Yorkshire Sculpture Park

It was my birthday earlier this month, and we went to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park - one of my favourite places.  It was a hot, sunny day - as most days have been this summer.  (Though today it's raining - the first serious rain we have had in weeks.)

One of the current exhibitions (until April next year) is of work by Giuseppe Penone.  There are bronze trees around the park, some in the open, some in the wood, surrounded by other trees.

Giuseppe Penone - "Tree struck by lightning" 

Albero folgorato is a bronze cast of a tree trunk, split in two by a bolt of lightning.  The split in the tree is covered in gold leaf - a beautiful sight in the sun.

Idee di petra - olmo is in next to the path through the woods,  around the upper lake at the Sculpture Park. It is a bronze tree, with a water-worn boulder caught in its branches, positioned between two of the natural trees of the wood.

The bright sunshine showed off the sculptures in the open areas of the park very well .  Here's Nigel Hall's huge Crossing (Horizontal), one of the long-term exhibits.

Even without the sculptures, the park would be a good place to be.  In a clearing in the woods, the teasels were coming into flower. 

They flower very oddly, starting usually with a band of florets round the middle of the head.  Insects love them, evidently.

The upper lake

Landscape with sculpture

We ended our visit with James Turrell's Skyspace - a peaceful place to sit and watch the sky for a while.