« HOME

The Center

Fellowships

Workshops

Events

Digital

2006-2007 Fellows

 

Karen Rapp

Stanford University
Department of Art & Art History

Karen Rapp is a PhD candidate in the Department of Art and Art History at Stanford. She received a BA in American Studies from Northwestern University in 1999. Her current research focuses on contemporary art and globalization.  

Project Summary

Rapp’s dissertation, "Not the Romantic West": Site-Specific Art, Globalization and Contemporary Landscapes, looks at a recent trend in contemporary art practice: the return to working in or with remote landscapes. Focusing on four projects (Andrea Zittel’s A-Z West Studio in Joshua Tree, California; Rirkrit Tiravanija’s Land Foundation outside of Chiang Mai, Thailand; Matthew Coolidge’s Los-Angeles based Center for Land Use Interpretation and Stefano Boeri’s Milan-based collective Multiplicity) she argues that today’s land-based work both continues and deviates from the sculptural interests of the 1960s “earthworks” artists. Contextualizing today’s trend within a discussion of contemporary spatial politics, Rapp contends that the renewed interest in land is best understood as a response to globalization and the technological, economic and social effects this phenomenon has had on both the art world and the world beyond its borders.