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The Grand Tourist with Dan Rubinstein
Rainer and Flavin Judd: “There’s Nothing Minimal About the World”
00:56:42
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- [00:00]
A
None of the artists that were labeled with this term ever agreed to it because certainly in Don's case, he didn't see anything minimal about his art because his art was about the world and there's nothing minimal about the world. So it's not about minimalism at all. It's about maximalism, if anything, because he's trying to make something that is as powerful as a tree that you're standing in front of.
- [00:24]
B
Hi, I'm Dan Rubenstein and this is the Grand Tourist. I've been a design journalist for more than 20 years and this is my personalized guided tour through the worlds of fashion, art, architecture, food and travel. All the elements of a well lived life. If you're a fan of this podcast, then the name Donald Judd needs no introduction. A titan of 20th century art and even design, Judd rewired the creative mind and expanded it through his spaces, furniture, pieces, writing and sculptures, including his famous stacks and boxes. He helped to clarify the definition of art for the rapidly evolving consumer driven culture he found himself practicing in. His multi story home in what is now known as SoHo in New York has become a mecca for those that prefer their understanding of art to be as holistic as possible. Floor to ceiling in every sense and beyond his incredible spaces, he put Marfa, Texas on the map.
- [01:17]
C
More on that later.
- [01:19]
B
He left behind books and written words that will be pored over and contemplated for eons to come. The Judd foundation, today tasked with preserving his work, is run by Judd's two children, Rainer and Flavin Judd, who are my guests today. It's also worth noting that this episode will be part of our upcoming spring print issue due out in May. It's one of our special limited edition cover options. To snag your own copy, make sure you sign up for our newsletter. The Grand Tourist curator@thegrandtourist.net I caught up with the siblings from the foundation spaces in New York to discuss why minimalism is a total misnomer. The early days of living in Marfa, Texas, why preserving American ranchland is so essential to the Foundation's aims, how the understanding and appreciation of their father's work has evolved over time and much more.
- [02:14]
C
I know that you guys grew up mostly in New York and especially in places like soho that is so synonymous now with the foundation and it was such a different place back then. I wanted to ask both of you what your earliest memories of life growing up in SoHo were. Something that I ask a lot of my guests. Rainer, when we start with you.
- [02:36]
D
Well, actually it wasn't even called soho yet. When we grew up here, it was Lower Manhattan. And not sure when exactly it started being called SoHo, but it was very much like a small town, a little village with Dean and DeLuca and Vesuvios and. And in the 80s, this awesome store called Craft Caravan, which sold goods from Africa, Ford Wheeler and his partner Ignacio ran this little big store. Yeah, you kind of couldn't walk down the street without seeing friends, neighbors, probably. Before Dina DeLuca, one of the things that was a reality was that if you needed dill, you would have to go to 8th Street. In many ways, like a small town where you would have to go to, like, the next town to get something. Like many industrial places, you know, the artists took it over because they were looking for inexpensive, free places to work with high ceilings and a lot of natural light. And there's a great history to that, including fighting the Lower Manhattan Expressway, which our parents were involved with. And actually the fight against that ended kind of before we were kids to remember it. But we heard about it, and it was a great accomplishment. So that's. We kept hearing about it. Jane Jacobs was also involved in that. And if anybody's interested in that story, there's a great documentary called Citizen Jane. Yeah, I guess we were the first generation of kids that were the kids of artists living in that area. And we run into fellow soho kids in here and there. Little Red Schoolhouse was the place where a lot of them went to school, but we actually went to elementary school in West Texas, in Marfa. So we were not growing up all the time in New York City.
- [04:31]
C
So, Flavin, what was that like going back and forth between these two kind of polar opposites, I guess you could say lower Manhattan and SoHo and Texas.
- [04:38]
A
I mean, I liked them both, I admit. I liked Texas better because you had freedom, because you could. I went there when I was really small, and by the time you're, I don't know, eight years old, you can walk around all over town because everybody knows who you are and you can't get lost. People will say, oh, yeah, I saw him over at so and so's house. So. And that's the end of it. You know, you're found immediately, especially in New York.
- [04:59]
C
Back then, it would be. Was very.
- [05:01]
A
That's not happening in New York.
- [05:02]
C
Yeah, exactly.
- [05:04]
A
No, I mean, I like them both, but New York was very industrial. I mean, it was a textile area, and there were gangways going from elevated doors to the back of trucks, and I had to walk under them to go to School. So it was very. New York was almost as different to what it is now as it is different from Texas. It's like a third place.
