Not on view
Date
1970
Classification
Installations
Medium
Six custom-made aluminum projectors with steel stands and six black-and-white film transparencies mounted between glass
Dimensions
Dimensions variable
Accession number
96.137
Edition
Unique
Credit line
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of Virginia Dwan
Rights and reproductions
© Michael Heizer.
Photography © Museum Associates/ LACMA, CA and artist.
API
artworks/10937
In 1969, in a Munich suburb, Michael Heizer created Munich Depression, a 16-foot-deep void with gently sloping sides that reached 100 feet in diameter. Viewers experienced the work in two ways: from a distance, as an interruption in the flat ground, and from within, as a gravel and earth interior forming a horizon line against the open sky above. After completing Munich Depression, Heizer made the photographic projection installation Actual Size: Munich Rotary, a 360-degree view of Munich Depression projected from large photographic glass plates created from Heizer’s own negatives and screened through six custom-made projectors. Like Munich Depression, Heizer’s granular, black-and-white, actual-size projections of the gravel and earth sides, horizon, and ribbon of sky explore how optical perception is determined by location. The gallery, which normally allows us an exterior view of sculptures, here defines a negative space that encloses us in its interior. The installation does not simply document Munich Depression—it also creates a parallel, independent work that emphasizes the tension between real space and its photographic counterpart.
