james turrell - roden crater
we finally found it. took 2 years and its in our home state. but its not public yet. it is absolutely breathtaking - a whole mountain/crater turned participatory art
This photo was taken on January 15, 2005 using a Fujifilm FinePixA101.
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Kobaltblu added this photo to his favorites. (86 months ago)
Clerkenwellbelle (84 months ago | reply)
I'm very jealous that you have been able to visit. I'm desperate to fly over and take a peek!!
prettyshake added this photo to her favorites. (83 months ago)
prettyshake (83 months ago | reply)
I'm overwhelmed to see it. Thankyou for your persistence and your photo. We've been planning for 18 months to come from Australia for the sole purpose of seeing Roden Crater. It was supposed to be open in Sept of 2006 and we're all set to come in November but the powers that be say it's impossible to get to. If you can give me any tips on how to get there I'd be forever grateful. Once peak oil hits those of us who live on the other side of the world aren't going to be able to travel overseas anymore and we have to take our opportunities as we get them.
robert_chrétien added this photo to their favorites. (81 months ago)
Martin Khan (81 months ago | reply)
Did you get inside?
Why is it so hard to find?
Is it open yet?
*linds added this photo to her favorites. (77 months ago)
rjseg1 (67 months ago | reply)
Good article in the Travel section of today's New York Times. Opening date is now pushed back until 2011!
crazycurves added this photo to her favorites. (67 months ago)
GRID CITY (66 months ago | reply)
my experience at roden crater (PART ONE.... please note... when i get a chance to finish part two will be full of statements like this: i do not want to encourage or discourage you to go. my experience was completely magical and miraculous... but i wasn't going COLD. please read and understand that there were channels in place for me... i really am in awe of how it worked out. but if you are just gonna 'go for it'..... i don't know if you'll have an ok trip. ok? ok. i just can't say, and it's a really important prefece statement because there are NO amenities around the crater. ok? at all. it is hard to find. remote. weather in that elevation unpredictable. VERY MUCH at your own risk if you go. ok?!) also... if you misunderstand me and pester the sorensons... then... you just stink. oh, and one more thing... if you have 'go to the roden crater' on your list of things to do before you die.. and you have NOT been to the Burning Man Festival yet... SHAME on you. because that is indeed what you SHOULD have on your list. and you are WELCOME THERE. ok. OK. here you go with part one. ....
alright... perhaps it is time to answer some questions (i've been on flickr since about may 2005, and i posted a few dozen pictures only to have my really crappy, but completely beloved fuji finepix break down on me, i may have gotten it wet... i dont know, but i stopped posting after that, so all of these pics are like a time capsule of just a few months in 2005 for me). i am truly bummed that i didn't get quoted in the new york times article. BOOHOO!! man, i said some good stuff to ms. jori finkel too, wish i had recorded myself. basically... the big deal here is this: this man, this artwork IS a BIG DEAL. it is the real deal. THE REAL DEAL.
ok.
i told the interviewer that i had yet to respond to any inquiries becuase i really don't want to encourage OR discourage anyone from going.
that said.
GO.
because if you want to. why not. the only thing bad that will happen is ... well.. you might get lost and die in this incredibly beautiful high desert.
or you may make it there and be completely unable to get in. i guess.
my story.
after my first year at burning man. fall 2004. life completely changed.
GO TO BURNING MAN.
one of the wonderful ways it changed is.. after going to the big festival in nevada... when i come home, i immediately want to plug in to the local 'burners' community. events events events. networking, instant friends because you all have the best thing in common, you've been to that mazing experience.
so. there's an Arizona burn called TOAST. in early spring of 05.
