The sixth of a series of reading group podcasts on sculpture. In this episode we talk about entropy in relation to sculpture. We look at two texts. One is Robert Smithson’s 1966 essay, ‘Entropy and the New Monuments’, and the other is a 2015 publication on the work of Beverly Buchanan from the late 1970s to the early 1980s, edited by Park McArthur and Jennifer Burris Staton. We talk about entropy, ruins, major and minor approaches to work, and the relationship between wider culture and formal developments in art.
Below are the texts we looked at for this podcast, with links to download a PDF of each text.
Smithson, Robert. ‘Entropy and the New Monuments’. Artforum, 1966. https://holtsmithsonfoundation.org/entropy-and-new-monuments. Download PDF.
McArthur, Park, and Jennifer Staton, eds. Beverly Buchanan: 1978 - 1981. Mexico City: Athénée Press, 2015. Download PDF.