Nancy Holt made drawings for several large-scale public art projects that remain unrealized and exist only on the page. In 1982 she developed High Voltage for Creative Time in New York City, as a proposal for the Brooklyn Bridge’s forthcoming centenary in 1983.

This is an early example of Holt’s interest in infrastructural systems. In these drawings she maps a plan for an artwork inside the Brooklyn Bridge Anchorage that expands an existing high-voltage electrical cable into an aerial network of wires and light bulbs, working with existing niches in the walls. Holt specifies that the floor remains earth, and the second and third images in the carousel show views looking up towards the power lines. High Voltage was made as Holt began her exploration of electrical systems, making visible the currents of power moving through architecture and public space.