6 INSTALLATIONS,

ENVIRONMENTS, AND SITES

Ibn Selz

b Gn:nuny between the 1\"'0 World Wars, Kurt Schwitters, an early

adherent c1 ~ 1IAXkcd on his so-called .Herzball. 1 Originally named Die G1w­
dml 4 Er()O:.- ~_ il consisted of acactiolls of every kind of discarded llutI."TUI
;lnd homed ~ poaoes dedicated to his friends, as well as a "Cave of the ~
bclung" and il -sc:.:-enme Den." In the llJ20S, Schwittt':r'> had filled J larg.;- p.i...-;:
of his home in ~ \\;rh this huge and idiosyncratic construction. During 1m
self-irnpmed o:ik ttum Nazi Germany, he repeated this endeavor in Norw-.a:­
(I937~45) and F ~ (1945-48).
Unschooled ....~ l:II:Xie their own outdoor installations, ,ometimes ,,;[h L._
tonishing authenonty. Woe think of the Paillis ideal, built by the French pO$UlUn
Ferdinand Cheval bernttn 1879 and 1912-:\ large bizarre environment suggCi-.t­
ing Buddhist, Hindu. :--"osJem. baroque, medieval, and alpine archirecture. And in
the poor section of W...m in L~ Angeles, the lulian tile setter Simon Rodia b\lilr
his soaring rO'"'eTS, struCtures rlling to about a hundred feet that were made stedor
rods.. v.ire iOttIling. and CODCIT'tc and covered with brilliant colored shards of tile
mdgl=.
On ~ miniature scaJe. Joseph CorneD (United States, I 903-7z) -made his mirac­
Dkx:s baxes in New York tor a period of almost five decades, beginning in the
t93it5-- Although he roo waS not trained as an artist, Cornell \\:a5 aware of Euro­
pczl ~ md farnilUr wirh nlrrealist ideas and became associated with the anists
roe .. hu when me surrealists were in New York dUring World War II. Cornell
Wid cd ~en boxes that contained maps and butterflies, compasses: and rays,
pic aM".md sand, and other articles that alluded to geography, history, science, and

ti:lri:=a;gDurion. His small dioramas had a visual poetry and seductive magic and
fin *1 .. zn inspir.ltion for poets such 3., the Mexican Nobel laureate Octavio paz
191-t1. along with several generations of visual artists. especially in the United
Scc:':s.. ~\S the American city became increasingly cranmled, heterogeneous, and

499
a Guggenheim Tellowship and worked a~ BranC\1Si'~ studio assistant ill 1l)27. An
arti.~t of extraordinary versatility and refinement, he nor only fashioned sculptum
in a great man.... m.. terial~ and forms bllt also designed ~I:ts and costume, for Martha
Graham's and George Balanchine's dance peTforn1dnce~ as well as furniture, 13mp~.
and whole interiors. Bur the culmination of his artistic a.chievement may well han>
been his landscapes and gardens. which began with (ontoured playgrounds in the
I 9)OS. Steeped in both \Vc~tt'rn and Eastern traditions but part of no stylistic mon:­

