Art Section II: Perception and the Art of Walking/A Line Made by Walking

What kind of experience can walking be?

Meditative or transformative

What did Alfred Barron write in his 1875 book Foot Notes, or Walking as a Fine Art?

Let a man take to his legs and soon his brain will begin to grow luminous and sparkle

What are some examples of walking as an act of religious devotion?

Circumambulation of Buddhist stupas or the Ka'ba in Mecca and the pilgrimage roads in northern Spain that led to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela

What is the intention behind meditating on the movement of the body through or toward holy spaces?

Creating a psychological state of reverence that allows the walker to contemplate the divine

What effect does the toil of a journey on foot have?

It challenges the body and mind

According to Yi-Fu Tuan, what is the purpose of secular walking?

Achieving mindful and open attentiveness to self and surroundings

What questions does A Line Made by Walking raise?

Questions about human relationships with nature

What does the photograph show?

A whitish line about 30 feet long in a field of scrubby grass and tiny flowers

How was the line created?

By walking back and forth until the walker's feet flattened the grass

Why does the line's outline waver?

Parts of the grass started to spring up again

What was the real piece produced by Richard Long?

The act of walking back and forth and the sculpture that was temporarily produced as a result

What did Caroline Tisdall write about the photo in 1971?

The only trace left once the grass straightens will be the photographic record.

What event was Tisdall responding to?

An exhibition of Long's works at the Whitechapel Gallery

What categories of art is A Line Made by Walking included in?

Land art and conceptual art

What did artists of the Land art movement do?

They physically intervened into the natural environment to change the way visitors see, think about, or experience that space

Why was walking often a necessity of Land art?

Spectators had to move around the site to fully appreciate the artist's modification of it

Who was the creator of Las Vegas Piece (1969)?

Walter De Maria

What exactly was Las Vegas Piece?

A sunken path carved into the Tule Desert in Nevada

What did De Maria forbid?

Photographing Las Vegas Piece from the air

What is the most important thing in conceptual art?

The idea behind the art

What was conceptual art interested in exploring?

Repetitive forms and pre-determined processes

What are scripts?

Pre-determined processes

How did Sol LeWitt describe conceptual art?

All of the planning and decisions are made beforehand and the execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea makes the art.

What were conceptual artists pushed to explore due to their dedication to process over result?

Basic, everyday acts

What are some examples of conceptual artworks that focused on walking?

Bruce Nauman's Walking in an Exaggerated Manner Around the Perimeter of a Square (1967-68) and Vito Acconci's Following Piece (1969)

How did Vito Acconci create Following Piece?

He chose random strangers to follow around New York City

What did both Nauman and Acconci do to create their works?

They used a script to stage walking-related actions

How does Richard Long usually refer to himself?

As a sculptor

What do most of Long's pieces have in common?

They are transitory interventions into the landscape that are only made permanent through documentation

Where and when was Richard Long born?

Bristol, England in 1945

What generation is Long a member of?

Britain's baby boom generation

What did Long often do as a child?

Accompany his parents on walking holidays

Where did Long study from 1962 to 1965?

West of England College of Art

Where did Long study sculpture starting in 1966?

St. Martin's School of Art

Who dominated St. Martin's sculpture faculty in the 1960s?

Anthony Caro

What was Caro known for?

Large-scale works exploring equilibrium and balance, using industrial material and bright colors

What kind of teacher was Caro?

Flexible, inspirational, and used experimental instructional methods

How did Caro's students react to his fame?

They pushed back against it by turning away from his example

What artists were part of the generation of the 1960s?

Long, Hamish Fulton, and Bruch McLean

What differences were there between Caro's work and his students' work?

Caro's pieces were permanent, grandiose, and monumental while his students' works were transient, self-deprecating, and intimate

When did Long produce A Line Made by Walking?

1967

What kinds of pieces has Long created since 1967?

Walking-related pieces and installations that bring natural materials into traditional gallery spaces

What award did Long win in 1989?

Turner Prize

What does the Turner Prize reward?

The best exhibition or installation in a British museum or gallery each year

What role did Long play in the Land art movement?

He was an important pioneer

What movement has Land art been tied to?

Environmentalist movement

Who were some of the best known practitioners of Land art?

Robert Smithson, Nancy Holt, Michael Heizer, and Walter De Maria

What did these practitioners lack when approaching their work?

An environmental consciousness

How did Heizer create his pieces?

He bulldozed the land to carve trenches into rock

How did Smithson cause pollution?

He used industrial chemicals in his "pour" works

What is an example of one of Smithson's "pour" works?

Glue Pour (1969)

Where did famous Land art practitioners create their pieces?

The American Southwest

What was land modification in the Southwest historically associated with?

Expansion and Manifest Destiny

How was British Land art different from American Land art?

It had a quieter impact and a more limited scope

How did Dieter Roelstraete compare American and British Land art?

American Land art had an aggressive, macho ethic while British Land art showed humility in the face of nature and the landscape

Besides Long and Fulton, which English artist exemplified the humility of British Land art?

Andy Goldsworthy

What historical context contributes to the Britishness of A Line Made by Walking?

The history of walking

When did walking for pleasure begin in Britain?

Late eighteenth century

Why did walking for pleasure become an activity?

Romantic writers adopted it as a habit that could encourage self-reflection through bodily and sensory experiences

How did the British economy shift?

It shifted away from the land and toward mercantile and industrial economies

What was the effect of this economic shift?

Rural areas became less associated with productive labor and more tied to relaxation

What were rambling clubs?

Large groups of walkers, who were mostly working-class men

What idea did the rambling clubs challenge?

Only the landed gentry belonged in the English countryside

What did rambling clubs push for?

The right to pass through private land

What organizations were formed to advocate for the right to walk through private land?

Open Space Society (1865) and Forest Ramblers' Club (1844)

How did walking change in twentieth-century Britain?

It became connected with youth movements and countercultural attitudes

What did Alfred Wainwright publish?

A series of humorous walking guidebooks

How did Wainwright envision long-distance walking?

As a form of guerilla action

What advice did Wainwright give to ramblers?

He told them to ignore threats from landowners and taught them how to evade detection, cross over barbed-wire fences, and defuse run-ins with farm animals

What was British youth culture in the 1960s and 1970s connected to?

A New Age movement focused on harnessing mystical energies thought to be a deep part of the rural landscape

What text experienced a revival of interest in the 1960s?

The Old Straight Track (1925) by Alfred Watkins

What theory did Watkins discuss in The Old Straight Track?

Ley lines, which were ancient walking paths that Watkins believed connected sites of psychic power

When did Richard Long likely read The Old Straight Track?

After he had completed A Line Made by Walking

What ethos is present in many of Long's works?

The countercultural ethos of New Age mysticism

What kind of sites has Long often walked?

Sites associated with ancient British religious rituals

What are some examples of sites Long visited?

Silbury Hill and pagan sites across England and Scotland

What was Cerne Abbas Walk (1975)?

A six-mile circle around the Cerne Abbas Giant

How old was the Cerne Abbas Giant believed to be in the 1970s?

Around 1800 years old

How was the Cerne Abbas Giant made?

The figure was cut into the turf of a hillside to expose the white chalk beneath

What did Long write as a caption for the Giant?

His eyes watch over a country mile / The giant / Walks on the hill / One step / Forever

How do the previously mentioned walks and artworks relate to histories of walking?

They re-enacted imagined religious and ceremonial processions by the ancient peoples of the British Isles

What important aspect of finding our way does Long engage with?

Mapping