Nancy Holt

Nancy Holt (April 5, 1938 – February 8, 2014) was an American artist most known for her public sculpture, installation art, concrete poetry, and land art. Throughout her career, Holt also produced works in other media, including film and photography. Since 2018, her legacy has been cared for by Holt/Smithson Foundation.

Biography Nancy Holt was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1938. An only child, she spent a great deal of her childhood in New Jersey, where her father worked as a chemical engineer and her mother was a homemaker. She studied biology Three years after graduating, she married fellow land art artist Robert Smithson This trip was a catalyst in formalizing her artistic language and location-based works.

Holt began her artistic career as a photographer and as a video artist. In 1974, she collaborated with fellow artist Richard Serra on Boomerang, in which he videotaped her listening to her own voice echoing back into a pair of headphones after a time lag, as she described the disorienting experience. Today Holt is most widely known for her large-scale environmental works, Sun Tunnels and Dark Star Park. However, she created site and time-specific environmental works in public places all over the world. Holt contributed to various publications, which have featured both her written articles and photographs. She also authored several books. Holt received five National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships, New York Creative Artist Fellowships, and a Guggenheim Fellowship.

In 2008 Holt helped rally opposition to a plan for exploratory drilling near the site of Smithson's Spiral Jetty at the Great Salt Lake in rural Utah. After Smithson's death, Holt never remarried.

Artistic style The land art tradition Holt is associated with earthworks or land art. Land art emerged in the 1960s, coinciding with a growing ecology movement in the United States, which asked people to become more aware of the negative impact they can have on the natural environment. Land art changed the way people thought of art; it took art out of the gallery or museum and into the natural landscape, the product of which were huge works engaging elements of the environment. Unlike much of the commercialized art during this time period, land art could not be bought or sold on the art market. Thus, it shifted the perspective of how people all over the world viewed art.

Land art was typically created in remote, uninhabited regions of the country, particularly the Southwest. Some attribute this popular location for land art to artists’ need to escape the turmoil in the United States during the 1960s and 70s by turning to the open, uncorrupted land of the West. As a result of earthworks not being easily accessible to the public, documentation in photographs, videos, drawings became imperative to their being seen. The first exhibit of contemporary land art was at the Virginia Dwan Gallery in New York in 1968. Other earth artists who emerged during this period include Robert Smithson, James Turrell, Walter De Maria, Michael Heizer, Dennis Oppenheim and Peter Hutchinson.

Perception of time and space Holt's works of art often deal with issues of how people perceive time and space. The various monumental works she created blend with and complement their environment. Works such as Hydra’s Head do not merely sit in their environments, but are made of the land, stand on it and are created to be harmonious with the land. The pools in this work are at the top of concrete tubes imbedded in the ground. The land already at the site surrounds these pools. They reflect the natural landscape, while not disturbing it. Holt thought about human scale in relation to the works she created. People can interact with the works and become more aware of space, of their own visual perception, and of the order of the universe. as seen in works like Sky Mound, which serves a dual function as a sculpture and park and it also generates alternative energy.

In her works, Holt created an intimate connection to nature and the stars, saying, "I feel that the need to look at the sky-at the moon and the stars-is very basic, and it is inside all of us. So when I say my work is an exteriorization of my own inner reality, I mean I am giving back to people through art what they already have in them." Thus, for Solar Rotary, Holt employed Dr. Jack Robinson, an archaeo-astronomer and professor to help her, among other things, to plot the sun's coordinates for the work. For Rock Rings, Holt searched far and wide to find the right masons to work on the piece and also had local stone called schist, which was 250-million-years old, quarried by hand for the work. involved a team of academics, teachers and students, an astrophysist, a surveyor, a metalworker and an architect.

Analysis of major works Sun Tunnels A small crowd views the summer solstice sunset on June 20th, 2021 at the Sun Tunnels.

Sun Tunnels is located in the Great Basin Desert outside of the ghost town of Lucin, Utah, at . The work is a product of Holt's interest in the great variation of intensity of the sun in the desert compared to the sun in the city.

The tunnels not only provide a much-needed shelter from the sweltering desert sun, but once inside the effect of the play of light within the tunnels can be seen. The top of each tunnel has small holes, forming on each, the constellations of Draco, Perseus, Columba, and Capricorn, respectively. It is now considered one of Dia's 12 locations and sites they manage.