ment, Noguchi crc,ned sculptun~d gardens in the United States, Japan, and Israd
that often transmined his understanding of man', rdarion [Q earth and ~ky.
The Spanish sculptor Eduardo Chillida (b, 19=-+) lCwal1y studied architecture
before turning to sculpture. A knowledge of the bss~ of structure and a sense 0:'
the architectonic have been fundamental to his- work. \\'hich addresses i~df pri­
marily to the relationship of solid and void. Hi; :=ncountt'rs with ~pecific nuteTl­
als and techniques svae of great importance to llli work in forged iron, oak, t"Orten
steel, burm clay, alabaster, and concretl:. The ~n~ 01 working: specifically \sith
matter harmonized with the sculptor's merarhy~lc.ll cOllcerns with form and void.
with time and space. Near his native Basque ciry 0," San Sebastian 011 the Bay 0:­
Biscay, he designed a place in which three gigantic Heel claws, set into the rocks 0:­
mountain and sea, grasp the sky while reaching for each orher. Like a number 0:­
his other public works, it is, as the eminent critic James Johnson Sweeney dedare":­
a "triumph of sensitive, respectful man doing homage to both man and nature ir:
the same sculpture."}
When Maya Lin (b. IYS9), a Korean Alnerican raised in Ohio, sS'as a student ...:
Yale University, she designed the prize-wlnning entry for the Vietnam Vetenr..;:
Memorial (1982). Like some funerary monuments of the past, it was a fusion ...~:­
architecture and sculpture. In the mall of the nation's capital, it was situated on th:
holy ground between the Washington Monument ,Uld the Lincoln Memorial. whe:-:­
a latge gash was Cut into the canh for the V-shaped wall of polished granite. tum­
ing the ramparts into reflenive surfaces. The names of almost sixty thomand Am<!r­
icarn who died in Vietnam were engraved into the walls in chronological order ,,(­
cording to their dates of death. Minimal sculptun: ,md earth and ~ite an we~
combined into a pO\\'erfuJ public monument that. d(:~pite its TC'lenrless amten"~
became an environment of per<onal and national memory and mourning,
Lin's memorial was telated to the work dOlle by "earth :lrtim" since the br=
1960$. These worb arose as a....-nStS te!t more and more comtrained by the incf1:'.<--<-'
ing commodification of .lrt ot-Jeers. fn 1969, while working on his major ::1r~~
vcntion in thl' Jantt«Jre enoUed Dl11lblr j\legatillf:, Michael Heizer stated: '"The~"'"
sition of art as a nullt"~.H~ ~l."'T-exchange item (alters:iS the rumul.l.tive econt'r:::l:
struCture gluts. ~ T""':l5<:"'~ md collections are .uuffed.. the dOOr' .ue ~:lggi!lg. to:
real sp:lee st:ill C'X15&. -...

S02 I~ST.u.u.no~~. E~V1RONMENTS, AND SITES

 &';:zt of the gener.LI reappraisal of the meaning of art ill the 1960s. artists, in­
sr::ea!lof pmning me landscape, engaged in the landscape itself. In 1955. Herbert
~ a- fOrmer llauhaus master, had created envirolUllental wurks such as hi~
!Ez:3.J,.kcmd in Aspen, Colorado, photographs of which were exhibited at the
~D-2I1 Gallery EarthwtJrks exhibition in New York in '968.13y the turn of
,z.~_ earth art had become a form of great concern for a ~izable group of
~ .utists. Walter De Maria (b. 1935) drew twu parallcllines of chalk a
a:~.ia me Mojave Desert in California in 1969. He had been a student at the
""- .; 3· of California at Berkeley, and had \\-litten statel1tent~ about breaking
~ixcs rmeaningless work") and the "high art" of natural dis.a..~ters; hc had
eM i:HiJin;aa: bnJs related to both minimalism and conceptual art. He created TI,e

