SALT:
"Common salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in its natural form as acrystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quantities in the seawater, where it is the main mineral constituent; the open ocean has about 35 grams (1.2 oz) of solids per litre, a salinity of 3.5%. Salt is essential for animal life, and saltiness is one of the basic human tastes. The tissues of animals contain larger quantities of salt than do plant tissues; therefore the typical diets of nomads who subsist on their flocks and herds require little or no added salt, whereas cereal-based diets require supplementation. Salt is one of the oldest and most ubiquitous of food seasonings, and salting is an important method of food preservation.
Some of the earliest evidence of salt processing dates to around 6,000 years ago, when people living in Romania were boiling spring water to extract the salts; asaltworks in China has been found which dates to approximately the same period. Salt was prized by the ancient Hebrews, the Greeks, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Hittites and the Egyptians. Salt became an important article of trade and was transported by boat across the Mediterranean Sea, along specially built salt roads, and across the Sahara in camel caravans. The scarcity and universal need for salt has led nations to go to war over salt and use it to raise tax revenues. Salt is also used in religious ceremonies and has other cultural significance.
Salt is produced from salt mines or for the sea salt by the evaporation of seawater or mineral-rich spring water in shallow pools. Its major industrial products are caustic soda and chlorine, and it is used in many industrial processes and in the manufacture of polyvinyl chloride, plastics, paper pulp and many other products. Of the annual production of around two hundred million tonnes of salt, only about 6% is used for human consumption; other uses include water conditioning processes, de-icing highways and agricultural use. "
Salt has become significant in my work this term. I have become fascinated by its power in the landscape to errode rock faces and leave it's lasting traces and drawings on the coastal landscape. Furthermore salt is necessary to life. We need it. It is also something which offers us pleasure in the form of taste and is used often in religous ritual and ceremony. This I felt lead back to the communal experience which I had explored through looking at ritual in the landscape in cairn building and coin logs as superstious acts which are communally invested in.
Experimenting with salt I have created works which trace the track of the salt as it leaves crystalised patterns from water evaporation. These pieces I find very interesting however they are not finished artworks, they lie on the point before a natural process becomes an artwork, they are merely a presentation of what we fail to see. Almost a scientific experiment.
However I have found the power of salt interesting as it affects other materials and substances it is combined with, it has chemical power. When combining it with PVA glue I was able to create a small star like pattern with the salt which I used to form delicate paper sculptures.
Though I have not yet found a resolved way to present salt in my practice yet I will remain continously interested in it, having taken many photographs of it's affects in the landscape for its ability to create pattern.