- [05:30]
C
Rayna, would you say that it was that sort of dichotomy between those two places? Was that. What kind of. How would you describe that? Your childhood, if you have to sort of encapsulate it from that, like where you were and was that. Would you kind of want to.
- [05:45]
D
Well, I would say that both places had strong community and strong connection and neighbors and helping each other out in terms of resources or where can you get this do that? But the biggest difference is that whereas New York City was full of culture and all these people who had moved from different parts of the country looking for a freedom of life, freedom of expression, a way to remake their lives, but also to get rid of a lot of very suburban ideas, whereas there was an abundance of that in New York City. I would say that in West Texas, what maybe I didn't grasp intellectually as a kid was the abundance of nature and that you just feel very small as a human, but at the same time, it makes you feel big. So it has an empowering experience to be in nature and really to get fairly in sync with it. And that. What I've discovered more as an adult, but I think it's grounded in my experience as a kid, is that actually it's a relationship that is not just with a town, but it's with an actual place and all the aspects of the natural world that you're experiencing daily.
- [07:15]
C
And obviously, you know, growing up with your dad, you know, you guys have a view of him that no one else really kind of does. And so how do you kind of, you know, if your dad was not an artist and he was a schoolteacher, he did something that was completely different. How would you just sort of describe your dad to someone that you met? If they said, tell me about him, how would you reply?
- [07:38]
D
Unless he knew something like you'd written an article or he'd seen your art, if he didn't know anything about you? He approached pretty much everybody with the expectation that they, too, were passionate about the world and were wise and had a very good brain and could dialogue with him, I would say almost dignity that he imparted, definitely on our friends who were little, like we were back when we were kids, really was expressed to me by my friends that they were so excited to talk to him because they. They were treated like an adult. And, you know, you could kind of see them get taller in some ways. I Think he enjoyed having kids because they're not yet hindered or kind of chopped up or crunched down from society, so they have this like, ability to engage. He really liked to think and question and consider so many aspects of society and civilization and why are the things the way they are and why. What are good ideas? So in many ways, I think that his respect to others was one of the kind of most warm aspects to meeting him and engaging with him.
- [09:12]
A
Yeah, I mean, he was very democratic in that sense that everybody was on the same level, whether they're little kids or heads of state or museum directors. Kids might have been better actually, in his view. He was a voracious learner and he, he just kind of assumed that everybody else was and should be.
- [09:32]
C
So was there any kind of ways that that manifested itself growing up that he like, kind of require you to do certain things that maybe your friends didn't have to do?
- [09:42]
A
When rainer was like 8 years old, he gave her a college level book on symbolic logic. That doesn't happen much now, Rand.
- [09:51]
C
Do you remember that?
- [09:52]
D
No, but I did have incredible number of books, but a full anthology of poetry, like, I don't know, eight books or something that I don't know that I really ever opened. But I felt very comprehensive on my shelf. We did go. It was quite a regular family outing to go to. I think it was called Spring Street. Books and books were one of the things that were fairly. Books, food and train travel were all things that we, we were encouraged to spend money on.
- [10:25]
C
How train travel, how. So was it like, like regional trips, like, hey, we're going to go to Montauk or you know, things that you do from New York or things like that? Or was it just.
- [10:33]
D
Yeah. And then later train travel in Europe. A lot of train travel in Europe.
- [10:37]
C
Oh, interesting. Flavin, do you know why? Did he ever like, kind of wax poetic about trains or anything like that? Or like. No, like the license to go explore.
- [10:45]
A
It was just that as a teenage teens, you get to. Trains are easier, so.
- [10:49]
C
Okay, fantastic. Well, obviously your, your dad had a. Interesting trajectory as an artist in his early years. And I'm wondering, just for the totally uninitiated, you know, who was Donald Judd as an artist? If someone just, you know, someone came from the, you know, from the planet Mars and they were like, I've never heard of Donald Judd. Who is he? Who was he as an artist? Just how would you kind of describe
- [11:10]
A
him as an artist? He, he, he want. He was, he was, he was interested in things that were true and factual and had gave himself the problem of how do you make art that is true and factual. And that's kind of half of what he made. The other half being the esthetic part which is blended into it and is more arbitrary. But those were the kind of restrictions he gave himself and everything else comes out of that.
- [11:40]
C
Rainer, would you agree with that sort of top line description?
