Happy New Year everybody out there in blog land! I want to thank everyone over the past year who have dropped by to check out the latest from the Artist at Exit 0 at the Falls of the Ohio State Park. This year is shaping up to be much like the previous one. Which means both man and nature are predictably unpredictable with a sense of timing not easily plotted. Since the holidays, the Ohio River has been up and much of the park that I access has been underwater. That in itself is not news, but the length of time the water has been high has been. It all points to heavy rains and snows in the northern part of the Ohio River Valley and water flowing downriver. The forecast at the time of this writing is not encouraging with showers turning to snow today followed by a precipitous drop to sub-zero degree temperatures. This cold could be historic for us and so far we have received more snow than in recent winters. I think I will stay indoors today! Since my last post, I have been to the river twice (including New Years Day itself) to see what there is to see and experience. Here’s a synopsis so far.
Between rising and falling waters I have been able to skirt around the edges. One thing that unfortunately hasn’t changed is the junk in the river. I’m always interested in what gets stranded in the trees like this wooden pallet that has a corner delicately balanced on the surface of the river. It’s cold out here and despite being warmly dressed, my eyes and nose water from the bit of wind that is also present. 
At the water’s edge is a mix of debris. Most of it is natural with driftwood, wood bark and bits being the most prominent. Trees that have surrendered to the river are rolled against other logs by the waves and the grinding (which can be very audible as well) knocks the limbs off with a loud crack and chews the bark away from the trunks. Intermixed is various man-made and colorful junk that is mostly plastic in composition which also gets masticated by the river. The above photo is fairly typical with lots of polystyrene fragments which also make up the core of my art materials. Most artists have positive feelings for their materials, but I have a love /hate relationship with mine. Let’s move on and see what other sights are along the river in this new year. 
Floating tires always catch my eye. Their blackness and circular perfection contrasts sharply with the rest of the objects on the river’s surface. A short distance away from this wheel I find a dead steer at the water’s edge. 
I debated with myself whether to include this distasteful image in this post, but decided to do it since it represents some of the truth that is in the river. Pictures of man-made trash are one thing and have an almost benign aura to them by now, but something that was once alive registers in a different way. The gravity is far heavier. This poor cow is the largest dead animal I have encountered in the park. Dead deer and other smaller animals are not too unusual in the river. No telling how far this unfortunate animal has floated to arrive here? Rising high waters could once again carry it away. I take this picture and walk on. 
There are other objects that the river has delivered to the park like this plastic turtle sand mold. Having gone through my river collections recently I discovered that turtles are among the most common subjects for sand molds. Who knew? I have found six or seven of them and they are all different like the plastic hamburgers from a recent post of mine. Here’s something else to add to a growing collection. 
I have a Rubber Duck Collection as well and all found within the park. Truthfully, none of them are actually made from rubber and are of course composed from plastic. This is a hunter’s decoy of a pintail duck and would have been cooler had it been made out of wood…alas. I haven’t seen much of actual bird life in the park except for a few hardy species that are around all year round. I noticed that the ring-billed gulls that come here for the winter are not present. I wonder if the cold has them migrating further south this year? To mark how exceptional this winter has been, our area has seen a rare migration of snowy owls from the far north. The snowy owl is listed on the official Falls of the Ohio bird checklist as extremely rare and accidental. For me, this would be a good enough reason to journey here and this just might be the year to see one, but I haven’t heard if any were actually seen in the park? A short distance away from here, a snowy owl in a weakened condition was rescued by our local raptor rehab folks and is being nursed back to health.
Here’s a test for you. Do you know what this is? Time’s up…this is the plastic body of a Mr. Potato Head toy! I count Mr. Potato Head as one of my artistic influences for my Falls of the Ohio Styrofoam projects and this is the first one of these that I have found out here. According to Wikipedia, Mr. Potato Head has been in continuous production since 1952 (that’s a lot of plastic) and was the first toy advertised on television. I can remember as a kid…using actual potatoes to make funny faces and now I use Styrofoam.
I walked up the riverbank to access my outdoor atelier and discovered that the river has swept over it. All the materials that I had cached here over the last couple of years have floated away and the large logs that defined my space are rearranged. I will need to create a new studio if I continue here. I suspect, however, that the river is far from being done and would wager we will experience more flooding in the near future. I picked up a few small pieces of Styrofoam and willow sticks and made my first figure of the new year and posed him at the river’s edge as waves lapped the shoreline.
He is not a large figure and the expression on his face is one of amazement. I first posed him near the river in an old life-preserver that washed up. In addition to being expedient on a cold day it also seemed symbolic. For me, it always comes back to the river and its waters. The quality of our fresh water remains our number one vanishing resource and the river’s course is the journey we all take through life. I will continue to use my creativity at this one small spot on a large river and publish my results on this riverblog. Thanks for checking it out every now and then. As the year progresses, I hope to be like the river by being predictably unpredictable. May we all have a wonderful 2014!
Artist at Exit 0 Riverblog 