This is a blog of ongoing projects starting with: 1) Antarctica -Dec. 2006 - February 2007 2) Work made from the experience 2008 3) Nevada Feb. - Oct. 2008

Friday, December 23, 2011

Stromatolites rubbing



STROMATOLITES FOSSIL RUBBING

This is a rubbing of a fossil found in the Cradle of Humankind, near Johannesburg, South Africa in October 2011. Stromatolites are fossilised layers of cyanobacteria algae, which formed here around 2 billion years ago. These primitive life forms were the first organisms to convert CO2 into oxygen, eventually giving the planet its atmosphere and creating the conditions for life on Earth and the biodiversity we know today. Cyanobacteria organisms still exist in our soils today.

Wednesday, November 09, 2011

Carbon Sink, The debate continues

Four months on the Debate about Carbon Sink at The University of Wyoming continues. Jeff Lockwood was the man who put the idea for the work into my head a year ago, during a brief conversation. His article in Wyofile is brilliant and the comments are revealing. Check it out online:
http://wyofile.com/2011/11/art-energy-coals-reaction-to-carbon-sink-sculpture-reveals-the-power-of-art-%e2%80%94-and-the-essence-of-education/).

Here it is copied:

Art & Energy

Art is science made clear.

—Wilson Mizner

The business of art is to reveal the relation between man and his environment.

—David Herbert Lawrence

A work of art is 2½ million times more noticeable than an open pit coal mine. I base this on the physical sizes of—and political responses to—Chris Drury’s “Carbon Sink: What Goes Around Comes Around” on the University of Wyoming campus and the Black Thunder coal mine in Campbell County. The coal mine is a monumental sculpture (broadly construed) visible from 700 miles above the Earth; Drury’s art installation fits into a single 270 square-yard pixel on Google Earth. But if you really want to see human handiwork from outer space, check out the swaths of beetle-killed forests stretching across 4,800 square miles of the West. Of course, that would be a rather environmentally sly use of imagery—which is precisely what Chris Drury was up to in using beetle-killed trees to form a vortex at the center of which is a pile of coal.

Carbon Sink

Chris Drury's "Carbon Sink" as installed on the University of Wyoming's campus. The 36-foot diameter piece of art, composed of scorched wood felled by pine beetles, has created a controversy: how much sway should politicians and industry representatives have over academic freedom? (Photo courtesy of Chris Drury — click to enlarge)

The point of “Carbon Sink”—or at least the message that the politicians and energy industry drew from the installation—was that burning fossil fuels pumps carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, which is warming the climate (which is an intolerable scientific discovery), which has led to higher winter temperatures, which are insufficient to kill off the outbreak (which was fostered by drought and forest management practices), which results in mountainsides covered in dead trees. And to take this one step further, a recent study in Canada revealed that the decomposition of the trees is further adding to atmospheric carbon, making the winters warmer which means—well, you get the picture. Or at least the power brokers get the picture.

In a melodramatic response to the artwork, Marion Loomis, executive director of the Wyoming Mining Association, asserted that the University of Wyoming, “put up a monument attacking me, demonizing the industry.” Loomis claimed to understand academic freedom, but intimated that liberty has a price. State representative Tom Lubnau from Gillette employed the same sort of roundabout threat: “While I would never tinker with the University of Wyoming budget—I’m a great supporter of the University of Wyoming—every now and then you have to use these opportunities to educate some of the folks at the University of Wyoming about where their paychecks come from,” (Translation: I’d sure as hell tinker if these uppity artists and impertinent eggheads continue to misbehave.)

All of this leads one to wonder how a small work of art in a corner of a university campus could warrant such outrage. Could the hegemony of Wyoming’s energy industry really be threatened by an elegantly arranged spiral of burnt logs? This whole hullaballoo could be the old ploy of powerful industrial interests playing the victim, but that explanation is too easy. I suspect that the panic was overblown but real. And it arose from Drury’s subversive work being featured in an educational setting. The university is corrupting the state’s youth — and we all know what happened to Socrates (hint: hemlock).

