Robert Smithson, Asphalt Rundown, Rome, Italy, 1969. Gelatin silver print, 10 x 8 inches, 25.4 x 20.3 cm. Inscribed by the artist in pencil verso.

Photograph used for reproduction purposes and shows signs of handling. There is a light patina of impressions, indentations, and dings throughout image including Smithson's inscription on verso showing through, visible only in raking light. Some tiny spots in image and finger print visible only in raking light. Some very slight soiling along bottom margin. Printer's crop marks on recto.

Robert Smithson (January 2, 1938 - July 20, 1973) was one of the most influential artists of the 70s, and continues to be seen as a groundbreaking artist of the 21st century. While he is perhaps most well known for the Spiral Jetty and other earthworks, Smithson also worked in a number of other media, including drawing and sculpture. Smithson also filmed and photographed his site specific earthworks in order to record the ephemeral pieces, which changed with the landscape in which they were installed. The resulting film and photographs stand alone as artworks in their own right.

To express his many complex ideas, Smithson favored non-traditional art forms and materials. While his pieces often had more visual stimuli than those of minimalist and conceptual artists, Smithson was a leader in the vocabulary of minimalist and conceptual art. He possessed the ability to verbalize his extremely intricate thought process with exceptional clarity. Speaking about his piece “Enantiamorphic Chambers” Smithson said, “If art is about vision, can it also be about non-vision…its form is a bipolar notion that comes out of crystal structures…two separate things that relate to each other…” Today, Smithson’s life and work live on through the continuous outpouring of scholarship and exhibitions worldwide.