Published Works
The Sacred Abecedarium
In the late nineteen-nineties I authored and directed an artist book titled The Sacred Abecedarium. I asked my friend, artist Jeffrey Morin, if he would be interested in a collaboration. One of the reasons I produced this book was to publicly secure the work in my name and hopefully promote interaction with scholars. With Jeff’s reputation, I knew the work would be placed well. We produced a letterpress edition of twenty-six books on hand-made paper. It’s in major collections including The Victoria Albert Museum, The Getty Museum, Yale University, The Newberry Library, to name a few. Unfortunately, not one of these books inspired any interaction with me, the author. Jeff produced a beautifully artistic book worthy of these collections, but content is also very important. It is this lack of interaction that has motivated me to create a much more comprehensive work and hopefully inspire conversation.
The Sacred Abecedarium was many things to me. In one sense it was a type of apology. I set up the structure of the book so that each geometric letter was presented on the verso, left side of the spread. I very purposely instructed Jeff to respond instinctively to these images on the recto, right side. This concept of structure and intuition supports the values of the artistic process. I do not believe that the two models of design; structure and intuition, need to be in conflict with each other. I believe they have everything to do with each other. I do not profess that the arts should be straight-jacketed by a self-conscious fidelity to rigid structure. I think, in the hands of a talented artist, structure will instinctively be created. I think that the chaos of accident can free the artist to find a less predictable, more beautiful expression.
Sacred Space
Much thought was given to the creation of this chapel during the sorrow filled event of 9/11. I was living on a beautiful little sailboat in New York Harbor at the time. I had a slip at Liberty Landing Marina directly across the Hudson River from the World Trade Towers. Living on the boat was a fabulous time for me. There was a ferry that came into the marina every half hour to shuttle its residents across the river to Manhattan. The towers were my backyard. Sailing the harbor you certainly had a point of reference. What a lighthouse!
As a child I watched the Trade Center being built. I grew up in central New Jersey and my Nana Lucy lived in Astoria, Queens. Mom and Dad would drive the family out to visit Nana often. I remember vividly being in the back seat of the station wagon, always playing astronaut, as we drove past the ‘Moon Buildings.’ I watched them rise from the ground to the sky during my childhood.
On the morning of 9/11 I was waiting at the dock for the ferry. I was delayed by my son with some questions for his homework. Otherwise I would have been in peril as my weekday routine took me past the base of the Trade Center each morning on my way to work. As it was, when the first tower fell, we ran from the dock to take cover as the cloud of debris climbed into the sky like a monster. Seeing this monolith disappear in front of my eyes, as if it were a magic trick, was illogical and gut wrenching.
I designed the chapel during this time. The mangled and melted glass and rebar, and the souls of more than three thousand lost people codified into a compressed mass of spiritual energy. I remembered an art history class, from decades before this tragedy, where we discussed the irony of the modern skyscraper outreaching the steeples of our faith. In my thoughts, the stained glass windows of our cathedrals combined with the symbolic wreckage of the Trade Center. I imagined the ‘stained’ windows of my chapel built of melted slump glass formed around a geometric grid of drawn and twisted rebar. It would be a modern interpretation of traditional construction, honoring the creative, growing from the ashes, representing us all.
My very first sketches for the chapel had a very Class Oldenburg quality about it. He is an American sculptor best known for massive replicas of common objects such as a giant clothespin or a giant eraser. The original sketches for the chapel had a roof made to replicate a giant downward facing book. Its pages hung into the nave from a ‘book spine’ like ridge beam. The concept was to illustrate how the alphabet activates and organizes to inhabit the pages of a book. Similarly, the chapel model Sacred Space can serve as a lectern. This lectern idea would present a place (the lectern) for the alphabet to come to life in words and meaning. A sort of bully pulpit for the creative spirit.
- Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, CA
- San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA
- Victoria and Albert Museum, National Art Library,
- London, United Kingdom
- Library of Congress, Washington DC
- The New School, New York, NY
- Yale University Library, New Haven, CT
- Newberry Library, Chicago, IL
- Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
- University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI
- University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point, WI
- University of Utah, J. Willard Marriott Library, Salt Lake City, UT
- The Claremont Colleges, Claremont University Consortium, Claremont CA
- University of California, San Diego, UC San Diego Library; UCSD Library, La Jolla, CA
- University of California, Santa Barbara, UCSB Library, Santa Barbara, CA
- Stanford University, Stanford, CA
- Swarthmore College, McCabe Library, Swarthmore, PA
- Hofstra University Library, Joan and Donald E. Axinn Library, Hempstead, NY
- RIT Library, Wallace Library, Rochester, NY
- University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
- Wheaton College, Madeline Clark Wallace Library, Norton, MA
- Ringling College of Art and Design, Verman
- Kimbrough Memorial Library, Sarasota, FL
- Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton Campus, S. E. Wimberly Library
- University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada
- Occidental College Library, Mary Norton Clapp Library, Los Angeles, CA
- California Polytechnic State University, Robert E. Kennedy Library, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, CA
