Rijksmuseum unveils Richard Long exhibition thanks to biggest-ever donation

The most recent sculptural exhibition on the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam—eight works by English modern artist Richard Lengthy—playfully makes artwork from the museum’s lawns and rocks from the river Maas, open to everybody to take pleasure in (however to not tread upon).

Opening on 26 Could and working till 29 October, Richard Lengthy within the Rijksmuseum Gardens is the tenth in a collection of free-of-charge, sculptural exhibitions exterior the Netherlands’ nationwide museum, which has been made attainable by the museum’s largest-ever donation of €12.5m.

Six new trimmed grass and stone artworks standing within the shadow of the monumental Nineteenth-century constructing by Pierre Cuypers look conversely—based on Rijksmuseum director Taco Dibbits—modest. “Ten years in the past we had the primary backyard exhibition, and this yr’s is a really uncommon, an virtually modest one by Richard Lengthy,” he says.

“He talks about them as traces you allow behind within the panorama, and he instantly stated he wished to work with grass… it brings him ideas, feelings, holding on to this primitive materials. With out this donation we couldn’t have made this exhibition.”

Lengthy, 78, who is understood for making easy artwork by strolling in landscapes, creating images and books to doc his interventions, says that he was in some methods the “final of the amateurs” making artwork together with his personal arms. On the Rijksmuseum, he has mown grass into shapes, created works by laying stones in shapes, and contained in the museum’s atrium and nice corridor, recreated an awesome circle and snake of stones from Swiss and Indian rock on the marble ground.

“I’ve at all times made the whole lot myself as a result of that’s my pleasure,” he says. “I benefit from lifting all of the stones, strolling hundreds of miles in stunning landscapes, tenting at night time. My work is sort of a self-portrait of me on this planet I dwell in. I’m not inquisitive about making a monument—the works will depart no hint.”

Within the meantime, although, there are strict directions for gardeners to keep up the grass at a particular top and spray in opposition to weeds if essential, whereas the rocks on the ground of the Rijksmuseum are being watched intently by safety guards for his or her “journey” danger.

For Lengthy, the invitation to work within the Rijksmuseum’s gardens takes him again to his first-ever work in panorama. “In 1966, I made a recessed circle in my neighbours’ backyard; I had these concepts to work into the land, most individuals had gardens, so it appeared apparent to work it into somebody’s backyard,” he remembers. Luckily, he provides, the neighbours didn’t thoughts.