Model for Dead Furrow,

1967

Thanks to the generosity of Dr. Kazan and Dr. Lichtenstein, Princeton is able to represent in some depth two key moments in the early career of Dennis Oppenheim, a pioneering member of the postwar avant-garde. <em>Model for Dead Furrow</em> is a proposal for a tall viewing platform made of precast concrete and metal pipes. Its design was probably inspired by a structure in Monte Albán, in Oaxaca, Mexico, one of the earliest Mesoamerican cities and the center of Zapotec cultural and religious life from about 500 b.c. to a.d. 1000. <em>Dead Furrow</em> belongs to Oppenheim’s <em>Viewing Stations</em>, a series of outdoor boxes and platforms from 1967 that prefigure his slightly later experiments with Earth art. Oppenheim characterized the <em>Viewing Stations</em> as "works to view from," rather than objects to look at. As such, they demonstrated his fascination with ancient American temples, which functioned both as places of worship and as stages for the performance of acting, seeing, and being seen. <em>2-Stage Transfer Drawing</em>, in contrast, exemplifies Oppenheim’s contribution to performance art, which he began to embrace in the early 1970s. This mixed-media diptych documents a performance conducted in collaboration with his daughter. Here, a kinesthetic feedback loop is created between father and child, resulting in a series of drawings.