~1i=U (1974-'77) in a remoee area of New Mexico, manifesting a snmning

"eL •• w'iy~n pure, rational. abstract manmade fOrIm and the overwhelm­
ing ~ci o:mm:'s earth, sl.7, and light.
Robe:iS:xirhsou's (1938-73) Spiml ]my (1970) in the Great Salt lJ.ke is often
co~~'&iIiclt point of the land-art movement. Using the form of the spi­
nl he ~ ~ C21kitude of asmciatiom with growth and desuuction. The Jrny
rurne-d Fi=i hec:a::cs< of millions of swarming microorganisms and eventually K~S
~,u.km"e'd ~ riscg -..'Uer until it was no longer visible. The work was conce_me':
with m.:- ot!lp o,j He ~ well as the devastating forces of entropy and the irre­
\·ersibility or ~ to.-e£ energy. Its location ncar a disused oil-drilling operation H"~
f1ecr.:-d Smir:h;.on·~ g::=n: interest in the rehabilitation of land damaged by indusrry.
One of his last \\'o:::b ~ ~ propos,2l for the reclamation of a strip mine-he w,mted
ro act 2!>. mediator ~1:CJ) ecology and industry by reclaiming (he land in terms
of .at.. AI. age forry~n'\~. SmIthson was killed in a plane crash while pltotograph­
-~l:is -=-:k Amarillo Ramp (1973) in a desolate area of Texas.
~pd~aUsas ~ to work in the "wide open spaces." Carl Andre took
.. iIa~ sculpture, of "sculpture as the toad," omdoors \11 worksl.ike
.r.c-JII!Iiiar tJg6.S in Colorado. Richard Serra built a IlliIjor outdoor piece, Shift
~ m Onuria. He dedicated to Robert Smithson another work in \...·hich
_ -=d phres interwned in the landscape of the wooden glen of the Kr<:;J]er­
"S'7 .M::so:um in Hollmd (J973). Robert Morri.~ also erected large outdoor pieces
~ R. \as well as in Michigan and Washington State. Michael Heizer (b. 1944).
2 S 2Ysr-c.e 6tst earth artist to move to the desert, went to a virtually inaccessible
.-all_~ in 1967. In his sculpture Double !'iegmive (1969-70). he displaced
,-CiR 4 gr;wd--if only human-scale when he executed tWO great cut~ II1to the
"iiiIPa~Mesa, temoving twenty~four thousand tons of ehe arid plateau. Den­
_.~. be im carried on many impressive engagements with the land: in I 967,
kh:w:::bi away huge masses of snow in the- Saint L1wrence River on the US.­
e:---..~ border in the form of Annual Rings. The Dutch invited him to a piece

INSTALJ.AT1QNS, ENVIRONMENTS, AND SITES 503

called Dircrted Seedin$Canct:led Crop (1967), in which he harvested a field of grain
in the shape of a huge X. A di~(;ussiol1 among three of me protagonists of earth art
was published in Avalanche, a pioneering journal (1970-;6) edited by Willoughby
Sharp, who was an early advocate of land art and who wrote the foreword to the
catalog of the first museum exhibition of earth art held at Cornell University in
I!,169. Nancy Holt (b. 1938), kno",," as a photographer. filmmaker, and pact be­
fore she went West to IIlake work with Slllithmn and Heizer, created 5tIU 1im"ds
in 1977. The principal concerns of her site were rime.md light. The four concrere
pipes of the work were locators oriented toward the summer and winter solstices.
while the holes in their walls reflected astronomical configurations. In the 1980s.
Holt, like many other earth artists, IIloved back into the urban environment, using
the 1cssom learned in remote open spaces to re\;o..lize art in the public domain.
Agnes I)enes (h. 1938) wa~ born in Uudapest.~· up in Stockholm, and moved
to New York in r954, where she studied sciences and philosophy as well as art. A
universalist in an era of specialization, she drew on investigations in mathematics.
physics, geography, biology, hisrory, and philO5Ophy for hl:r vimalizations. One 0;'
her chief concerns was her focus on paradox... In r968. this preoccupation brought
her to create the ritualistic site piece RudTret:.·, &mal. which took place in Sullinn
Counry, New York. It dealt principally with the life cycle and with tegeneration.
T\\,elve years later, Denes planted, tended, and han'~""1ed a four-acre wheadidd nt"~,
to the World Trade Center on the bottom of Manhattan Island, celebrating th~
earth and its endurance.
Also concerned primatily with the urban enviroomenr, Alan Sonfist (b. 19461-­
who grew up in [he Bronx, where he actually lived close to a native hemlock for­
est-began his "forest reconstructions" as early as 1965. He presented his pi\~
ide-a 01 "rurural phenomena as public monuments" in 1968 alld created his Tre!
Lm.i'bJ~ ten years later. It consisted of a parcel of land 011 La Gu;"trdia Place !::l
Greem\;ch Village in which he planted the kinds of shrubs and trees that woui::
kn-e been found in precolonial days on Manhattan Island. SOnfISt'S attempt to re­
new the city's natural ecology entailed minimal intervention and. unlike the ~_
erful work of carlier earth artists, eliminated the artist's gesture. It could be seen ...
relating to nincttt:nrh-ccntury landscapists and their search for nat'U«' 5 penixtica.
Ht: worked with geolo/:,,;sts and ecologists on problems of reclaiming chernial ~
dump sites for native plant forests and saw his work as a "meaningful rnetapho!r =.
shows that we arc one of many internal structures in nature."
Chri~to (b. Christo Javacheff. 1935) Was born 10 Bulgaria and studied..-z ~fiae
Arts Academy in Sofia. By r95S. hn;ng arrived in Paris by way ot p~ z:rd'\'i­
enna, he "'':IS close to the NDU\"'e"~U.'\": Realistc.~ (see chap. 4). Like mt'm. hc-wa'"
terested in the present.nion at" acrual objects, and he began \\-raPPmlii:: thinil:J ~
often mysterious presences. acantuating and questioning their ~ .aOO ~
. - ­

