0:01

Ted Audio Collective. Till.

0:07

I sort of fell into theater, but

0:09

now after thirty years I realize haven't

0:12

done many other things. How

0:14

unique rare and precious

0:16

is for a. Group of

0:18

people to gather together and. As

0:21

my friend Lindsay turn of the director says

0:23

still. The eager for the greater good. From

0:29

the Tag Mario collective this is designed

0:31

moderns with every Milner. For

0:36

nineteen years every moment has been talking

0:38

with designers and other creative you will

0:40

about what they do have. we got

0:43

to be who they are and what

0:45

they're thinking about and working on. On

0:47

this episode as Devlin talks about a

0:49

collaboration between performers, can their audience the

0:51

fact that we all keep clean? yeah

0:53

we'll keep blowing the building up together

0:56

is if I did for human thing.

1:04

Everyone if that. I'm Grant host a

1:06

podcast called a Rethinking About the Science

1:08

Of What Makes Us Tick This season

1:10

we're talking to Black Eyed Peas, front

1:12

man and tech entrepreneur. Will I Am

1:15

about the future of Ai and being

1:17

a multifaceted think I'm going to find

1:19

my way to that stage. And my

1:21

whole journey from a teenager was like

1:23

you're worth stage at Where's the Mike

1:25

Find in follow rethinking without him, Grant

1:27

wherever you're listening. A

1:32

program Note: Before we begin, there are

1:35

some intermittent background noise and this recording

1:37

we hope it doesn't interfere with your

1:39

enjoyment of the interview. In.

1:42

Two thousand and three the artist

1:44

as difference career took a turn.

1:47

Shit aren't you need for name

1:49

is a theater to sign with

1:51

A conceptual and sculptural stage designs

1:53

had long impressed the London theater

1:55

world but my homework turn summit

1:58

for attention to concert sectors. She

2:01

pretty much impressed the entire world. She's

2:03

been concertist for Beyonce and Jay-Z,

2:06

for Lady Gaga and Miley Cyrus,

2:08

for opera festivals, the Olympics,

2:11

and even the Super Bowl. She

2:13

also helped launch the sphere in Las Vegas

2:15

with her artistry with U2. There's

2:18

currently an exhibition of her work at

2:20

the Smithsonian's Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum

2:22

in New York City, and

2:24

she joins me today to talk

2:26

about her truly extraordinary career. As

2:29

Devlin, welcome to Design Matters. Thank you

2:31

so much for having me. I love this podcast so much. Thank

2:33

you. Oh, thank you. Is it

2:36

true you like to buy your shoes in Terminal

2:38

5 at Heathrow Airport? Oh my goodness. Do

2:40

you know what? I haven't bought a

2:42

pair of shoes for a long time. I

2:44

probably said that at a time when I did buy

2:47

shoes. I reckon I've got enough shoes

2:49

now. There's

2:51

a pair of shoes I'm really into, which are Converse

2:53

with a really deep soul. And

2:56

I just bought like five of them

2:58

and I wear them on rotation because they make me

3:00

a bit taller and I don't fall over. So shoes

3:02

is sort of, yeah, I don't even

3:04

buy them anymore. I've got enough. Your

3:07

earliest memory is of a

3:09

line of light through dark

3:11

water. When you were about

3:13

two years old and you

3:15

accidentally fell into the River

3:17

Thames and remember voices and

3:20

bright light penetrating a

3:23

medium other than air. What

3:26

was that like for you and how were you rescued?

3:28

Do you know what? I was

3:30

probably only in there for moments, but the odd

3:32

thing is that I remember it. I think, you

3:34

know, I was paddling. I fell in. I think

3:37

my dad noticed pretty quickly that I was nowhere to

3:39

be seen and scooped me out. But

3:42

weirdly, I really remember it

3:45

and I know it was only two.

3:47

And I remember, I mean, I didn't,

3:49

I wasn't aware of what drowning was

3:51

or anything. But I just

3:54

remember seeing particles of light

3:57

from a source of light above me.

4:00

I remember this deep greenish brownish

4:02

color of the Thames and

4:04

rocks and little particles and things. And

4:07

I just remember I was being observant. I

4:09

was observing and taking it all in, even though

4:11

it was obviously a condition

4:14

of not being able to breathe. But I

4:16

guess because I didn't understand it, I was just living it

4:18

and it stayed with me. And

4:20

that light is something I seek out now, I think, in

4:23

any form I can find it. It

4:26

seems as if this experience

4:28

contained the five ingredients

4:30

often found in the process of

4:32

your work. And you've talked about

4:34

space, light, darkness, scale, and time.