- [11:44]
D
Yeah, and I was thinking about how when Flavin was talking I was realizing that I really don't know where he got his drive and ambition from or that he wasn't intimidated like a lot of people either at that time or that you meet today. And even he wasn't coming from a family that had a kind of empowered sense about them. They were fairly humble. And I think one of his favorite people ever who I never met was his grandmother. And I don't know if maybe she gave him a. A certain sense of go get em ness, but I wouldn't say. He had a ton of support coming from the people I did meet who were his parents and our grandparents. And so he did have quite a self motivating drive. And he was a guy from the Midwest that came into New York City at a time when both there's a lot of conservative power in terms of the Upper east side and New York City having a very. As downtown people, we felt quite a class division. You'd have to have something quite provocative to get somebody from uptown to come downtown. And yet we were quite happy as I guess a lot of kids are taught to be happy with where they are. We were quite happy being, you know, the downtown kids. Well, we're not going to go uptown. But back to what he was coming into, which was this combination of a lot of very progressive people or more and more progressive. From when you go from the 50s to the 60s to the 70s, it's increasingly more radical and progressive in New York City. And he was immersing himself in philosophy and art and really taking art very, very seriously, which more and more seems to be a rare thing, and dedicated himself to the value of art, the role of the artist in society. And that was all very self motivated. It's not like I saw, I see any kind of background in his family. You know, how some people kind of build on what happened in their family. There were farmers and carpenters. There's a fairly humble background. And he was very driven and took himself very seriously. And the artists and writers and thinkers that he liked and teachers that he connected with, he took them very seriously. So he took life very seriously. I don't know if I'm saying that over and over again, but there's something to it, because then you have all this meaning and then you are very excited to be on the planet making work, making, writing, contributing, because you sense not only that there's a value, but that you have a role in culture and in society.
- [14:47]
B
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- [16:10]
C
And sometimes, you know, in the worlds of art and design, you've got these words that are sometimes necessary to use and oftentimes just totally inadequate, and sometimes they bother people. And obviously, I'm coming with this word minimalism, that that probably was just the wrong word to use, but it is something that people just keep using. So I'm kind of, when you guys hear that word, like, what does that word mean to you or doesn't mean to you? And how do you connect that world with that of your dad's work?
- [16:42]
D
I think of what Barney Newman said. I'm a bird, not an ornithologist. And I think that's a word for the ornithologists. And as a fellow bird, I would say I don't really think much about that word. And we're so raised within not only an artist studio, but the world of artists that there's just so much chatter and labels that people who are not creative will come up with that. You really can't spend your time worrying about what non creative people are saying.
- [17:15]
A
Well, it was a derogatory term that came up to describe the art made in the late 60s, early 70s. None of the artists that were labeled with this term ever agreed to it because certainly in Don's case, he didn't see anything minimal about his art because his art was about the world. And there's nothing minimal about the world. And it was just that people had gotten very used to certain aspects of visual art at that time that were not necessarily relevant to what they were doing. And if Don is interested in clarity and honesty and making something that is its own fact, it doesn't need a lot of other stuff that you would might put in a landscape painting, for instance. So it's not about minimalism at all. It's about maximalism, if anything, because he's trying to make something that is as powerful as a tree that you're standing in front of. So.
- [18:10]
C
And Flavin, you mentioned in an interview once that your father had quota a mix of a Midwest farmer, common sense and empirical enlightenment philosophy with a heavy dose of skepticism. Tell me about that sort of mix of skepticism and enlightenment.
- [18:30]
A
Yeah, I mean, they go together. They're all very related. So, you know, if you have Descartes who's saying, I want to investigate everything I might have believed and prove it wrong, and you have the Greek skeptic saying, well, everything we think is wrong, and you have a farmer in Missouri saying, you know what? I don't believe anything you're saying at all. Show me. It's basically the same thing. And Don was a very much an empiricist and not interested in long narratives and histories that are made by winners, for instance. And his attitude towards art was that representational painting, for instance, had gone on a very long time, but for him was not interesting because he felt that real objects were more interesting than the paintings of objects. And so the whole narrative that went along with that kind of art had to go away too. And that includes things as diverse as Plato's, you know, forms to Christianity, to a lot of art history that was no longer interesting, or to him. And this is strictly what he's talking about. He's not saying other people should do this. He's just talking about what he's interested in, in. Because it's not believable. I mean, it's all on the same level. If you believe in one God, then you have to believe in all of them because they're all on the same level of validity or your ability to prove whether they exist or not. So for him, he wants to get rid of these histories and narratives that are no longer valid because art has to be, to him, as powerful as it can be.