* * *

Anyone who has a soft spot for the underdog has to be doubly tickled by the fallout over “Carbon Sink.” Most obviously, the Goliath of the fossil fuel industry was thumped between the eyes. Even more delightful is that the rock was a piece of art. Not a regulation, or a lawsuit, or a technical report (e.g., an unflattering analysis of water and coal-bed methane) but an evocatively named arrangement of scorched wood. Of course, it’ll take a much larger aesthetic stone to do any lasting damage to Big Coal.

Black Thunder coal mine

Satellite photo of the Black Thunder coal mine, which spans some 50 square miles in Wyoming’s southern Powder River Basin. (click to zoom)

In addition to admitting my deep feeling of schadenfreude, I should also make two other confessions. First, I had a lovely, long visit with Chris Drury when he first came out to Wyoming. And I just might’ve given him the idea about the beetle-forest-coal-climate connection. You’ll have to ask him about the details. Second, although I came to UW as an entomologist, my position is now split between philosophy (where I work on natural resource ethics and philosophy of ecology) and the Master of Fine Arts program in creative writing. So in terms of full disclosure, I fancy myself something of a literary artist.

Having worked in the sciences, humanities, and arts, I admit to some frustration when the latter two endeavors are dismissed as frivolous or largely irrelevant to modern life. This past spring, a university committee of scientists was trying to figure out if and how the arts and humanities could offer anything of value to an initiative concerning biodiversity conservation. There was something of a dog-and-pony show to explore the possibility, but there wasn’t much evidence that the scientists were convinced. And then along came “Carbon Sink.”

I suggest that those who doubt the relevance of art to contemporary society consider that Chris Drury might have done more to catalyze a serious conversation about energy, ecology, and climate change than any technical report or research paper produced by the university. And the same goes for those who cut the arts when school funding gets tight—and for those parents who wring their hands when their kid declares a major in art (or theater, dance, philosophy, English, or history). Turns out that art matters.

The irony, of course, is that it took a British artist to stimulate Wyoming politicians. At least we can hope that Governor Mead’s efforts to develop a state-level energy policy might include a recognition that burning fossil fuels has regional, national and global ramifications. Wyoming’s policy will affect others in profound ways. If it is “our” coal and gas, then it’s also “our” carbon dioxide—and “we” see both lucrative profits and dying forests.

* * *

The tradeoff between wealth and beauty is a lesson worth teaching to our children, which brings me to the another political consequence of “Carbon Sink” and other works that provide social commentary (such as the seditious documentary film, Gasland). Wyoming’s Joint Minerals Business and Economic Development interim committee recently took up the matter of energy education. The idea is to develop an “Energy Literacy Education Program” for K-12 students. Two important concepts emerged from the committee’s September 12thmeeting in Casper.

A few red-needled pines, infested with bark beetles, rim a soggy meadow in the Medicine Bow National Forest. (Photo by Josh King with aerial support from LightHawk Aviation — click to enlarge)

First, the model for our venture is to be Oklahoma’s energy education program. It seems that Sen. Eli Bebout of Riverton is a real fan of the Sooners’ approach to education. Given that I teach natural resource ethics, I have a vested interest in seeing what students will have been taught when they arrive on campus. It looks like my job is not going to get any easier.

At the Oklahoma Energy Resources Board website, one is introduced to the educational program with a video of teachers singing the praises of the Board. The state has cut teachers’ supply budgets to zero, so the educators fawn over the boxes of cool stuff that the energy industry provides for “free.” The teachers seem blissfully unaware that if their state increased severance taxes to the level of neighboring Texas, perhaps there’d be enough state revenue to provide funding for classroom supplies. Then the teachers might not have to settle for the “free” things provided by the energy industry and they could decide to purchase art supplies. We can only imagine what might happen if the kids were able to think about their world and creatively express their hopes—and concerns—without the oversight of the energy industry.

