Artists from Matthew Buckingham to Diana Thater address the rich
legacy of Robert Smithson's films, sculptures and Spiral Jetty
This is the fifth volume in a series that builds upon Dia Art
Foundation's Artists on Artists lectures. The contributors to Artists
on Robert Smithson engage with Smithson's work in myriad ways: Matthew
Buckingham's essay highlights Smithson's preoccupation with the ways
that histories of the earth are constructed and contested; Abraham
Cruzvillegas considers Smithson's work with broken glass and
architecture; Mark Dion's didactic approach to the life and work of the
artist recounts the conceptual and evolutionary conditions that led to
his birth and development; Teresita Fernández confronts the limitations
of dominant histories of place, art and the monumental; Trevor Paglen
considers Smithson's iconic spiral and his fascination with natural
history; Rayyane Tabet weaves together a history of basalt that reveals
themes of colonialism, surveillance and strife; and finally, engaging
with the science fiction canon and its cinematic conventions, Diana
Thater provides a close reading of Smithson's Spiral Jetty film.
