Au Dessus de la Rivière, grass planting (L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue, France)

Nils Udo is a German artist who has been creating land-based sculptures since the 1960’s. The artist’s style is well-defined and almost stark, if not for Udo’s use of the materials of the surrounding land, creating a fascinating tension between what could exist in nature, and what is necessarily man-made.

La Mousse I, (Forêt des Vosges)

I really love the artist’s works of Art in Nature -- here Udo uses materials including trees, moss, rocks, and leaves, not quite removing these materials from their natural existence, but instead coaxing them into novel forms that simultaneously sit in contrast, and blend right in, to their surroundings.

Udo has also brought his unique twist on nature into the public, urban sphere, creating interactive artworks in green space and public parks around Europe. There’s something magical about the spaces that Udo creates -- the artist is expert at weaving the illusion that these scenes could, perhaps, exist naturally.  

Gulliver's Forest, (Palace Gardens of Chaumont-sur-Loire, France)