More on Marfa and Donald Judd

The restored court house in downtown Marfa.

     The prime mover behind the Dia Foundation is Philippa de Menil, the daughter of Dominique de Menil and the granddaughter of Conrad Schlumberger, a French inventor.  We’ll touch on Philippa now, and get to know Dominique much better in a later article I plan, which will continue my celebration of Texas Women.

     Anyone who ever worked in the oil fields knows that “Schlumberger” is pronounced “Slumber-Jay,” and thousands of big blue trucks carry the name to every nook and cranny of the world.  These blue trucks come back loaded with money from the nooks and crannies and send it to Houston, where a whole building full of CPAs decides what to do with it, to keep from paying those nasty old taxes.

     Philippa de Menil married an art dealer named Heiner Friedrich, and, with art historian Helen Winkler, the three of them set up The Lone Star Foundation, which evolved into the Dia Art Foundation.  Philippa sat on the board, but her main job was providing Schlumberger money. The word “Dia” comes from the Greek word meaning “through” and was chosen to indicate the truckloads of money that left Schlumberger, passed “through” the Dia Foundation into the hands of unrecognized, but possibly deserving, artists.   The foundation provided funding for artistic projects that might otherwise never see the light of day.   Some critics suggest that would not have been a bad thing. 

     Donald Judd considered himself unrecognized and deserving and immediately became associated with Dia.  They provided him with stipends, studios, archivists and “walking around” money.  Lining up at the trough with Judd were Joseph Beuys, Dan Flavin, Agnes Martin, John Chamberlain, Andy Warhol, and dozens of others.  Judd presented the “Art for the Masses” idea, and the Dia Foundation eagerly stepped forward to fund the exercise.

Prada, an art installation in the desert near Valentine, about thirty-seven miles northwest of Marfa.  Micheal Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset, two German artists, did the installation with Prada's blessing.

     Judd put Dia’s money to good use.  The Chinati Foundation provided internships for deserving artists, funded an annual “October Art Weekend” in Marfa, and imported art dealers and celebrities from all around the country for immersion into the West Texas art scene.  Judd bought and coordinated renovation of several buildings, invited artist friends to show their work in Marfa, and learned to weld while he worked on some rusty Cor-Ten steel sculptures—the only art he actually built in Marfa.

     In the nineteen-eighties, I read about an incident involving Judd that took place near Marfa.  I have looked for mention of it, but cannot find anything about it on this electric machine. I will recite the story from memory, and if it turns out to be untrue, don’t tell anyone.   It is far too good a story to ignore.

      A student of Judd’s did a sculpture to represent the Virgin Mary, or the Virgin of Guadalupe, or the Angel of Goliad.  I’m not sure which, but one of the Mexican Virgins that are so deified because they are so scarce.  The sculpture was done with “found pieces,” bits of rag and tin and sticks, and perhaps a stone or two.  It was very much to Judd’s liking, meeting his criteria that art stand unequivocally on its own, not represent anything, and occupy real space, not illusionary space.

      Judd explained to the young artist that sculpture was not designed to be a lasting thing, at least not this particular sculpture, because it was not a concrete box or an aluminum cube.  The highest and best use of the virgin sculpture should be “Performance Art,” or a “Happening.”  In either case the piece would be destroyed in a blaze of glory, purified by cleansing flames.  Judd, as always, was very convincing and soon the artist trainee was ready to put a match to his work.  Judd’s genius for grasping an opportunity served him well.

If you are unsophisticated, you might not recognize this as art.  These cars were selected and placed by an artist, and probably paid for by Schlumberger money.  The train comes by every two hours or so and the whole scene becomes "Performance Art."

      Art dealers, movie stars, writers, critics, and movers and shakers from coast to coast were invited to Marfa for “A Happening Performance of Art.”  All arrived at the Midland/Odessa Airport and were met by Judd, in an air-conditioned Greyhound bus outfitted with a full bar, a bartender, and classy cocktail waitresses.  After several happy hours on the bus, the dignitaries were put up for the night in and around Marfa.  The next morning, at a civil hour, breakfast tacos were served at the Chinati Foundation and everyone was loaded back on the bus—the bar was open—and transported to the north bank of the Rio Grande, where a scaffold-like stadium had been erected.