If anyone wonders whether such an educational program in Wyoming might be just a tad tilted toward the views of industry, visit the Campbell County School District website dedicated to the Powder River Coal Company. Sixth graders from the gifted-and-talented program put this site together, and they’re certainly a capable bunch. The text is well-written and the design is quite professional. But try clicking on “Environmental Issues.” You’ll learn that PRCC’s low-sulfur coal is better for the air, that coal mines comply with the Clean Water Act and the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act, and that, “Powder River Basin coal mines provide a kind of refuge for wildlife. Besides creating animal habitat with rocks and dead trees, the coal mines protect the animals that are living on the mine site [from hunters].” Coal mining appears to be just about the best thing that could happen to the environment. As for the effects of carbon dioxide on the climate, there’s not a peep. Maybe it’s time for a school field trip down to the UW campus to check out “Carbon Sink.”

The other important concept to emerge from the committee meeting was framed by Lara Ryan, executive director of the Wyoming Land Trust. It seems that the core message to our children will be: “Energy and conservation are not at odds. Rather they are mutually beneficial…We can have it all.” This might be true, depending on who “we” are. If it includes today’s K-12 students, then having it all isn’t so simple. “We” (adults) seek to have it all by externalizing costs—shifting our problems onto “them” (the children and future generations).

The core reality of the modern world of energy consumption is that we can’t have it all. My mother was an artist and wise woman. When people asked her to produce a calligraphic piece, she would tell them that there were three qualities in commissioned artwork: good, fast, and cheap. The client could pick any two of these. For example, if a bride-to-be wanted her wedding invitation to be good and fast, then it wasn’t going to be cheap.

The same limitations hold for energy. Pick whichever two you want, but you can’t have all three. What is good (for humans and the environment) and fast (available right now) isn’t cheap (e.g., solar home systems). What is good and cheap isn’t fast (e.g., large-scale alternative energy systems), and what is cheap and fast isn’t good (e.g., burning fossil fuels). No, you can’t have it all. Even an artist knows that.

* * *

Philosophy and art come together in the field of aesthetics. And environmental aesthetics is a rich interaction of science, philosophy, and art. The great ecologist Aldo Leopold wrote: “Our ability to perceive quality in nature begins, as in art, with the pretty. It expands through successive stages of the beautiful to values as yet uncaptured by language.” His concept has since been framed in terms of ‘thin’ beauty, which appeals to our superficial sense of what is pretty, and ‘thick’ beauty, which arises from our understanding of what lies deeper. The Tetons are postcard pretty to anyone who sees them, but when one understands the geological forces that pushed the mountains skyward and the ecological zones that are layered on the slopes, then a thick sense of beauty emerges. It’s the difference between listening to a lovely sonata and knowing the musical theory, historical context, and composer’s anguish that lie behind the composition.

Pine Beetle

Mountain pine beetles, roughly the size of a rice grains, spend most of their lives feeding under the bark of pines. At certain times of year, the beetles, en masse, take flight to find new trees to infest. (Photo by Jeff King — click to enlarge)

Many people are aesthetically offended by wind farms, although some find the form and motion of windmills to be elegant. In either case, the initial impression is just that—a hasty judgment. Understanding the marvelous complexity of engineering deepens one’s appreciation. But what makes these structures beautiful in my estimation is understanding that each day a windmill turns on the high plains of Wyoming, 4 tons of coal that are not incinerated—and each year a windmill churns means 4,300 tons of carbon dioxide do not enter the atmosphere. Now that’s a beautiful thing.

Perhaps we should be ethically offended by coal mines and gas wells, or at least by the fact that Wyoming has extracted such wealth while spreading the costs of burning fossil fuels into the future and around the world. Maybe it’s a good thing that our views are interrupted by windmills and that we won’t derive enormous riches from this energy source. Justice entails that we bear some of the burden—whether aesthetic or economic—of energy production.

