In anticipation of her installation for ‘Groundswell: Women of Land Art,’ Mary Miss talks with Dr. Leigh Arnold, Associate Curator, Nasher Sculpture Center.

About ‘Stream Trace: Dallas Branch Crossing’ As part of Groundswell:

Women of Land Art, the Nasher commissioned Mary Miss for a new site-specific sculpture that follows the path of a buried stream passing beneath the museum grounds. Titled “Stream Trace: Dallas Branch Crossing,” the work originates within the Nasher Garden as a line of reflective X’s on stakes and extends into area neighborhoods through a series of participatory walks. Miss metaphorically “daylights’ the stream, bringing to the surface histories of Dallas, its infrastructure, and the various communities that once lived alongside the stream’s banks.

Groundswell features 12 artists recognized for their sustained engagement with Land art. Through works made from the late 1960s through 1990, Groundswell provides a broad overview of themes and artworks that are integral to understanding the history of Land art. While most scholarship on the field tends to focus on the decades of the 1960s and 1970s, broadening this time frame allows us to chart the emergence of Land art in the 1960s, its so-called decline in the 1970s, and artists’ transition from working in rural, unpopulated settings to creating Land art in urban centers with the emergence of public art programs and art parks that flourished around the United States in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Curated by Nasher Associate Curator Dr. Leigh A. Arnold and organized by the Nasher Sculpture Center, Groundswell: Women of Land Art is accompanied by a fully illustrated scholarly catalogue with a central essay by Dr. Arnold, and contributions by Scout Hutchinson, Jana La Brasca, Anna Lovatt, Jenni Sorkin, and Anne Thompson, co-published by the Nasher Sculpture Center and DelMonico Books.
Video by: Oresti Tsonopoulos