The archive of place and land art as archive: A case study of Spiral Jetty

Abstract

The land art movement of the 1960s and 1970s challenged traditional art notions of object-ness, commodification, and permanence. Land art resides within, or on top of, landscapes, which are themselves sites with histories and identities that precede the land art use. Frequently created in remote areas that pose accessibility issues, viewers most often experience the physical locations through visual and written documentation. Literature on landscapes and the built environment serves as a foundation for considering the importance of place in archives and culture memory, and literature on artistic documentation of landscapes informs a discussion about the role of art in interpreting and accessing remote places. This article examines the land artwork Spiral Jetty by Robert Smithson as an art object with information worth preserving, while considering how the universe of documentation surrounding Spiral Jetty has shaped its interpretation and accessibility, revealing a complex narrative carefully controlled by the artist. The article concludes by inviting closer consideration of three-dimensional modeling as a new method for documenting land art, while determining that no one-size-fits-all approach exists to document and preserve these unique, artistically significant sites.