article on the official GLORIOUS burning man web-site about az burners:
regionals.burningman.com/spotlights/arizona_s potlight.html
and my brother and i go. it was in eastern az, not easy to find. but a very fun trip for us from phoenix to st. johns area:
www.toast-town.org/toast/page.php?3
we love it. a small version, very very small... but perfect because it is in the same spirit as the big burn. we meet incredible arizonans. we meet Mark and Kate Sorensen, who of course are not going by ther full real names, they have great 'playa names' that i just can't quite remember. please, please read this article. these are tremendous people:
www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/200 5/05/29/MNBU...
still with me? anyways. they invite a whole clutch of sillies like us at Toast, back to their place to spend another night and just enjoy another day together.
they happen to say to my brother and i... we are the closest neighbors to the Roden Crater.
i die. i have been working at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Arts in the gift shop and we had just barely had this retrospective on James Turrell. it was an incredible exhibit, installed by him personally... he was in and out a lot, a very quiet cool guy rocking this great look... jeans, boots, pressed shirt tucked in with a western suit coat... sometimes a bolo, like fancy rancher ( L.A. baby come AZ cowboy) and so i see him and can never figure out how to say anything to him exactly... i may have muttered to him... 'i eat lunch every day out in the skyspace.. i love it in there'
www.scottsdalepublicart.org/collection/knight rise.php
which is true. i am starstruck by his artwork and thusly, him. others are too. and i hear it all being at the front desk. i hear the people who hate the exhibit and are PISSED that they paid. others are hushed and blissed out. transformed. prayerful sometimes. in lieu of a real modern religion... sometimes people would find themselves unexpectedly... in a worshipful way in one of his rooms. so cool. the design just promotes introspection. people were inspired. i really did eat lunch every day in the skyspace. besides the visual aspect... it is a very auditory experience...
in my months at the museum, even after the exhibit .. the skyspace was permanent in the tiny outside courtyard. The Tibetan Monks from the Deprung Loseling Monastery performed in there to a crowd that simply will never vibrate like that again in their lives. myself included. packed in. the monks voices so loud and ... their other instruments... the long horn that goes all the way to the ground... it was amazing. and other performers at evening parties... a clarinet i remember being perfectly beautiful. and violin.
but just on the daily. by myself. the simple act of eating lunch became a concert. a paper bag. crunching into an apple. the sound travels around you and back to you.. amplified. it is stunning.
oh.. and the sky... just a lovely idea perfectly executed. to frame the sky. find a skyspace... and SIT IN IT.
alrighty. so that exhibit was so inspiring to me. and a whole aspect of it, touted his big project. Roden Crater.
which after seeing what he can do with even just one of the 5 rooms and loads of strategically placed/perfectly hidden blue neon bulbs, if that is... IF you loved it like i loved it... you would crave the crater like i did.
and so i probed. can i go? how does one go?
is it open? what does it cost? i want to go. i need to go.
and really... no answer. really... except no. not open yet. open someday. nope. not open to the public. at all. thank you.
and here's what really sucked to me at the time (now i understand more about how hard it is for him to complete it like he wants to... TOTAL PERFECTIONIST... without having the museum and the people who write big checks to the museum on his side)
....
i would hear about other trips to the roden crater. ... upper level contributors, members of the SMoCA staff, HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS. i would ask... how was it? and just get this nonanswer back. i think... they would take vans and go up on a very official tour thing. and walk walk walk and walk through the hallways and out to the top and then back down and back into their vans. and maybe james toured them, talked to them... told them about what was going to keep happening to it. and then they got back into their vans and rode back to the museum, whereupon they got into their cars and went home. maybe .. they didn't know what to make of it.
i remember the most significant response i got when i would ask.. how was it... was one high school student told me abotu the plinths that you lie on at the very top, and how cool it was to be inverted just enough that the sky seemed somehow both 'bigger and smaller than ever'.
i liked that a lot. and completely agree.
so. i want to go. but there's no way for me to go. and the exhibit comes down. and i go on with my life having simply loved that exhibit. and .. waiting for the day it is indeed open to the public.
