I want my own art ranch.

It's official -- I want my own art ranch. 

Friday afternoon we trekked up to Geyserville for a benefit for BAMPFA (UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive) at Steven Oliver's ranch.  Oliver has about 100 acres of land in Geyserville where he's collaborated with some of the world's best living artists to commission site-specific architecture and sculpture.  (Check out this sculpture.org profile / interview with Oliver for context.)

Ann Hamilton tower at Oliver Ranch

Oliver has just completed a 13 year collaboration with installation artist Ann Hamilton on an 8 story concrete tower that's now situated on the ranch.  Hamilton is more well known for producing experiences than things -- and has never designed an outdoor architectural structure, as far as I know -- which is what made this piece so special. Dubbed "The Acoustic Tower Project," the tower is nestled in the hills on Oliver's ranch, is approximately 40 feet in diameter and 100 feet tall.  The tower is lit inside through indirect windows, the bottom of the tower is a well-like pool of water, but the most amazing thing is that along the inside of the cylindrical tower are two staircases which wind in a double-helix structure from the water to the top of the tower.

Since it's an "acoustic" tower project, the whole point of the piece is to create an environment for sound.  As part of the debut of the piece last night was a performance by the Meredith Monk Ensemble, with a set of new work composed by Monk.  Monk has been a staple of the new music scene for 40 years, but I'd never heard her in person.  And my God, I'd never heard anyone do anything like that with their voice.  It was literally breathtaking.  The performance lasted about an hour, with the audience was on one set of of the double helix stairs and the ensemble on another.

Here's Oliver in that sculpture.org interview from October 2002 about the (yet unbuilt) tower, and the relationship between it and a well on a piece of land they own in Italy:

We own a home near Orvieto, the site of the so-called Well of St. Patrick (1527–40), which was built by Clement VII to provide the city with a water supply in case of attack. The site has a traditional connection to St. Patrick. The well descends more that 60 meters: in order to get enough water to the surface the architect designed a double helix staircase. This means that the mule goes down one staircase, loads up with water, and comes back up the other staircase. The two staircases never touch; they are interlaced with each other so that the mule never has to turn around and never meets another mule. It’s the same form as DNA. Ann proposed a double helix staircase inside the stonework, descending to a water source: into the ground and up out of the ground. It looks rather agricultural in form, like a silo, and she wants to put it down by the barn. It will be a performance space, and she will curate poetry readings and concerts of a single voice or a single instrument.

Oliver does tours of his ranch about 35 times a year.  I want to go back.  Because even with the hour plus in the tower, I want more.  Plus, I want to walk the Bruce Nauman steps, see the Richard Serra pieces Snake Eyes and Boxcars as well as the pieces by Martin Puryear, Fred Sandback, Andy Goldsworthy and a bunch of others.  As I told Trina, I'm not the guy for a ranch with horses, but I could handle a ranch with sculpture.