4:36

Do you know what? I've never

4:39

had it put like that before, but you're absolutely

4:41

right. It probably did include

4:43

all of those things and encapsulate in a

4:45

very brief span of time, but

4:48

one that I still think about and write about even

4:50

now, 50 years later. You

4:53

were born in Kingston upon Thames

4:55

in England. Your mom

4:57

was a teacher. Your dad

5:00

was a journalist in education at

5:02

the Times. And you said they

5:04

were education obsessives. And

5:06

I'm wondering if they

5:08

inspired your work ethic. I

5:11

think they did. My mother

5:13

is from Wales and

5:15

her father was a physics

5:17

teacher and his father was a coal miner. My

5:20

mom was a hairdresser. And I think

5:23

my mom, her story was

5:25

that through her education at

5:27

the local school, she managed to go to

5:29

a university in England, which was

5:32

unusual from that small mining town.

5:35

And I think they really impressed upon

5:37

me the value of practice, the

5:40

idea that if you were

5:42

patient and if you played a violin scale

5:45

every day, it would sound bad on Monday.

5:48

But on Friday morning, it might get a bit better. In

5:51

1977, when you were six years

5:53

old, your parents went on

5:56

a romantic weekend to rye in

5:58

Sussex on the advice of... your

6:00

aunt, Prue. And they

6:02

impulsively bought a house and you all

6:04

moved. And the house had a

6:06

history. Apparently, T.S. Eliot played

6:09

his first game of ping pong

6:11

there and Henry James lived up

6:13

the road. Did you feel there

6:15

were ghosts at all? Well, funnily

6:17

enough, the stories

6:19

about ghosts were written by a

6:22

lady called Joan Aiken, who was the daughter of a

6:24

man called Conrad Aiken, who owned the house for a

6:26

while. And they

6:28

were written and staged in the house. So

6:31

because I was six, and I do think from

6:34

subsequent reading that something happens in a child's

6:36

brain when it is six years old, and

6:38

that certain habits that

6:40

its form start to crystallize into

6:42

belief. And so I

6:45

believed that houses were

6:47

the site of stories and that houses

6:49

told stories. So to me, I

6:52

just thought that was what houses did,

6:54

that stories were written them and that

6:56

place could tell a story. One

6:59

of the landmarks of Ry, where you

7:01

grow up, is a handmade one

7:03

to 100 scale model of the

7:05

town during Victorian

7:08

times. And you've written about how Ry

7:10

had a way of telling its stories.

7:12

Oh, I

7:17

think so. I was six

7:19

years old when we moved there. And

7:21

we would go, I think the practice was a

7:23

bit like going to church. So we would go

7:25

to church on a Sunday. And on

7:28

Saturday, we would go to this model, we'd

7:30

seen it. But because my

7:32

parents had moved away from the suburbs

7:34

of London, which is where I was

7:36

born, their friends were

7:38

coming to visit. And every

7:40

time a friend would come to visit, they would be

7:42

taken next door to see the model and we would

7:44

go. And it became a little

7:46

ritual. And I guess in my mind, because I

7:49

was six, it

7:51

was more confirmation that buildings

7:53

told stories, because it

7:55

was little models that spoke, I

7:57

think they had little lights in them and and

8:00

each one would tell its own story. But

8:02

it was also somewhat conflated, I think, in

8:04

my mind, with going to church, where

8:07

objects also spoke, because

8:09

we were ringing little bells. It

8:11

was in Latin at our church. And

8:15

there was a little theatre in the church

8:17

with a little curtain. And

8:19

then there was a chalice, and there were these

8:21

wafers that were standing in for

8:24

much bigger things than wafers. And

8:28

objects were standing in for ideas. And

8:30

the idea of objects being protagonists

8:32

in a ritual felt

8:35

quite normal. That's just what

8:37

was happening in my weekend, I think. Isn't

8:40

that sort of a beautiful

8:42

way of understanding your origin story

8:45

and how you've become who you are? I

8:47

mean, it's amazing how these little vignettes in

8:50

our histories impact our futures.

8:53

I think that's so true. And I think through

8:55

practice of 30 years of doing various

8:58

different things from theatre to opera

9:00

to concerts to art installations, I

9:03

guess what I'm finding now, you

9:05

ask about shoes, is just

9:08

I'm beginning now to

9:10

practice that objects are protagonists in

9:12

life, not even just in

9:14

ritual, but just anything we touch.

