Nancy Holt and Robert Smithson: England and Wales 1969

About

John Hansard Gallery presents the work of two leading world figures within the Land Art movement, Nancy Holt and Robert Smithson, seeking to examine a short but significant moment within their working life together; a trip made to the UK in August 1969. Developed to coincide with a major exhibition - Uncommon Ground: Land Art in Britain 1966-1979 - at nearby Southampton City Art Gallery from 10 May - 3 August, the John Hansard Gallery expands a story begun in the 1960s.

In August 1969, prompted by Smithson's inclusion in the seminal exhibition at the ICA, 'When Attitudes Become Form', Robert Smithson and Nancy Holt came to the UK and spent one month travelling together to various sites throughout England and Wales. From Chesil Beach in Dorset, Dartmoor, Wales and to Oxted chalk quarry in Surrey, the exhibition aims to give a thorough immersive overview of this journey, bringing together a range of the photographic and sculptural works that Robert Smithson and Nancy Holt produced during their visit.

Acting as a comprehensive diary of Smithson and Holt's journey to the UK in 1969, this exhibition will mark the first occasion this material will have been brought together, and will also show for the first time a series of personal photographs Smithson and Holt took of each other over their month's journey. Through all the material on offer, the exhibition aims to showcase the two artists' relationship with the unique ecology, geology and natural phenomenon that was so central to their work, and continued in influencing their careers, as they interact with Western landscapes and form their own candid accounts.