Windmills are conspicuous. And that’s good. For too long Wyoming has externalized the costs of energy. Rather than shoving the aesthetic costs of energy into places where most of us don’t have to see the ugliness, or spreading health costs across the planet via the atmosphere (sick people aren’t very pretty), or pushing the environmental costs into the future when we don’t have to confront the unpleasant consequences of rising sea levels, windmills make us face up to our consumption and complicity. If carbon dioxide was colored a sickly chartreuse rather than being invisible, we might be much more pleased to see windmills. Of course, there’s another way of making the costs of burning fossil fuels visible—go look at the dying forests in the Rockies. Or perhaps just check out Chris Drury’s artwork tucked away in a corner of the UW campus.

Some pretty things become beautiful when you know the deeper story, but not always. I remember as a kid seeing a pretty, swirling rainbow along the edge of a lake and later learning that this was an oil sheen. The truth isn’t always pretty; sometimes knowledge makes the world a disturbing place. Merely ugly things can become truly awful when we learn more about their appearance—as with the beetle-killed forests of Wyoming. The thin sense of ugliness gives way to a thick sense of awfulness when we understand our role in the insect outbreak.

* * *

After the executive director of the Wyoming Mining Association claimed that his industry had been villainized and victimized by art, Mr. Loomis went on to insinuate that corporate monies to the university were put at risk by the artwork. After all, students could be led to ask hard questions (remember Socrates?). Given that political pressure worked to shut down a photography exhibit that offended the oil and gas industry (“The New Gold Rush: Images of Coalbed Methane,” at the Nicolaysen Museum in Casper) and political extortion worked to shape university policy with regard to unwelcome political views (i.e., the Bill Ayers debacle), Loomis’ warnings are understandable if profoundly disappointing. Of course, he hadn’t actually seen the artwork when he made his threat, but it seems that empirical evidence isn’t all that important when it comes to energy education in Wyoming.

Construction of Carbon Sink

A detail of ‘Carbon Sink’ as it is being installed. The sculpture is composed of timber felled by pine beetles. (Photo by Chris Drury — click to enlarge)

Loomis suggested that the university might, “put up a sculpture commending the affordable, reliable electricity that comes from coal on the other end of Prexy’s Pasture.” Perhaps Mr. Loomis has a good idea. But as much as education is touted by the energy folks, they don’t seem to be fast learners—at least when it comes to the subversive disposition of art. An artist with a keen sense of irony might be tempted to integrate the two messages. For example, s/he might install an electric light to illuminate Drury’s work. Leaving the light on continuously would convey to the viewer a sense that thanks to cheap electricity we believe that we can have it all. And perhaps it’s only fair that the energy industry would get to shed some light on “Carbon Sink,” given that the art did such a fine job shedding light on the energy industry.

* * *

Coda

As for representative Lubnau’s admonishment that, “you have to use these opportunities to educate some of the folks at the University of Wyoming about where their paychecks come from,” I’m well aware that my salary is largely provided through mineral revenues—and this is exactly why I was compelled to write this piece. That, along with a real appreciation for the challenge issued by Academy and Tony Award-winning director Elia Kazan: “The writer, when he is also an artist, is someone who admits what others don’t dare reveal.”

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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }

Mark Northam November 8, 2011 at 3:34 pm

Carbon Sink is a piece of art. We are all entitled to decide whether we like it or not. Had the artist not explained what his “message” was, those of us who view it could easily have arrived at very different messages. My first impression – prior to the Trib spilling the beans – was to see it as an endorsement for co-firing coal and biomass as an energy source. But then, I’m not much of an art buff, and I am an energy geek. What shocked me was first that the art had to be explained in order to communicate the message, and second, how much the artist was payed for his week’s work. But, as I said I’m not much of an art buff.

The point is, the piece is just art – and the artist probably knows as much about energy and climate change as I know about sculpture. If Mr. Drury had real scientific understanding about the interplay of “beetle-forest-coal-climate” I suspect he would have titled it “Carbon Source”, not Carbon Sink. In his defense, he was quick to explain that his personal carbon footprint was as large as anybody’s so he is not ignorant on the topic.