     The sculpture of the unrecognizable virgin had been installed on a flat raft and was tethered to the bank, upstream from the stadium.  The plan: Set the raft adrift and afire simultaneously.  As the flames consumed the virgin and the raft drifted along the international boundary, the highest level of performance art would be achieved when the whole installation sank gently beneath the waves, sizzling and smoking as it dropped out of sight directly in front of the tipsy celebrities assembled on the makeshift grandstand.

     The cocktail cuties freshened everyone’s drink and Judd signaled for the “Happening” to happen.  The raft started to burn and drift, but after the initial flare up, the fabric and wood parts of the hapless virgin quit burning and began to smolder.  The crew had not used enough diesel fuel.  Some plastic melted and smoked and stunk to high heaven and the metal parts warped. The raft began to burn vigorously, but soon the diesel fuel dissipated and the wet wood smoldered like the remnants of the solitary virgin.  The whole smoking, smoldering mess hung up on a sandbar and stuck there, fifteen feet off shore, listing and sputtering, stuck in the mud at a distressing angle.  Judd hurriedly loaded the bus and sent the celebrities back to Midland.

      Most of the working press who witnessed the “Happening” didn’t remember much about it.  Free booze does that to reporters. Those who did remember chose to be kind and wrote about the big sky, the breakfast tacos, even the Midland/Odessa Airport.  No one really panned the incident, partly because of embarrassment and partly because of ignorance.  The writers feared everyone else understood “Happening Performance Art,” and they didn’t.

     In the early eighties, oil prices went south and took Schlumberger stock along.  The nervous CPAs in that building off the Gulf Freeway in Houston pulled in their horns to weather the financial storm.  Among the horns they pulled in were Philippa’s.  This forced the Dia Foundation to rethink its priorities and to reorganize, asking Philippa’s mother, Dominique de Menil, to join the board.  It was decided to cease funding art in the desert wilderness, for at least a year or two.  Dia reneged on a promised $2.3 million grant to Donald Judd and the Chinati Foundation.

     Donald Judd did not take this lying down.  After all, that money was meant for art and it was his responsibility to protect it.  He threatened a lawsuit, and the Dia Foundation, in shambles financially because of over-spending and decreased funding, hurriedly settled.  The Chinati Foundation came out of the negotiations owning all the Marfa art and real estate and was provided with $800,000.00 to finish works in progress.

     At the time, Judd stated, “You could call it a divorce settlement, although I’m not entirely satisfied.  It’s not close to what they originally intended to do.  But it’s great that we’re free.”

     In Marfa, Texas, a million dollars will buy a whole lot of anything you might want.  The Dia Foundation poured more than four million dollars into Marfa in the years from 1980 to 1986, then, when threatened with a lawsuit, signed over everything they owned out there to Chinati and Donald Judd.

     I have not a lot of respect for Donald Judd as an artist or as a man.  Perhaps I’m too naive to understand his art, and I certainly cannot speak to his motives, but I have no admiration for his methods.  He approached the Dia Foundation with hat in hand and enjoyed their charity when he was broke and times were good for them.   He repaid their kindness by taking advantage at a time when they were defenseless and vulnerable.

     In the realm of art, I admire one thing he did.  He had a talent for renovation of older buildings.  He converted wool warehouses, motor pool sheds, and unused hangers into museums for the display of art, and he did fantastic work.  He sandblasted masonry walls, polished concrete floors, added windows and state-of-art lighting and made drab old buildings sparkle with new life.  He probably did nothing more than any competent fourth-year architecture student might have done, but he did the work and deserves the credit.

     He also put Marfa on the map.  His work and Dia’s money provided jobs for natives of the area and added zip to the otherwise stagnant economy.  Empty buildings that once lined the main streets are filled with art galleries, gift shops, and restaurants.  Older hotels--the Piasano and the Thunderbird--have been renovated.  A new motel, the El Cosmico, with vintage Airstream Trailers and Native American Teepees as guest cottages, beckons to the artistic traveler. 

     New, creative people have discovered and embraced the high desert climate and environment.  In this age of computers, artists and writers who can live wherever they please are moving into the area and putting down roots.    None of this would have happened without Donald Judd.  His motivations may have been purely selfish, but a lot of deserving people in a hot, dry, vacant, dusty corner of Texas benefitted from his vision.  I can’t fault him for that.

I believe this must be art, too.  No self-respecting sheep herder would build such a shoddy cabin.  How much do you suppose this thing cost Schlumberger?