- [20:29]
C
And, you know, when it comes to his sort of holistic view of life and art, you know, since the foundation is really about bringing a person's legacy to, you know, a broad audience and to keeping it alive, what do you want? Sort of like the average everyday person, you know, want to really understand about your father's work and. And. And what it means in the history of art?
- [20:55]
A
Well, it depends on what's. It's on what they're looking for. So there's not one narrative that we want everybody to go away with. It's that somebody devoted their life to color space and actually built something that explains what they. That demonstrates what they thought and hopefully for other people, for various reasons, why whatever they're going through or whatever they're thinking about or whatever they're working on, it can be useful to them. So it's not about, like a paragraph we want to disseminate to everybody. It's simply a toolbox we're opening up and saying, take what you want, because somebody's already went to a lot of work to build something, and maybe it's useful.
- [21:39]
C
Rainer, is there part of that toolbox that you kind of have pulled from in your own life? Tell me about that toolbox. Or maybe that perhaps you might have an example or.
- [21:50]
D
Well, I think Flavin and I have talked about it here and then, and often that the toolbox is really to share, to empower people to look at their own rich heritage, cultural and unique abilities and to take their own thoughts seriously. And that each person has the potential to contribute to society. And in fact, probably the future of humans depends on everybody really contributing their own unique combination of heritage and their innate gifts. And all of you know, the synth, they. They need to take the time to synthesize who they are. And I think Don Ju. Don asking us to save his work as the Judd foundation was just a saving one human's example of what can be done in a. In a lifetime. And I think it's actually a call, if it can be to other people, to work as hard and work passionately and to be quite determined to make a difference and actually care as much as this one person did about the world and about art. I think it's exciting
- [23:17]
C
and something that might not be as widely known to the Average person that just knows your father's work is that he was a prolific art critic for quite a while. Can you tell me a little bit about that part of his life? What got him excited when he would do his journalism and what he would see and what kind of. What got him excited or what kind of maybe got him not excited or the things that he maybe perhaps didn't like?
- [23:45]
A
Well, I mean, the art world was very small at that time. We're talking about 1957 to say, 62.
- [23:51]
C
And he was writing for different magazines, if I'm right.
- [23:53]
A
And he could, he could. He could basically see every show that was up and which is not. You can't do now because it's been completely commercialized. So he and his fellow writers had an incredible knowledge and memory of what was going on and what had been done up until then. And they could keep it all in their heads. So if Don reviewed a show, he could know exactly. If, if it was riffing off of somebody else's work from six months prior or 10 years prior or 50 years prior, he would know exactly what it was. And if it was fresh and radical, he would know that too. And that's what got him excited. And that's why he didn't just write about so called minimalist artists. He wrote about everybody, including, you know, Oldenburg and Rauschenberg and people like Lee Bantaku, because they were radical. And that's what really got him interested. Because if, for an artist, if you're not being radical, you're not making your own work, and if you're not making your own work, you're making somebody else's work. And if you're making somebody else's work, you're not going to do a good job of it, so don't do it. So, for instance, he wrote a review of Cy Twombly's show and he didn't have anything nice to say about it. And I suspect that's probably because he knew Cy Twombly and probably thought he could do better or knew he could. He knew that Cy could do better. So it was very small. Everybody knew each other and they were all. Don and the rest of the critics were very quick to call out somebody who was doing the work of somebody else, because it was very evident.
- [25:34]
D
I just want to add to that and say that it may be true that he wrote a bad review of Twombly. I'm not questioning that, but I recall as a teenager engaging in an argument with him, because I myself did not like Twombly or a specific painting. And he passionately tried to convince me why this white painting that was hung on our wall on the second floor of Spring street was so great.
- [26:03]
C
So later on do you remember what he said or like how he kind of.
- [26:07]
D
I'd have to look in my journals to see to remember what he said about it, but I remember him passionately defending this white ish painting. So if anybody else who likes Twombly that there's actually quite an array of opinions about different artists at different stages in their work. So just one declaration that an artist's work is not good. There were a few that stuck, but there were many also that changed. Like he might like an artist's work in their early career and not their late career. Maybe I don't have to mention artists names but but and also he's being
- [26:49]
A
very specific when he reviewed a show. It's just the show, it's not an artist. He's talking about the six paintings he's looking at. So people like to extrapolate to the entire artist but you can't do that. It doesn't work.
- [27:06]
C
Is there a particular review that you think you would say? Maybe whether or not it was a good review from a writing point of view kind of change someone's career.
- [27:18]
D
I remember talking to John Chamberlain about Rooseveltian red. Don Chamberlain liked the way Don wrote about his use of color. I think it, I think his writing would affect the artist and maybe that's as far as I understand. I don't know if it would affect the dealers or anybody else. But I think artists were sensitive to what he was saying. Fairly alert.
