Land Art, Sculpture & Site-Specific Art

Land art, environmental projects and site specific sculptures as well as freestanding sculpture - all urban art projects - have been the main areas in which I have been working during my career as a sculptor. I have been doing mainly site specific art in the public space. My work represents my geometric and mathematical approach to sculpture as well as to environmental art.

My sculpture, and also my land art are based on constructive principles. In the south-west of Holland I have designed and made a highway bridge. As a maker of art in the public domain, I am a sculptor of urban art. In the early nineties I installed a twenty meter long stainless steel sculpture, which I called Opening the Arctic Circle, in Kemijärvi, in Finnish Lapland; according to my knowledge this is the largest public sculpture north of the Polar Circle. In the city of Vaasa, in the west of Finland, I installed a monumental red steel sculpture, Veera. For the Finnish city Kajaani I designed a park - the Suvanto Puisto - which was never executed. The plans and representational drawings are in the collection of the Kajaani Taide Museo (Kajaani Art Museum).

As the spokesman of the Dutch Sculptors' Association I was co-organizer of this manifestation in Dordrecht, the Netherlands from 1982 to 1984. The symposium, East West Forum was a confrontation between six Japanese and six Dutch sculptors.

To show my urban sculptures and land art projects I have made cities pages on this site which list the site specific public sculpture and environmental works. As a sculptor of public sculpture in the urban space, I have made sculptures inside and outside of public buildings, on roundabouts, gardens and more remote locations of more than fifty five cities. Since not all my proposals have been accepted, I wanted to show them on these pages also. A recent (2012) proposal was made for Changchun sculpture Park in China. Not having my sculpture accepted only means that  works by colleagues were more appropriate at the time. I designed and built my studio in Zwijndrecht, The Netherlands.
I now live and work at Penttilä in Kangasniemi, Finland - and recently presented a proposal for a sculpture on a traffic circle at the University of Texas at El Paso.

sculpture park

In the spring of 2006 I installed my large sculptures and constructions around our house and my studios in Finland - this permanent exhibition, called POAM sculpture park (Penttilä Open Air Museum) is located in the forests and hills around Penttilä Estate.

by Lucien den Arend

MORE ABOUT LAND ART AND SITE SPECIFIC SCULPTURE

status quo site specific sculpture
circumstantial demarcation - with Vera Röhm
in retrospect - Kajaani Museum of Art
texts
the cities pages on this web
studios
see works under construction
in 2012 I started a section with video films of land art and site specific sculpture either under construction or after installation.

the planting of trajectory for Rembrandt - 2002 - curvature length 250m - 100 Salix Alba (white willow) branches and three oaks

categorizing in forms - another approach

The academic approach towards specifying different forms of art is by way of subdivision in terms of art history - terms laid down in the course of the study of art history - such as periods, movements, styles or various other fields into which art has been categorized.

But one can also take a step backward and look at only the forms in which art, and in this case my own sculpture, manifests itself. I have no preference for any particular material, technique or form of presentation. This results in a variety of topics into which the work can be subdivided. Although I call all my works sculpture, and in fact they are, it is sometimes much more clear to classify these works under different - more obvious, down to earth - categories - forms in which his sculpture manifests itself:

islands
gardens
forests|trees
mazes|labyrinths
patios|courtyards
objects

A broad scope of my work is presented in different categories.
You can view some of my one man exhibitions at Galleria Sculptor in Helsinki Finland and at Galleria Nuovo in Lahti Finland.

In the vicinity of my birthplace, Dordrecht, I have created and organized the Open Air Museum OPAM. I present many of my colleagues on StIvesNet selected-art where also I have a home page. My cv/résumé is an extensive curriculum vitæ with links to it's many items.

The  cities pages present my site specific-public sculptures and projects in various municipalities in Finland, NL and other countries where my work has been installed in the public space. Some of my landscape works have the maze as inspiration. One maze is in the Dutch village of Hardinxveld Giessendam.

One of my sculptures for a roundabout can be visited on his domain about the subject of art and roundabouts - rotonde is a monumental roundabout sculpture for Heemskerk.

My encounters with colleagues and personalities in the field of the arts are documented and presented - Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, Henry Moore, Andries Copier, Truus Schröder Schräder, Kari Huhtamo, Jorma Hautala, Matti Peltokangas, Mark di Suvero, Christo and Jeanne Claude and Donald Judd.

During the sixties I made water colors and was mentioned as one of Holland's foremost water colorists in the Pieter Scheen Lexicon of Dutch artists born between 1750 and 1950. This was very flattering, because I am certain that there are other water colorists much better than I am.

Geometrie mit Kopfweiden - Basler Zeitung 26|05|2001 by Marie Luise Blatter - as (pdf file) or (HTML document)

BLOG a weblog in retrospect

site specific sculpture and land art
"On various locations mainly in Europe - Finland, Germany and Holland one can find site specific SCULPTURE including LAND ART and environmental LANDSCAPE designs by the sculptor - texts by Lucien den Arend and texts by others about his work." Read the article in Basler Magazin 21 - Basler Zeitung 121 (pdf version with illustrations) - LANDART Geometrie mit Kopfweiden (HTML version)

lectures
Die Erkundigung der Grenzbereiche zwischen Landschaftsarchitektur und bildende Kunst - the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zürich (ETH) Switzerland - other lecturers were Vito Acconci, Magdalena Jetelova, Dani Karavan, Andy Goldsworthy, Bernard Lassus, Peter Latz, Franco Zagari - the invitation (pdf file)

an exhibition by guest curator Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands De Voorstelling - her presence at the opening of the 1999 Keukenhof

Bulgarian decoration in the 1st class Order of The Knight of Madara

manifest - the art economists no longer have the sole power to manipulate art history

Finland experience

potential projects and applications

Having made many projects over the last thirty five years, there are the effects of time - reconstructions - indifference - up to a populist mayor - taking a heavy toll on some works.

"if you would like to discuss a subject with the sculptor, e-mail him and I will respond within a day."

sculptures | environmental sculpture and landscape design

the world's largest pink ribbon