A Redneck Perspective: Snow King Artspot

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

By Clyde Thornhill

Jackson Hole, Wyo.-Susie comes over all excited. “Let’s go up Snow King,” she says.

 Susie gets excited all the time - a poetry reading, a bike ride and now a hike up the King. I fear she will end up a spinster unless she learns to demonstrate excitement for Coors Light, barbecued ribs and Bond movies.

“I’d love to,” I tell her, “but the lift doesn’t open until Memorial Day.”
“We’ll walk silly,” she says.

She must have seen my questioning expression that said, “Why the hell would I want to walk up Snow King? If I wanted to climb a mountain I’d drive to the top of Teton Pass.”

“Artspot has created an innovative public art display below Old Man’s Flat,” she explains. “It provides a thought-provoking, unique experience that transcends every day activities. Similar to a rainbow, or seeing a blast of lightning, it is a reminder that life can hold unexpected surprises.”

“Is this like the time you dragged me to Lyndsay McCandless Gallery to see art made from recycled bailing twine that represents the transcendental nature of our existence as it relates to political and religious theory?”  I say.
“You remember!”

“At least they had beer, and I didn’t even have to walk up a damn mountain,” I mutter.

I start hiking up to the art display with Susie. With help from a backpack loaded with energy food (beer and pretzels) and a couple twenty minute breaks, make it to the Artspot by mid-afternoon.  

“Looks like a pile of snow with a hole in the middle,” I observe in the attached yet sophisticated tone favored by art connoisseurs. “If they turned it sideways it would be like the tunnel.”

Susie gets involved in an exhilarating conversation with another pretty girl who had walked up to view the sculpture. “I think it is an emotionally moving piece of self-expression that defines the connection between selflessness and ego in world where the primal is often mistaken for unsophisticated,” the other girl says.

Susie says, “It is often difficult to differentiate between the pragmatic nature of essential substance and essence in a metaphysical sense. By blending environment, location and artistic statement, this sculpture bridges the gap between what is fundamentally translucent and that which is more material in nature.”

I smile to myself. Art girls can be a lot of fun and I don’t have much else going on this afternoon. I take my last dip of Copenhagen, cut a hole in the can with my Buck folding knife, run a pine branch through the hole, and jam the stick in the snow. The girls turn and look questioningly.

I say: “The Copenhagen can represents the circle of our individual reality, and the stick symbolizes our subconscious perception of a greater idealism. By placing it in the larger snow circle I am showing how we can integrate our consciousness to blend into the greater collective energy of the universe. All three, the Copenhagen can, the stick and the pile of snow with a hole in the middle, become as one.”
Both Susie and the other girl get tears in their eyes.

“That’s beautiful,” they say.

I walk down Snow King with a girl on each arm. I say: “Speaking of three becoming as one and blending into the greater collective energy of the universe.” PJH


PERMALINK:
A Redneck Perspective: Snow King Artspot | Planet JH News Article: General Worm Hole

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