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Desert Passages

Artist: Roger Asay and Rebecca Davis
Completion Date: June 1990
Medium: native boulders and landscape elements
Location: Lookout Mountain Park, 18th Street and Winchcomb
Funding: Parks, Recreation and Library Department, CIP bond funds
Artist Contract Amount: $18,000
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This project consists of a one mile-long exercise trail that winds through the park. The trail includes ten sculptural passages comprised of native boulders and landscape elements set into the natural desert environment.

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As one walks through a desert trail, it is common to focus on the smaller details within the environment. In the case of Desert Passage this idea is taken to another level, encouraging the public to reflect on the way they interact with the trail itself. Artists Roger Asay and Rebecca Davis have created a mile long environmental sculpture where park visitors can enter the trail at several interconnecting points.

In order to provide a transition between a residential area and Lookout Mountain, Asay and Davis chose to work with natural substances that will change over time. All materials used were chosen due to their ability to blend in with the physical environment. The trees will grow to create unique spaces within the park while the stone will mature and age in the same manner as the natural landscape. Using this working method, the structures avoid seeming obtrusive while drawing attention to their massive size and surface texture.

About the Artists
Roger Asay and Rebecca Davis have been collaborating since 1983. Both have exhibited widely in New Mexico, Colorado, and Arizona. Asay and Davis currently live in Prescott, Arizona.

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