The Incredible Art Of Stone Balancing
Howdy folks and greetings from the Great Plains of North Texas!
Well yesterday I stumbled onto an amazing artist while I was looking for a cover photo for my post. This guy works with rocks and stones, creating fascinating sculptures by stacking them.
And usually the results look impossible, like they're defying the laws of physics.
His name is Michael Grab and he started working with rocks in Boulder Colorado. Isn't that a fitting place to stack rocks! After years of practice, he's honed his skills to baffling levels.
On his website gravityglue, he gives an explanation of how he does it:
"Balance requires a minimum of three contact points. Luckily, every rock is covered in a variety of indentations that can act as a natural tripod for the rock to stand upright. When the rocks touch, you can feel the vibrations or "clicks," as the surfaces move against each other."
A core, non physical element is meditation. In order to feel the smallest clicks, it helps to breathe slowly, clear the mind, and relax, while remaining alert. Something to note: This meditative state seems also a natural symptom of feeling for balance points.
Achieving a challenging balance requires patience and becoming fully in touch with NOW(where the vibrations live). You must get to know the rocks you are working with. Some rock characters will coordinate better with others, vise versa, back, forth, right, left, up or down.
The trick I've found is to play and experiment. Start simple. Step by step. Add complications if you feel. "Try not. Do, or do not. There is no try. - Yoda"
-LEAVE NO TRACE-
I don't understand all that but I have about as much artistic gifts as a fence post. If that all makes sense to you, let me know. Here's a few more sculptures:
How in the world did he do this??
This one here is one of my favorites, I think it's in the Arizona desert:
Kudos Sir, I don't think anyone in the world is doing this!
This video actually shows him building one in real time. It doesn't look possible and yet he does it right before your eyes:
Thanks for stopping by folks, God bless you all!
-jonboy
Texas
I don't really understand how they do it... my record is 3 stones!
I don't know either but the artist said it took him years of practice, I'm sure it was mostly failures at first! Thanks so much for commenting.
Hey janton, I love this type of artwork, so much energy is flowing with the stones and nature. Just beautiful and yes very clever balancing.
After seeing those would you like to try it angiemitchell? I don't think I'd have the patience!
I seriously need to spend time practicing this art Cowboy 🙏
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Oh that's a great idea reikigirl! That would make for some great posts too I think. It's getting pretty dang cold to do that now though, isn't it? Like I can't imagine getting out into the river and doing it like he does in freezing temperatures, but then I'm more of a desert rat. lol.
I hope you do some of this stuff and post about it!
You would absolutely love it April. Just start small with similar rocks. ♥︎♥︎⚖️♥︎♥︎
Not really sure it is a useful skill but hey if he can make a living doing it then good for him! (Oh and I have been offline for about 2 weeks so I will try to get to all the comments you did leave me over the next couple of days!)
What was that sir simms50? A Steemit vacation?
I agree about the artist, it's so unusual that I hope he can monetize it somehow.
He could sell the photographs and make saleable videos. Get commissions for garden sculptures. Although in such situations they would have to be protected ~ Or the garden lovers protected. ♥︎♥︎⚖️♥︎♥︎
Great ideas allyinspirit! I wonder if he has ever glued any together so they'll last? I don't see anything wrong with it but he is probably a purist in that regard. I agree though, he could work on commission and do demonstrations and teach about his work.
I had an idea for doing some as part of a larger sculpture ~ And using glue. But it kind of defeats the miraculousness of them. So I decided against it.
YES. Teaching others would be a great income generator. Some people are concerned that the over-enthusiasm of some rock stack makers in some areas is detrimental to the environment. If one was to teach it would be good to always keep this in mind. ♥︎♥︎⚖️♥︎♥︎
Very good points allyinspirit!
Yes I was off for 2 weeks. I queued up some posts for a week then pretty much was offline for the other week.
On sabatical or vacation or celebration of the feasts or traveling?
A little bit of all of them!
First was the Feast of Tabernacles, then I took a few days off after that. All in all it totaled around 14 days off!
From work too, or just steemit?
BOTH!!!
cool!
I agree sir michealb, thanks for stopping by!
No, sorry, but this is just not possible. I think he's posing as a sculptor but is, in fact, the inventor of an extremely strong invisible glue.
lol! Well, I HAVE seen glue advertised that works underwater so maybe the video is edited to fake us out. Wow, you Irish are hard to convince!
lol..I'm glad you enjoyed this one barbara-orenya!
Howdy sir @janton. I enjoyed looking all these examples of stone balancing art. Thanks for sharing.
Howdy there torrey.blog! Where do you hail from and what does "leader of engineers" mean? I'm so glad you enjoyed the stone sculptures and thanks so much for commenting!
Hey @janton,
I hail from California. By day time I lead teams of software engineers. :)
Howdy again torrey.blog! Oh how interesting...do you have any advice for the Steemit developers?
I love these !
That vid was fun to see.
Howdy jacey.boldart! I think it's so fascinating and I'm glad you enjoy them. thanks so much for commenting!
Amazing sense of balance. Great to watch, but I wouldn't have the patience to do it.
Howdy today sir Vincent! Isn't that something? I still don't quite understand it but I highly admire it. I don't think I would have the patience either. I mean it had to take hours and hours setting some of those scenes up with rows of rocks.
I think there is a method to this 'madness'. But I guess we will never know. 😊
There definitely is but I guess you'll let us know in your posts when you start doing it. lol.
You can count on that. 😊
lol! Yeah, IF you start doing it, that's a big if!
Howdy Jonboy. You know me so well. 😊
lol..I'll try it when you do, that will get me out of it!