Along with moving contemporary art from the constraints of the white cube exhibition space to the outdoors, he also brought the desert inside; in the 1980s, he began foraging rocks that weighed more than 50 tons in some cases, framing them with steel slabs and installing them in galleries and, later, museums. (“Earth,” he once said, “is the material with the most potential because it is the original source material.”) Though Heizer’s work can be found in such museums as Dia Beacon in upstate New York and Glenstone, outside of Washington, D.C., some of his most important contributions should not be experienced firsthand without at least a day’s supply of water, food, a 4 x 4 vehicle and maybe a prayer or two.