Earth Art
Earth art
refers to a movement of artists with wide ranging goals, but all created
in nature, employing such materials as stones, dirt, and leaves. Most
works are sculptural. Earthworks often refer to phenomena such as the slow
process of erosion or to the movement of planets or stars, especially the
sun. Many earthworks are intended to help us to better understand nature.
Some demonstrate the inherent differences between nature and civilization,
often pointing out artists' desires to understand, conquer, and control
natural processes.
During the
late 1960s and early 1970s art began to move outdoors from galleries. Some
earthworks have been small enough to be gallery pieces, but many involve
huge land masses, as did Michael Heizer's Nine Nevada Depressions,
1968: big, curved and zigzagging trenches, like abstract doodles on the
earth, placed intermittently over a span of 520 miles. Another example is
the 1970 piece by Robert Smithson (American, 1938-1973) titled Spiral
Jetty, which extended 1500 feet into the Great Salt Lake, though today
it can be witnessed only through documentation.
Earth art's emergence in the 1960s was simultaneous with that of the
ecological movement, Arte Povera and process art, with each of
which it had a kinship. Earthworks can be considered part of the category
of works known as environment art.
Representative artists:
Christo, Walter De Maria, William Delvoye, Andy Goldsworthy, Robert
Smithson, James Turrell