- [27:46]
C
Was he, was he kind of person that could like strike up a conversation with anyone, like a, you know, like a waitress at a restaurant or would want to like chit chat with someone waiting for a bus?
- [27:54]
A
Like you know, there was not a lot of chit chat.
- [27:56]
C
No, no.
- [27:57]
D
He was a little shy.
- [27:59]
C
Okay.
- [28:00]
D
Kind of quite a shy guy. So it's not like he would. He also didn't carry around a book to read though. He wasn't like this but he just kind of stoic and quiet.
- [28:16]
B
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- [29:30]
C
And the Judd foundation published a book called Donald Judd Interviews. And there's a quote that I think is a little bit of insight into his art. Generally expensive art is expensive. Chic circumstances, it's a falsification. The society is basically not interested in art. And most people who are artists do that because they like the work, they like to do that art has an integrity of its own and a purpose of its own and it's not to serve the society. And I thought that that was fascinating and very sort of declarative statement and I was wondering if the two of you could maybe translate it. What you, how you, what you think that says about, about him and his, his sort of view of the world. Flavin, why don't you go ahead?
- [30:19]
A
Well, as you can hear in that quote for dawn, art has a purpose that is itself. Art is the purpose. And he was against the use of art for other things. For instance, you know, art is used as a trophy. Art is used to address insecurities. Art, art is used as decoration, art is used as investment. And all of these things are to don contrary to what art actually is. So he's very much a person who, being an artist that you would expect he's interested in the art just for its own sake. And having been seen his art mistreated, destroyed, kind of used for other purposes, he's very, by the time he's writing these things, he's very tired of seeing it happen. And it has, it happens. If you're an artist, it happens over and over and over again. People are constantly trying to exploit you, trying to exploit the work, trying to Basically exploit culture for other purposes and that everything from a bank to museum trustees to museums themselves to art dealers to collectors to writers to art magazines, the whole thing. And he just has no patience for it.
- [31:45]
C
And I'm curious, like, how taking that idea, like, when you talk about the world of design, where it is, you know, people just often describe design as, you know, when you create something for a client and there's function to it and you're doing a job for somebody, then you go from being an artist to a designer. And how this sort of world of. Of Judd and his art and the way that he saw art, you know, kind of intersected with design in his life and the way that he saw it. Does that make any sense?
- [32:14]
A
Well, he's interested in visual things, including the way things are designed. So to him, it's. It's. It's very similar. And architecture is part of that, the visual world. But the activity of art is different because there's no use involved. And that does make a difference. If you're designing a chair, it's. You have to consider how. How tall people are and how heavy they are. If you're designing art, you really don't have to do that. So they are different, but while they are different, they exist within the same, you know, spatial environment. And that. That is exactly what Don is very, very interested in. And he was actually quite mystified as to why other people weren't as interested in it as he was. Because as far as he was concerned, that's what we had. You know, there's no heaven, there's no hell. This is the life we have, and this is it. So if you're not paying attention, that's really your loss. And he's really, really, really paying attention. And that includes design, includes furniture, includes writing, music and architecture.
- [33:21]
C
And in terms of Marfa, I was wondering if you can explain how the town came into your father's life and why he chose there and tell us a little bit about that story, because we're also. We connect Marfa with your dad so much. But we would love to hear. I'd love to hear from you guys, like, how that actually happened. Flavin, do you want to kick us off on that?
- [33:44]
A
We had been driving to Baja California in Mexico for, I mean, more than summers, because it was like four months, four or five months at a time. And Don really loved it in Baja and wanted to build a house and wanted to make art. But it turns out Americans at that time could not buy property in there. And bringing art across the border was impossible. So he realized he needed something north of the border. And while we drove through Los Angeles to get to Baja, he didn't want. He didn't feel California was open enough, and he felt New Mexico and Arizona were too cold or populated. So that's why we wound up in Texas, which he went through on a bus during his military training. And he liked the mountains south of Marfa. And. And Marfa had. Because its cattle industry had gone downhill, it basically skipped the 50s, 60s and 70s. And it looked like a 1930s town, which meant it looked like a nice town. And so that was very attractive to Don. So that's why we wind up in Marfa.
- [34:55]
C
And so in the beginning, did he kind of like buy one bit of land and buildings and then kind of build from there, or was it kind of more all at once? Because I've read different things, so I'd love to hear from just how that sort of evolved into.
