General Business Records
name: label: Collection Creator
content: Holt, Nancy, 1938-2014
setName: label: See more items in
content: Nancy Holt Estate records
label: See more items in
content: Nancy Holt Estate records / Series 11: Robert Smithson Estate and Legacy
unitdate: label: Date
content: circa 1961-2013
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Archives of American Art
identifier: label: Identifier
content: AAA.holtnanc, Subseries 11.1
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: Series primarily documents various aspects of Holt's management of Smithson's estate and legacy such as overseeing donations, the maintenance of contracts and agreements, the handling of requests for loans for exhibitions and permissions for publications and use, and the appraisal and inventory of Smithson's library donated to the Archives of American Art. The series also includes inventories and related records maintained by John Weber Gallery and James Cohan Gallery who represented Smithson, and scattered documentation related to the whereabouts of individual artworks. John Weber Gallery settlement records relate to the termination of the gallery's representation agreements with Holt and with the Smithson Estate.


Records of donations and gifts from Holt's collection of work by Smithson include appraisals, correspondence, and deeds of gift, and include documentation of the Spiral Jetty agreement with DIA. Also found are records related to the maintenance of Smithson's land art and monitoring of their condition; authentications for several artworks; and two unsigned copies of an affidavit stating that Smithson's rock salt and mirror sculptures (originally constructed for an exhibition at Cornell University in 1969), should continue to exist as unique and unduplicable works. 


Also found in this series are two folders of Smithson correspondence. They include photocopies of letters from Smithson to George Lester (1960-1963) and some general business correspondence such as letters from galleries and institutions about Smithson's work, sales, exhibitions, and potential visits and speaking engagements. One letter from Dwan Gallery relates to Centro de Arte y Communicación and includes photographic prints of a plantation being considered as a site for a work by Smithson.

Film and video records include correspondence, receipts, and photocopies related to Jane Crawford's 1994 film Rundown, produced by Robert Fiore.
Exhibition records include correspondence relating to the curation of a few Smithson exhibitions and catalog essays, loan documentation, and press coverage. Exhibitions documented include a retrospective at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, in 2004.