Like it or not, Wyoming’s economy and way of life are absolutely dependent upon society’s continued use of fossil fuels. Mr. Drury’s message is not going to change that. Ironically, education and research – made possible by the investment of state revenue derived from the energy industry and appropriated by legislators like Mr. Lubnau – are the path to a sustainable future regardless of the energy source.

Mr. Drury flew in, delivered his message and left a sculpture that pleases some and irritates others. Mr. Lubnau makes his home here and like his colleagues in our state goverment, is a real sculptor. His legislative work is sculpting real solutions to carbon emissions, leads the nation in that regard, and deserves our respect. He and his colleauges are the custodians of Wyoming’s future made rich by an industry that people love to hate, and their track record shows they are doing a damn good job of it.

JDB, there is nothing in Rep. Lubnau’s comment that fosters hatred in his constituency against educators and Artists. I know him well, and that would be completely out of character. It seems you have as much intollerance for his message as you claim he does for Mr. Drury’s. Your suggestion of “shame” is completely misplaced.

Lon D. Lewis BS Cemical Engineering UW 62 November 8, 2011 at 10:53 am

Wonderful! Wonderful! Wonderful! article and art work. It makes one proud of their University. Keep up and increase this sort of great work and effort.
Lon D. Lewis, BS Chemical Engineering U.Wyo 1962.

JDB November 8, 2011 at 9:30 am

“The hue and cry from the uppity eggheads would be deafening without qualification .
The uppityness, impertinance and arrogance of dismissing my words, and reading threats where none were made saddens me.”

No, Lubnau, you weren’t threatening anyone. You obviously have great respect for those who think differently than you–those who have dedicated their lives to learning. Art’s job is to start the conversation. When has the energy industry started the conversation about where it needs to improve? It has fought tooth and nail for deregulation and to spread misinformation. We all benefit from the energy industry in this state, which was admitted time and again in this piece, but the fact that you and the other pit-bull defenders of big-energy ignore that and try to draw black and white lines, try to foster hatred in your constituency against educators and “Artists” (nice quotes) is sickening. Shame on you for that, for your reaction to this piece.

Tom Lubnau November 8, 2011 at 6:50 am

I am often amazed at the presumptious nature of folks who want to read or imply messages in my words to construe them to their own meaning, for their own policital purposes and to create controversy where none really exists. Because I am conservative and because I represent one of the areas key in generating the revenue necessary to operate this state, I often have to preface my commentary with statements like, “I am a great supporter of the University of Wyoming, and I would never tinker with their funding stream” because if I simply said, “This sculpture gives me an opportunity to discuss from where UW’s funding comes” the hue and cry from the uppity eggheads would be deafening without qualification .
The uppityness, impertinance and arrogance of dismissing my words, and reading threats where none were made saddens me. I commented on the meaning a particular piece of art. And, isn’t that the point — for art to inspire commentary. Or, is there a double standard that art should inspire only the commentary desired by a particular group of “artists” with a particular point of view?

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Some people with stories

Rachel
Unknown San
Thomas
Stephan
Roger
Petrus
Michael
Lee
Benji
Alpheus
Maria

Layers of Time and Waves of Events

This is my last day here. I have been collating all the research I have done. Lining up all my collected objects, and collecting stories from the various people here who have agreed to do a portrait.

Of the research, my hunch is that the work should be about revealing what is hidden. This includes the rock and cave systems that underlie the Cradle, which have been slowly giving up their secrets in the fossil layers of plants, algae, sea creatures, and the fossilised remains of animals and early hominids going back 2 million years. Within this time line have been several catastrophic events including 3 magnetic pole reverses, which will led to the deaths of the hominids seeking water under the ground.

Going back further to the Impact event 2 billion years ago, a time when plants were just beginning to create oxygen from CO2. This event will have altered the rock beds in the cradle creating caves which slope gently into the rock. This destruction may well have upset things enough to kick start more life forces, which you could say was a creative event. The Earth has seen cycles of destruction and creation. From melted rock created during the asteroid impact, you get a line of rock boulders which 10,000 years ago San people use as a rain making site to encourage the cycle of life of which they were a part.

