Crop Art - Large-scale Crop Art; Landscape Art

Large-scale Crop Art; Landscape Art

Other views of Crop art are only obtained from the air. Land art, Earth art, and Environmental art are similar in scale; in Crop art the canvas is the size of the fields it stretches over. A major practitioner of this type of Crop art, Earthwork, or Living sculpture is Stan Herd. Herd says an early inspiration for his art was the ancient earth drawings called Nazca Lines after the Nazca people of Peru (Herd 14). One of his first works was the 160-acre (0.65 km2) portrait of "Kiowa War Chief Satanta" (1981) in southwest Kansas. Herd's work reflects a spiritual connection with the land, and respect for Native American culture (Herd 9). "Little Girl in the wind" (1992, Salina Kansas) was a portrait of an indigenous woman; Carole Cadue, a Kickapoo was the subject of this Earthwork. This portrait was made by burning and mowing, but without plowing the land. (Herd 56) His includes photos of his work and lists some publications where his work has appeared, including a Smithsonian magazine article by Jim Robbins, July, 1994. In Crop Art Herd mentions installation artist Christo observing that "Christo's success hinged on his ability to communicate with people outside the art world" (Herd 16). Herd's work is related to the wider arc of the Prairie Renaissance Movement, a loose grouping of people in the Midwestern United States focused on the preservation and restoration of prairie ecosystems, arts, and culture. From the Prairie Plains Resource Center in Nebraska website to the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Arboretum website to Minnesota's Prairie Renaissance Cultural Alliance website to The Native Prairies Association of Texas website concern with the preservation and restoration of prairies ties into the larger categories of prairie preservation and environmental ethics; efforts to preserve these prairie ecosystems are a version of In-situ conservation of the plant genetic materials which make up the palettes of all crop artists.