so at toast, when we get the invite.. we flip out completely. and yet try and remain calm. my brother and i are going to go to roden crater? we are gonna check it out in person????!??!?! un-officially!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
it was amazing. completely.. not just a dream come true.. but better than any dream i could have dreamt. because.. it was so strange. so compelling. so nice.
nice to be toured through it by neighbors of the crater. so we didn't feel like total assholes just barging in.. trying doors to see if we can get in. the doors weren't open by the way... so w walked all the way to the top first and then down and in.. and back up and out ... but then when we left... instead of spiralling down the path we had taken up to the top... we went to the edge and slid down the entire way down. just one unbeleivable part of that entire experience.
compelling because noone else was there. just us. Kate. my brother and i and another couple whose names i dont remember. the 5 of us just ... owned it. it was astounding. we hiked up about two hours before sunset and those two hours went by like minutes, and we had to leave or be in utter dark on roden crater.
ok.. i will finish this as i can. i have a son who just turned one... and so.. believe me... time sitting typing .. is so very very rare.
Natural Forces added this photo to their favorites. (66 months ago)
PeachLaser (61 months ago | reply)
Your comments are very interesting but you are admitting that you trespassed and were uninvited. The doors were locked for a reason and you still went around. Knowing Turrell, when you slid down the crater you left tracks just as a fingerprint on a masterpiece painting.
rojpix (60 months ago | reply)
interesting rave... one day... I will make it
rojpix (60 months ago | reply)
Artist's Statement
Light is the basis of all life. Photography is described as light writing. Hence it becomes the written language of light. The light etched image of itself, the new hieroglyphics, the story teller of now for the future, the history of life. It is good to be an interpreter in that history.
Roger Skinner
lhymbo (60 months ago | reply)
my name is jimbo. i AM the guardian of roden crater. i live here,this place is under 24 hour security .i just want to let everyone know that i am here to protect the artists wishes. to keep this place from being exposed before it is ready for all to expierience. it is important that all of you respect this dream. please don`t try to steal it , you grid city boys treated this place like a play ground . i had go up and rake out the scars you boys left on the face of roden crater. i don`t understand how thats cool. can you imagine what this place would be like if all the people you are trying to encourage to tresspass out here respected this place as much as you grid city boys did. thats why i`m here! to protect this place from that LACK of respect Soooo i want to let people know that i am here 24/7 i have 360 degree visibility from the top .please do not attempt to sneek in, you will be tresspassing on private property HELLO its against the LAW i WILL STOP you , if i don,t my dog JAKE will, you will have come a long way for nothing! and be hasseled by ME! i reccomend going through proper channels call the office SKYSTONE FOUNDATION @ 928 226 0837 or Email skystone@infomagic.net the office is working on a webpage that should be up soon and should answer most questions i want to thank you fomer tresspassers for making my job nessary PEACEOUT
GRID CITY (59 months ago | reply)
it had never dawned on me until these latest comments that we should never have done what we did. worst really... was sliding down the outside of the cone. i'm so sorry. i had no idea that by doing so... and yet, i see it now... we left marks... changing one color that was there before with the color underneath... and it all goes in layers... and to know that someone had to rake that back into proper cinder cone color-ness... pretty much makes me feel HORRIBLE. it just had never crossed my mind. and for that ... really... for someone who would never vandalize anything... and believes in leaving a small footprint on this earth and wants to encourage responsibility to wards others... and tells all her friends about the ethos of 'leave it better than you found it' and here... we clearly... left it messy and obvious that adventurers had been about and hadn't been invisible or clean... or really very responsible at all to something that DESERVES it, as much as all things do... but more... due to what it IS exactly that turrell is trying to facilitate.
i'm sorry. and for those of you thinking about going... i think the message is clear. go only through the proper channels. and if they aren't in place yet. wait.
Ben Lepley +_+ (59 months ago | reply)
@ Ihymbo-> Thanks for the info. Some people would kill for your job. Anyways I think we can all be thankful that 'Grid City' was not a high-desert dirt biker looking for some hills to do tricks and donuts on. or a crew of drunk paintball'ers looking for fun.