Just as behind each person I have met here, is a hidden story, so the Earth itself reveals glimpses of its hidden layers of history going back to the formation of the Earths' crust 4 billion years ago:
layers of time and waves of events.

My intention is to try to encapsulate some of this in a small rock chamber, set under some trees and within a circle of revealed bedrock. The interior of the chamber will plot the movement of the sun over a year and will have drawings in iron oxide on the walls - alluding to plants, fossils, shattered rock, time and waves as in sound waves, shock waves, waves of events.

Over the coming months I will be planning these drawings as works on paper and as prints as well as using geological and topographic maps. I will also begin work on transforming the portrait images into the stories given me by the various individuals. Then it is hoped I will return to make the chamber and show the works on paper in a space in Johannesburg, perhaps during the art fair here next September.

Studio and objects



Tortoise shells
Creation Destruction rocks, from The Cradle of Humankind and Vredefort Impact dome

Stromatolites: plants which began the process of creating oxygen on the planet - Cradle



Drawings for Time/Wave chamber

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

San rock drawings

Bushman

In Johannesburg at Wits University is the Origins Centre, a remarkable museum of early man, displaying skulls, tools, rock drawings and some remarkable film of San bushmen killing an Eland, doing a healing trance dance and talking about the various aspects of the paintings, dance, healing and ways into another world, through cracks in the rock, or down a termite nest.

All of this came as a jolt to me because at Nirox I have been thinking along the lines of a chamber into another world; inside/outside, revealing the cracked dolomite paving rocks, and the significance of caves and the underworld, which have revealed the remains of very early hominids. Here at the museum and earlier out at the dome I have encountered just that in the San rock art.

My introduction to the Origin Centre came through Hugh Brody in London, who put me in touch with Ben Smith at the Centre, and Ben advised that I take a drive out to a farm 2 hours from here to see more petroglyphs and to the Drakensburgs to see rock paintings, copies of which he showed me at the museum. These paintings are going fast, vandalism, rain etc etc. so they are making meticulous tracings. They are also in the process of trying to get all of world rock paintings onto a web site because there are so many crossovers between cultures.

So today I drove out with Stephan to Bosworth Farm, just north of the impact Dome. There we were given tea by Dr Neil Orford and his wife. They have a stud farm for race horses and Sussex Cattle. Neil worked as a vet in Sussex, many years ago. He has also had many encounters with modern day bushmen who have worked for him on various farms and he has nothing but praise for them. he even reminded me that Mandela has strong bushman blood in his veins (you can see it in his face) which accounts for his compassion and intelligence.

So Neil then handed us over to Petreus who was to be our guide for the morning. The three of us drove up to a low boulder strewn hill. Clouds were gathering and the sky was looking somewhat black. We were a bit apprehensive because the rock has a lot of iron in it and attracts lightning!

At the gateway to the hill was a single standing figure with very obvious San features. From then on we threaded our way between rocks, Petreus pointing out drawings which we would never have noticed. Subtly pecked into the rock, these are the most delicate, tender and beautiful of images, drawn with great surety, not for the sake of art but to heal someone or to give a sense of power for anyone who later touches them.


Searching for drawings



Ostrich

Rhino

Lion

Hippo emerging

Eland

Hartebeest



Elephant

Zebra

Lovers

Eland

As well as the animal and human drawings there many more hallucinatory images which looked to be the kind of images which might come up during a trance dance. As well as these, there are the purely abstract patterns which Petreus says denote that here a healing took place.

Hallucinatory beings

Healing place

Many of the drawings are so faded in color, that without Petreus keen eyes and awareness we would never have known just what we were looking at. Most of the drawings face the slope down to the river where many of these animals were to be found. You stand in front of them, they may have been done 300, 3000, or 30,000 years ago, no one knows for sure, but tears come to your eyes and you are gripped by both sadness and elation.

As we return to Nirox the storm finally breaks and there is rain, hail, thunder and lightning. Nature demonstrates its power and the first rains of Spring have arrived.

