18 Quotes by Martin Puryear

When I went to Africa I think that was when I really found a way to deal with what I had recently discovered; in two-dimensional terms, at least.

The most precise work is generally done by hand, with hand tools. Some people rely on machines for their precision, and my way of working is backwards. I rely on the machines for doing the gross stock removal and then, when it comes to the final refinements and fitting of joints and things, making things work together, I rely more on sharp-edged tools that I push by hand.

I’m interested in vernacular cultures, where people lived a little closer to the source of materials and the making of objects for use. And for me, not to rely strictly on the history of art has always been an interesting process, to be looking into areas that we call craft and trades.

There remains this belief that the work itself can have an identity that can speak, whether it's through beauty, or through ugliness, or whatever quality you put into the work. The work doesn't have to be a transparent vehicle for you to say things about life today.

I think of moving as a kind of saving grace.

The design is a public amenity, designed by a sculptor, which tries to invest a public facility with a bit more poetry than it otherwise might have.

I realized it wasn’t necessary to work in the traditional methods of carving and casting.

There remains this belief that the work itself can have an identity that can speak, whether it’s through beauty, or through ugliness, or whatever quality you put into the work. The work doesn’t have to be a transparent vehicle for you to say things about life today.

The site I landed on feels much more isolated than it really is; it’s almost magical. Within its limited radius, there was a whole range of the local ecology.