Dradny and ross.grady added this photo to their favorites.
shame2009 (50 months ago | reply)
Im with you jimbo. It is a shame that people like that feel the need to break the f'ing rules. Shame on them and anyone else who tries to break the law. Although with a public profile with roden crater pics. They incriminate themselves publicly.
Louisa Slee added this photo to her favorites. (49 months ago)
GRID CITY (49 months ago | reply)
howdy there.... guess what? we weren't trespassing. we were guests of the closest neighbors. and they had permission from james turrell. i have said here before that we were 'sneaking in' or what-have-you and now remember clearly that it wasn't like that at all.... that was simply the feeling of being there when noone else was. we were absolutely not trespassing. thank you and enjoy your moral high ground :) i have apologized here for the fact that we chose to walk down the crater... but please.... i mean.... seriously.... animals roam around this area too.... at some point.... it makes no sense to hold a project so dearly that you lose the notion of nature as a whole... nature = wild. and we like it like that. i regret that i didn't think of it that day.... DO NOT HIKE DOWN THE SIDE. but ..... are our steps still visible? or even visible that day? no. it was our feet. in the rocks. and we absolutely held the work he has created as a whole in veneration. i forgive us for hiking down the side. i would hope James Turrell would too. and i hope that his relationship with Mark and Kate is still on wonderful terms. they, as his neighbors.... have, i am sure, had a very new quality to their way of life happen and having met them... i can say.... James Turrell has good neighbors in THEM... who THEY are.... i just really need to clear this up... we were not trespassing, breaking rules or treating anything that WE RECOGNIZE as wonderful, genius, brilliant, amazingness.... with any kind of disrespect.
shame on those who DO. ok.
brendanturrell015 (48 months ago | reply)
How did you people get these photographs of my father's crater? I generally know the people going there that are actually allowed. Either way i hope it was absolutely captivating as i am sure it was
menosketiago™ added this photo to his favorites. (43 months ago)
menosketiago™ (43 months ago | reply)
Saw it yesterday in Sculpture Diaries :D
Hope it opens meanwhile!
Kinda Kinked added this photo to her favorites. (37 months ago)
badasspotato (32 months ago | reply)
James Turrell sounds like an elitist douche bag.
Ben Lepley +_+ (32 months ago | reply)
Kizmet (31 months ago | reply)
I, the aforementioned Kate Sorensen, just now found this while looking to see if there are any leftovers from the past still online. I look at Roden Crater every day but haven't been there for 4 (or 5 now?) years, since they told us to stop visiting and posted the security guard. It's an enormous and magnificent project and the wishes of the artist deserve to be honored-- even if it's a little hard to wait for 20 years!
Nobody pesters us to get in any more. Every once in awhile a visitor, usually from across the Atlantic or Pacific, finds their way out here and we just tell them it's not open. Jimbo, we respect you and know you'll do your job. If the scars you had to rake out were from the 6 of us around May 10, 2005, I apologize. Sliding in cinders and picking them out of my shoes isn't my idea of fun so personally I came down pretty carefully-- but yeah it's a steep slope.
Roden Crater has always been a sacred site to us. For many previous years our family and friends were welcomed at the crater, given the combination to the lock, taken on a tour with our Hawaiian and Navajo friends, invited to a memorable party with a sushi bar and live C&W band, etc. I miss those good ol' days! We had the nearest phone and sometimes helped the Project's friends in need out here in the desert-- remember the DeConcini Lincoln breakdown? We want to be good neighbors and I hope you know the kind of people we are (thanks, Grid City for the character reference). Although I know we stretched the limits in visiting, I always did my best to make sure we left no trace on our annual pilgrimages. I wouldn't have shared one of the most awesome man-made sites on Earth with just anybody-- only with friends who could appreciate the dedication and magnitude and beauty. Or at least attempt to appreciate it, I'm sure I grasp only part of this myself after watching all these years.