504 lNSTALU.T10:"'S. E:"'VlRONMFNTS, AND SITES

ticcs.. Calling mention to the twentieth-century preoccupation with packaging,
he -::::a;lp(:d whole buildings, beginning with dIe Kunsthalle in Bern in 1968 and
~·M3et.!!!lof Contemporary Art in Chicago (1969) and leading to the Pont Neuf
D ~ (J975-8S). Since T972, he has been planning to wrap the ~ichstag, the
ji=e ' t . Gernun parliament building. Perhaps he has become mmt famous for his
i:na;- '-as in the rowral environments, realizing ever larger projects such as the
!

....~ Gx& near Sydney, Australia (1969), the t11l1ey Ontain at Rifle Gap, Col­
~ (19"(0-7:), the Running Fence in Sonoma and Marin counties, California
~~ me Surrounded Islands in Biscayne Day. Florida (T 980-87), and Thr Um.
&.dZI:..ajoior: projeCt for Japan and the United State,<; (I984-yI). In all of these
~<::kisto pointed to the often cumbersome political process that was needed
M>oi:aiiDb- requisite permissions. In order to be totally free of obligation to any
~.a:x!Iot:it~" he paid all expenses with his own money, accepting no SpOIl­
~ ~ W<J:5 also an important environmental concern in his work, which
o-l1..""'O t~ ~ously unnoticed forms and contours of the site. All muerWs
\\~ I t t ~do!..ad his impermanent structures returned the land to the way it turd
beffi... bc:... -.rn:::!:I axmorics, films, and documentary books, they helped to ~ :0
h~lghtcned u* Sf IUUSlilless on the part of the viewer.
GoroO::l ~b::::rChrk (1945-78), son of the surrealist painter Roberto M..cr.o.
\ Roben:o ~ ~bttl Echaurren), grew up in the company of Marcel Duchamp.
.\!..Lx Ernst- .~ Bttron. and the incipient group of abstract expressioniS15 in Ne\\'
IOn.:. He him..-d!" w.zs ro be in the center of a new avant-garde of earth artist! and
conceptualists dutmg his shaft: lifespan. A former student of architecture, he de­
~ his idea or "uart:hitecture"~thedeconstruction of structures-to re\·e.l1
~_ philosophical and ~ problems, Like his friends among the eanh and
!cd zti5G.. be v,vrked on a \-ast scale. Like the conceptualists, he focused on idea
wd ~~ li1:e the performance artists, his work was a public act performed in
~ew York..\'Wa.n. Berlin. ~l. and Antwerp. In order to document his decon­
srructions. he became a. highly innovative photogrnpher and experimental filmmaker.
I.nstead of going to the Western desert. Matta-Clark worked in the dense city en­
..~nt. manipulating the urban space, taking down walls of buildings. and cut­

