MrC chose our weekend outing for this week; we’ve said for ages that we’d both like to go to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park and finally got around to going yesterday.

The weather was amazing; short-sleeve weather with a lovely light wind (enough wind, in fact, for me not to realise that the sun was catching my arms – I’m suffering from an intensely prickly sunburn today).

I’m not quite clear on how the park’s actually organised; it ‘s part sculture park, part nature walk, two art galleries set around 2k apart and some amazing views.  They’re also in the process of opening up a conservation project along the banks of their two huge lakes.   All set in grounds that were previously part of a very arty teacher training college that used to be known as Bretton Hall and was fairly recently absorbed into part of Leeds University.

Map in hand, we plotted out a route that took us from the main visitor centre, over to the far gallery and back along a route that took is in a huge circle.  There was plenty to see throughout, both nature and sculpture.

I’m not great on art and find that I most enjoy the things which are most easily accessible.  My tastes are for ordinary pieces of life put across quite boldly; I love Alexander Miller, for example, and love poring through the Washington Green catalogues and dreaming of having enough money to fill the house with prints from their artists.

MrC seems to do better at enjoying the more abstract things, and he has a good eye for seeing even those in portions that he can photograph differently.

There were pieces to suit both of us at the park, and I managed a few shots for the 365 project.  I most enjoyed a piece called ‘Trees’ by Dennis Openheim; a series of pieces of furniture, arranged by room and then presented as trees.  Photographing them was quite difficult, but the one here explains a little better than I can in words.

I think art’s good when it kicks off some kind of feeling, and that needn’t necessarily be all positive and lovely.  I felt quite odd about a piece which was sort of half woman half rabbit.  And I think that’s actually a good thing because it gave me something somehow and I’m still thinking about that a day later.

We spent about five hours at the park in total, and found that there was a whole section that we’ve saved for next time. We felt that we needed at least another couple of hours there to see everything properly.

So definitely a great day out and a really good find; the sculptures – and obviously the natural environment – change from time to time, so I’m sure that we’ll be back and will find something different there every time.