When napping in nature becomes art
All photos courtesy Mario Gallucci
alum Rick Silva finds meaning in the stillness of the natural world
Rick Silva (MFA ’07) is lying still in the frame, perched on a rocky outcropping overlooking azure ocean waves. He’s sound asleep.
That’s one of 46 places you’ll find him taking a snooze in his new video art piece, .
As he describes it, “Dirt Nap is composed of one-minute excerpts from 46 naps Rick Silva took in nature across the Western United States between September 2024 and January 2026, sequenced in the order they were recorded.”
“The project has some heavier personal meanings for me, but I also think it touches on broader themes of loss related to landscape in the 21st century, whether that’s the precarity of protected lands or ongoing threats from climate change,” says Rick Silva (MFA ’07) of his new video art piece, Dirt Nap.
The project’s structure is simple, almost stubbornly so. But the simplicity of one-minute naps, repeated 46 times, has a way of becoming something else—a question that challenges notions of patience and what it means to rest.
Taking a rest
The project began in 2024, a time marked by both grief and physical strain for Silva.
“My uncle-in-law died in a ski accident the previous year, and that late summer we hiked into the Grand Tetons to spread his ashes,” he recalls.
That same summer, Silva was dealing with severe migraines that forced him to retire to a dark room, sometimes for the entire day, just to ease the pain.
“The idea for Dirt Nap emerged during a lull in the pain of a migraine,” he says.
From the start, Silva knew the project needed to unfold over time. As the idea of deliberately resting in nature took hold, he started thinking of locations. Some had personal meaning. Others he hadn’t yet experienced but wanted to.
“There was a balance between planning and spontaneity throughout the process. I created a loose set of rules around framing and duration, then pushed against those rules through location, weather and light,” he says.
The title carries its own gravity. Often a dysphemism for death, the phrase “dirt nap” invokes images of a body being returned to the ground for its final rest.
Silva acknowledges the double meaning.
“The project has some heavier personal meanings for me, but I also think it touches on broader themes of loss related to landscape in the 21st century, whether that’s the precarity of protected lands or ongoing threats from climate change,” he says.
An ‘in-action’ sport
Prior to Dirt Nap, Silva spent years immersed in outdoor action sports culture, especially snowboarding. Video is a powerful medium for showcasing the pulse-pounding motion and spectacle of athletes carving through exotic terrain at high speeds.
Boulder alumnus and artist Rick Silva created his video piece Dirt Nap from 46 naps he took in nature across the Western United States between September 2024 and January 2026.
Dirt Napinverts the formula.
“There’s definitely a connection between Dirt Napand that lineage of sport and nature filmmaking,” Silva says, “except here I’m doing ‘nothing’ in the landscape. It’s a kind of in-action sport focused on recharging and recovering.”
For Silva, shooting videos lying down instead of airborne while capturing exotic vistas across the Western United States is something of a return to his roots.
“My MFA thesis work at was a video art piece in which I filmed myself in nature, sort of DJ-ing various landscapes,” he says.
A foundation
Silva traces much of his foundational approach to filmmaking to his time in Boulder’s MFA program.
“I was exposed to many different approaches to working with moving images, including experimental film, video art, performance and new media,” he says.
Just as influential was the support he received along the way.
“My professors encouraged me to follow my own path through those techniques and conceptual strategies, especially around time, presence and process.”
That trio anchors Dirt Nap.
“I think meaning emerges through the variation and duration of the project. It’s a very simple act, but multiplied to this extent it becomes something more epic, or perhaps absurd. I hope viewers oscillate between those readings,” says Boulder alumnus Rick Silva.
Silva also found inspiration for the meditative quality of his footage from artists like Roman Signer and Ana Mendieta. While filming, he learned about the early works of Laurie Anderson, another artist who captured herself napping in public.
“I’m a longtime fan of her work and felt connected to her through our napping projects,” he says.
For current students, Silva offers some practical advice rooted in his own trajectory.
“If you can make it financially feasible, I highly recommend taking on an ambitious, self-driven creative project during a summer break.”
He points to an example close to home.
“The creators ofSouth ParkmadeCannibal! The Musical during a summer break while they were students at .”
Ambitious early projects, he says, often echo through the careers of their creators for years.
Learning to look longer
As for Dirt Nap,the cumulative effect of 46 one-minute excerpts challenges viewers with one request: patience. It’s a hard ask in a world consumed by short-form videos and a never-ending tide of “the next big trend.”
Silva often finds himself returning to a quote from composer John Cage: “If something is boring after two minutes, try it for four. If still boring, then eight. Then sixteen. Then thirty-two. Eventually one discovers that it is not boring at all.”
“That quote took on even more meaning for me during this project, which was both born from and made within that zone of observation and reflection,” Silva recalls.
While appreciating Dirt Nap,viewers start noticing the little things. The flicker of shadows across Silva’s face. The rhythm of his breathing. Grass, trees and water responding to the wind. From one minute to the next, a person lying down outdoors runs the gamut of looking peaceful to looking exposed.
What first appears to be “doing nothing” becomes a sustained practice of attention born from grief and structured by repetition. The act is quiet, even vulnerable, and for Silva, it’s a reminder that nothing is ever truly still.
“I think meaning emerges through the variation and duration of the project. It’s a very simple act, but multiplied to this extent it becomes something more epic, or perhaps absurd. I hope viewers oscillate between those readings.”
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