Two acres of wheat planted and harvested by the artist on the Battery Park landfill, Manhattan, Summer 1982.
After months of preparations, in May 1982, a 2-acre wheat field was planted on a landfill in lower Manhattan, two blocks from Wall Street and the World Trade Center, facing the Statue of Liberty. Two hundred truckload of dirt were brought in and 285 furrows were dug by hand and cleared of rocks and garbage. The seeds were sown by hand and the furrows covered with soil. the field was maintained for four months, cleared of wheat smut, weeded, fertilized and sprayed against mildew fungus, and an irrigation system set up. the crop was harvested on August 16 and yielded over 1000 pounds of healthy, golden wheat.
this is such a fascinating piece! it's likely something that would be too expensive to do nowadays! the land was worth 4.5 billion even back at the time of its creation, and the photographs of this pieces are incredibly striking... the sharp yellow against the city skylines is gorgeous!
This site-specific installation employed a semi-circular screen, a ceiling of mirrors, and artificial mist to create the illusion of a sun. Aluminium frames lined with mirror foil were suspended from the ceiling to create a giant mirror that visually doubled the volume of the hall – along with the semi-circular screen mounted on the far wall, its long edge abutting the mirror ceiling. Backlit by approximately 200 mono-frequency lights, the semi-circle and its reflection created the image of a massive, indoor sunset seen through the artificial mist emitted into the room. By walking to the far end of the hall, visitors could see how the sun was constructed, and the reverse of the mirror structure was visible from the top floor of the museum.
this art is utterly gorgeous!!! it's like a sunset indoors, the photographs are beautiful and the colours are amazing... it's almost apocalyptic, as if the end of the world has been teleported indoors... honestly such a moving piece. the environment and setup is ludicrous.
The FedEx works […] initially interested me because they’re defined by a corporate entity in legal terms. There’s a copyright designating the design of each FedEx box, but there’s also the corporate ownership over that very shape.
I was interested in how art objects acquire meaning through their context and through travel, what Buren called, something like, “the unbearable compromise of the portable work of art”.
these sculptures are extremely fascinating!it showcases the reality of transporting goods and the kinds of damage that art can be forced to take while in transit, and the sculptures were often painstakingly extracted from their packaging to be displayed in the galleries they were posted to. they're really interesting looking, and the 'proprietary shape' of each box is taken and formed into its own artwork... very very cool!
