“Within Contemporary Art, I don’t see any frontiers” –Raquejo

With almost six decades since it originated in the United States, amidst the artistic ruptures of the 1960’s and the search for a new creative paradigm that would separate the work from its objectual characteristic, Land Art has continued to prevail without exhausting its manifestations. By intervening and/or doing alterations to the landscape as a creative medium to provoke certain reactions were the relationship between man and nature prevail, the method turned into a new way of indicating the signifier in the work of art. This is how “Spiral Jetty”; accumulation of rocks that formed a spiral shape at a lake in Utah; by American artist Robert Smithson, became one of the precursory works of Land Art and were most contemporary artists take reference.
“All contemporary art since the 50’s, demonstrates that the work does not reside in the object. It’s all about the reflection we have of it”, said Tonia Raquejo, senior lecturer of the Complutense University of Madrid and professor of History and Theory of Contemporary Art.

As part of the 2012 “Archivos de los Efimero” expositions of Art in Nature, arte_FITS.Foundation organized a conference at Universidad Sagrado Corazón contemporary art expert, Tonia Raquejo. The topic of the aesthetic experience of nature through ephemeral art was discussed along with a panel of discussion about the history and information of Land Art by Dr. Laura Bravo with the participation of Dr. Lilian Ramos-Collado and Javier & Jaime Suarez. In the conference, Raquejo mentioned that artists continue to find in Land Art a suitable way to attain the spectator’s participation both in the process of the intervention and the final result.
One must remember that Land Art does not conclude with the artist’s work but requires the presence of environmental characteristics, such as climatic conditions, that constantly change the work until it disintegrates as part of an organic process. The video and photographic documentations of the artwork are the most important things that make up the characteristics of Land Art.
“It is all part of an ephemeral act. In the documentation, the aesthetic experience remains so it can be appreciated.” According to Raquejo, even though Land Art is made in and for nature, it doesn’t fight against new technologies and sophisticated machinery since these tools are useful to the artist; like the manifestations of performance and resonant art.

After being asked about the evolution of Land Art and how contemporary artists reassess it, Raquejo answered that “currently the works of art are placed in more public places so more people can see it. Before, the would be located at inaccessible places with few population and/or deserts”. Therefore, in the past, Land Artists would sustain the base of their land works in the most natural way possible. Now a days, emerging artists work on Land Art with proposals that make not only reference to known works of the movement but also evoke new creations. Most of these creations allude to a significant number of modern preoccupations about the conservation of the environment, demonstrating once again the positive effect art has on society as a whole.

 

Written by Carlos Antonio Otero Aponte; published December 2012

Edited and Translated to English by Karina del Mar; June 2014.

Documented photos by Zayra Taranto and Neysa Jordán.

Land Art in Puerto Rico

 

 

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