- [35:08]
A
We first rented a small house in town for a summer, and then we rented another house that Rainer now lives in on the edge of town. And we stayed there for about six years and until Don fixed up what is now the block within town and then much later bought the rest of the buildings. So it's basically in two. Two chunks. Moving into town really in seven, around 71, and then really moving into town and buying a ranch house in 76.
- [35:42]
C
And like, were. Were the locals kind of welcoming at
- [35:45]
B
any point in time or was it
- [35:46]
C
a little bit hard to get a. Was it easier to warm them up?
- [35:49]
A
It depends. It depended on who you were talking to. But it was. It was. I think the reaction was basically kind of all over the place.
- [35:59]
C
How old were you guys around that time?
- [36:01]
A
Like four and two at the beginning.
- [36:05]
D
Yeah, I think I first came here when I was 2. But in terms of though being welcoming, I don't think our parents were that welcomed. They. Don had a ponytail and our mom was tall and beautiful, so not much to complain about there, but he didn't look like a conservative Anglo person. And Marfa, though it's not very old, was founded in 1883, has historically been segregated. And there's a great new national historic site, which is Blackwell School, which is. Tells the story of the segregated school and the segregated town. But we were always living in the Mexican American community and therefore our friends were in Mexican American community. I would say what opened us up a little bit to the wider community, though it is a small town, so how wide can you get? Was going to school opened things Up a little bit. And also by Don employing people in town, that opened things up a bit. And we became friends with other. Either ranching, Anglo ranching families or border patrol families. But I guess it's helpful to just tell the truth and explain that it was pretty segregated.
- [37:21]
C
And what kind of.
- [37:21]
D
Who.
- [37:22]
C
Who was he hiring back at the time? At the time or in the sort of first way?
- [37:26]
D
Well, different jobs. So there was an accounting position, and that was a woman named Darlene Freeman with a huge, red, beautiful beehive. Do you remember her? Flavin Darlene Freeman. And she was actually related to the brothers that our dad bought the block from. She played music with the family. The webs that she was. A web. Anyway. And then there was his eventually very large crew. But it started with just a few people. Brothers Celadonio and Alfredo Mediano. And so the folks who did work with him, physical work, were usually from the Mexican American community. And then I'd say accounting was varied and administrative. Maybe kicked in more with the Chati Foundation.
- [38:20]
C
In terms of what did friends and family think when he was kind of investing so much space, time and energy and with these buildings and so on in Marfa, where were family and friends? Kind of thinking about it, because now it sounds like it's, you know, obviously today, with hindsight, we know it would sound amazing if anybody said they were doing something in Marfa. But at the time, it was, you know, it was quite the move. So, like, what did his friends and family think about that?
- [38:46]
A
His friends and family?
- [38:48]
C
Yeah, like. Or his contemporaries or anyone would just kind of say, like, were they excited for him or were they kind of critical?
- [38:54]
A
Nobody was excited. Nobody. Because Don moved to Marfa? No. They were like, what the hell are you doing down here? And that's the people who would visit, which was pretty rare until later, like, say the early 80s. But at the beginning, nobody's excited at all? No.
- [39:08]
C
Was he trying to get people to come visit?
- [39:10]
A
No, that's not the point.
- [39:12]
D
I'd say just during Chanatti foundation, where Rudy Fuchs was involved and Brooke Alexander, I think those. And Bryden Smith, they were very excited to be at a place in their lives where they could turn their attention towards really doing whatever they wanted to do with Don with the Chenadi Foundation. These guys got along well. They drank together. They stayed up late talking, having dialogue. So there were a few that really got into it. But there were also people like John Chamberlain who didn't really like it down here, didn't like to be here very long, even when they did travel here. And then the only other thing I'll say is that they were pretty good at visiting with each other in New York when we would go back.
- [40:14]
A
So
- [40:16]
D
it's not like Don and Klaus and our families would have dinner pretty regularly. So there was, I think, a pretty good connection.
- [40:26]
C
And I believe that the Judd foundation was his idea first. You know, it wasn't something that was sort of conceived after his passing. So can you tell me about that? The beginnings of what his wishes were for a foundation and. And how that started in him, what his first thoughts were?
- [40:46]
A
Well, it's related to the idea of installing art within spaces permanently, which started in Spring street, which was a reaction to having temporary shows in museums or galleries where you spend an incredible amount of time and energy putting up this show, and then it disappears six weeks later, and half the time the art gets damaged in the process. So he wanted an alternative to that, and Spring street was that. But Spring Street's rather small when you think about it. Marfa came out of the requirement for something bigger. But of course, if you're going to put all that effort into doing something, it should stick around. And so very early in the. In the late 70s, he decided that it had to stick around past his lifetime. So that's what we're doing.