9:16

I'm really interested in the

9:19

etymology of every object, like what went into

9:21

it, where did it come from? Whose

9:24

hands touched it? Where did it travel? And

9:26

I think more and more, as

9:28

we start to question the complex systems that

9:30

we're all entangled in, I think

9:32

we are really interested in the stories of our objects

9:34

and how can we make sure

9:36

we're aware and that we honor

9:39

them and notice them and allow them

9:41

to resonate or not have them

9:43

in our lives at all as an option. Like

9:46

shoes, like what do we need? What do we want?

9:48

What's the story of it? What what do we really

9:50

bring into our house when we order an object? And

9:54

what does it say about who we are?

9:56

And even I think

9:59

more interesting, interestingly, what

10:02

do we think or want it to

10:04

say about who we are to others? And

10:06

what is that telegraphic projection doing?

10:09

I read something really interesting, which I really

10:11

recommend if you have time. It's a book

10:13

by Peter Frankapan, and it's called The

10:16

Earth Transformed. And

10:18

it goes through the history of

10:20

civilization, East and West, and various forms

10:22

of civilization across the 4.6 billion

10:25

year history of the planet. So

10:27

it takes each chunk of history and

10:30

views it through the lens of

10:32

climatic shift. So it

10:34

says, for example, the first sort of totemic

10:36

objects that humans

10:38

made on various sides of the planet

10:41

independently that were made in honor of

10:44

cosmic deities may have

10:46

been made at a time when

10:48

the sun was particularly busy with

10:50

solar radio activity like kind of

10:53

the Northern Lights. So

10:55

it may have been that cultures

10:58

were observing cosmic deities because

11:00

they were literally observing great

11:02

streams of light, of performance art,

11:04

light coming down from the sun. And

11:07

I found that a very interesting thing to consider.

11:11

And I also find it so

11:13

sort of endlessly fascinating that

11:17

people were doing this all

11:19

over the planet without

11:21

knowing that other people all over the

11:24

planet were doing it. And the same

11:26

with religious symbols. We were creating religious

11:28

symbols almost around the same

11:31

time about 10,000 years ago. And

11:34

there's really no recorded

11:37

history of any culture

11:40

not having some sort of religious

11:42

symbol that was created around that

11:44

time. Another one in that

11:46

book actually related to what you

11:48

just said is that around the

11:50

same time in various sites in the

11:52

Lascaux caves in northern Spain or the

11:54

Blombos caves in South Africa, these

11:57

first drawings in caves that we know, especially in

11:59

the northern Spain, were the ones that are

12:01

kind of half animal, half human. There's

12:03

a thesis in this book, the Peter

12:05

Frankopan book, The Earth Transformed, that possibly

12:07

this was during a time 40,000 years

12:10

ago when conditions climatically

12:13

were pretty hazardous. And

12:15

the humans that did survive were the ones who were

12:18

living deep in the caves. And it may have been

12:20

that in those depths of the

12:22

caves, there was a diminished level of oxygen.

12:25

So if you're deep, deep, in a cave

12:27

and your brain is somewhat deprived of oxygen,

12:29

the thesis is perhaps this somewhat

12:32

hallucinogenic state of shamanic

12:34

sensibility, of recognising the

12:37

continuity between human and animal

12:39

might have been attained because of a diminution

12:41

in oxygen level, which I find really interesting

12:43

as well, just looking at it through the

12:45

end. Oh absolutely, yeah. Do

12:48

not try this at home, callers. Don't

12:50

try this at home. Oh actually, I

12:52

was imagining thousands of listeners running

12:54

to keep... To the cupboards. Experiencing,

12:56

yeah. As

12:59

you also avidly studied music and learned

13:01

to play the piano, the violin, the

13:03

clarinet, were

13:06

you considering pursuing music professionally?

