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The Ethics of Earth Art

The Ethics of Earth Art
Library Shelf Location 09.BOET
Publication Date 2010
Description Analyzing the ethical stance of the earth art movement from the 1960s to the present. Since its inception in the 1960s, the earth art movement has sought to make visible the elusive presence of nature. Though most often associated with monumental land-based sculptures, earth art encompasses a wide range of media, from sculpture, body art performances, and installations to photographic interventions, public protest art, and community projects. In The Ethics of Earth Art, Amanda Boetzkes analyzes the development of the earth art movement, arguing that such diverse artists as Robert Smithson, Ana Mendieta, James Turrell, Jackie Brookner, Olafur Eliasson, Basia Irland, and Ichi Ikeda are connected through their elucidation of the earth as a domain of ethical concern. Boetzkes contends that in basing their works’ relationship to the natural world on receptivity rather than representation, earth artists take an ethical stance that counters both the instrumental view that seeks to master nature and the Romantic view that posits a return to a mythical state of unencumbered continuity with nature. By incorporating receptive surfaces into their work—film footage of glaring sunlight, an aperture in a chamber that opens to the sky, or a porous armature on which vegetation grows—earth artists articulate the dilemma of representation that nature presents. Revealing the fundamental difference between the human world and the earth, Boetzkes shows that earth art mediates the sensations of nature while allowing nature itself to remain irreducible to human signification. Amanda Boetzkes is assistant professor of art and design at the University of Alberta.
ISBN 9780816665891
Quantity 1
Pages 228
Author Amanda Boetzkes
Format Paperback
Publisher University of Minnesota Press
Related Artists Ana Mendieta, James Turrell, Olafur Eliasson, Robert Smithson, Chris Drury, Ichi Ikeda, Jackie Brookner
Categories Surveys of Modern & Contemporary Art, Art Styles and Movements, Public/Landscape Art
Language English

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