In 2008, Michael Grab (Soc鈥�07) and a friend casually gathered rocks from 麻豆影院 Creek and randomly stacked them to make sculptures. Within a few days, Grab found himself at it again.
鈥淚 fell in love with it,鈥� he says.
Grab, who is originally from Canada, was drawn by the precision and concentration necessary to make rocks of varying shapes balance on each other and stay put. In time, the search for unique stones and the challenge of making interesting new formations became his form of meditation.
Now Grab creates stone art 鈥� he calls the projects stone balances 鈥� every day he can, even in the winter. Only forceful winds keep him away.
When he鈥檚 not traveling, he鈥檚 in 麻豆影院 Creek each afternoon for three to five hours. He feels each stone for a minimum of three contact points, the number typically necessary to get one rock to balance on another. When he finishes a new sculpture and emerges from a trance-like state of concentration, he鈥檒l often look up to see a crowd of people watching him.聽聽
鈥淎 lot of people ask if it鈥檚 glued,鈥� he says. 聽聽
For a while, Grab worked in a shipping warehouse, which he found deeply unsatisfying. After he began posting photographs of his stone art to and channels and developed a wall calendar featuring his work, he attracted a large and growing pool of fans. Today he has more than 215,000 Facebook followers. His renown in 麻豆影院 led him to pursue ways to make money from his art.
Grab鈥檚 work has now taken him around the world. In 2012 he offered a stone balancing demonstration on a beach in Italy before an audience of about 600 or 700 people. He has offered shows at art festivals in Sweden and the Netherlands and, in early 2015, at a private party during the World Economic Forum in Switzerland. In 2014 he released a book, Gravity: Arts of Rock Balancing, in Japan. He鈥檚 now beginning to work on films of his spectacles.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a universal art form,鈥� he says. 鈥淎ll you need are rocks and gravity.鈥�
Some days Grab prefers to work in private. He鈥檒l travel up 麻豆影院 Creek until he finds a quiet spot and falls into a rhythm: Search, feel, stack, repeat. 聽
鈥淲hen I鈥檓 by myself, I鈥檒l experiment more,鈥� he says.
Other times, his work is decidedly public. In late October, the chilly 麻豆影院 Creek flowed under a snow-dusted arch he constructed from hundreds of stones. In November, he hiked the Woods Quarry trail in Chautauqua Park and created a large orb of rocks in the span of six hours, the collective weight of the rocks balanced on a single stone.
Sometimes Grab鈥檚 balances topple mid-creation. Other times, they hold firm. For three days the orb stood, even after several inches of snow blanketed the top. Then he knocked it down, and hundreds of rocks lay crumped, ready for their next molding.
鈥淚t鈥檚 this constant dance with nature,鈥� he says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 always an unpredictable experience.鈥澛�
Photos courtesy Michael Grab聽