ring ;qwt houses and turning them inside Out and upside down; his acts were
~ for shattering social and economic conditions and creating more useful
~ Pn ~ urba.n ecology. Matta-Clark exerted an enormous influence on artists
afb:i5 znd the fonowing generations. A monograph published in 1985 5 has eulo­
~ ~oniak, and interviews by over forty of his contemporaries, indudiO£ a
s aeor,E by the painter Susan Rothenberg (see chap,· 3),
~ ~ock (b. T946) was among the friends who contributed a statement to
.~. . (:nzri:"s monograph. She herself began to create site-specifIC work in the
iP.:::a:s~hmia countryside not far from her birthplace. Her mazes, platforms, tun­

(NSTALLATIONS, ENVIRONMENTS, AND SITES SOS

nels, and trenches evoked the memory of primirn.~ ~ h:!toric~ architectural ed­
ifices. Ma:u (1972), her first outdoor installaoon. r::i:ad. to the historic stmcture
of the labyrinth, which .l.ppeaR'd In many anciem ~5.... toduding the Minoan
and M.ayan cjviliuoons. It "'~.l. highly popubr fix=:l ~ e:unainment in the eigh­
teenth century and was brought back to the ('XC"' : . " R ~- ..-ocabulary by Patrick
Ireland in 1967, 3Ppearing subs,equendy in ~ -xD-ei"Tony Smith, Robert Mur~
ris, Terry Fox, and Richard Aei:schner. ~ ~ zs ~ .rna created a dodecz6'Onal
of SP:lO~ surprise.
Cturles Simonds (b. 194 j). who ~ . . s.e- bt.. where both his parent"
5
were psychoamllysts, \'\"'Z!i eduattd x: dr 1 - -!lei c.hfomi3 at Berkeley before
returning to New York... ~ he ~ a -..m I\-bna-Clark and formed
dose friendships with SwirtN)Q _ criDc t..y~ In 1971, he started to in­
vesogate the im3gin3JY civjli,·ioas of -me people" and created theit tilly
dwellings out of brick and cby. He placed Ibc:osr ~rian works in the cracks of
buildings and in the streets of many ciri~ ac ix:r continents. The audience for
most of his work consisted of passersby md. !:il3 e" whether in the \lums of New
York or the communal farms a100gthc -~vCGudin.'·Like Jonathan Swift in
hi" satire and Jul~ \"erne in his ~. ~ 5ailxl.. Sinunonds created an imagi­
n:lry past to focus on th:: prescnt rod fim:ne..
In Briuin and the United States, a number of 2:!OSCi felt they should work with
nature and nOt inmJde on the ecology. Ian Hamikon Finby, originaUy known as 2.
\...Titer of cOr'.ott.e ~"~:. began in the 19605 to orve words into stone, which he
:lrT3':-rd m,...· .~ e::'i_omnenu. nuinly his e1abor.lte garden in ScodarKi. David
NM.- mq =-.1 poot" qw..~' to\\-n Ul Northern Wales, felt a strong identification
IA-Q 0- ~ k ~ his simple earthen strueture5. Andy Goldsv.urthy garh­
~ lI::E:b... 1c::zRs. md feathers md wove them into pri\';l,te offerings be­
_ aIIU pDocognphs of the assemblages. Hamish Fulton's gallery
. Sa ;horognphs: his documented walks he took without dis­
iiiIeu ~d his interest in Asian landsC3pe painting, but he.
&ie ...... ~ 2'e[1 in the rn.dirion of the English Iand~C3pe p2.inters.
<e; '1!'IKliis~ w~ communion with nature \....as manifested in
_ """"m:I:I...
loog (h. li..;!........c;..a n tht- St. Maron's School of An, where minimaJ­
i5I scuJpaxs '" R 5 Czo.mod Pbilhp King were on faculty. In I968, he made A
UM .\b« iF .a ~ c=rrimaJist work that predicted the conccrn~ of hU
future pieas:- GaO:- bnd: it was a simple form (i.e., a straight lin('):
it W2S 'T"""i-s..,A'i Me .md. C' toe manefit. Afier that time, he look lengthy \\":l1h

in me Andes. the Himal:lyas, Japan, Mexico. the Arroe

Cirdc:.. ~ ;iaas.. be set down indigenous stones or drlfrwood ana
arn.ogcd to ill ancieD[ cultures: configuraoons of straight

