Anti Form

The Asheville Art Museum presents Anti Form: Robert Morris’s Earth Projects. The suite of lithographic drawings by Robert Morris presents a series of ideas for ten works of art shaped out of earth, atmospheric conditions, and built environments. Created in 1969, the series marks an important moment when artists began to reimagine what art could be. Morris was a pioneer in conceptual art working at the forefront of Minimalism, Process art, and Land art. He theorized and championed the work of art as an idea rather than a physical form, influencing generations of artists to come.  

Morris’s lithographs situated the Earth Projects series within the state of Missouri, offering the plans as concepts that could be realized but which he never physically brought to fruition. If erected, the works would depend on and react to their environments, in some cases shifting with the seasons–like a waterfall turning to ice–in others, changing because of their materials’ physical nature–like dispersing steam or burning petroleum. Refocusing attention on the role of sensory experience, Morris envisioned each of the Projects as too vast to take in all at once, only realized as viewers moved through the landscape. Each Project would eventually conclude as it naturally reintegrated with the environment. 

This exhibition is organized by the Asheville Art Museum and Jessica Orzulak, Associate Curator and Curatorial Affairs Manager.