John McCracken

 

In the summer of 2008 I and a crew of five helped John McCracken, a minimalist sculptor living here in Santa Fe, prepare 100 pieces for a show in New York. I had remodeled his house for the past three years and the helping him with his work grew out of that. These sculptures were 8 and 10 ft planks in different colors, laid up against the walls of the gallery in different numbered groupings. The carcasses were plywood; colored polycarbonate resin was then "poured" individually on all six sides of the carcass. Carefully. All through this process I wondered what the big deal was, about the sculptures and making them too.

Life was good that summer. We worked, but not too hard. Good food, learning, always learning and lots of drama amongst the crew of five and the dreams and hopes of all spelled out at the communal lunch table and no one seemed to be worried about finishing until the middle of August when John finally realized that the deadline for shipping was in 20 days. And then we suited up and started sanding 14 hrs a day, 7 days a week. All of us. Two work stations inside the studio and one in a portable tent outside. Air conditioners. Industrial fans. Respirators. A stationary sanding machine for sanding the ends of the planks at precisely 90 degrees. 36 grit, 50 grit, 80 grit, 100 grit, step by step by step until we were wet sanding with 1500 and 3000 grit. And then polishing with super cut and fine buffing paste.

I thought I knew something about sanding from years of woodworking but I did not. And as we sweated in our suits and pored over scratches that were mostly invisible to the naked eye with big wattage lights I began to get a inkling of what tremendous efforts went into these planks. And maybe people felt some of that effort when they stood in front of the serene inert colored planks.

At some point, before the time crunch, I asked John McCracken to explain to all of us what we were doing, what was on his mind about the doing, after sixty years of sculpting, mostly by himself. Us helping him was the first real help he had had, and was mostly driven by necessity, I think. He told us in garbled fashion with hand waving and gestures; as well as it is possible to convert thoughts and feelings about space and dimension and color into words. We saw some old slides of him building the same plywood boxes and nailing them together with ten penny nails! A long time ago. It was his life, creating things.

We finished waxing the last of the planks the evening before the truck came to take them away the next morning. By then we all knew how to wield the big orbital buffers like they were an extension of our selves. The half moons that the buffers laid out on the colored plank's surface were even from side to side and lapped each other steadily and rhythmically. We had, in a short and intense time, developed a sense of touch. Necessary for that kind of work.

I went to New York and saw the show at the David Zwirner Gallery. I stayed with a friend of a friend near the Williamsburg Bridge in Manhattan and "did" New York day and night for four days until I was "done" and came home. Lehman Brothers collapsed the day I left New York for Santa Fe.

John McCracken died on April 8, 2011.

His art is in major collections and museums throughout the world.