>Subject: Living from Land: A 30 day performance
>X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
>
>LIVING FROM LAND
>30 DAY PERFORMANCE
>MARK BREST VAN KEMPEN
>MAY 15-JUNE 14, 1998
>
>For thirty days I 'll live in an unpopulated area in Colusa County,
>bring no food with me, and subsist directly from what I find within the
>five square mile area. Documentation of this performance will be
>exhibited in SPACES of NATURE curated by Peter Selz at the Richmond Art
>Center May12-June 3, 1999.
>
>The installation at Richmond Art Center will be derived from my
>experience of living off the land for thirty days. With this action I am
>transforming the traditional role of the artist representing the
>landscape into the artist living as a part the landscape (becoming
>indistinguishable from the landscape). I want to explore through direct
>experience the relationship between humans and "nature", our ambivalence
>(fear and romanticization) about "wilderness".
>
>The installation will consist of video, drawings, objects, and writing
>that will document the performance as well as focus in depth on specific
>aspects of the project.
>
> -MBvK
>
>
>"Mark Brest van Kempen has created a variety of artworks using the
>landscape itself as sculptural material. From the Free Speech Monument
>on the UC Berkeley campus to Land Exchange at the National Academy of
>Art in China, his work explores the range of emotions and issues that
>are embodied in our relationship to the landscape. He has spoken in the
>US and abroad on the possibilities of creating artwork that functions
>outside the museum/gallery context and that brings aesthetic and
>symbolic meaning to everyday situations."
> -Marcia
>Slackman
>