German artist Cornelia Konrads uses steel poles, rope and branches to presents an ethereal emancipation from the clutches of gravity. The site-specific installation in a forest clearing in Osnabrück, Germany presents the audience with a pseudo-reality in which the Gateway also the title of work appears to emerge from the forest floor. In it's construction this effect is acquired through a subtle interweaving of very different materials that culminates in-corporeal perspectives. A strong narrative of the works is in it's appropriative reference to folklore and magic yet its realization is through a harnessing of the immediate natural surroundings and found materials.

Dan Holdsworth series Transmission is a print project showing the topographical contouring and façades of Salt Lake City, Mount Shasta, Mount St Helens, The Grand Canyon and Yosemite. These famous geographical area's have been presented in a c-type print format that shows texture with light and shadow. The whitewashed appearance of the work is similar to when sometimes too much light enters a camera before taking a picture.

Photographer Lola Guerrera attempts to empower a resource taxed area of Mexican desert in hope of raising awareness of a previous metaphysical interrelation that was shared by the indigenous people and the land. If I had found about Lola Guerrera I would have included this work in my dissertation which held some concern for the practice of rituals in indigenous cultures.

In this recent series by Guerrera an orchestrated performance is initiated through the use of brightly coloured smoke clouds that through a strange surreality narrate the relationships between Human and landscapes carried forward by the inertia of smoke resembling apocalyptic natural disasters.

What is meant to be a signifier for a balanced relationship with the natural landscape also acts as a metaphysical performance by the land to depict an unseen, unperceived dimension.

Illustrator Simon Padres creates eclectic narratives where the image grows from within depicting for example an apocalyptic urban landscape within the confines of a hippo's insides. This convoluted amalgamation of line and tone produces a strong effect enabling the image to carry the narrative forward.

Designer françois xavier saint georges automatic drawing machine similar in essence to the automaton the recent feature length animation Hugo is able by layering to construct complex patterning and tone. The ink drawings fixed to rotary or cyclical outcomes are simple yet through evolution of the 'roto-drawing machine' different and unexpected outcomes may be possible.

What is interesting about this project is the idea of letting go and removing a dictatorship over the work. Such work as this has been more attractive to me since attending Giorgio Saddatti's Transmission lecture. I feel that this work is close to the ideal of a metaphysical natural freedom that I search for in my own practice which is perplexing considering the taxing despotic character of the way I work.

Issac Cordal's project of carving then placing miniature figurines in dire yet melancholic climate changing scenario's acts as a subtle reminder of the natural environments potential future. I write this on April the 4th during a heavy snow shower at 9' o'clock in the morning.

Natural illustrator Natalya Zahn has been able to make a living by combining her blog and painting into an artist book that relates her experience's of visiting Franklin Park Zoo. The initiative to combine the traditional and digital mediums of an an artist's thought's, research and expressions is an inspiring and motivating one.

To be able to cultivate one's own unique pathway in the arts and present it in an accessible way is a very industrious feat. Also the demand for such work as Natalya's is high, which is a perplexing phenomenon in these times of socio-economic strife.

What may account for this is a dexterity to combine zoological and ecological systems and it's power with funding and promotion with an artists flexibility, motivation and skills. One a personal level I am very intrigued with the study of Natural Illustration and am interested in the modules of study and possible pathways thereafter.

Yasuaki Onishi's commission for Rice University Gallery, Houston, is a perplexing installation constructed from simple polythene and synthetic materials orchestrated to construe grand natural formations in the likeness of mountains and clouds. 'Onishi views this process of “reversing” sculpture to be a meditation on the nature of the negative space, or void, left behind.'

I am interested in this polarity between representation and nothingness, that such practices as Onishi's deals with. The conflicting theoretical ideals of East and West may be bridged when perceived with an inverted tangent such as this. The work of Onishi is suggestive of natural structures however they are presented with the philosophical backdrop that 'nature' is insignificant yet important at the same time. This Zen or Taoist rhetoric is informative of Onishi's affirmation to a practice concerned with the metaphysical.