Friday, October 14, 2011

Vredefort - an impact Crater

As part of my research into the geology and archeology of the area I had asked to visit the Vredefort Impact Crater. 2 Billion years ago an asteroid hit the earth at this spot, creating a crater 300 km across with an impact dome in the middle 90 Km. across. This dome was formed by compressed rock coming back up again, like a rain drop does in a bowl of water. It was the remains of this dome which we were due to visit with the Geologist from Wits, Professor Roger Gibson. We spent the morning exclusively with him, looking at the rock at ground Zero, the various impact melt and fractured rock at the domes edge, and then after lunch joined a bigger tour looking at all the various rock, iron age settlements, Voer trekker farms, early gold mines, Boer war sites and ending up at a seam of melt rock, in the plains near the centre, called pseudotachylite on which were San petroglyphs of various animals and spirit creatures.

All the rocks on this hill at the edge of what was a dome have been lifted from the horizontal to the vertical and shattered.
On the edge of what was the dome looking at seams of pseudotachylite

We crossed the Vaal river and headed into the haze of the centre to what was ground zero and is now a shallow lake caused when an ice sheet, which was at some time responsible for eroding the dome, created a hollow. There are granite boulders strewn across the plain. These are some of the oldest rocks on earth, formed over 4 billion years ago when the earths crust solidified. These rocks formed the bedrock of the dome, ie the bottom of the impact. Everything else, including the asteroid was simply vaporised or hurled into the air. You would have had 4 K square blocks of rock hurled 40 k into the air. Everything beneath the surface was compressed and then sprung back up.

At the centre here, the impact of this 10 km. long flying piece of rock traveling at thousands of miles an hour was massive. The granite was heated, melted and fractured forming pockets of melt known as Granophyre in what had become a kind of plasticine rock. Its rapid cooling meant that this melted rock formed a kind of black glass, a tiny percentage of which is meteorite.
As the rock shattered it formed cracks which in grating together heated the rock to around 14,00 degrees, almost double the heat which will normally melt rock. The resulting liquid melt ran into all of the cracks, some of them several metres wide. this again is the fine grained, black pseudotachylite and is a conglomerate of all the melted rock around it. It takes this new form because it cools rapidly, so being unable to reform its original crystalline state.


pseudotachylite breccia within granite. Friction in the cracks, seconds after impact, melted the rock which ran into the cracks

After lunch we joined a bigger tour and headed for the old gold mines and Boer war sites.

Upended quartzite on the Vaal river which cuts through the dome. These layers of rock are ancient beaches.

searching for gold in the ancient river deposits.

Roger explaining the significance of the shatter patterns in the rock.

As the sun dropped lower in the sky we walked across flat farmland near the centre, headed for a small tree and a line of boulders on the horizon. This is a pseudotachylite fault line, eroded into a line of massive boulders. There is evidence here of massive destruction 2 billion years ago, but 10,000 years ago, San bushmen were using this place as a sacred rain making line. For some reason the rocks have attracted acid drips of water, either from trees, or from a since eroded porous rock. As a result these rocks have little depressions and cups within them which hold water. Rain brings the migrating animals onto fresh grass and so it is here on these rocks, which were once melted at 1,400 degrees centigrade, that the bushmen chipped images of animals and possibly a rain man.

Pseudotachylite fault line of melt boulders

Water cup rocks
Eland

Rhino

Hippo

Hyena

Wildebeest/Eland

Horned rain man?

As the sun sinks low we head back after a very long but extraordinary day, where we have looked at evidence of absolute destruction. A mountain sized rock traveling at 10 Km per second, blasts the Earth causing a fireball with temperatures up to 20,000 degrees centigrade and penetrating 40 Km into the bedrock, creating a 90 Km dome in a 300 Km crater. All this in about 10 minutes max. Early hominids will have lived in the area as they did in the Cradle 2 million years ago, and 10,000 years ago the San will have seen evidence in the rock of water and life. Perhaps the rocks allowed for the growth of trees which attract water and animals seeking shade. The San turned this site of destruction into a place of creation. Creation, destruction, creation, destruction, creation.