- [41:49]
D
Yeah. Just to add a little bit to the chronology. So the essay that's in this book, the Donald Judd writings book, in Defense of My Work, is written at the same time as his will, his first will, last will and testament that mentions his intentions for when he's gone. And we have to credit his best friend from his early twenties that remained his best friend throughout his whole life. John Jerome. A lot of artists don't have a lawyer who works at a great firm who can. Who's a great strategist and a brilliant mind. John Jerome really was the architect of how Don's will would structure, go to an estate, and then the beneficiary of the state would be the Judd Foundation. So I think now there are a lot more tools for artists to create foundations. But back then, it was really to the credit of this lawyer friend of his that the structure was defined. And though they missed a few things, like how are you going to pay for it? Some basic things, they really got a lot right in structuring it legally.
- [43:12]
C
Is there anything. What was the thing that got the most right or something that you think that was just really had great foresight?
- [43:20]
D
Well, defining that the beneficiary of everything would be the. The foundation was dealing with. So our dad knew a lot about inheritance tax because all around him ranches were being split up because it couldn't. The ranches couldn't be passed on to the kids. And he felt a sense of sadness both for families that were losing their ranches, but also for the land itself because it was being sliced up and subdivided in order to pay the US Government. So the structure of the will and then the estate that would take in all of his assets was very much structured so that it wouldn't be divided up more than it needed to be to pay its debts.
- [44:13]
B
And tell me a little bit about the foundation today.
- [44:15]
C
Like how many people are you and sort of. How do you describe the mission of the Judd Foundation?
- [44:24]
D
Well, we're about 31 people in Marfa in New York, and that includes part time. And in each location we have artist guides. And that's something that we started at the beginning, at the opening of spring street in 2013, which was a great idea that has stuck. It allows people who make art to have hourly wages. Being docents, I guess is the word. And then in terms of the mission, it is primarily for the public access of his installed spaces, as well as scholarly research. And there's a component for listed in his will for biological research and access to what were his ranch lands. But yeah, it's all very programmatic in terms of involving people and getting people in and sharing ideas and thoughts and writings and work with them.
- [45:33]
C
And Flavin, how would you describe sort of like a vision for the foundation in the future? Is there a way that. Is there any kind of long term hopes and dreams for the foundation that you'd like to.
- [45:45]
A
I don't use the word vision nor legacy. Yeah. The job of the foundation is to simply preserve what Don made. So it's very static, which is unusual because if you're a museum, for instance, you're having shows all the time because you need to bring people in the door. And that's how you measure success. We don't measure success by that in that way. As long as things are being taken care of, that's what we're supposed to do. And we have projects in the works for the future that are different and we have lots to do. But our main role is to preserve what Don built.
- [46:34]
C
Is there anything that is from his body of work that has actually been difficult to preserve in a sense that maybe people may not realize?
- [46:44]
A
Ranchland is really hard to preserve. And that's something he was very interested in. And I mean, nobody's making it easy to preserve nature because it's in nobody's direct interest. So it's basically made as hard as possible. So that was very hard. And we're still trying.
- [47:05]
C
So what aspects of it are kind of it ecologically or is it just because of just neighbors or, you know.
- [47:15]
A
No, ecologically. And the way the United States is structured, nature is thrown last thing on the totem pole that you're supposed to consider. And the first thing you're supposed to consider is, I don't know, capitalist production or something. I have no idea. But Marfa is in a plateau where the land is not great for mass production of anything. And that's why it's ranch land, because that's basically the best you can get out of it. So all of just keeping it as nature is, it's hard to convince people and it's hard to get done.
- [47:58]
C
And, you know, we all sort of view our parents in their world differently as we age and as we understand them. I'm wondering, in both of your lives has your own sort of perception, let's say, starting from, you know, late teenager dumb to today, how you've kind of your perception of your father's work or, you know, his trajectory has changed. For you personally, how do you. How you viewed it from. From then till now?
- [48:31]
D
I think I'm able to see more aspects of him and his interests as part of his work. I think as a kid, I saw his artwork as his work and because other than that, he was my dad. And now I'm able to see how to use one of your words in one of your questions, how holistic it all was. I definitely keep learning more about him. And I think that that choice to have made, which for Flavin and I, we made the choice when we were in our early 20s to do the Judd estate and do the Judd Foundation. And you never know about question decisions you make in your early 20s. But I'm so glad we did choose not all children of artists.
