jim denevan lake baikal snow art

(Video link here.) It’s been an eerily snow-less winter in New York City. With the exception of a single January snowfall there has been nothing—and we kind of miss it. This post is in honor of the snow we think may be on its way…and the possibilities it brings with it.

We wrote a couple of summers ago about artist Jim Denevan and his large-scale sand drawings which totally transformed how we think about playing in the sand. Now our attention has been called to his work with snow and ice. In 2010, Denevan made the largest piece of artwork in the world on the surface of Lake Baikal in Siberia. This nine-mile spiral of circles over the ice is stunning and allows us to once again completely re-imagine the possibilities of using snow as/in art. 

jim denevan snow art lake baikal golden ratio

While Denevan’s art is based on an intricate mathematical formula (the golden ratio, above), just as with sand this is the kind of art anyone can be inspired by and make their own. All you need is a good pair of gloves and some snow boots.

(Video link here.) Denevan’s work at Lake Baikal is now the subject of a documentary that started screening this fall. Learn more about it here.

Via The Anthropologist

Related posts: theo jansen’s ‘life forms’ evolve!
making art out of a ‘wasteland’ via vik muniz
thomas ashcraft: artist as electroreceptor
snow fort guest house
ice texts: words of ice (molded like a popsicle)

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One thought on “jim denevan and the possibilities of snow

  1. Thank you !
    Reminds me a bit of the art of Andy Goldsworthy

    to me your site is like an inspirational treasure box 🙂

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