Richard Long, Africa Footprints, 1986
From the Tate Collection:
Africa Footprints depicts Long’s footprints within the shape that resembles that of the African continent. The image is brown and is based on a unique mud work entitled ‘Africa Footprints’ made for a contemporary art exhibition and auction sale in aid of African famine victims. The project, called ‘New Art New World’, was organised by three undergraduate students at Edinburgh University, Charles Booth-Clibborn, Jay Jopling and Greville Worthington.
In conversation with the compiler on 29 September 1990, Long said that the theme of the project inspired the image, which was atypical of his work in being asymmetrical. He agreed with the compiler that the footprint drew attention to one of the chief means of transportation in Africa and that mud, his choice of material for the work on which Africa Footprints was based, was an important material in African life. Long made the original work with River Avon mud from near his home in Bristol. He drew a light outline of the shape of the African continent before filling in the area outlined. He said he no longer remembered how the work progressed and by what steps he filled in the outline, adding that there was a point ‘where you can have too much information’.
