CHRISTO AND JEANNE-CLAUDE

WRAPPED COAST, 1969

Christo (Javacheff) Jeanne-Claude (de Guillebon)

husband and wifecreate temporal environmental artworks in urban and rural sites they both go by their first names only

born on the same day in 1935, he in Bulgaria and she in Morocco of a French military family

1956, Christo left Bulgaria to go to Czechoslovakia;from there he escaped (from Communism.)

went to the United States in 1964, with their son Cyril

met in Paris in 1958

created their temporary environmental artworks together since 1961, Christo doing the preliminary drawings for the works.

They pay all expenses associated with the artworks, including planning, construction, and taking down, partly from the sale of Christo's preliminary drawings, early works from the 1950's and 1960's, and lithographs

They accept no contributions, grants or other financial assistance, preferring to make their aesthetic decisions apart from any influence financial backing might involve

All of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's projects come from their own ideas (The artists never create works that come from other people's ideas.)completed 20 projects and 39 projects have not succeeded. The artists could not get permission to create those 39 projects, and the artists lost interest.Many of the artist's 20 completed projects have been refused, more than once each, but they persisted Some projects took many years of refusals until the artists could complete the project:•32 years for Wrapped Trees 1966-98.•26 years for The Gates 1971-2005.•25 years for the Wrapped Reichstag 1971-95•10 years for The Pont Neuf Wrapped 1975-85•5 years for Running Fence 1972-76

Christo and Jeanne-Claude Wrapped Coast – one million square feetLittle Bay, Sydney. Work started 5 October, completed 28 October; dismantled 11-14 December

Little Bay, property of Prince Henry Hospital,is located 14.5 k southeast of the centre of Sydney.

Cliff area approximately 2.4 k long, 46 to 244 m wide, 26 m high at the northern cliffs, and at sea level at the southern sandy beach.

92,900 square m (one million square feet) of erosion control mesh (synthetic woven fibre usually manufactured for agricultural purposes), was used for the wrapping. installed in lengths of 11.6 by 183 m or 22 x 91.5 m. 56 k of polypropylene rope of 3.2 cm circumference tied the fabric to the rocks. Ramset guns fired 25,000 charges of fasteners, threaded studs and clips to secure the rope to the rocks.

John Kaldor was the project co-ordinator

A retired major in the Army Corps of Engineers, was in charge of the construction site.

17,000 manpower hours4 weeks 15 professional mountain climbers, 110 labourers, students from the University of Sydney and East Sydney Technical College, as well as a number of Australian artists and teachers. All climbers and workers were paid with the exception of eleven architecture students who refused to be paid.The project was financed by ChristoThe coast remained wrapped for a period of 10 weeks from 28 October 1969,then all materials were removed and the site returned to its original condition.

Installations take years of planning. The activity which precedes the installation of a piece is as much a part of a particular work as the actual installation. It took twenty-four years before the Reichstag could be wrapped, seven years to organize The Umbrellas, ten years to plan The Pont Neuf Wrapped, and three years for the Surrounded Islands in Biscayne Bay. Numerous books and videos have documented the succession of zoning board hearings, public forums, parliamentary debates, public and private meetings, legal releases and contract negotiations, press conferences, materials' tests, drawings, collages, exhibitions, as well as the enormous effort and teamwork required for the actual installations.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude propose the installation of a temporary work of art, to be installed for a 14-day period over a section of the Arkansas River between Canon City and Salida, during summer 2011, the earliest possible date.On March 4, 2006, Christo and Jeanne-Claude officially requested that the Environmental Assessment (EA) currently in process for Over The River, be upgraded to an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). The artists made this decision because they wish to provide the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), all other permitting agencies and the general public with the most detailed research possible. The artists are aware that an EIS provides the most thorough analysis available in the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process. This will ensure that when a decision is reached, all potential impacts, both positive and negative, will have undergone the most careful examination.On June 19, 2006 the Notice of Intent was filed in the Federal Registry in Washington D. C. This document is formal notification that the EIS preparation process is underway. It is expected that the Environmental Impact Statement will be complete by August, 2007The permit process continues and involves the following agencies:Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Colorado State Parks Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) Colorado State Patrol Colorado Division of Wildlife (DOW) Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Fremont County officials Chaffee County officials Canon City officials Salida officials The Littleton, Colorado firm of J. F. Sato and Associates is preparing the Environmental Assessment (EA).Engineering services are being provided by Golder Associates, Inc. of Lakewood, ColoradoThe survey reports are prepared by Law and Mariotti Consultants, Colorado Springs, Colorado.Aerial photographic maps have been made by M. J. Harden, Inc., Kansas City.All wind tunnel tests, both scale-model and life-size, have been conducted by RWDI Inc., Consulting Engineers of Guelph, Ontario, Canada.

