Hammer chisel stone simple tools for hard moments
[Music]
i’m a stone sculptor
i work mostly with granite using the
traditional tools of the trade the
hammer
and the chisel it’s an ancient motion
one of mankind’s first and unchanged
since we started to alter
our world around us
when i make this motion i can feel the
muscle memory in my body
it resonates beyond this time beyond the
present
and after decades of carving i still
experience that sense of
timelessness each time i pick up the
tools
i measure my sculpture progress in
seasons and years
the work takes real time stone is hard
and the process is physical
it’s slow and can sometimes feel
grinding
but rather than be discouraged by the
slow progress i seem to be making
i have come to relish the iterative
empirical process it requires
slowing down and turning inward has
helped talk me out of any number of bad
ideas
it’s given me time to ask the hard
questions
sometimes waiting years for the answer
it’s also given me courage
to tackle the big themes and work on
them
over long arcs of time
david brooks in his book road to
character
says that one should always have
a permanent commitment to tasks that
cannot be completed in a single lifetime
a single lifetime seems about right
since stone reminds me every day through
its resistance and
its unyielding permanence that the
things worth doing
take real time
let me offer a few examples
this sculpture contains 550 tons of
granite
that’s the equivalent weight of 250
small
trucks it’s one of four
forms that divide the rooms of a large
residence
some of the blocks measure nine feet by
twelve feet
that’s the scale of an apartment bedroom
this took four years to hand carve and
install
one of my latest works the resolute arch
took eight years to solve the
engineering
build the prototype and hand carve the
granite
this work is on a civic scale and one
could easily
drive a fire truck under it
when the stone carvers built the great
cathedrals of europe
it was not uncommon to spend 20 years on
the foundation
imagine spending your entire working
life on a foundation
that no one will ever see talk about
delayed gratification
masons spent their entire working lives
on these projects over hundreds of years
meaning and life purpose arose naturally
from
slow sustained contribution
from the rush of setting a single stone
into what i call
a position of certainty once placed
properly
stone stays put maybe for a millennium
maybe forever the fact that the
task was hard took real time and effort
is certainly part of it but there’s also
something about
leaving the world a little better a
little more beautiful
than when i found it whatever it is
i feel that i’m part of that sustained
contribution
each time i finish a sculpture and place
it on the ground
these days we often look to technology
to save us time
technology seems to offer us shortcuts
or
life hacks i am often asked
why do you still carve by hand when we
can cut by computer
or scan and squirt in 3d
indeed why talk to a person when i can
text
or simply swipe and like
working in stone has made the reasons
crystal clear to me
if i have done my work as an artist over
the decades i have built
thick neurologic cables between my heart
and my hands using these simple
ancient tools what i feel
is conveyed directly into my carving in
my hands
the hammer and chisel offer me an
unmediated connection there’s
nothing standing between what i feel and
the material
with modern technologies i’m i’m several
steps removed from the work
they can offer me a type of translation
but in the end technology cannot
transmit
the human soul this immediacy
this unmediated connection
is at the center of the great mystery
the magic
of how some artworks affect and stir
us
my family jokes that i still carve with
the hammer and chisel because
i just want to do everything the hardest
way possible
but what i’ve discovered is that when i
tackle hard and difficult things
two important things happen first
my body adapts and hardens for the task
how many of you have gone camping and
slept on the ground
the first night is universally awful
there’s no getting around it
but the next night is better and after a
couple more nights i’m fine
what started as hard turns out to be
not so bad as my body adjusts
but the other thing that happens when i
embrace difficulty
and this is really fascinating to me
is that my creative energy fires up
my inner resources awaken and rise to
the challenge
just like my body solving problems
turns out to be a great way to engage my
creativity
my best solutions have been born
of painful necessity
let me share a humbling example
carving this sculpture a mistake was
made
and the base of the larger form had to
be
unexpectedly shortened
i was devastated ultimately
i grafted another stone to the sculpture
using this unusual joint
the form and more importantly the
metaphor
were expanded the solution seems to
suggest that we are
standing on the shoulders of what came
before
and of course we always are
it’s a stronger sculpture for the error
and for the creativity it took to get to
the solution
when i’m missing something i need to
make a sculpture
my first impulse is to feel exasperated
and think
i cannot proceed but then i remember
that
the some of the best works of
civilization
were created with the most basic of
tools
obstacles just like mine fired the
creativity of ancient peoples
to tolerances we struggled to match
today
the inca civilization had neither the
wheel
iron tools nor a written language
yet they created these walls from hammer
stones
not even chisels
from ten ton blocks they dragged five
miles across a mountainous valley the
workmanship is so tight you can’t put
paper between the joints
the walls so strong they have survived
more than
50 earthquakes over 6.0 on the richter
scale
without losing a single stone i only
wish
that i had designed and built them
the pyramids at giza were built by
ordinary people who
placed by hand 800 tons of stone every
day
think of it 800 tons
shaped fabricated
moved to the site and installed
the needs of the project were so great
they had to first invent geometry
amazing earlier civilizations faced
many of the same threats we faced today
they had natural disasters and
heartbreaking pandemics they suffered
social unrest and unstable political
leadership
creatively they found
ways to succeed listen
i’m i’m not anti-technology and i’m
certainly not one of those pining away
for a time before anesthesia
but i work every day not to let the
promise of technology
rob me of my own agency or creativity
i absolutely refuse for it to make me
passive
or afraid to try and accomplish really
hard things
over long periods of time
technology is sexy and it seems to offer
me
shortcuts but what i find
is that it can also rob me of deeper
expression
and considered impact i try to remember
that
my creativity is not device dependent
on the contrary working more simply
forces my creativity into play it calls
it forth
demands my full attention and makes it
part of my tool set
so let’s try something let yourself
dream
of a project too big to complete in a
single lifetime
draw a sketch of your idea using paper
build a simple model using popsicle
sticks or
or cut it out of blocks of zucchini and
stack it up
tackle it with simple tools under
imperfect conditions
nurture that idea over weeks and then
months
chip away at it through the seasons do
it the hard way
see how your body adjusts first your
body
then your soul then your creative spirit
things feel hard right now
these are times requiring our creativity
thank you