Environmental artist Martin Hill says he tends to get more pleasure from personal experiences than from tangible objects.
Martin Hill is an internationally recognised environmental artist and photographer who creates sculptures from site-found materials that then return harmlessly back to nature. He believes we should be guided by nature and its cyclical design for our long-term survival.
Hill will be exhibiting his editioned photographic prints and talking about his recent book, Earth to Earth: Sculpture Inspired by Nature's Design at the Words on a Small Island Waiheke Book Festival from October 8-10.
Earth to Earth captures the best of Hill's works created over the past 13 years in New Zealand and around the world. Hill says his favourite things tend to be experiences rather than objects.
"The lessons I've learned from experiences - through my senses and my feelings - are more important than the things I own. Possessions are too transient to be important in the larger scheme of things - even with all the sentiment we attach to them."
When pressed for what he values, Hill came up with these.
10 FAVOURITE THINGS
1. Karearea, the New Zealand falcon
From the hill on which we live in Wanaka I can watch falcons swooping down on prey in mid-air below. Their distinctive cry is thrilling and reminds me that falcons are a measure of the health of the local ecology.
2. The evocative music of Stephan Micus
A German composer and performer who roams the world in search of new sounds and textures from instruments such as the Ethiopian lyre, gongs, an Egyptian reed flute, Ghanaian talking drums and tin whistles, and adds his own sonorous voice to create beautiful unearthly music.
3. Home-made marmalade on toasted home-made bread
My partner, Philippa, has found a local source of Seville oranges and she keeps us stocked up with home-made marmalade all year round.
4. Contemporary sustainable design
Like the building known as R128 by Werner Sobek. It's an example of ecological design that meets the highest aesthetic design criteria while setting new standards of performance in terms of the relationship between the built environment and natural systems. It's an emissions-free house, it requires no energy input for heating and cooling, and its materials are completely recyclable.
5. Books that have changed my life
I treasure books, both art books that are visually inspiring like Richard Long's Walking in Circles and those that shift our thinking on design, namely Buckminster Fuller's Critical Path, Victor Papanek's Design for the Real World, Paul Hawken's The Ecology of Commerce and Bill McDonough and Michael Braungart's Cradle to Cradle.
6. My 17-35mm lens
This lens allows me to capture my creative vision when photographing my sculptures. I use it more than any other in my camera bag.
7. Multi-pitch rock climbs on granite peaks
I started climbing in Britain when I was 16 and have climbed in many parts of the world. To this day I have found nothing else that compares with the total presence required of me, or the regenerative effects I get from climbing into locations and experiences with friends in high places.
8. Mountain light
From our house we look north and west to the mountains of Mt Aspiring National Park. Watching the light change, the fronts coming through is spectacular all year round.
9. Multi-day journeys in wild places
The world is still full of wondrous remote places in which to venture both in New Zealand and overseas. They fill my imagination and keep me coming back.
10. Quality of life itself
Moving from Auckland to Wanaka, creating a home and working environment that reflects who we are and how we prefer to live is continually rewarding. Working at what we love most is our recipe for happiness.
* Words on a Small Island, The Waiheke Book Festival.
