A man stands on a pavement looking up at the clouds, full and grey. At the first drop of rain, he lies on the ground with his arms and legs slightly ajar. The man lies still as the rain falls and darkens the concrete all around him. In due course, he gets up, leaving a pale silhouette in his wake. Within seconds, the edges of this shape – part crime-scene outline, part evanescent graffiti – begin to blur. Minutes after the man lay down, there is nothing left of this ghostly shadow, no suggestion he was ever there. The British artist Andy Goldsworthy has been performing and photographing this ritual since 1984, three years before I was born, in an ongoing series called ‘Rain Shadows’. I was in my early twenties when my father gave me a catalogue of Goldsworthy’s work. Back then, I was a newly minted art dealer in thrall to London’s vibrant contemporary art scene.…