Richard Long / Mendoza Walking

At a time when the natural world is threatened by human intervention and negligence, Richard Long’s contemplative and organic meditations in nature and his installation for the historic Los Molinos room of the Faena Art Center, remind us of our own passages, the ephemeral and profound marks we leave upon the earth’s surface and the possibilities for future engagement with the environment.

Mendoza, a city that exists as a bridge between Argentina’s indigenous and colonial past, is also a gateway to the Andes—the largest mountain range in the world, a mystical frontier of human exploration, and the spiritual spine of the Americas.

Richard Long grants us the means to enter into conversation with the landscape. His eighteen days walking in the shadow of Aconcagua are not just his alone but speak to human potential as well as the need for universal remembrance.

His work is at once the walking itself, the imprint he leaves as he displaces stones and mud to activate the landscape with in-situ sculptures, and finally the totems of this spiritual journey (made from materials collected in his walking) and offered at the Faena Art Center as remains and mementos of the experience.

Founded to celebrate movers, rebels, thinkers, and makers who create new dances, new songs, and new rituals, the Faena Art Center is honored to present the work of Richard Long, an artist who continues to break new ground and whose work insists upon maintaining dialogue with the space around him and the materials found therein. Manifest from the remnants of our terrain, the installation at the FAC signals to our past, grapples with the material potential of the environment and urges us to reimagine movement, place, materiality and future change.

Ximena Caminos Executive Director and Chief Curator, Faena Arts Center