Christo & Jeanne-Claude: The Mastaba / Over the River

This book compiles documentation for two unrealized projects by the legendary duo of Christo (born 1935) and Jeanne-Claude (1935-2009): "The Mastaba," a project conceived in 1977 for the United Arabic Emirates, and "Over the River," a project recently conceived for the Arkansas River. "Mastaba," Arabic for "bench," is proposed as a sculpture of approximately 410,000 horizontally stacked and variously colored oil barrels. Trees and shrubbery would be planted around the Mastaba as a windbreak against the sand and windstorms; the area adjacent to the walkways approaching the Mastaba would resemble an oasis with flowers and grass. "Over the River" consists of a succession of fabric panels to be suspended above the Arkansas River, for a period of two weeks sometime between mid-July and mid-August of any given year in the future (2013 at the earliest). Both projects are fully illustrated with preparatory drawings and photographs of the proposed locations.