Lot 296: Roden Crater--Fumarole Entrance

James Turrell (b. 1943)
Roden Crater--Fumarole Entrance
signed and titled 'Roden Crater - Fumarole Entrance James Turrell' (lower edge)
photographic emulsion, graphite and conte crayon on mylar
26¼ x 36¼ in. (66.7 x 92.7 cm.)
Executed in 1983.

Roden Crater is the ultimate manifestation of James Turrell's interest in Light and space. It is the central medium of his work and he traces it to an early interest first felt when reading Antoine de Saint -Expurery's description of flight space in the skies and visual atmospheric phenomenon. Turrel's vision was to reproduce this phenomenon with as few unnatural physical materials as possible. James Turrell first conceived What would be become the Roden Crater project in 1972. In 1974, the site in Northern Arizona was chosen, purchased by the artist in 1977. Construction then began in 1979. Turrell was looking for a large, geophysical bowl-shaped formation, perfectly elliptical and concave.
A skilled pilot, Turrell flew throughout the west to find his site. within a crater exists a fumarole, a small mountain in the crater bowl which often is the release valve for a dormant volcano.
The sale lot illustrated above depicts the artist's vision to utilize the fumarole space as a passage for an observer's experience of light and space within the larger arena of the crater itself.