Richard Long. Land Art.

Richard Long is an acclaimed British land artist.

As Ben Tufnell defines land art is ”characterised by immediate and visceral interaction with landscape, nature and the environment” (Tufnell, 2006, p.16).

Richard Long studied at Central Saint Martins School of Art and Design where students’ practice focused on ”challenging accepted conventions” (Tufnell, 2006, p.22). Long has broaden the perception and understanding of contemporary art by creating works outside the studio or gallery space, in the land, seeing nature and natural phenomena as the medium and art in themselves. The characteristic trait of Long’s practice is the act of walking, which is marked and documented by land sculptures, photographs, maps and textworks. As the artist said ”the walk is the ideological starting point” (Tufnell, 2006, p.26), ”a simple metaphor of life” (Tufnell, 2006, p.31).

Long’s art is about simplicity, archetypal shapes, lines, circles, spirals, ordinary, raw materials, stones, sticks, soil, simple acts, walking, observing, yet it explores and communicates complex ideas about the universal, the primal, the atavistic, it reflects ”the relationship with the landscape, one of respect, wonder, curiosity” (Tufnell, 2006, p.31).