OVER THE RIVER

C. V. J. Corporation has retained the services of: Marca L. Hagenstad of J. F. Sato and Associates, Consulting Engineers, Littleton, Colorado, to prepare the Design and Planning Report for the Bureau of Land Management which the BLM will use for the Environmental Impact Statement; Francis E. Harrison and Clare H. Dunning, of Golder Associates, Inc., Lakewood, CO, to prepare the geometric design engineering; Jeremy Zeid and Thomas Stelmack of Parsons Transportation Group, Inc., Denver, CO, to prepare the cable and structural component designs; John Wolosick and Tom Szynakiewicz of Hayward Baker, Broomfield, CO, to prepare the anchor installation plan;Bryan Law and Richard Mariotti, of Law and Mariotti Consultants, Inc., Colorado Springs, CO, to prepare the topographic maps; David Ness and Donald Cleveland, of M. J. Harden, Inc., Kansas City, Missouri, to prepare the aerial photographic maps; Steve Coffin of GBSM, Inc. and Ford Frick of BBC Research, Denver, CO to provide strategic communications and economic analysis. To provide legal counsel: Scott Hodes and Margaret B. LaBianca of Bryan Cave LLP and Lori Potter of Kaplan, Kirsch & Rockwell LLP, Denver, CO.

Of the many perspectives from which one can investigate the Christos' artit is the use of fabric as an agent for transformation and revelation that is perhaps most crucial. The wrapping or surrounding of familiar objects, the curtaining off of familiar views, the intervention of fabric where one least expects it undermines our comfortable residence with the accustomed and creates a sense of dislocation. This substitution of a more ambivalent than unfamiliar presence for the predictable is one of the key elements of their work. Yet the wrapping, draping, surrounding, or veiling action of the fabric does not dissolve the known. Rather it recontextualizes it within a variety of corresponding associations. As the curtain surges in the wind, as the wrapping billows over a form, the fabric's fluttering surface serves as a mediator between our preexisting conceptions concerning a particular condition and inferences of shifting states.

Throughout the history of art, the use of fabric has been a fascination for artists. From the most ancient times to the present, fabric, forming folds, pleats and draperies, is a significant part of paintings, frescoes, reliefs and sculptures made of wood, stone and bronze. Fabric, like clothing or skin, is fragile, it translates the unique quality of impermanence.

FABRIC

The final realization of a project by Christo and Jeanne-Claude is not the installation of a particular piece. A project is not completed until the installation is removed and the site is returned to its "normal" state. Yet that formerly inviolate condition has been forever altered by the installation and the lingering resonance it leaves behind.While the fabrics, ropes, cables, poles, and whatever other materials used in an installation will be recycled and the site returned to its pre-installation status,the uncertainties and questions raised by the Christos' efforts remain, dispersed among all those who have been engaged by the project. This process of reevaluation continues long after the project is supposedly completed. This creation of permanent states of reconsideration, instigated by work which is temporary by design, is perhaps the Christos' greatest achievement.

www.christojeanneclaude.net

Why wrapping?Christo and Jeanne-Claude have done very few wrappings in comparison to their whole portfolio of artworks. the works are more about altering an environment than wrapping -- which is only one way to to that. The last time Christo & Jeanne-Claude wrapped a work it was the Pont Neuf in Paris, and then it took them ten years to get the permits.

THE AUDIENCEChristo and Jeanne-Claude donated the merchandising rights to the charitable foundation NNYN (Nurture New York’s Nature and the Arts) who are sharing the proceeds with The Central Park Conservancy.

The people of New York used the park as usual.

THE GATES

For those who walked through The Gates, following the walkways,the saffron-colored fabric was a golden ceiling creating warm shadows When seen from the buildings surrounding Central Park, The Gates seemed like a golden river appearing and disappearing through the bare branches of the trees and highlighting the shape of the meandering footpaths.

PONT NEUF

Witnessed by three million visitors before its removal on 5 October, the project has been considered the most sculptural of the Christos' monumental works.

WORLDglobalization

international

urban

rural

BIBLIOGRAPHY

http://www.kaldorartprojects.org.au/projects/pastproject.asp?idExhibition=22&idArtist=135&idImage=545

http://www.ndoylefineart.com/christo.html

http://www.christojeanneclaude.net