Devin Devine, land artist and stone artisan based out of the Pocono mountains in Pennsylvania
Projects completed across the USA
Newly completed sphere with integrated patio and wall
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Land Art Installation
Over 16 tons of natural stone were used in this new installation. Dry stone walls, built primarily from locally harvested native stone, with native boulder wall ends and bluestone wall cap. Pennsylvania bluestone patio, with yellow inlay. The sphere is integrated within its environment, with the inlay moving through and connecting the sphere with the wall and patio.
Details of the sphere installation
I built his completely of dry stone–and built it to last forever. The sphere is built primarily of Pennsylvania bluestone, fragments leftover from countless patios, and other stone art installations, over the years. Plus, a decent amount of reclaimed slate, in red, purple, and some black. Yellow stones here are mostly from Tennessee. These are reclaimed materials. Precious treasures, which I find, collect, and use when the right installation project comes along. Purple and white dots seen here are from a beautiful Maryland limestone. I’m not revealing my secret source of this material! The red dots, are locally harvested stone, from near my own house, not my customers.
Just a sneak peak, for now! Check back in a month or so for additional information, progress photos, process video, and a bit of background information too.
UPDATE! Here’s a process video!
Related Content: checking out this sphere from a different vantage, and the lower wall which supports it.
“Awesome work, but couldn’t it just fall over or be knocked over?”
So this is my seventh sphere in this style. Furthermore, it’s my eighth large sized sphere all told. I build them strong–and climbable. In fact, I not only climbed this installation when it was fully complete, but I also climbed it when it was three quarters complete. Spheres one through five–I would NOT have dared trying to climb before they were complete. Why?
The structure of a dry stone sphere installation
A stacked stone sphere is an example of corbelling–each stone leans out, beyond the one beneath it. Therefore, the sphere is getting weaker as it is built up–until you get to the top half. As you build the top half, the sphere gets stronger and stronger. But with sphere number 5 and with the present new sphere, I did something “more different!” Each stone actually points towards the sphere’s center. This is how an arch is built, this is how a dome is built. My other spheres were and are quite strong already–but these new spheres are just quite, quite sturdy.
One sturdy land art installation! My work is not ephemeral, like so much land art–but as a stone mason with decades of experience doing structural stone masonry work–I build my installations with the intention that they should last as long as possible, outliving myself by far.
See? The stones on the lower half all point upwards to the center, while the stones on the top half point downwards, towards the center. This is a LOT of extra work, but it makes for an even stronger sphere.
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