Mark Brest van Kempen
"Las Vegas Piece Piece", 2023
Botanical signs, drawings, photographs
Courtesy the artist

Artist statement:

In 1969 Walter De Maria created the earthwork "Las Vegas Piece" by bulldozing a geometrical shape consisting of perfectly straight lines totaling four miles in the Mojave Desert near Las Vegas.

As aggressive as this action is, 50 years later the piece has largely been erased
by the action of the weather and the re-colonization of plants within the bulldozed space and is notoriously hard to discern.

Taken together, the initial sculptural gesture and its eventual re-absorption backminto the landscape is a fascinating process to me that evokes ideas of wounding and healing, industrial-scale human impact on the environment versus the ultimate temporary nature of all human endeavors.

My project "Las Vegas Piece Piece" consists of the temporary installation of
botanical nameplates on plants that have re-established themselves within the margins of "Las Vegas Piece." In this way the project will temporarily restore the lost boundaries of the original work while also paying homage to the slow persistence of desert life.

My project changes the point of view of the original piece by shifting attention from celebrating the wounding action of humans on the landscape to celebrating the healing action of the landscape itself.

www.mbvkstudio.com