,o6 .,.nIllLO:....... L'. ..·IRONMF.NTS, AND SITES

.~ cicdres. spiral~, and squares. At times. he put river mud or found stones into
'''''..-'' s giring careful insrructiom as to placement and use. He also exhibired
iI!~)5 "t iriUl maps and included "word pieces" of poetry.
.Ili:b:::: bv."'in (b. 1928), in a manner very different from Long's. also made min­
is hions on the land. During his early years as a painter, he reduced his
jfic:::n:e..s:::ufaees to spare monochromes. Feeling that the aestht=tic experience was
,Jhill *q ~endentaland must not necessarily be tied to an object, he designed
~~ me threshold (or upper registry) of the visibility of light became the
::* .. ai' II! ~ Reading extensively in philosophical literature from Plato to
"'[!If M' -m md working with a psychophysicist, he developed his own theory
c£ "l"lrR po:ttption. In his 1986 discount, he defined the relationship of out­
.:bcr- ..-n~ lD setting by sugge.~ting four classifications: site-dominant, site­
2~~C, :rnd site-determined. It was the last, the least obstructive to
t,l;,: lm..cS:z2 .mxated. There it was the surroundings that determined the re­
;;po~ ::t'>~ztobjeet, which became "so ephemern as co threaten to <fu2ppear
alt~~ - ~ the viewer to "discover :md Vdlue the potential for e:\.""p~
beauty lZ. e'iCliyCiug.-
Innl'-; ~ ~ r fonner <l$SOciatc, James TurreU (b. 1943), \vas aoo ;:-:_
occupied \\-=- ...:r~tion of the effect of light on space and the inf1ut"ncc ex­
this imerpl.n- oo!::f=::::::m paception. (Other artists from Los Angeles., such as i\b,-.....
Nordman and ~ Wheelet, were sim.ihrly involved in light-space intcrreU­
rionships). TurrdL ~ meaed by the emanation of light in Mark Rathko's pamt­
~ became vcry """""""""":eR'"ed in Maurice Merleau-Ponty's PhenortletfoloRY oj P{'r~
::i. . md the French ~'\ e:xplorarion of the relationship between pcrcepoon
z::lrrd i!I:mioo. Turrell a-~ indoor installations in which light was perceived .l..'i ..i.
~ presence and tiX' nnure of space was seen in an unexpected way. In J 97 ...
T:::cz:I began working on ~ ~ extinct volcano in the Arizona desert. The R\)·
. . Grma Project-like De _'li.,."u'-s URhtning Field, supportt:d by the Did Founda­
a:D is one of the most -.mbirious works of att ever undertaken by an individual
.a:::::iIc. bcomplete as of du:; writing, the work comprises tunnels leading to various
........toa:ion chambers me. creating a visual disclosure of the interconnection be­
~plogicaland amonomical time and space. As C<lrly as 197 I, Charles Ross
~ing on anomer extraordinary land project, Star Axis, in an isolated area
~!rtk:xico. \Vhen completed, it will reveal images "drawn by light ... 111an­
- '$ d.:ments of light's structure, solar power, the combined motions of the
c::zriii:;i:l space and the geometry of the stars. "6
I: "ius beyond the concepts of doing no more harm to the fragile environ­
.,....,.,,:wrdae;l.tlng aesthetic interpretations of the state of the ecolob'Y, Helen Meyer
JI!I:'9' md Newton (b. 1932) Harrison d~cided to intervene, to develop
"!fllt' for a nt:\V rea.lity in close touch with nature, and to point to f~asible so-

