Robert Smithson Essay

Robert Smithson
Artist:
Robert Smithson, born 2 January 1938, was an American artist. Unfortunately he passed away on the 20th July 1973, at the age of 35, in a plane crash. While Smithson was still at High School (in Clifton, New Jersey during the 1950s), he attended art classes on the side. These art classes were at the Art Students League of New York in 1955 and 1956. Attending these classes allowed him to satisfy his creative passion for art. Another popular artist who attended the Art Students League of New York was Roy Lichtenstein. A little while after Smithson studied at A.S.L.N.Y. he studied at the Brooklyn Museum School. Through Smithson’s studies and training, he became fascinated with some Abstract Expressionists, e.g. David Smith,
Tony Smith, Jackson Pollock and Morris Louis. Robert Smithson found David Smith’s sculptures particularly captivating. In 1963, Smithson married Nancy Holt, another artist with a similar style of artwork. They were married for 10 years and worked together on Spiral Jetty – one of Smithson’s most renowned earthworks, and on the film, Swamp.
Artwork:
Robert Smithson worked mainly in sculpture and land art, usually combining them together. His large scale sculptures were eventually known as Earthworks as they engaged directly with nature and were created by moving different amounts of soil and rock to create an image. Smithson preferred working with ruined or ‘tired’ sites in nature to create classic forms such as spirals, circles and mounds. His major earthworks are also most commonly found outside, unlike some other artists of the 60s and early 70s (e.g. Walter De Maria, Nancy Holt-Smithson’s wife, Michael Heizer and Carl Andre). This is mainly because Smithson considered the outside as a compromised gallery system despite also creating artworks that belong in museums and gallery settings which were referred to as “nonsites”. In his earthworks, Smithson was interested in stimulating geological time through scale and using ancient rocks and dirt. Smithson investigated a fair few prehistoric sites (e.g. Stonehenge, England), as he felt his work was directly associated with such locations. Smithson was also captivated by ideas of entropy – how energy is scattered in nature from the meticulous to the muddled over time because he saw this as a metaphor for a theoretical orientation to life. Smithson documented all of his “nonsites” and earthworks by taking an extensive amount of photographs and films. Along with these “nonsites” and earthworks, Smithson also produced a number of minimalist sculptures. To create these minimalist sculptures, he used industrial materials such as glass and mirrors. As an artist for less than 35 years, Smithson was very committed, even going as far as taking a 20 year lease on 10 acres (4 hectares) of lakefront land at the Great Salt Lake in Utah to make a huge spiral, Spiral Jetty. Smithson also hired contractors to create Spiral Jetty, which can still be seen, depending on the water level.

World:
Robert Smithson’s main working period was during the 1960s and early 1970s.
However, Smithson’s artwork did not portray heavily on the world events during that time. This is because nature was his main focus. Smithson’s earthworks, in particular, are only obviously connected to technology. This can be seen in two of his earthworks, Asphalt Rundown and Concrete Pour. The asphalt and concrete in the two art pieces are like Smithson’s way of showing how technology can change nature as well as change with nature over time.
Rather than being interested in political artworks, Smithson was interested in the concept of entropy, the second law of thermodynamics, geology and mineralogy. Due to these interests, Smithson created earthworks displaying these ideas and his “nonsites” were also organic and based upon natural elements and concepts.
Audience:
Robert Smithson’s intentions of his earthworks were to combine nature and art Smithson admired the way nature changed with the artificial elements applied to it.
Smithson attempted to put the concept of entropy into his artworks. He did this for his audience to admire and consider, although he didn’t state this idea obviously. Part of Smithson’s unclear idea amongst his artworks was for the audience to find themselves without being forced to extract a certain meaning from the artworks.
Many of Smithson’s earthworks became so popular in society that he created a short documentary of his Spiral Jetty.
Smithson also produced another short documentary called Swamp, with his wife, Nancy Holt.
Frame – Structural:
Spiral Jetty, created by Robert Smithson is one of his most famous earthworks. The earthwork is 460m long, 4.6m wide and made entirely of mud, salt crystals and basalt rocks. The sculpture is situated in the Great Salt Lake near Rozel Point in Utah.
Smithson apparently chose the Rozel Point site based on the blood like red colour of the water and its contact with the primordial sea. He was attracted to the site because of the stark anti-pastoral beauty and industrial fragments from nearby Golden Spike National Historic Site, as well as an old pier and a few unused oil rigs. Old and used materials were included into Spiral Jetty to give the concept of entropy – one of Smithson’s favourite concepts.
Bob Phillips was hired to move the materials in and around the lake. Phillips used two dump trucks, a large tractor and a front end loader to haul the 6650 tons of rock and earth into the lake. It was reported that Smithson had struggled to convince a contractor to accept the odd
proposal.
The spiral structure of the jetty was inspired by growth patterns of crystals, but it also reflects an ancient symbol, making the landscape seem prehistoric even while it expresses the future.