2022 Research Fellow: Rory O'Dea

We are pleased to announce our first 2022 Holt/Smithson Foundation Research Fellowship awardee: Rory O'Dea.

Rory O’Dea is an Assistant Professor of Contemporary Art and Design and the Associate Dean of the School of Art and Design History and Theory. He received his PhD in art history from the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University, and his scholarship explores the ways that visual art intersects with ecology, geology, and fiction as a means to produce speculative realities and alternative modes of knowledge. At Parsons, his pedagogy is rooted in the intersection of theory and practice and explores the ways that art history shapes and is shaped by artistic research. His monograph titled Robert Smithson, Land Art, and Speculative Realities will be published by Routledge in 2023.

Rory O'Dea's Project Description

"Encompassing site-studies, ethnography, and archival research at ecological and historical institutions, my fellowship project will investigate the local cultures--human and nonhuman--of the Pine Barrens, New Jersey that have been erased or are under threat of erasure by the processes of industrialization and environmental degradation. More specifically, my project will examine the connections and tensions between the contemporary movements to preserve the “wilderness” of the Pine Barrens and the human culture of its long-standing communities. At the same time, my research of the Pine Barrens represents a critical opportunity to investigate the ways that Holt and Smithson collaboratively and individually produced work in response to the same site. Finally, my research addresses the question of how contemporary art can productively respond to and mediate the various land uses of the site to achieve a sustainable future will be central."

Read Rory O'Dea's text "Robert Smithson’s Fictions: A Speculative Reading of 'The Monuments of Passaic'" published as part of our Scholarly Text series.

Nancy Holt, Pine Barrens [still] (1975)

Archived News

Book Launch at Sprüth Magers New York with A.K. Burns and Lisa Le Feuvre

Please join us on Monday July 17 for a conversation and book release to celebrate the launch of Nancy Holt: Locating Perception with a conversation between Lisa Le Feuvre and A.K. Burns.

Nancy Holt: Locating Perception takes a journey through Holt’s work, paying particular attention to her investigations into the structures that we humans use as we attempt to understand our place on the surface of our planet. The book includes an essay by Julian Myers-Szupinska, an interview between Holt and Laura McLean-Ferris, and extensive notes on the work.

Nancy Holt / Inside Outside launches at MACBA on July 12

This summer the exhibition Nancy Holt / Inside Outside launches at MACBA, Barcelona’s Museum of Contemporary Art. Opening on July 12, 2023 this major survey is on show through January 7, 2024.

The exhibition launches on Wednesday July 12 at 8pm, preceded by a conversation at 7pm between Lisa Le Feuvre, Executive Director of Holt/Smithson Foundation and Teresa Grandas, curator at MACBA.