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Arcy Douglass: Land Arts Investigations and Writings

CAE0909

Summary Note

The Arcy Douglass: Land Arts Investigation and Writings archive consists of photographs and writings relating to early earthworks by Michael Heizer, Walter De Maria, Nancy Holt, Robert Smithson, and land arts in general.

Biographical Note

Arcy Douglass is an artist and writer who originally received his Bachelor's degree in Architecture from the University of Southern California in 1997. He also attended the Arts Student League in New York from 1999 - 2000. He has had several solo exhibitions and has participated in several selected group exhibitions. He has also published essays, reviews and interviews. Most recently, he worked on a conference titled "Donald Judd Delegated Fabrication: History, Practie, Issues and Implications."

Scope and Content

In Spring 2009 Arcy Douglass, an artist and writer based in Portland, Oregon, took an extended trip through the American Southwest to visit, document, and photograph earthworks and former earthwork sites. From this research he developed a series of articles for the online art journal Port.

The sites visited include: Mono Lake (where Heizer took Robert Smithson and Nancy Holt and made a short film); the Mojave site of the now almost invisible Las Vegas Piece by Walter De Maria; The Lightning Field; Amarillo Ramp; Double Negative; Spiral Jetty; Sun Tunnels. The materials include field notes, photographs, Google Earth™ views of the Las Vegas Site used to determine its location, and other research materials. Douglass also travelled to places as diverse as Marfa, Texas and Chaco Canyon, all to inform his writings about Land Arts.

The research conducted during this trip also informed a number of subsequent articles and essays about minimalism, the Japenese garden of Portland, the light and space works of Robert Irwin, and other artists. This archive also includes copies of published essays and reviews from 2006 through 2009.

Arrangement

The Arcy Douglass Land arts Investigations and Writings archive is organized into two series: Land Arts Investigations, which contains photographs taken by Douglass during his 2009 trip in which he visited Land Arts sites, which are further organized chronologically; and a series titled Writings, which contains a collection of Land Arts based writings.
  • Series 1: Land Arts Investigations
  • Series 2: Writings

Inclusive Dates

1969-2009

Bulk Dates

2007-2009

Quantity / Extent

.125 cubic feet

Language

English

Related Archive Collections

  • CAE0901: The Deiro Collection
  • CAE0902: Land Arts of the American West
  • CAE1111: William L. Fox: Michael Heizer
  • CAE1212: 871 Fine Arts: Land Arts Ephemera
  • CAE1312: Jim Denevan: Land Drawings
  • CAE1501: Boundless Horizons: A Land Arts Exhibition
  • CAE1606: Randolph Sims: Paintings and Land Arts Projects
  • CAE1609: Ars contemporaneous alpinus
  • CAE1714: Owen Gump: Desert Works

Related Publications

Beacham, Jon, and Michael Heizer. Coyotes, Silver Slippers, Pumas, Mesquite ... and Word List Extracted & Edited: Selective List of Uses for Welding Electrodes: Michael Heizer. Tivoli, NY: The Brother In Elysium, 2015.

Camfield, William A. Michael Heizer: 45°, 90°, 180°: A Sculpture for Rice University. Houston, TX: Rice University, Farish Gallery, School of Architecture, 1985.

Celant, Germano. Michael Heizer. Milan, Italy: Fondazione Prada, 1997.

De Maria, Walter. 1999 Milano 2000. Milan Italy: Fondazione Prada, 1999.

De Maria, Walter. Seen/Unseen, Known, Unknown. Okayama City, Japan: Naoshima Contemporary Art Museum, 2002.

De Maria, Walter. Skulpturen. Basel, Switzerland: Öffentliche Basel, 1972.

De Maria, Walter. Trilogies. Houston, TX: Menil Collection, 2011.

Durham Press. Michael Heizer, Tom Slaughter, Ray Charles White, Scott Kilgour, John Giorno, Robert Harms, Daniel Villeneuve, Beatriz Milhazes. Durham, Pa: Durham Press, 1996.

