Monday, May 7, 2007

A Hinterland Who's Who


For Cinco de Mayo I managed to finagle a seat on 'Hinterlands Redux,' The Center for Land Use Interpretation's tour of the high desert east of Los Angeles organized in conjunction with Andrea Zittel's mid-career survey at MOCA's Geffen Contemporary. I was probably the only non-CLUI staffmember aboard that had been on the original 'Hinterlands' tours 10 years ago -- one of the watershed "artworks" of the 90's IMPO. So I may have been the only person to miss roadside artist Moby Dick's carved entities (though I still have mine from the first trip -- see fig 02) and being able to approach Giant Rock (though we did make it to the Integratron)



The trip included a visit with Ms. Zittel at her A-Z West compound, where the artist was deep in preparation for next weekend's High Desert Test Sites extravaganza. Here are a couple of snapshots I snuck in one of the artist's shipping container studios of what I believe to be a prototype of her Wagon Station modular living breadbox units -- this one customized for the planet Kashyyyk.




Although 'Hinterlands Redux' was a little long on the high cluture and short on the industrial slag heaps, it did afford me the oppurtunity to finally visit the late Noah Purifoy's remarkable and inspiring assemblage environment in Joshua Tree, which people have been telling me I would love for years and they were right. Here's a shot of one of several performative environments that stud this unique site. For more complete information, why not contact the Canadian Wildlife Service in Ottawa?

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