Taut strings and other imaginings
The algae you saw beginning to dry out in the previous post’s first photograph appeared to consist of strings, but those strings were crumpled, presumably because there had been no strong flow in that part of the creek. The second photograph in that post showed somewhat straighter and drier but still mostly green algae.
Now contrast those patches of algae with the ones in today’s post, which are likewise from a tributary of Bull Creek. In today’s first photograph you see dried and stretched-out strings of algae that retained the imprint of a once-fast current. Note several sycamore seeds (Platanus occidentalis) tangled in the algae strands.
Here’s another picture from that same January 29th session in which the algae are so finely swept that you might think you’re looking at the grain in wood or the strata in rocks:
And finally, in a third straight-down view, the picture below offers up curves and feathery structures in dried algae, as well as intricately delicate forms that could pass for cobwebs. This photograph kept reminding me of a fossil of Archaeopteryx, and then also of the Escher lithograph Drawing Hands.
So ends a three-part trip into pallor. Color comes crashing back in tomorrow.
© 2016 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 
I’ve brought up wads of matting that looked like that with a fish hook.
Jim Ruebush
February 17, 2016 at 7:41 AM
Was the matting you brought up natural or manufactured?
Steve Schwartzman
February 17, 2016 at 7:48 AM
It was algae.
Jim Ruebush
February 17, 2016 at 8:03 AM
This series reminds me of when I was a kid and my mother would send me out in the canoe to pull algae out of the lake. As it dried it would create interesting patterns, as you have shown here and yesterday.
melissabluefineart
February 17, 2016 at 8:19 AM
I’ve heard of being a swinger of birches but never till now a puller of algae. Have you incorporated algae patterns into any of your art?
Steve Schwartzman
February 17, 2016 at 8:27 AM
I love that poem! I believe John Muir also liked to climb trees and swing in the wind.
I haven’t painted algae yet, but you never know!
melissabluefineart
February 18, 2016 at 8:31 AM
I hope you’ll finally paint some. Remember, algae’s well that ends well.
Steve Schwartzman
February 18, 2016 at 10:01 AM
🙂
melissabluefineart
February 19, 2016 at 9:28 AM
I take it this symbol means you’re facing up to that truth.
Steve Schwartzman
February 19, 2016 at 9:43 AM
The effect that the presence or absence of water has on algae is fascinating. Your series as a whole reminds me of this almost unimaginable example of 4D printing.
Of course, the technological version of flowers which expand and open in water is akin in its effect to the paper flowers we used to play with as kids. They were Chinese or Japanese, and came in a little tube. We placed them in water, and, in time, had a wonderful floating garden. Even Proust remembered those:
“And as in the game wherein the Japanese amuse themselves by filling a porcelain bowl with water and steeping in it little pieces of paper which until then are without character or form, but, the moment they become wet, stretch and twist and take on colour and distinctive shape, become flowers or houses or people, solid and recognizable, so in that moment all the flowers in our garden and in M. Swann’s park, and the water-lilies on the Vivonne and the good folk of the village and their little dwellings and the parish church and the whole of Combray and its surroundings, taking shape and solidity, sprang into being, town and gardens alike, from my cup of tea.”
shoreacres
February 17, 2016 at 9:26 AM
The quotation in your comment acted as a little madeleine for me and sent me back half a century to the French literature course in which we read Proust, and to the time dimension in which I worked to hold the first parts of each long sentence in my mind so I could hook them up with whatever conclusion the sentence eventually came to and not get lost along the way. Having to do it in a foreign language made the task more difficult.
I hadn’t heard about the printed objects that change their shape in water. The technique is fascinating, and I expect before long we’ll see plenty of creations brought to life by it.
I saw more algae today but kept myself from photographing it. Not so yesterday.
Steve Schwartzman
February 17, 2016 at 12:18 PM
I liked that 4D printing example.
Jim Ruebush
February 17, 2016 at 4:41 PM
I thought you would know about this place near Austin. I follow Chris Helzer and enjoy his good works on the prairie.
http://prairieecologist.com/2016/02/17/hill-country/
Jim Ruebush
February 17, 2016 at 4:38 PM
The preserve in that post isn’t generally open to the public, but I’ve been there on field trips a couple of times.
The flower in the post’s second picture appears to be a four-nerve daisy. The fourth picture there shows one of the many little white snail shells we have here, a bunch of which have appeared in these pages:
https://portraitsofwildflowers.wordpress.com/2013/01/22/a-little-white-ground-snail-in-an-atypical-place/
In addition to NPSOT, the Native Plant Society of Texas, I’m also a member of NPAT, the Native Prairies Association of Texas.
Steve Schwartzman
February 17, 2016 at 6:54 PM
As a guitarist, I was immediately drawn to your allusion to taut strings, and continued on to your lovely treatment of the algae. Your third image (2985) I find particularly well-composed, and it reminds me very much of the grasses that grow up here in Omaha. Good stuff, Steve.
krikitarts
February 17, 2016 at 8:44 PM
As a guitarist, you got a bonus here that I not only didn’t intend but didn’t even conceive, not being a musician myself.
How interesting that the dried algae of the third photograph look to you like Nebraskan grasses: such different organisms, yet similar forms. I’m used to thinking about convergent evolution, but I don’t know that we could invoke that for this resemblance.
In any case, Gary, I’m pleased that you found these photographs good.
Steve Schwartzman
February 17, 2016 at 9:02 PM
Pallor works for me. It’s all part of life’s pageant. I’ve never much paid attention to dried algae so you’ve piqued my interest.
Steve Gingold
February 21, 2016 at 4:58 PM
Oh, the pallor pageant. I hope you’ll pursue it now that your interest has been piques.
Steve Schwartzman
February 21, 2016 at 6:56 PM