page of notebook with handwritten list in blue ink

Nancy Holt Archives Head to Smithsonian Institution's Archives of American Art

We are very pleased to announce Nancy Holt’s papers are finding their permanent home at the Smithsonian Institution’s Archives of American Art.

Nancy Holt’s papers document the development of her art and ideas over the course of more than four decades, her network of artist peers, her personal life, and her care for the legacy of Robert Smithson. Holt and Smithson were married in 1963, and Holt managed his estate from 1973 until her passing in 2014. Holt’s files include extensive documentation of both realized and unrealized works, exhibitions, publications, interviews, and her wide-ranging research interests. This bequest from the Estate of Nancy Holt brings Holt’s papers together in the same institution with the widely consulted Robert Smithson papers, which she generously donated to the Archives in eight separate gifts  between 1986 and 2011. 

“Research and partnerships are at the heart of Holt/Smithson Foundation. The Archives of American Art is the perfect home for the Papers of Nancy Holt, and aligns with Holt’s lifelong dedication to research,” said Lisa Le Feuvre, Executive Director of Holt/Smithson Foundation. “We are committed to growing our partnership with the Archives to enable new scholarship on the enduring legacies of Holt and Smithson. Their work continues to resonate with artists working today.”

Liza Kirwan, Interim Director, Archives of American Art says, “The bequest of Nancy Holt’s papers and related materials will provide researchers with unparalleled resources for the study of her work. This important collection adds immensely to our already substantial holdings relating to both Holt and Smithson and joins the Archives' oral history interviews of both artists.  We look forward to working with Holt/Smithson Foundation and a global public to expand scholarship on Nancy Holt.”

Nancy Holt’s works of art are held at Holt/Smithson Foundation. We are actively working on a number of national and international loans from our collection. The Foundation welcomes research queries, and appointments to consult materials at the Archive are made via their website.

Read article by Gabriella Angeleti in The Art Newspaper  about this collection.

Page from Nancy Holt's notebook listing potential titles for Dark Star Park (1984)

Collection of the Archives of American Art

© Holt/Smithson Foundation

Archived News

Robert Smithson looking at the camera from the back of a stationwagon loaded with rocks

Casting a Glance: Dancing with Smithson

 "Casting a Glance: Dancing with Smithson" launches at Marian Goodman Gallery Los Angeles on November 8, 2025, with an opening reception between 6 – 8 pm and on show until January 24, 2026. In 1968 Robert Smithson declared: “A great artist can make art by simply casting a glance.” This exhibition takes him at his word and invites eighteen artists to join Smithson on the floor as partners who resist, improvise, and extend the rhythm of his thinking.

two people looking through sculptural seeing devices at black circular shapes painted on a white wall

Holt's "Locators with Loci" on view in "Minimal" at the Bourse de Commerce

Nancy Holt's 1972 sculpture Locators with Loci is on view in the exhibition Minimal at the Bourse de Commerce, Paris on show through January 18, 2026. Curated by Jessica Morgan, Director of Dia Art Foundation, the exhibition traces the diversity of this Minimal Art since the 1960s through over a hundred works by some forty international artists, many from the Pinault Collection.