Dark Star Park Dark Star Park was commissioned by Arlington County, Virginia, in 1979, in conjunction with an urban-renewal project.

The forms stand in stark contrast to the busy and highly developed commercial area that surrounds the space. There are places to walk and sit within the park, giving a passersby a chance to escape from the urban environment. Dark Star Park is more socially interactive than Holt's other works. Holt paid attention to how people both inside and outside the park would see the spheres. The work alters the viewer's perception by using curvilinear forms, such as the walkways that mimic the curving roads surrounding the site. Walking in the park or driving by it, viewers may mistake spheres of different sizes to actually be the same size or one sphere may eclipse another. The tunneled passages into the park frame certain sculptural elements, as do the reflections in the pools. However, Holt made sure not to alienate the park entirely from its surroundings. The spheres are made of gunite (a sprayable mixture of cement and sand), asphalt, precast concrete tunnels, steel poles and stone masonry. The project was later abandoned after protests from oceanfront homeowners who complain the artwork will ruin their scenic views.

Flow Ace Heating A functioning hot water system, Holt's Flow Ace Heating (1985) begins with a pipe that cuts through a gallery wall near the ceiling and grows into a complex configuration of linear form, punctuated by radiators, valve wheels, gauges and other instruments. The pipes (all warm to the touch) wrap around walls and extend into their rooms' centers where they blossom into large rectangles and loops.

Sky Mound Located in Northern New Jersey, Sky Mound sits where a , landfill once stood. The state's Hackensack Meadowland Development Commission (HMDC) asked Holt to reclaim the site in an effort to provide an environmentally safe spot for plant and animal life to reside and for humans to enjoy.

Still unfinished in April 2008, the landfill is to be turned into an earth sculpture and public park. The landfill has been covered with grass. Ten mounds stand upon the site, as well as steel poles, plants, and a pond, designed for the approximately 250 species of migratory birds that visit the area seasonally. In 1991, funding on Sky Mound was stopped to perform a technological study at the site; currently construction remains postponed.

From the Holt/Smithson Foundation web page, and Art in America (2024): [Holt] planned to incorporate gravel paths in alignment with the solstices, a large gunite sphere encircled by a moat to represent the moon, methane flares visible from planes overhead, and a pond that would attract wildlife and drain surface water from the landfill. This pond is the only realized portion of Holt’s design—the rest is delayed indefinitely.

Mound can be glimpsed from the New Jersey Turnpike—the mound is now a solar farm, which at least aligns with Holt’s desire to model sustainability and closer connections to the cosmos.

Films Holt made a number of films and videos since the late 1960s, including Mono Lake (1968), East Coast, West Coast (1969), Swamp (1971) (in collaboration with Robert Smithson ) and Breaking ground: Broken Circle/Spiral Hill, a video "guided by Smithson's film notes and drawings" and completed forty years on. Points of View: Clocktower (1974) features conversations between Lucy Lippard and Richard Serra, Liza Bear and Klaus Kertess, Carl Andre and Ruth Kligman and Bruce Brice and Tina Girouard. In 1978, she produced a 16mm color film documenting the seminal work Sun Tunnels.

Underscan (1974) - Videotape Holt made Underscan in 1974 using still images of her aunt Ethel's home in New Bedford, Massachusetts, and an underscanning device to tell a story of aging and the passage of time. The images are manipulated through a process of videotaping, and then re-videotaping the monitor of the underscanning monitor screen, which distorts, elongates, and compresses the images. The video begins by zooming in on a blank monitor until the images appear to encompass the entirety of the screen. The letters from Ethel Holt-Tate to her niece discuss Ethel's experience of maintaining her home, her health over the years, and the health of her roommates. The entirety of the voice-over is completed with Holt reading in a deadpan tone and metronome rhythm, which normalizes life and death as equivalent human experiences. Importantly, Holt’s narration partitions the viewer’s relationship with her aunt Ethel. Presumably, upon receiving the letters, Holt’s internal dialogue is mediated through Ethel’s voice, through their personal interactions. On the other hand, the viewer cannot and would not recognize the voice of aunt Ethel— that relationship is kept private within Holt’s family. Underscan invites viewers into a series of intimate conversations, yet inherently keeps full intimacy at bay. In this way, Underscan’s dual nature lends it to quick, familiar connection—where viewer’s relate to the experience of aging—and disjunction, grasping at a relationship one can never be privy to.

