Projects by Name
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 5: Project Files
unitdate: label: Date
content: circa 1900-2014
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Archives of American Art
identifier: label: Identifier
content: AAA.holtnanc, Subseries 5.1
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: Records include Holt's correspondence with architects, designers, project managers, local government planning and budget departments, fabricators, and others involved at all stages of her projects. Often Holt conveyed developing ideas and change details on notes written on fax cover letters which are included here. The evolution of Holt's ideas can be further traced in what are called "drawings" in the container inventory and are primarily copies of Holt's originals which may include design sketches, studies, progress prints, plan layouts, and blueprints of her evolving and final designs. 

Of note is substantive documentation of two of Holt's unfinished projects: the earthwork Sky Mound which has been on hold since 1984 and was originally envisioned to revive a landfill in the New Jersey Meadowlands four miles outside of Manhattan; and Solar Web (1984-89) an open structure that tracks the motion of the sun on Santa Monica beach. Although funded and approved by the California Coastal Commission, the  installation was discontinued due to one dissenting vote on the council that claimed the work would spoil ocean views.

Also particularly well documented are Holt's Arlington installation Dark Star Park, and Up and Under, an installation of carved, winding mounds of earth and tunnels in a quarry in Nokia, Finland. Included in Dark Star Park records are tape logs for and transcripts of interviews conducted by Holt at the park site and documenting people responding to the work.

In addition to land art installations, documented projects include Holt's film projects Revolve and Underscan and her book projects Ransacked: Aunt Ethel, An Ending and Time Outs. Records include interview transcripts for Revolve, and background material for Underscan and the related Ransacked, including family photos dating to circa 1900, draft manuscripts, Holt's notes on the sequence of events surrounding her aunt's demise, and transcribed letters from her aunt. Also found are text, photographs, and a mock up of the book Time Outs. 

Notably absent from the series are project files for Sun Tunnels with the exception of some related printed material and some copies of plans and drawings.