Michael Heizer @ Dia Beacon

On February 16th, 2024, I took a day trip to Beacon, NY. Part of my trip included a visit to "Dia Beacon", an art museum. Check out more from the museum here.

When I set off to explore Dia Beacon, I didn't really know what I was getting into. I got to the museum right around 2 in the afternoon. While the museum closed at 4, I figured I could walk around, hit up Main Street in Beacon, grab some food, and then head out to a "Live Art/Music Installation" that I was invited to.

One of the first things you see when you look up the museum is a giant hole in the ground (at least on Google at the time of writing). That hole in the ground is "East" of Michael Heizer's "North, East, South, West". While I was aimlessly wandering around the museum, appreciating art from the likes of Andy Worhol, Rita McBride, and Mario Merz, one of the first things I stumbled across what this installation. Nothing quite prepares you for the absolute scale of this piece. It's almost haunting to a degree, the empty voids, just four giant holes in the ground.

I also managed to walk past "Negative Megalith #5", a massive chunk of granite that can't be properly conveyed in this image. This is roughly 16 feet tall or 5 meters for the metric folk. You almost feel like it's going to topple over at any second and yet, it's been here since the museum opened in 2003.

Heizer is truly a master of scale and makes the world feel as massive as it is.

Learn more about Dia
Michael Heizer's Exhibition @ Dia
More info on Michael Hizer @ Dia