Richard Long’s Dallas Rag – Video Transcript

Richard Long (00:18):

This is, it is as much about water and gravity as it, as, as it is about, um, you know, clay. You have the, um, the power of the overall image, you know, but then you also have the, um, the beauty of the micro, um, details.

(00:36):

Every,

(00:37):

Um, every minute detail has is, um, like the cosmic variety of chance. So the title is called Dallas Rag, and it’s like a bit like music, you know, it’s like, um, like a piece of jazz, you know, it’s, it’s very improvised, and yet you couldn’t do it without an amazing technique.

(00:59):

So people ask me, what does a circle mean? And I always say that the first time I used a circle, it just seemed like a good idea at the time. But having used it once, I, I, I began to understand that it was very powerful and I could use it in many different ways, in many places around the world for the rest of my life. So I’ve walked in circles, I’ve made text works, which are circles of words, and this is a mud circle. The circle is like an open system. Well, I mean, the whole point is that it is my human energy that, that that’s the whole deal. You know, that’s what makes the image. So I’m working very fast. I’m working with very liquid mud, and if I was working slowly, it wouldn’t make so many splashes. So in a, in a way, the, the, the, the outtakes as, as it were, as is are, are as important as my hand marks. So I make the circle and nature does rest.