Robert Smithson

Retrospective: works 1955-1973

19.6 1999 – 12.9 1999

Stockholm

The American artist, Robert Smithson (1939–73) had a short but intense career before he died in a plane crash when he was working on the earth work, “Amarillo Ramp”. With his minimalist sculptures, “nonsites”, slide shows, land recovery projects, texts and not least, the monumental earth work “Spiral Jetty” (1970) in the Great Salt Lake in Utah, he was one of the most influential artists at the end of the 1960s and beginning of the 70s.

Robert Smithson’s first retrospective exhibition in Sweden contains about 230 works – among them well-known works like “Alogon 1”, “A Nonsite, Pina Barrens, New Jersey”, “Hotel Palenque”, and the film, “Spiral Jetty”. The exhibition also includes a large a number of relatively unknown early drawings and paintings from the late 1950s and early 60s, which were influenced by the Beat culture.

Robert Smithson´s many-faceted art is among the most innovative of the post-war period. His name belongs on the list that includes Louise Bourgeois, John Cage, Öyvind Fahlström, Eva Hesse, Jackson Pollock and Andy Warhol. Art and physical reality was central in his work and he was inspired by everything from geology and astronomy to science fiction and psychology. He questioned the role of art in society and consequently where it belonged; many of his own works could be placed – or rather, take place – in the remote wilderness as well as on the outskirts of big cities. At least as important as his art are his texts, published in various art journals during his lifetime and read by generations of artists and others interested in art.

The exhibition is the result of a collaboration between the Museet for Samtidskunst, Oslo and Arken, Copenhagen. A 300-page catalogue in English, rich in pictures, addressing various aspects of Robert Smithson’s art, will be published in conjunction with the exhibition. Contributors to the catalogue are Stian Grögaard, who is a philosopher from Oslo, Per Boym, director of the Museet for Samtidskunst in Oslo, Annette Österby, curator at Arken in Copenhagen, Vibeke Petersen, art historian from Copenhagen, Tim Martin, art historian from Oxford, and Maria Lind, curator at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm.

Curator: Maria Lind