While many people use snow for skiing and sledding, Englishman Simon Beck has another use: art. Beck uses only his imagination and a pair of snowshoes to create giant works of snow art on ski slopes. Most of the creations are done at the French ski resort, Les Arcs, beginning as early as October and sometimes going until late May. So, how does the artist create his masterpieces which take about 10 hours each to do?
“The setting out is done using handheld orienteering compass and distance determination using pace counting or measuring tape. Curves are either judged or arcs of circle using a clothes line attached to an anchor at the centre,” Beck says on his Facebook page. “Designs are chosen from the world of geometry or “crop circles”. Some are named eg Mandelbrot set, Koch curve, Sierpinski triangle are 3 of my favorites.”
For a visual idea of Beck’s snow art, check out the gallery below.
Jessica Festa is the editor of the travel sites Jessie on a Journey (http://jessieonajourney.com) and Epicure & Culture (http://epicureandculture.com). Along with blogging at We Blog The World, her byline has appeared in publications like Huffington Post, Gadling, Fodor’s, Travel + Escape, Matador, Viator, The Culture-Ist and many others. After getting her BA/MA in Communication from the State University of New York at Albany, she realized she wasn’t really to stop backpacking and made travel her full time job. Some of her most memorable experiences include studying abroad in Sydney, teaching English in Thailand, doing orphanage work in Ghana, hiking her way through South America and traveling solo through Europe. She has a passion for backpacking, adventure, hiking, wine and getting off the beaten path.