- [49:35]
A
It was one of the better decisions of our 20s. Yes, during the Judd foundation, that's for sure.
- [49:41]
D
Mr. Judd, would you like to tell us about some of your. Not some of the better decisions you made during your 20s?
- [49:47]
A
No, let's not get into that.
- [49:49]
D
Okay. Anyway, so this is not. You didn't ask me this question, but I think one of the things that has been rewarding has been the synthesis of my own journey with my journey, learning more about my dad and his work. And I feel so lucky to have been able to be in this area of focus and proximity to his work because it has enriched my life. And in my 20s, I wasn't aware that that potential existed because I was 23 and it could only see so far. Really thought it was, you know, I can't do. Is it dualistic? My philosophy is not that good, but like one or the other, I didn't realize that there was a path of synthesis that was possible. And in many ways it makes me. I get stronger the more I learn about him. And at the same time, again, something you didn't ask, but I think worth saying at the same time, there are certain areas of his thinking, particularly in the areas of land restoration and caring for land, that I have now gone past what I learned from him and am now building beyond what he knew was possible, or am facing challenges that he never knew would exist. Yet I feel like he gave us very good tools for facing things. Almost like a good constitution or something like that, like a good country's constitution that we can take other scenarios or other situations and be determined and rigorous and inventive and resourceful to. To do as much as we can, both for the communities and the public, but also for land, who really does. There are not a lot of people, I guess Flavin reflected on this, but there are not a lot of entities or people speaking on behalf of land. But there are some, and we engage with them.
- [52:16]
A
And, well, it's deepened because I know a lot more about him now than I did when he died when I was 25. And, I mean, you get to put together a lot of things. So if, you know. I remember being with him in the Soviet Union, and he's reading a poem that he thinks is really good. And recently my daughter said, oh, I need a poem. And I was like, oh, I know a Russian poem that you can use. And I found it just by chance and gave it to her. So you never know how these things are going to interconnect. And that's true also for his work, meaning all of it. Meaning the architecture, the design, the furniture, the writing, the way of thinking about the world. That is all much. I have a much better understanding of all of that now. I saw the results of it then, but now I see where it came from. And that's a big difference.
- [53:29]
D
Yeah, I think it's beautiful what Flavin just said, particularly in using the word deeper, a deeper understanding. And I was reflecting recently that not only were we taking in ideas and thinking and participating in dialogue, but we were living amidst structures, outdoor and indoor structures, that were being built and that. That we're a manifestation of this thinking. So even though he was never stopping and pointing it out and nobody was pointing it out to us, that we were living amongst ideas, I was reflecting on how, as the Judd foundation, that we're able to supply somewhat of what we experienced as kids, which was thinking, and also these physical structures that reflect so much of the thinking.
- [54:36]
C
And Flavin, what's next for the Judd foundation in 2026?
- [54:40]
A
We have to stop buildings from falling down. That's our job. So our next big project is restoring our Adobe wall. So if you want to come down in Marfa and learn how to make Adobe bricks and put them together, we got a job for you.
- [54:54]
C
Hey, listen, I think of a lot of people that would. Would love to say that they prevented a wall from falling down.
- [55:01]
A
Rebuild, Rebuild. It Already fell down. You have to rebuild it.
- [55:04]
B
Okay.
- [55:04]
C
Oh, gosh. Well, Reina, how are you with hammer and what do they call it? Like a spackle? Like for.
- [55:11]
D
I'm pretty good at adobes, maybe not so much with plaster, but I hung around the Adobedos a lot when I was little. I really liked them. They were friendly, warm. Well, we're coming up on Judd's centenary, 100 years since he was born, so we're actually preparing for that and that's super exciting and I think just reaching a wider audience with making some of his ideas even more accessible. We have put together a few fairly dense books. They're 1,000 pages long and I think finding ways to kind of like what you're doing, but to share ideas in a more casual, kind of broken down way, perhaps curriculum or something like that.
- [56:05]
B
Thank you to my guests Rainer and Flavin Judd, and to everyone at the Judd foundation for making this episode happen. The editor of the Grand Tourist is Stan Hall. To keep this going, don't forget to visit our website and sign up for our newsletter. The Grand Tourist curator@thegrandtourist.net and follow me on Instagram danrubenstein and follow the Grand Tourist on Apple podcasts, Spotify or wherever
- [56:26]
C
you like to listen.
- [56:27]
B
And leave us a rating or comment. Every little bit helps. Till next time.