From the distance of a gallery wall, this photo inspired curious guesses about what it might be. Many saw it as trees on a hilltop.
Near our home was an old shed built of eleven scavenged elevator doors. I found this five-inch detail on one: thick enamel paint pealing off of rusting metal. With the ease of digital editing, blowing up this small area to a larger scale enhances its luscious textures and colors.
Dr. Gary Greenberg descends much further down the size scale, using the remarkable microscope he invented (high-definition, three-dimensional light microscopes) to magnify beach sand (Gary Greenberg's Website). He kindly gave me permission to include his photos here. Looking REALLY closely, a scattering of grains from Maui reveals delightful treasures: bits of the earth -- volcanic and quartz, and biological bits -- tiny fragments of shells, coral, sponge spicules, sea urchin spines, coral and forams (July 11th post).
Greenberg
As he says, "When we walk along the beach we are strolling atop millions of years of biological and geological history...a record of an entire ecology." His photographs represent the fascinating intersection of science and art.
Greenberg
The grains above (quartz, feldspar, garnet) are from the Great Sand Dunes that I photographed from afar in Colorado (August 14th post). Again quoting Dr. Greenberg, "Each grain of sand represents a moment captured in time. It is somewhere on its path from creation to erosion and recycling back into the earth." Those tectonic forces I've mentioned, which rumpled up the Rockies, did so in part by subducting oceanic crust down into the furnace beneath the continent where gems like these melted ... re-formed ... were raised ... eroded ... and ... will repeat.
Sand Time - Greenberg
William Blake: Auguries of Innocence
To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.
.......
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