Andy Goldsworthy

Decmber 2013 - Andy Goldsworthy, artist. British artist Andy Goldsworthy was commissioned to create a site-specific sculpture for the National Gallery of Art in 2004. Installed in the East Building in the winter of 2004/2005, Roof comprises nine stacked-slate, low-profile domes—each hollow and measuring, roughly, 5 ½ feet high and 27 feet in diameter, with centered oculi 2 feet in diameter. Goldsworthy, who has worked with the domical form since the late 1970s, chose it for the Gallery in part because the site's northern orientation would allow him to produce perfectly black holes. The earthbound domes also serve as a counterpoint to the many rooftop domes of Washington. In his first public appearance at the Gallery since the spring of 2005, Goldsworthy looked back at Roof's installation. Recorded on November 11, 2013, this lecture focuses on Goldsworthy's art in relationship to the built environment and the contextualization of Roof within his more recent body of work.