Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and a blue sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

simple landscape with small pines, snow covered ground, and an overcast sky

Nancy Holt, Alaskan Pines (1986)
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)

© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

Photoworks

Alaskan Pines

Nancy Holt
1986
Southcentral Alaska
Nine inkjet prints on archival rag paper from original 35 mm color transparencies
Framed size: 15¼ × 22¼ in. (39 × 57 cm)
© Holt/Smithson Foundation, Licensed by VAGA at ARS, New York

Holt created the photo-series Alaskan Pines while traveling through Southcentral Alaska upon invitation from the Visual Arts Center of Alaska in Anchorage. In March of 1986 Holt visited the towns of Eklutna and Chitina, Alaska, where she created two photographic series: Alaskan Pines and Athabascan/Russian Orthodox Graveyard.  As in the earlier photographic works Trail Markers(1969) and California Sun Signs (1972), in Alaskan Pines we see Holt communicate movement through space by focusing her lens on one repeating element of the landscape. The focus on small pines in these images also calls to mind Holt's 1975 film Pine Barrens and the resulting photo-composite "Pine Barrens: Trees," made from film stills of isolated pines.⁠⁠ Returning to Alaska in July after traveling and observing the landscape, Holt chose to create the System Work Pipeline in response to the Trans-Alaska Pipeline. 

Related Info

Earthwork & Sculpture
steel duct zig zags through the air and along walls in a white gallery space
Pipeline
Nancy Holt
1986
Earthwork & Sculpture

Holt visited Alaska in March of 1986 upon invitation from the Visual Arts Center of Alaska in Anchorage, who hoped she might create a work of art in celebration of the region’s beauty. Holt was instead struck by the infiltration of the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline through pristine wilderness. In July of 1986 Holt returned to Alaska to create the System Work Pipeline in response. The steel pipes of the structure twist in and out of the gallery and visually penetrate through the building to the interior space below.

Works on Paper
drawing on paper depicting the layout of an oil pipeline in Alaska with handwritten words along the path
10 Billion Barrels of Crude Oil
Nancy Holt
1986
Works on Paper

Nancy Holt created this concrete poem along with two System Works in response to the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline in 1986. The facts and figures of the pipeline’s operation snake along the oil’s route; to read them one must shift positions, a physical disturbance that accentuates the discomfort of the information itself.

Earthwork & Sculpture
a person stands next to a sculpture made of metal pipe that zig zags through the air and along the wall in a basement room
Pipeline II
Nancy Holt
1986
Earthwork & Sculpture

After creating Pipeline at the Visual Arts Center of Alaska Anchorage in July, Holt created Pipeline II at the Fairbanks Arts Association in Fairbanks, which was on display from September 5 to 28, 1986. The primary materials of both Pipeline works are steel and oil, but the work extends beyond the gallery space and calls attention to the architecture and systems of the buildings in which they were exhibited.

See Also