Art © Holt/Smithson Foundation/Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY
Currently not on view
Sprawling Mounds,
1972
Robert Smithson, 1938–1973; born Passaic, NJ; died Amarillo, TX
2012-6
Smithson’s best-known works involve shaping and manipulating the earth to create site-specific outdoor sculptures. Sprawling Mounds appears to be a sketch for one such installation. Had it been realized—and it is by no means clear whether Smithson intended it to be—such a work probably would have consisted of hard-packed earth. The configuration of the mounds mimics the form of a labyrinth, whose ability to disorient Smithson would have appreciated. As Susan Ginsberg wrote in 1974, "Smithson’s drawings are not plans. . . . They are graphic representations of the conceptual basis of a work of art."
Information
Title
Sprawling Mounds
Dates
1972
Maker
Medium
Graphite
Dimensions
40.6 x 48.3 cm (16 x 19 in.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase, Mary Trumbull Adams Art Fund and Henry G. Jarecki Fund
Object Number
2012-6
Signatures
Titled, signed and dated in graphite, at top right: Sprawling Mounds R. Smithson | 72
Culture
Type
Materials
Estate of the artist; [James Cohan Gallery, New York, NY]; purchased by the Princeton University Art Museum, 2012.
- Robert Smithson: drawings. April 19-June 16, 1974: The New York Cultural Center in association with Fairleigh Dickinson University ... New York, (New York: New York Cultural Center, 1974).
- "Acquisitions of the Princeton University Art Museum 2012," Record of the Princeton University Art Museum 71/72 (2012-13): p. 105-132., p. 125