Felix, Zdenek. Michael Heizer. Essen, Germany, Otterlo, Netherlands: Museum Folkwang; Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller, 1979.

Gorgoni, Gianfranco. The New Avant-Garde: Issues for the Art of the Seventies. New York, NY: Praeger, 1972.

Hedger, Michael Albert. Larger than Life: Size, Scale and the Imaginary in the Work of Land Artists Michael Heizer, Walter De Maria and Dennis Oppenheim. Sidney, N.S.W.: University of New South Wales. Art & Design, 2014.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer. Innsbruck, Austria: Galerie im Taxispalais, 1977.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer. London, England: Waddington Galleries, 1990.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer: Actual Size. Detroit, MI: Detroit Institute of the Arts, 1971.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer: Double Negative. New York, NY, Los Angeles, CA: Rizzoli; Museum of Contemporary Art, 1991.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer: New Sculpture. New York, NY: M. Knoedler & Co., 1988.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer: New Sculpture. Tokyo, Japan: Akira Ikeda Gallery, 1988.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer: Photographic and Actual Works. Detroit, MI: Detroit Institute of the Arts, 1971.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer: Sculpture in Reverse. Los Angeles CA: Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, 1984.

Heizer, Michael. Michael Heizer—Dragged Mass Geometric. New York, NY: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1985.

Kimmelman, Michael. The Accidental Masterpiece: On the Art of Life and Vice Versa. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2005.

Levitated Mass: The Story of Michael Heizer’s Monolithic Sculpture. Directed by Doug Pray. New York, NY: First Run Features, 2014.

Lewis, David P. The Size of City: Michael Heizer’s Masterpiece as Architecture. Cardiff, Wales: Dissertation, Cardiff University, 2010.

McGill, Douglas C. Michael Heizer: Effigy Tumuli: The Reemergence of Ancient Mound Building. New York, NY: H.N. Abrams, 1990.

Vander Weg, Kara. Ed., Michael Heizer: Alters. New York, NY: Gagosian Gallery, 2016.

Container Listing by Series:

CAE0909/1 Series 1: Land Arts Investigations, 1969-2009

Series 1 consists of the collection of photographs and writings based upon the trip completed by Arcy Douglass on May 6 - May 22, 2009. The sites visited include: Mono Lake; the Mojave site of the now almost invisible Las Vegas Piece by Walter De Maria; The Lightning Field; Amarillo Ramp; Double Negative; Spiral Jetty; Sun Tunnels. The materials include field notes, photographs, Google Earth™ views of the Las Vegas Site used to determine its location, and other research materials.

  • CAE Box 1

    • 1-1 Itinerary, 2009
    • 1-2 Mono Lake, 2009
    • 1-3 Las Vegas Piece, 1969-2009
    • 1-4 Lightning Field, 2009
    • 1-5 Amarillo Ramp, 2009
    • 1-6 Double Negative, 2009
    • 1-7 Spiral Jetty, 2009
    • 1-8 Sun Tunnels, 2009
    • 1-9 G. Robert Deiro Interview, 2009

CAE0909/2 Series 2: Writings, 2007-2009

Series 2 includes published essays and reviews from 2007 through 2009 by Arcy Douglass. From the research trip, he developed a series of articles for the online art journal Port. The research also informed subsequent articles and essays about minimalism, the Japanese garden of Portland, the light and space works of Robert Irwin, and other artists. Douglass also travelled to places as diverse as Marfa, Texas and Chaco Canyon, all to inform his writings about Land Arts.

  • CAE Box 1

    • 2-1 Land Art Essays, 2008-2009
    • 2-2 Art and Nature, 2009
    • 2-3 The Black Square, 2009
    • 2-4 Art Criticism Essays, 2007-2009
    • 2-5 Portland Essays, 2008-2009
    • 2-6 The Design and Construction of the Japanese Garden: A Lecture by Shiro Nakane, 2008
    • 2-7 Exhibition Reviews, 2007-2008