Inside the Spiral: The Passions of Robert Smithson

by Suzaan Boettger

An expansive and revelatory study of Robert Smithson’s life and the hidden influences on his iconic creations

This first biography of the major American artist Robert Smithson, famous as the creator of the Spiral Jetty, deepens understanding of his art by addressing the potent forces in his life that were shrouded by his success, including his suppressed early history as a painter; his affiliation with Christianity, astrology, and alchemy; and his sexual fluidity. Integrating extensive investigation and acuity, Suzaan Boettger uncovers Smithson’s story and, with it, symbolic meanings across the span of his painted and drawn images, sculptures, essays, and earthworks up to the Spiral Jetty and beyond, to the circumstances leading to what became his final work, Amarillo Ramp. While Smithson is widely known for his monumental earthwork at the edge of the Great Salt Lake, Inside the Spiral delves into the arc of his artistic production, recognizing it as a response to his family’s history of loss, which prompted his birth and shaped his strange intelligence. Smithson configured his personal conflicts within painterly depictions of Christ’s passion, the rhetoric of science fiction, imagery from occult systems, and the impersonal posture of conceptual sculpture. Aiming to achieve renown, he veiled his personal passions and transmuted his professional persona, becoming an acclaimed innovator and fierce voice in the New York art scene. Featuring copious illustrations never before published of early work that eluded Smithson’s destruction, as well as photographs of Smithson and his wife, the noted sculptor Nancy Holt, and recollections from nearly all those who knew him throughout his life, Inside the Spiral offers unprecedented insight into the hidden impulses of one of modern art’s most enigmatic figures. With great sensitivity to the experiences of loss and existential strife that defined his distinct artistic language, this biographical analysis provides an expanded view of Smithson’s iconic art pilgrimage site and the experiences and works that brought him to its peculiar blood red water.

Genres: Biography, Art, Nonfiction

440 pages, Paperback

Published April 11, 2023

Reviews

[A · Rating 4 out of 5]

Robert Smithson is among the mythical art figures of the 20th century whose reputation was based partly on his sculpture, critical writing, and bluster. Boettger peels back the curtain on this artist's life and reveals information that was hidden during Smithson's lifetime, and continued to be hidden by his wife after his death.

Boettger examines Smithson's complete biography, including his complicated childhood, struggles with religious belief, and how it was manifested it in his early paintings which were rarely seen. She brings up an earlier design for the Spiral Jetty which was changed after Richard Serra viewed the piece. There are also details which bring Tony Shafrazi into the mix, introducing Smithson and Holt to Stanley and Wendy Marsh in Amarillo.

One wonders how many people think they are meticulously orchestrating how their life will be portrayed, and then more details are later revealed to complete the picture. Boettger certainly dug deep to provide a more complete understanding of Smithson's life and work.

[Kiersten Cole · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m a Utahn who loves the spiral jetty. Hoped to love this book. The story of Robert Smithson is an interesting one… but the writing in this book was tough, hard to follow and stay engaged with. Reads a lot more like a textbook than a book and is more focused on his themes and theories than construction of the spiral jetty. Feels more like a book an art graduate student would enjoy.