INSTALLATIONS, ENVIRONMENTS, AND SITES 507

J.tet"...4 S",;~ So

disintegrated, artists-greatly aware of the "junk culture" in their surroundings­

created a proliferation 01 colhlges and constructed objects. It became necessary for
the chroniclers of an [0 find a ,...ard to identifY this pre....a lent mode, and the piv­
otal exhibition TIll: ..trl (~r .-lssembla.!!!' did juSt that at the Museum of Modern Art
in 1965 (see chap. 4).
Working in Ne"" York. Schwittcl":l' contemporary. the Vienn~-born visionary
architect, sculptor, painter. designer, writer, and theater director Frederick Kiesler
(I890~I965), developed a highly original idea of emrironmental sculpture, which
was based on his principle of the continuous "endless house," Kiesler, an itnpor­
tUlt member of the European avant-garde, was in dose touch with Schwitters, Laszlo
Moholy-Nagy, EI Lissitzky. and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and was friends with
the surrealists and a member of the De Stijlmo\'cment. In New York, he was di­
rector of scenic design for the Julliard School of Music and founded the Labora­
tory of Design-Correlation at Columbia University. In 1942, he designed the sur­
reillist interior of Peggy Guggenheim's Art of This Cenmry Gallery. In 1959, he
\\la~ commissioned to design the sanctuary for the Dead Sea Scrolls in Jerusalem.
which g.tve monumental expression to his ··principle of correlation." He exhib­
ited his environmental sculpture Gt/axil'S Jt the .\luscum of Modern An in 1952..
Consisting of bonelike forms that he vi~-ed~ "chunks of maner," they were prob­
ably the first exampl~ of a \v<llk-in sculptural environment.
Louise Ne\'ekon (b. Louise Berliawsky, u}oo-88) was, like Kiesler, conncctt'd
to many of the pi\"uu.l .lIt movements of her time. Born in Kiev, she came to the
United SUt~ ~ .. duld. ffiJrued art at the ArL~ Students League in New York .rno
Hans Hoiiru:::l.-:·J. 5Cboo1 in .\1unich. worked as an assistant to Diego Rivera in Mex­
ico CtX ~ ~p:n ahib-iring her early sculpmre in New York during World \t"-.:r
11. B!"::::': Jl:ir:I::. ~: sh-t ~ placing discarded objects into cheap wooden cr.lte:s..
'lIIrl!:rd 3:rU:~::D ~ mugnl elements of large walls. Painted black, they coo­
~ZZ1ar~.o::J .1Sronishment. Follmoving the black wall environment\..
• tt:z:::IOd to .-:af ~ -""'hite, and then to golden environment_ thar resembloi
.5, 'dnof~~or or the festive atmospheres of baroque chapels. ~
~.l good of public commissions in the 1970S and 198os. she supe-­
-ris.ed me bbrica:i::u ofbrge Plexiglas and metal sculptur~ and emironments.
During d:w: b::r f950S md earl.... 1960s. a good many arrist.~ experimented in ~
ettation of Z5 -m'\i.ronmenr. Of particular interest was the work of ~b­

trnas Gocriuia~ Cit~... Y,"'t"S Klein in Paris, Harold Paris in C.ilifornU. ~

Herbert mbe:r"Zld l..ucz ~ in New York. Very different in kind \\"25 dz
tableau IDr:m t:L em ita .-m !m:roduced into the art world by Cilifornia scuJp:u'
Edward }CI¢: ' , , , ~ L Born in a rural area of the state of W;a.;;h.ingcon. Kie::I­
holz ~tDLs~ 10 '953. supported himself as a car-petItn". md beg:m ~
sembling ~cij::cs~ btu of junk and fr.lsh with rM hricol~UT's ~

