Profiles

Some people travel the world to find meaning in their life. Some climb mountains. Some create works of art. Some take photographs. Martin Hill does all these things.

'About 15 years ago I was living in a suburban house in Auckland and running my own graphics and design business,' says Hill from his home overlooking Lake Wanaka, in the South Island of New Zealand. 'I was thinking that the dominating model of behaviour in our industrialised world is completely unsustainable, the world needs to change fast, and what part could I play in that?'


Circle of circles.

He considered three factors: what he loved doing, what made sense to him and what he could contribute to the environmental movement. 'When I put it all together, I didn't know where my new direction was going to take me, but I changed everything about my life. I scaled down the way I was living and gradually started doing work based on what I believed in. Even after five years of publishing cards, posters, calendars and the like in New Zealand, people were seeing my work everywhere but it wasn't easy making a living in such a small country. I still kept some of my commercial clients - the ones with businesses based on sustainability. Then I broke into the international market.'

Hill is now one of the world's most recognised environmental or land artists, in a group that includes the British exponents Andy Goldsworthy and Richard Long. He ventures into wild places and uses the materials on hand - rocks, leaves, grass, flowers, berries, sticks, driftwood, feathers, snow, ice - to create sculptures in the landscape. The forces of nature inevitably reclaim them, but before they do (and sometimes while they do), Hill photographs them.

'The sculptures often disperse in no time,' he says. 'I'm always thinking about and working towards the moment when the photographs are taken. The natural setting or landscape, the time of day and fall of the light, the weather... Of course, things don't always go entirely to plan, but that's all part of working with nature. It's completely unmanageable and you try to second-guess. A touch of magic usually eventuates - if you're lucky.'

Hill and his partner, Philippa Jones, were recently in the Swiss Alps near the Matterhorn to create a rock sculpture for their long-running, globe-encircling project The Fine Line. 'We hoped the weather wasn't going to be as bad as was forecast, but it was. Basically, it was a blizzard,' he says. 'But we knew that if the weather cleared even for a short time, we'd get a magical image with blue sky and the sculpture covered in snow. On the third day I got up at 4am and climbed by torchlight to the sculpture site, waited for an hour and the sun hit the sculpture. The whole experience was wonderful.'

The resulting photographs have been added to what will eventually be the record of 12 works in high places, connected by a symbolic circle around the earth's surface. Hill and Jones are trying to complete two works a year for the project, which also involves locations in New Zealand, Antarctica, Madagascar, Kenya, the Isle of Skye in Scotland, Iceland, Baffin Island and the Bugaboo Mountains in Canada, and Yosemite National Park in the United States. It will culminate in an exhibition and book, and perhaps a film.

Cyclical system
The circle is Hill's central motif. 'The main metaphor is to do with the shift we all have to make from a linear system to a cyclical system. We've been taking stuff from the earth, making things and turning them into waste, which is the opposite of the way nature works. Everything in nature gets recycled or transformed into something else.'

Circles feature on almost every page of Hill's recently published book, Earth to Earth: Sculpture Inspired by Nature's Design (Hodder Moa). In a foreword by the late Sir Edmund Hillary, the first conqueror of Mt Everest wrote: 'The world is still very beautiful; every effort must be made to preserve it. I admire Martin's unique way of showing us the beauty of nature, not only visually, but metaphorically, because the cyclical way in which nature works is a guide to our own destiny, should we choose to see it.' The book also has brief essays by various environmentally-driven social innovators, and inspirational quotes such as one from philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer: 'The task is not so much to see what no-one has seen, but to think what no-one has thought about that which everyone sees.'

Asked if his inspiration comes from contemplating the wilderness, Hill says, 'That's pretty much it.' These days he doesn't have to go far from home. The house he designed and moved into in Wanaka in 2005 is surrounded by the lake, rivers, forest and mountains, which are all in play marking the changes of season. His neighbours are used to seeing him on his hands and knees or standing in icy water, engrossed in arranging stones, driftwood or floating leaves. 'They're often surprised at how small my sculptures are, but I'm thinking about how close I'll get with the camera to fill the frame.'

2000 circles.

One of his most enigmatic and popular images, Encircled Stone, is comprised of brightly coloured pohutukawa leaves set in smoothly rippled sand around a rock. Part of its appeal is trying to work out how he did it without disturbing the sand. "Easy," he reveals. "I stood on the rock."

Hill has made little attempt to gain acceptance from the art world, believing it's more important for him to communicate to a wider public audience about sustainable design. On the other hand, he has been getting some commissions for more permanent sculptures set in the natural landscape. He has also just completed a commission from a Wanaka resident to create and photograph 30 sculptures on his property, called Just One Life, over the period of a year. The resulting one-off book is to be entitled One Life, One Place, One Year.

Learning curve
Hill, who grew up in England and moved to New Zealand in 1975, initially photographed his work with a Nikon SLR loaded with Velvia film. He now uses a digital Nikon D300. 'Shifting to digital puts a lot of the pre-press preparation in the hands of the photographer, so it has been a learning curve,' he says. And, of course, in keeping with his philosophy of sustainability, it means he's no longer consuming film and processing materials. For his cards and other products, he uses recycled paper and eco-sound inks as much as he can, and he's looking forward to the day when the paper industry, and all other industries, embrace complete reusability.

'Instead of trees, why isn't paper made of a 100 per cent recyclable polymer?' he says. 'There are already examples on the market, but we have to change the way we produce and take back materials. It's a global systems design problem. We need a lot of leadership, commitment and cooperation in order to reach new standards - to complete the circle.'

To see more of Martin Hill's photography, visit www.martin-hill.com

See Photo Review magazine Issue 38 for the print edition of this profile which includes additional images.

To subscribe or order back issue(s):
1. Click here to pay online by credit card, or
2. Order by phone (02) 9948 8600, or
3. Mail or fax - click here

To see more photographer profiles, click here