13:09

I loved practicing and I loved

13:11

playing. I wasn't ever good

13:13

enough, but I did love being part of

13:15

an orchestra. So I would sit

13:17

at the back on my violin. I

13:20

wasn't actually good enough to get into... I got into a wind band,

13:22

but not a big orchestra because there's only a

13:25

few clarinets. But I'd be at the back scratching

13:27

away and I

13:29

learned that I could be part of

13:31

a really beautiful big sound and

13:34

my small part in it

13:36

was sort of unbelievable to me that

13:39

this overall sound could be so majestic and yet

13:41

I was just sort of going with

13:44

my bow and yet I was part of something

13:46

way bigger than I could ever do

13:48

on my own. So that was a big teaching for me. I

13:51

did go to the Royal Academy of

13:53

Music on a Saturday and take junior

13:56

lessons. It wasn't like you had to

13:58

get in, to be honest. You had to just pay. and

14:00

my granddad paid me. So

14:02

I don't want anyone to get the idea that

14:04

I was brilliant. But I did work hard at

14:06

it and went every Saturday, but I

14:09

learned there, I saw people who really

14:11

were gifted way beyond

14:13

what I was. And I did have

14:15

this sort of revelation moment that I mentioned

14:17

in the book where I

14:19

guess even I was only 11 years old, I was

14:21

probably thinking, God, there's something about

14:23

these people who are way beyond me. This

14:26

is not my league or my tribe. But

14:28

when I was walking down the corridor, hearing

14:30

a lot of very young, very gifted people

14:33

playing a bit of clarinet, bit of violin,

14:35

bit of jazz over here. I do

14:38

remember, perhaps not consciously, but

14:40

something in me holds on to this memory of

14:42

a corridor and this light coming in, and

14:44

this mixture of music. And I something

14:47

landed in my head going, well, actually,

14:49

this corridor is kind of cool. The light

14:51

in here is cool. I really like the way

14:53

this music is all meeting. And maybe this corridor

14:57

is itself quite an interesting place to be.

14:59

Even if I'm not in one of those rooms specializing

15:02

in one, I learned if

15:04

you wanted to really excel in music, you

15:07

have to just make that decision to specialize,

15:09

specialize, specialize. And practice

15:11

so hard. So I liked being in the corridor. And

15:13

that's kind of where I still am, I reckon. Yeah,

15:16

you've talked a lot about the

15:19

importance of the corridor to your

15:21

practice, to the way you

15:23

approach your work. What do you think it

15:25

is about that

15:27

space between, you know, a corridor

15:29

is almost like the

15:32

space between two separate

15:34

rooms or environments? Well,

15:36

there's an essay actually, or a conversation

15:39

in the book with a woman I really

15:41

admire called Dorothea von Hankelmann. She's a German

15:43

art historian. And she

15:45

taught me a lot about sinesthetic ritual. And

15:47

she made me see something which I hadn't

15:49

taught before, which is maybe

15:54

when we look back at this period of time, this last 500

15:56

years or so or more, we

15:59

might look at it as a bit of A. Then, operation and

16:01

that, Actually, up until

16:03

now, these last five centuries,

16:05

it would have been normal.

16:07

For. Humans as their birthright along

16:10

with sleeping and eating seen

16:12

as attended at least weekly

16:14

a collective ritual entertained this

16:16

of collective flags day and

16:18

assign ascetic slow say and

16:21

it would have been unusual

16:23

until this chunk of five

16:25

hundred years to break down.

16:28

Ritual into. Musician,

16:31

composer, artist, architect it

16:33

would have been considered.

16:36

A sign ascetic ritual and you

16:38

wouldn't really have asked who wrote

16:40

the music in the in the

16:42

church he would have to said

16:45

i'm singling this with every atom

16:47

of my body. I'm smelling the

16:49

insects, I am feeling the light

16:51

coming through the windows. I'm waiting

16:53

the colored like to the same

16:55

glass. I'm listen to the tax

16:57

since then the city so maybe

16:59

that fusion. Of things

17:01

is me perhaps wanting to try

17:04

to restore something perhaps instinctively on

17:06

the i think the human body

17:08

and. Species.

17:11

Really respond positively. Team is that.

17:13

I think I haven't read much

17:15

Emile Durkheim, but people keep telling

17:17

me to and things I've read

17:19

about it or that he talks

17:22

about a sort of effervescent slow

17:24

state that when humans or sing

17:26

together or I'm engaged and focus

17:28

together, a stay afloat can be

17:30

attained. Which is very positive said

17:32

the human species. and I'm I'm

17:35

finding that in the work that

17:37

people really respond well to collective

17:39

ritual. You.

17:41

Considered going to Maidstone

17:44

Art School for college,

17:46

but when to Bristol

17:48

University and study literature.

17:51

What made you decide to do that? I

17:54

didn't feel ready yet to make

17:56

our. To write my in thesis

17:58

of him. I didn't feel

18:00

I had enough, per se. I didn't feel I'd

18:02

learned enough. And the people at my school who

18:05

were ready to go and

18:07

were all ready to form their discourse,

18:10

I didn't really relate to their discourse. It

18:12

wasn't at the level that I wanted to

18:14

speak. It was a different type of engagement.

18:16

And I wanted to learn

18:18

a lot more before I tried to

18:21

form an analysis or a thesis in my

18:23

work. So I really

18:25

just wanted to read and learn.

18:27

I felt there were so many

18:30

lacunae and gaps in

18:32

my knowledge. So I

18:34

really relished reading for three years.

