WEBVTT

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[Arlene Shechet: Sculpting Time]

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I am going to see pieces I haven't seen in
twenty years

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because a lot of these went to different people
in different places.

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Sadly, some of them we couldn't locate.

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Twenty-five years ago, a very close friend
of mine, Carol,

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was dying at a very young age--

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at the same time that I was having babies.

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One day, when it was very clear that Carol
was dying quite soon,

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I was tearfully explaining to a Buddhist teacher.

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He said, "You know, stop making such a big
deal out of it."

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And when he said that, I realized he was completely
right.

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He's like, "Everybody's going to die,"

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"don't be too dramatic about it."

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I had come to the realization, for the first
time,

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that I was going to die--

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which should have been no surprise

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but was a huge surprise, [LAUGHS]

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inside of me.

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So, to honor Carol, I basically threw out
everything in my studio

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and I started anew.

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Instead of being one of those New Yorkers
saying, "I don't have enough time,"

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I said, "Whatever time I have is exactly the
time that I need."

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Plaster is so much a timekeeper.

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Every single second as it's drying, it changes.

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Even though I'd work with plaster many times,

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I was just starting to pay attention to what
was happening,

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and I took the wet soup and I would try to
mold it,

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and it would start to harden up.

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I would keep molding without an armature.

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I had been doing some paintings out of paint
skins.

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I started embedding the paint skins onto it.

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Whatever time--be it an hour or be it five
hours--

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I would make a piece for that amount of time,
out of that material,

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that suddenly became just the right thing.

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For about a year, without letting anybody
know--

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including my husband-- [LAUGHS]

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I grew this family.

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I would put them on the various stools.

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I just saw them as living on those places.

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And so they just stayed there.

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[Arlene Shechet: All at Once]

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I didn't have aspirations to make a perfect
figure;

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I had aspirations to make this, kind of, signifier.

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The real meaning of an icon--at least for
me--

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was in that it was there to keep me remembering
what I wanted to remember.

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After a period of time, I made something that
reminded me of a Buddha form.

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Very long story short, I just decided to go
with that

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because seeking form was giving what I was
doing some direction

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without too much direction.

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I actually lived with them and enjoyed them
as an installation.

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It's not going to look as funky as my studio,

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but it gets back to what I lived with,

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as reminders of life being fragile--

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and to have that be addressed in my studio
on a daily basis.