Robert Smithson Overview

Smithson is best known for his large-scale earthworks -- including "Spiral Jetty" (located in the Great Salt Lake, Utah), "Broken Circle," and "Spiral Hill" (both in a Holland quarry) -- in which he reshapes landscapes in a way that recalls both... [more]

Smithson is best known for his large-scale earthworks -- including "Spiral Jetty" (located in the Great Salt Lake, Utah), "Broken Circle," and "Spiral Hill" (both in a Holland quarry) -- in which he reshapes landscapes in a way that recalls both the forces of nature and ancient archeological sites. Like all earthworks, Smithson's projects are subject to natural climactic changes in temperature, light, wind, and erosion; for example, "Spiral Jetty" is now submerged in rising lake waters. His choice of locations reveals a preference for fringe landscapes rather than city centers. "The idea of the city as an organic structure never appealed to me too much, and Frank Lloyd Wright's metaphors about the city being diseased didn't interest me too much," Smithson once said. His first interest in earthworks arose with his development of large-scale ground systems, which he called "Aerial Art." Eventually, Smithson decided that rather than simply installing a piece onto a land site, he would incorporate the land into the art. He applied this aesthetic to the commercial arena when he was asked to contribute to the design of the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport. Smithson resisted the temptation to simply attach a separate object of art to the building after it was finished; instead, he created large-scale ground systems on the fringes of the airport, including grids and other configurations that could be seen from the aircraft as they were landing or taking off. In his own words, Smithson was most "interested in showing, with seemingly very stable things, the instability, the elusiveness, the sort of mental disaster that can take place within this whole complex." [show less]