Buckminster Fuller for the system discovered by Kenneth Snelson in which compression elements are held in dynamic balance solely by tension threads that connect them.
Donald E Ingber in a paper for Scientific American described tensegrity as “the architecture of life”. Other scientists see it as a model for sustainable economic and social systems.
In this sculpture for the Festival of Colour raupo stems were used, interconnected by linen threads. None of the stems touch each other and stress is distributed equally throughout the system making it resilient.
Previously he made a semi circular work titled Synergy and photographed it reflected in the lake to complete the circle. He then went on to make a completely circular sculpture that was eventually hung on 35 metre wires between two trees on the shores of Lake Wanaka with the mountains as a backdrop.
Entitled What is Life it was dedicated to the memory of his friend and climbing partner John Pawson who tragically fell to his death from the SW ridge of Mt Aspiring in New Zealand when he and Martin were climbing it together in November 2008.
1st December, 2008 - Photo Review Australia features Martin Hill
The summer 2008 issue of magazine Photo Review featured an illustrated article on Martin’s work and sustainable design philosophy. It was written by Steve Packer and entitled “Turning Circles.”
Link: http://www.photoreview.com.au/features/profiles/turning-circles.aspx
1st August, 2008 - Fine Line sculpture in Switzerland
In August 2008 Martin and I climbed to a site on the Wisshorn above Zermatt, Switzerland where we made a work from gathered rocks with the Matterhorn – one of the world’s most famous peaks – beyond. A summer snowstorm transformed the landscape and sculpture overnight for a magical dawn image.
26th June, 2008 - Martin Hill’s Stone Circle chosen for Yale conference report
28th March, 2008 - Carbon neutral cards
Improving sustainable design standards in product manufacturing has been the main objective of this work, so we are pleased to announce a carbon neutral range of stationery products featuring four Martin Hill sculpture images has been published by Museums and Galleries UK for international markets.
Any unavoidable CO2 emissions created in the production and distribution of the EDEN range are assessed and offset to net zero in partnership with The CarbonNeutral Company. The paper is naturally scented and the cellobags are manufactured from cornstarch.
These benchmark products gives Martin great satisfaction and makes him hopeful that this is just the beginning of a transformation of all publishing to meet or exceed these higher standards.
For more information about the materials and processes go to www.beaconpress.co.uk