Christo and Jeanne-Claude were standing on a barge underneath the Pont Neuf in Paris in 1985 when inspiration hit.
The renowned husband-and-wife artistic duo were overseeing the installation of a fabric panel underneath an archway of the French capital’s oldest bridge over the Seine River.
As the couple watched the panel, which had been lying flat on the barge, slowly being elevated into place, they looked at each other and smiled.
The seed of what would become a future initiative 5,000 miles away – to cover portions of the Arkansas River southwest of Colorado Springs with translucent panels – had simultaneously planted itself in both artists’ imaginations.
“In 1992, suddenly we realized: What was that big smile in Paris in 1985? What did we see?” Jeanne-Claude said. “We saw fabric suspended in the air, the sunshine shining through it, reflecting on the water of the River Seine. That’s ‘Over the River.”‘
After a four-year hiatus to focus on the February completion of “The Gates,” which saw more than 7,500 curtained gates lining the sidewalks of New York City’s Central Park, Christo and Jeanne-Claude have retargeted their energy to what they hope will be their second Colorado project.
If in the next 12 months the couple can secure the necessary permits from the 11 relevant governments and other entities with ties to the site – a big if – the project could go on view as early as two weeks in July-August 2008.
The couple, along with chief engineer Vince Davenport and project director Jonita Davenport, recently spent 10 days in Colorado. They met with state and local officials, reacquainted themselves with the site and took part in a kind of town-hall meeting Monday evening in Salida.
During that packed gathering and a Post interview the week before in Denver, Christo and Jeanne-Claude spoke not only about the complicated logistics of this large-scale, collaborative project but also some of its less widely known aesthetic aspects.
Since 1961, the artists have completed 19 of their monumental environmental projects, ranging from wrapping the German Reichstag in 1995 to partitioning a valley 7 miles north of Rifle with a 142,000-square-foot curtain in 1972.
“The exciting part is that all our projects, they are unique images,” Christo said. “We will never build another ‘Gates.’ We will never build another ‘Umbrellas.’ We will never surround another island. That’s probably what triggers the excitement, because it’s new for us and for everybody.”
Unlike a painter who works alone in his or her studio to create a painting, few if any artists, at least in modern history, have worked on a larger scale than Christo and Jeanne-Claude or have involved more people in their projects.
Around 2,500 people worked on the construction, installation and exhibition of “The Gates.” Jonita Davenport estimates that at least 1,000 people will directly contribute in some way to the realization of “Over the River.”
Thousands of others will be involved indirectly either by visiting or interacting with the work, should it become a reality, or by taking part in advance discussions, such as the one this past Monday in Salida.
“This discussion here was not invented to look beautiful for the moviemakers or the press,” Christo said. “This is a real discussion. People have a concern. They have a question. They ask it. We need to answer it and create the real pulse of the project.
“When the work is created, the work carries this huge amount of interpretation – critical, positive and negative,” he said. “But that’s all about the work of art. In some way, everybody becomes a part of our work. You can be against or for it, but you cannot help but be a part of the work of art.”
Beginning in 1992, the artists and their collaborators spent three years traveling 14,000 miles in four Western states – Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado and New Mexico – to examine the suitability of 89 rivers for “Over the River.”
They narrowed the list of possibilities to six. In late 1996, they selected a stretch of the Arkansas River between Salida and Cañon City as the final site for an array of reasons.
Christo and Jeanne-Claude liked the river’s varied topography and its mostly unblocked visibility from U.S. 50, which runs adjacent to it. They also were pleased that the channel is used by rafters. Many people live along it.
“It’s not a pristine river at the end of the world,” Jeanne-Claude said. “It’s a human river.”
The artists and their collaborators plan to stagger a total of 6.7 miles of fabric over 40 miles of the river, with interruptions ranging from 15 miles to a few hundred feet – the latter to accommodate trees, rocks and other encumbrances along the banks.
The panels will be made of a loosely woven translucent fabric that will easily allow rain water to pass through. They will be strong enough to withstand heavy winds that could blow through the canyon during a thunderstorm.
The couple already has spent more than $2 million on the project, including a wind-tunnel test of the fabric and a simulated installation of several of the panels over a river running through a ranch near Grand Junction.
“The advantage of the color we have chosen – which is not really a color; it’s aluminum that coats the fabric – is that it will keep changing all the time,” Jeanne-Claude said.
“The reason we know this is because we used aluminum coating for the wrapped Reichstag in Berlin,” she said. “In the early morning it was pink, at noon it was silvery platinum, and at it sunset it was golden.
“And, of course, with the blue sky of Colorado, very often, I imagine, it will be blue.”
Like some of the couple’s previous works, such as “The Umbrellas” and “The Gates,” this project will have an inner and outer dimension. It can be experienced by passersby above or by rafters on the river below who will have the sense of actually being in it.
“From above is the silver part,” Christo said. “It’s opaque and creates waves like waves in the ocean, because the fabric panels are moving with the wind and creating a fascinating, mesmerizing energy.
“While underneath, using that very loosely woven fabric, you have the contours of the mountains, the clouds, and, of course, that creates beautiful shadows in the water and on yourself.”
No one knows how much “Over the River” will ultimately cost if the artists are able to secure the necessary permits, but it could equal the $21 million price tag for “The Gates.”
“Vince is trying to scare us, saying it will be more expensive than ‘ The Gates,”‘ said Jeanne-Claude. “I hope not.”
Fine arts critic Kyle MacMillan can be reached at 303-820-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com.