Selected artworks

Missoula Ranch Locators: Vision Encompassed (1972, dismantled), Missoula, Montana Sun Tunnels (1973–1976), Great Basin Desert, Utah Hydra’s Head (1974), Artpark, Lewiston, New York Stone Enclosure: Rock Rings (1977–78), Western Washington University Public Sculpture Collection, Bellingham, Washington Rock Rings (1977–1978), Western Washington University, Bellingham, Washington 30 Below (1979), Lake Placid, New York Wild Spot (1979–1980), Wellesley College Botanic Gardens, Wellesley, Massachusetts Star-Crossed (1979–1981), Miami University, Oxford, Ohio Dark Star Park (1979–1984), Rosslyn, Virginia Annual Ring (1980–1981), Saginaw Valley State University, University Center, Michigan Time Span (1981), Laguna Gloria Art Museum, Austin, Texas Catch Basin (1982), St. James Park, Toronto, Canada Electrical System II (1982), Bellman Circuit, Toronto, Canada Sole Source (1983), Dublin, Ireland End of the Line/West Rock (1985), Southern Connecticut State University, New Haven, Connecticut Astral Grating (1987), Fulton Street/Broadway-Nassau Subway Station, New York. Commissioned by Metropolitan Transportation Authority Arts for Transit Skymound (1988–present), Hackensack, New Jersey Ventilation IV: Hampton Air (1992), Guild Hall, East Hampton, New York Solar Rotary (1995), University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida Up and Under (1998), Municipality of Hämeenkyrö, Finland Avignon Locators (2012), Sainte-Marthe Campus, Avignon, France (official sculpture and event Website)

Exhibitions The first retrospective of her work, “Nancy Holt: Sightlines,” opened in 2010 at the Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Art Gallery at Columbia University and traveled to several other venues in the United States and Europe. In 2022 the major survey Nancy Holt / Inside Outside launched at Bildmuseet, Umea University, Sweden, traveling to MACBA, Spain in 2023 with two accompanying publications in English and Spanish.

Selected solo exhibitions 1972 Art Gallery, University of Montana, Missoula Montana 1972 Art Center, University of Rhode Island, Kingston 1977 "Young American Filmmakers’ Series," Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York 1979 Rock Rings at Western Washington University 1985 Ace Gallery, Los Angeles, California 1989 Montpellier Cultural Arts Center, Laurel, Maryland 1993 John Weber Gallery, New York, New York 2010-13 "Nancy Holt: Sightlines" (international traveling exhibition), Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Gallery, New York, New York; Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe, Germany; Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Chicago, Illinois; Tufts University, Medford, Massachusetts (e-press release); Santa Fe Art Institute (SFAI), Santa Fe, New Mexico; Utah Museum of Fine Arts, Salt Lake City, Utah 2012 "Nancy Holt: Photoworks," Haunch of Venison, London, United Kingdom 2013 "Nancy Holt: Land Art," Whitworth Art Gallery, University of Manchester, United Kingdom 2013 "Nancy Holt & Robert Smithson: England and Wales 1969," John Hansard Gallery, University of Southampton, United Kingdom 2013 "Nancy Holt – Selected Photo and Film Works," Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver, Canada 2023 "Nancy Holt / Inside Outside", MACBA, Barcelona, Spain. 2024 Tate Liverpool

Selected group exhibitions 1969 “Language III,” Dwan Gallery, New York, New York 1972 “International Art Exhibition,” Pamplona, Spain 1974 “Intervention in the Landscape,” Hayden Gallery, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge 1977 Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York 1981 “Summer Light,” Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York 1983 “Monuments and Landscapes: The New Public Art,” McIntosh/Drysdale Gallery, Houston, Texas 1985 “Artist as Social Designer,” Los Angeles County Museum of Art, California 1989 “Making Their Mark,” Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, Ohio; New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, Louisiana; Denver Art Museum, Denver Colorado; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1998 Wiener Kunstverein, Vienna, Austria 1999 “After Image: Drawing Through Process,” Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California 2007 "Cosmologies," James Cohan Gallery, New York, New York 2012-13 "Ends of the Earth — Land Art to 1974," Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California and Haus der Kunst, Munich 2013 "Light Show," Hayward Gallery, London, United Kingdom 2013 "The Whole Earth. California and the Disappearance of the Outside," Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, Germany

Legacy In 2014, the Holt/Smithson Foundation was founded