The importance of play

Andy Goldsworthy is an artist I pay attention to. Goldsworthy is famous for his playful, intricate rearrangements of leaves, twigs, ice, and stones in natural settings. An incredibly enchanting documentary about his work, Rivers and Tides, shows him as he works outside overcoming pieces that keep failing, so for a brief moment I see the world as the artist does, as invisible flows revealed by play. Recently the same documentarian made a second film recording a more mature Goldsworthy working on more ambitious projects. This doc, titled Leaning into the Wind, accomplishes the same trick of helping me see the world differently, and via Goldworthy’s example, to take play seriously. – KK