Make a number of walks from my home up into the escarpment to various places where there are illegally dumped cars. On each trip cut out a section of a particular car’s bodywork with a battery powered angle grinder. Carry the piece back home and write an account of the walk. Once many pieces are collected, assemble them together into a line. The order of the line should obey the sequence in which the pieces were collected. The pieces should be connected together with loose joints so that the line is flexible. Roll up the line into a scroll. Transport it to a gallery space and roll it back out on the floor until only a third of the scroll remains. Make booklets of the written accounts of each walk freely available. Place the title of the work on a small visible card.
I acknowledge that this plan describes a rather neatly conceived art work, which for me is problematic, but it still may be worth following the plan and producing the work. The proposed work represents a fairly legible (perhaps too legible) means of reflecting upon the tradition of Land Art – addressing, for instance, issues related to intervention in the natural landscape and the privileging of natural materials and modes of experiential engagement. The work of Gordon Matta-Clark is also relevant, if only to remind me that the work is not only about the line of pieces, but also about the holes cut in the wrecked vehicles. The photographs of the holes could possibly be arrayed as a corresponding line on a nearby wall. At the very least, they should be included in the written accounts. I should explicitly acknowledge the reference to Richard Long’s iconic work “A Line Made By Walking” (1967) in the title.