Land Art by Brioney McClean:
Finding refuge from her full-time job in nature, Brioney Mclean is an artist who practices multiple disciplines of art.
A land artist is someone who uses the elements of a natural landscape as a means of creation. Land art is built in the same setting its elements originate from. Emerging from movements started during the late 1960's and during the 1970's, Land art is an attempt to to make art more accessible without confining it within the walls of museums/exhibitions and bringing it to a natural setting.
Based out of Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire (Wales), Brioney McClean is an artist who practices multiple styles including land art, pyrography, sketching and painting. Creating art from an early age, Brioney's motivation comes from her experiences and leanings through art.
With the influence and help of her partner and muse Jon Foreman, she was introduced to Land Art in 2017. Her work involves the use of any natural materials found in situ leaves, moss, stones, sticks etc. She believes that creating earth art and mandalas has helped her with the day to day stresses of life, her mental well-being and also serves as an escape from her full time job.
"It’s proven that being outdoors is beneficial for our well-being, so creating outside with nature, really being in the moment and getting lost in the process must be even more so beneficial." (Brioney McClean to TDC)
Her art work 'Confleure' is reminiscent of the same philosophy. Confleure translates from Latin as 'flow together'. Created with Jon foreman, Sculpt the world at the art of balance exhibition,Summerhall, Edinburgh. The art of balance is the first exhibition of its kind in Scotland featuring physical stone stacks, photography from internationally renowned land-artists, drawings and film.
"Jon and I were asked to collaborate and create a piece for the exhibition so people could see first hand the detail that goes into some of the pieces that we create. Looking for stones to use for the piece, we explored a couple of beaches near Edinburgh and come across Musselburgh, a lovely beach with a vast array of stones but we settled on white rocks speckled with red and black coal that had been tumbled by the sea. We did a couple of trips collecting stones and bringing them back to Summerhall. Before making Confleure, Jon and I had a vague idea of what we would like to create but as always we went with the flow, changing bits as we went, adding and taking away here and there until we were happy with what we had in front of us. Starting with tiny grains of sand in the middle, getting bigger as it moves outwards with scale change and playing with dispersion,
Taking 9 hours to collect and arrange, it is the most time I’ve spent on a piece of land art. We also hid a tiny sea shell in the white spiral and encouraged the public to see if they could spot it, it was interactive and quite fun!" (Brioney McClean to TDC)
'Petala Florum' is another interesting art work by Brioney and Jon. Petala Florum translates from Latin as 'flower petals'. This flower petal and leaf mandala was created with Jon and his son Alijah
at Artists Valley, Mid Wales, and our usual picnic stop.
"We were on our way home from the European rock stacking championships held in Dunbar, Scotland. This is an important area for us, its half way between Jon’s parents home In North Wales and our home in South West Wales. We always stop, have lunch, take a break and create here. It’s beautiful as you have the woods, the river and the water fall to create in. We also stop here on our way back to see how much the pieces change since we left them or if they still exist, which is fun and interesting. There wasn’t much special meaning or motivation behind this mandala
except that it’s something all three of us created in our usual spot on our way home. Alijah is great at spotting what materials to use and collecting them, he has input to what looks nice or if we should move something and we really enjoy making something with him. We hope its teaching him many skills as well as benefiting him with its calming affects amongst the other benefits of art and being outside." (Brioney McClean to TDC)
Jon and Brioney are currently working on a piece for the European stone stacking championship in Dunbar, Scotland and also taking a trip together to Llano, Texas to take part in the Llano Earth
Art Festival, to meet other artists and create. Through art, they hope to inspire others to create, whether it is outdoors or indoors, a simple sketch or a full detailed piece. They believe art can be used to help others and more importantly be relieving.
Artist: Brioney McClean
Artwork Credits: Brioney McClean, Jon & Alijah Foreman
Location:Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, Wales
Category: Land Art, Painting
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bri.rose.artist/
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