500 ISSIll..i...llJID E:'Io"YTRONMENTS, AND SITES

• **Sib ad skill. In 1957, he decided to open his myn art gallery and, together
'" ~ Hopps. founded the Ferus Callery, which becilille a tOCiI poillt of the
~,-,~ los An~"eles a....anr-g.Ifllc. 1r W~IS in il)62 that they tim exhibited
~.a.. !:".....l whorehouse that rC;Jlisrically recreated World War II in Las Ve­
. - a t *'5& Il)6os, a period when niost mainstream American ;artists stayed aloof
_ _ _.~J turbulence of the period, Kicnholz's tahleaux wefe rich in social
me;;: ,.- .~. and sa.tire.]11 TIlt' Lkallery he commentcd on the life ofbarAies,
___ "'I:iR"~ H,'spirClI he vented his anger at the accepted :mitude toward pfi~­
.....11ii'. .lId:J:u:~colllmentedOil teenage Sex, abortion, aging, the an scene. racism,
_~_ "-tetnam. Germany's Nazi period. :l.I1d humall life and the fcar of
~SDtr-.J2. his work has been produced jointly with his wife, N:lllCY Red­
.5i:n&.B Ii
Me ile¢$ .... .a~ger generation, the French artist Christian lloltamki (b. r944)
~ cu.- t 1t""fl[S that wne also COllllllcllTh 011 life and death, Doltanski's im­

~ """""",,:i-pn. in France wert the ,lrti~t~ of IWu/1I?dl/ rf,l!j~me and Fluxlli. Like

~ ~~Il,-g:u:b~ring objens. but th... artlcb he collected were obJ~ of

~ lI::::ld~Oeilingwith the lht:'llle of dying. His work was brgely aur&-r­
~ph!,~~ C:mo: .Zio projeL"ted collective cxperience~. ofren dealing \\"I(h l..:'::~
~mi~"In;o.:f ~~ of thc Jews. I30lrmski worked as:l filmmaker. ma.il artis:.
publisher v;' :::::s ~ books. and director of "theatrical compositions," "shadow
rhearrt"· .m-i ;-b..~, installa.tions called 'rnonUlllents." These last consisr oi
5mall b!..l.ck-lnd--...;-b:e photographs. usually of children with electric lamps placed
ncar their taco. R.o~ &rthes obsenTd that the process of being photographed
runsforms the subJe>., L"!:Q an objet"t. that i<;, displace"'i the subject from life to death.:
fooIiring the thou~n: ot death. the instaJl:niOTls of these' "monuments" included
.I..:ld ~ of electrical \\"i~ that helped to engulf the viewet in a state of par­
,~;, %: a i , . "Ihe -:-sludow rieco·· otten consisted of marionettes carefully lighted to
c.w:R:J.sc:::z< ott mystery s~~ring voodoo fetishes. Like the photogrLlphs, they
wa::b"tdoo Ox .:onccpr of r<:neetcd light, giving the vicwer 01 these sacred spaces
-Jl.-::l!irGi" lire 2S .- dicker.

Adhering to ancient tr.lt!ltions rebting sculpture: to architecture. a llUln­

. .~ created worh of public art in public space. But in an era ill which
fPliiiic"s7,,1tnue became ubiqu;tom, the distinction betwecn ,:m art of private in­
,f?Js: eM:-.a:riC sculpuue that TllMlifested.a true telation to place and human encounter
. . . . J i l l u' ~oum imporrance. Following the di...tinguio;hcd c)'";l.!llple of COIl­

\!clllc::d'rzxu.q·s public sculpuut's ar Titgu--:Jiu in "'ollthwest Roma.nia (J 937-38).

_ 6e iin~t sculptors of the Sl'cond half of thi$ century l'Xt'cllted significant
....:bln 0.: public domain. Isallm Noguchi (1904-)0;8), bUIll in Lo<; Angeles the
_cr- .. prominent Japanese poet and a noted American writer, went to I~tis on

lNSTA1.J.AT10NS. ENvrRONMLiNTS, AND SITES SOT