Amandine Alessandra: News & Projects / Portfolio

Ephemeral Stencils: Salt

Salt_stencils

Salt_stencils2

Amandine_Alessandra

While staying in Canada last winter, I became curious of the side effects of salt being used on snowy roads, and then dumped along with tons of snow in the nearest river. After laying a stenciled word on the grass, I covered it with salt, and then removed the paper. What was left was the word always neatly traced in the grass by the white crystals, bound to melt and disappear.

For weeks, I regularly went back to the site to photograph the evolution of the letterform. I noted that as the salt letters were slowly fading away, the grass surrounding it started to die, burnt by the sodium, leaving a well defined scare in the green surface, where I don’t expect anything to grow for a while.

It seems that although the word disappeared, the mark will always be there, unlike the grass which will never grow again.


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