Kunstmuseum M. is proud to present a special livestream conversation between two iconic earthworks: Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty (1970) and Broken Circle/Spiral Hill (1971) on September 10, 2024.

See the report with images and response by the audience

From Dawn till Dusk: an online encounter between two earthworks by Robert Smithson will be broadcasted live from first light at Spiral Jetty, located at the Great Salt Lake in the state of Utah, and concluding with last light at Broken Circle/Spiral Hill located in Emmen in Netherlands. This special digital event is a part of Land Art Lives, an on-going research project exploring the relevance of Land Art for our current times. Presented in collaboration with Land Art Contemporary, Land Art of the American West (Texas Tech University) and Holt/Smithson Foundation this event will be available as a livestream on September 10, 2024 through the Land Art Lives website.

Date and time: Tuesday, September 10, 2024 from 14:00 - 21:00 p.m. / Central European Time (6 AM - 1 PM / MT in Utah)

The event can only be followed online.

Program

Throughout the seven-hour program the livestream view of the two earthworks will be accompanied by an evolving program, highlighting a myriad of voices and viewpoints. You will learn more about these two iconic works of art and why they are still relevant and significant today.

Relationship between work and image

Most people will know Spiral Jetty and Broken Circle/Spiral Hill from (film) images on the Internet, in books and magazines. After all, the artworks are difficult to access and are located in remote locations. A few have visited the works in real life. Robert Smithson was fascinated by the power of photography, film and language to shape experiences. In his essays and artworks, Smithson explored the relationship between the physical location and the version presented in an exhibition space. He called this the dialogue between the site (an elsewhere) and the nonsite (the here) as the Site/Nonsite dialectic.

From Dawn till Dusk: an online encounter between two earthworks by Robert Smithson aims to create a digital space for a first encounter between these two earthworks and provides an opportunity to explore and discuss how media influence our perception of sculpture and landscape over time.

About the two earthworks

In 1970 the artist Robert Smithson (1938-1973) created Spiral Jetty on the Rozel Point peninsula on the northeastern shore of Utah’s Great Salt Lake. Made from over six thousand tons of black basalt rocks and earth collected from the site, Spiral Jetty stretches 1,500 feet long and 15 feet wide in a counterclockwise spiral. The following year Smithson was invited to create an earthwork in the Netherlands for the recurring outdoor exhibition Sonsbeek by the curator Wim Beeren. Beside a working sand quarry in the province of Drenthe and cut into the side of a terminal moraine, Smithson created Broken Circle/Spiral Hill—his only extant earthwork outside of the United States.

About Robert Smithson

Robert Smithson (1938-1973) was one of the most important postwar artists of the United States. In his short artistic career, which was brutally ended by a plane crash, he played a crucial role within the main art movements of his time: conceptual art, minimal art and land art. In his artworks and texts, he reflected on the relationship between man and planet and between ecology and economy, subjects that are even more topical today than in his time. Attracted by (post)industrial landscapes, his work broke with traditional notions of what art could be and where it could be seen.

Earthworks not easily accessible

At present, unfortunately, the work Broken Circle/Spiral Hill in Emmen is not open to the public because the work is on private property. Stichting Land Art Contemporary tries to organize open days once in a while. It is expected that the work will be open for regular visits starting in the spring of 2025. Keep an eye on the website brokencircle.nl if you want to stay informed about possible openings in the future. If you are interested in this work, also check out the report of the heritage meeting within the Land Art Lives program where the case of Broken Circle/Spiral Hill was discussed in detail.

The work Spiral Jetty in Utah in the United States, while publicly accessible, is in a very remote location. Read the travelogue by Land Art Lives curators Anne Reenders and Martine van Kampen who visited Spiral Jetty in spring 2024 in preparation for the conference and the unique livestream on Sept. 10.

Friday Film Screenings

In celebration of From Dawn till Dusk, Holt/Smithson Foundation will host two special Friday Film screenings that provide a window into the concepts and processes guiding Smithson’s creation of these earthworks. We will begin on Friday September 6 with Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty (1970). Smithson described the thirty-five-minute film as “a set of disconnections, a bramble of stabilized fragments taken from things obscure and fluid, ingredients trapped in a succession of frames, a stream of viscosities both still and moving.” The original 16mm film of Spiral Jetty was recently re-digitized by The Museum of Modern Art, New York in partnership with Holt/Smithson Foundation; this will be the first digital screening of this beautiful new 2024 scan.

We will continue the following Friday with Nancy Holt’s film Breaking Ground: Broken Circle/Spiral Hill (1971/2011), which combines 16mm footage Holt shot with Smithson during the construction of the earthwork with material gathered for the 40th anniversary of the earthwork in 2011 to create a portrait of Broken Circle/Spiral Hill and its unique surroundings.

The film Spiral Jetty will be available to stream online for 24 hours starting at 12pm Mountain Time (8:00pm Central European Time) on Friday September 6. Breaking Ground will be available to stream online for 24 hours starting at 12pm Mountain Time (8:00pm Central European Time) on Friday September 13. The Friday Films will be made available through Holt/Smithson Foundation’s Vimeo—follow Holt/Smithson Foundation’s website and social media for links to the films.

About Land Art Lives

This unique live connection is part of the pre-program of Land Art Lives, an international conference on land art on October 3 in Lelystad. Why is land art particularly relevant in this day and age?What are its new manifestations? How do we deal with these often ephemeral works of art? And how does land art shed light on today's urgent ecological and social issues? With the Land Art Lives program, Kunstmuseum M. searches for answers to these questions in close cooperation with Land Art Flevoland. More information about the program and the conference can be found on this website.