Listen to this interview with Tom Sachs and Adam Savage
Today, I listened to this great podcast episode with Tom Sachs and Adam Savage, while working out.
There's so many interesting quotes and stories that I kept finding myself saving clips to my phone. When I later looked for the episode, I realized there isn't a transcript online, and the page for this episode is strangely missing from the City Arts & Lectures podcast website. So, I'll post some of my notes and quotes from the podcast.
If you're interested in the work of Adam Savage from MythBusters, Tom Sachs art, love NASA, or just want a good podcast episode, I highly recommend listening.
Listen on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tom Sachs and Adam Savage - City Arts & Lectures
Recorded 15 July 2019
Notes
Adam Savage: When you touch a real piece of NASA hardware, the most striking thing I've ... is that it's clear people built it. It's not mass-produced, like [the iphone] that resists any sign of its maker.
...
But the NASA equipment has that meat on the bone, that you can feel that someone made it. And they made it for a reason.
Tom Sachs: "So, like, this best-made thing ever. iPhone. Without a doubt, the best thing ever made. There's no evidence of it being made.”
One of my favorite things about the work of Tom Sachs, or just projects I do around the house, is that the imperfections show the humanity behind the object.
The fingerprints and the screws and every mistake remind you that a person made this.
Tom Sachs: Sympathetic magic is an anthropological term, and it's used to describe things like voodoo dolls, or the first time it was used up, anthropologists went to New Guinea, and they flew there by planes, and they found local people making little models of airplanes, and they asked, why are you making this? And they said, because you came from there, you brought food and iron axes, and if we pray to these objects, more food and iron axes will come. And sure enough, more anthropologists came to see these model airplanes.
And so it wasn't necessarily in maybe the way that the guys who made the planes envisioned it, but sure enough, people came. So the idea is if first you must, and this is true of anything in using sympathetic magic, you must believe that it will happen.
This sounds a lot like the story of cargo cult science from "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman," though with a different conclusion.
Feynman tells the story to make the point that copying the form of science won't reproduce real results, while Sachs argues that the performance—the worship of the airplanes—in a roundabout way, worked! The prayers brought them new plans.
Unfortunately, both seem to have exaggerated the facts, a bit, but are excellent stories.
Adam Savage: When I've done costuming on the floor of Comic-Con, I had this incredible experience at one point where I was dressed in a Japanese anime character named No-Face. And I was taking pictures and handing out pieces of gold to people after the picture, which is part of the plot of the movie No-Face is in. And someone gave me back the gold that I'd given them.
And then somebody else clearly angrily gave me back more gold that I'd given them. And I realized it's because No-Face, it's bad luck to take gold from No-Face in the movie. And so that performative aspect of putting on the costume and transforming at Comic-Con specifically where audience and performer is a totally blurred line.”
I love that the Comic-Con-attendees felt compelled by the fiction to return the gold.
Moderator: For those of you listening on the radio, Tom has just produced September 1968 Playboy, 75 cents.
Tom Sachs: Page 195. This is an interview with Stanley Kubrick.
"The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it's hostile, but that it is indifferent. But if we can come to terms with this indifference and accept the challenges of life within the boundaries of death, however mutable man may be able to make them, our existence as a species can have genuine meaning and fulfillment.
However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light. And I would argue that art is that light.”
Adam Savage: Also, that Earthrise photo is really an interesting test case here because the astronauts doing that flyby, they were supposed to be taking very specific photos of the surface of the moon as they were going. They were reconning for the next mission. And then they looked up and they saw it.
And I'm getting chills as I'm describing it. And they realized, oh, wow, that's really something. And then they wondered, should we go outside of protocol and tilt the camera up?
And they decided in the middle of this scientific exercise that this other thing, this other story they wanted to communicate had value and it had this intense and amazing value that inspired generations of people—just to tilt that camera.
Tom Sachs: That tilt is they risked the entire mission for art or for spirituality.
Earthrise, "the most influential environmental photograph ever taken", was taken on a whim. In reading more about it, I found the transcript from when it was taken on Apollo 8.
Anders: Oh my God! Look at that picture over there! There's the Earth coming up. Wow, that's pretty.
Borman: Hey, don't take that, it's not scheduled.
Anders: (laughs) You got a color film, Jim? Hand me that roll of color quick, would you...
Lovell: Oh man, that's great!
Adam Savage: Maybe we explore because we want to try and find some sense out of everything. My shop is where I go to pretend that the world has order and to enjoy the fiction that I have some control over it.
After my best friend died, I spent almost every spare minute in my garage doing woodworking projects. The shop is where you pretend the world has order and you have control—ya, that makes sense.
Tom Sachs: Even going to the worst place on Earth, which is Florida, or Antarctica, is so much more hospitable than the best place on Mars.
As Floridian, I have to disagree, when it's 103° with 90% humidity, it's less hospitable than Mars.
Audience question: If procrastination plays a role in your process, and do you use it to its full potential, or do you find methods to get rid of it or null it at least?
Adam Savage: I have hundreds of projects that are halfway done. I will die with hundreds of projects halfway.
Tom said this—everyone dies with a to-do list. I have a rack of material storage in my shop up to eight feet, and then from eight feet to the ceiling, it's all uncompleted projects. And having them stare at me, they don't taunt me, it's just each one is a possibility of a way I might spend a day or a week or a month.”
[...]
Tom Sachs: And when you're confronted with something difficult, skip it and move on to the next problem. Work that until you get stuck and so forth and keep moving on. And after three or four procrastinator moves, you might circle back to the first one and your subconscious will have worked on it.
And you may have found the answer. Not always, this is the luxury of having extra time. And in that case, procrastination is a great thing.
It's like solving a problem by sleeping on it, only cheaper.
If you listened to this episode, or if it reminded you of something else you think I'd enjoy, feel free to shoot me an email.