Nancy Holt's Sun Tunnels and the Tension Between Art and Its Surroundings
In a review for ArtReview, Jenny Wu explores the enduring appeal of Nancy Holt's land art, focusing on Sun Tunnels (1973–76) in Utah's Great Basin Desert. Wu describes the work's framing of the landscape and its exclusion of the surrounding social reality, noting bullet marks from locals. Holt's film Pine Barrens (1975) similarly features unseen residents. The review ties these to Holt's interest in periphery versus center. The exhibition Nancy Holt: MoonSunStarEarthSkyWater is at Goodwood Art Foundation, Chichester, through 1 November.
Key facts
- Nancy Holt's Sun Tunnels (1973–76) consists of four concrete culverts arranged in an X in the Great Basin Desert, Utah.
- The tunnels are 22 tons each, 2.8 meters in diameter and 5.5 meters in length.
- Holt wanted Sun Tunnels to bring the overwhelming landscape into focus.
- The tunnels have holes cut in patterns mimicking constellations Capricorn, Columba, Draco, and Perseus.
- Local residents have fired bullets into the tunnels, leaving brown lines.
- Holt's film Pine Barrens (1975) shows southern New Jersey with voiceovers from unseen residents called 'Pineys'.
- Holt once said about Annual Ring (1981): 'I want to set up always the tension between the outside, or the periphery, and the centre'.
- The exhibition Nancy Holt: MoonSunStarEarthSkyWater is at Goodwood Art Foundation, Chichester, through 1 November.
Entities
Artists
Institutions
- ArtReview
- Goodwood Art Foundation
- Holt/Smithson Foundation
- Dia Art Foundation
- Artists Rights Society (ARS)
Locations
- Great Basin Desert
- Utah
- Salt Lake City
- Lucin
- Las Vegas
- Narragansett Beach
- Rhode Island
- southern New Jersey
- Chichester