I appreciate the Grid City write-up of our magical visit. They were our guests that day, and any blame belongs to us, not them. While I'm sorry for any perceived disrespect of this incredible work of art or the people involved, I'm grateful for the synchronicity that allowed a better-than-dream to come true. We long for the day that other people will enjoy the magic after James Turrell and the team's 30+ years of work. And we're deeply thankful to have had the visits we did, authorized or not. They made our life out here transcendent, in a neighborhood of cows, trailers, and meth labs. (and thanks to the Crater people for keeping the viewscape clear of trailers and trash. We can appreciate the cows.)
I have some dramatic photos of the crater taken over the years in case anyone (Skystone?) would like them.
A final word for any would-be trespassers: in addition to the respect issue it's true that you will be caught if you approach the crater. Our nephew was taking a walk from our house miles away and got stopped, nicely but no nonsense. Jimbo has sharp eyes and there's not a single tree out here.
mmmetronomy added this photo to their favorites. (31 months ago)
copyright enforced (30 months ago | reply)
I just found this Flickr account and would like my input to be read by anyone wanting to show up uninvited. The reason should be clear just from the above comments. I was lucky enough to visit the site long before any physical construction was done in the cone. I had a valid purpose for visiting. I had the blessing of the artist. I do not remember the year.
For the sake of everyone involved, including the neighbors, the security person, the artist and everyone who has spent time and effort to further this project, please wait until it is open and make sure you respect, and accept the admission rules. This will be an amazing gift for many generations. It will not be like opening day at Sky Walk. It may take some time before the average person, like myself can view it. From the outset Mr. Turrell has stated each group to visit will be small.
Believe me when I say, as anxious as I am to return, I would never consider going there until it is time, and I am in compliance with whoever will make those decisions.
Jimbo, I hope you are there when the project opens for the public. I would like to meet you, and I am really happy to find out that you are there now. Mr. Turrell suggested and hinted, how I could watch the shadow of the earth being cast on the sky. You must have seen so many amazing events play out there.
gunterheidrich and k8et added this photo to their favorites.
mollusk222 (21 months ago | reply)
WOW... poor Turrel, a genius amongst heathens. THis is better than reality T.V.
kateoplis added this photo to her favorites. (20 months ago)
RobBasile (19 months ago | reply)
Who CARES how these people got to see "YOUR" father's crater???? First of all NOBODY "owns" Roden crater nor do they own any PART of the Arizona desert. The native Americans who originally occupied those lands are the only people with the right to claim that right and you and your father are idiots to claim otherwise. You can no more claim the lands of Gods than the moon or stars. Just because your father raised enough funds to usurp the land, doesn't give him the right to desecrate it. You and your father are no different from the greedy Capitalist PIGS who've ruined this country into a land and resource grab. And another problem with "your" crater is the manner in which you hoard it, only allowing elitist art snobs to visit the site--which you don't even deserve to possess. Perhaps you and your father should transport the entire crater to New YOrk, where you can name it Studio 51 Gallery and then post a doorman who can decide who may visit and who may not based on their proper black jacket/turtleneck art gallery attire.
TEWZ (14 months ago | reply)
Hello, I am an artist living and working in Chicago. A recent graduate of SAIC, and a featured artist on Bravo T.V. ... I called the number for the SKYSTONE FOUNDATION @ 928 226 0837 to try to "go through the proper channels"
Dialing ... me: "Hello! is this skystone!?" ....
click.
hung up in my face.
a1911handler (10 months ago | reply)
leave it better... (9 months ago | reply)
Hi TEWZ,
Just want to mention that you had the phone number wrong :(
According to Google - Skystone Foundation it's 928-226-0937
I didn't try it tho. Good luck.
monicagenesun added this photo to her favorites. (2 months ago)