18:38

I really recommend

18:42

that path to anybody that I

18:44

can. I also studied English literature

18:46

in college. And in

18:49

many ways, it's become the foundation

18:51

of everything that I do. Not that

18:53

I teach literature at all, but that

18:56

it gave me a way of understanding the

18:58

world in,

19:01

I think, ways I could not have otherwise been

19:04

able to experience. And many,

19:07

many people that I talk to that have

19:09

that same background seem really grateful

19:12

that that's what they did, however

19:14

unpractical it might seem now. And

19:16

certainly with the numbers of people

19:19

majoring in English literature going

19:21

down so precipitously. But

19:24

I wouldn't change that for

19:26

anything in the world. I totally agree. And

19:28

I think this quality of internal

19:31

landscape are just the act of

19:33

reading. Again, we talked about practice

19:35

earlier. But the practice of reading,

19:37

I think particularly now, I

19:41

feel really challenged in my reading since the advent

19:43

of the ubiquitous companion

19:46

of the telephone. And

19:49

I got quite worried about it for a while.

19:51

And I made a work of collective reading, actually,

19:54

to see if we could gather people to read together.

19:57

Because I think that sense of what the process

19:59

of reading brain does when it takes just

20:01

black and white print on a page

20:04

and conjures imagery

20:08

and atmosphere and place. That

20:10

process that goes on in the brain seems

20:13

to me so precious to us. It seems

20:15

that that's what we've got to fall

20:17

back on. Look, I went to see a

20:19

lecture about poetry in the wonderful author and

20:22

poet Jeanette Winterson was there. And a young

20:24

16 year old girl

20:26

put her hand up in

20:28

the audience and she was quite timid. She said,

20:30

look, this might be a silly question, but what

20:32

is a poem? And

20:35

Jeanette Winterson said, it's not a silly question.

20:37

She said, a poem that you learn by heart is

20:40

something that nobody can take from you, even if

20:42

your house burns down and you've lost all your

20:44

belongings. I just think that

20:47

aspect of what is really what is inside you,

20:50

what is internal. And there's a book

20:52

that I recommend for the

20:54

book with a mandation by

20:56

a guy called Byung Ho Chan called

20:58

Psychopolitics. And he talks a lot about

21:01

the internal, that internal

21:04

landscape that humans can generate

21:06

and grow and how

21:10

resistant it needs to be to this

21:13

flow, I guess, of stimulation

21:15

that we now get. So

21:18

I'm really about cultivating that

21:20

internal compass landscape, things that we

21:22

grew ourselves in the brain rather than just

21:24

imbibe through the eyes, you know. Are

21:27

you worried about our, or

21:30

humanity's, I guess the best

21:33

word for it would be addiction to

21:35

our devices? Yeah,

21:37

I am. I don't like how I feel when

21:40

my hand keeps, you

21:42

know, creeping away to my phone. And

21:44

I know it's my hand wanting a little

21:46

rush of dopamine. And it used to

21:49

come, I remember when we, they only sound like a

21:51

real old granny now, but I remember when the phone

21:53

used to ring in my house

21:55

and go, bring, bring, it was the phone. And of

21:57

course it was attached to its place in

21:59

the house. And there was

22:01

a little dopamine rush that the house got because oh,

22:03

it might be my friend. It might

22:05

be my gran. That was what the

22:07

phone meant when I was growing up. And then when I was a young

22:09

adult and the phone was still attached to the

22:11

wall and I was first working,

22:13

it was like, oh, somebody might want me.

22:15

I might get a job. That was

22:18

what the phone meant. It was bring, bring. Maybe there's a

22:20

project for me. Those little dopamine

22:22

rushes were few and far between. The phone didn't

22:25

ring that often during the day. But

22:27

now suddenly it's just on

22:29

tap. So I think, am

22:32

I worried? I guess I think we're in

22:34

a sort of corridor moment. We're in a

22:36

liminal moment where we are all as

22:38

a species having to adjust and we

22:40

know that our evolution, the evolution of

22:43

our bodies is so much slower. Our

22:45

chemical evolution is so much slower than

22:47

the evolution of our tools, which is

22:50

way faster than our chemical makeup can

22:52

keep up with. So we've

22:54

got this torrent of chemical

22:57

stimulation that we, I mean, if

23:00

we get through it, we will be more

23:02

resilient as a species. I guess, you

23:04

know, I had a choice of my own kids. Do

23:06

you just take the phone away or do you say,

23:08

no, listen, you're going to have to develop some resistance

23:11

to this. Otherwise you're just

23:13

going to long for it. So

23:16

I guess me, my kids, my mum, all

23:18

generations, we're trying to develop strategies

23:20

and skills to grow our inner

23:22

selves as a bulwark against the

23:25

torrent. That's how I feel. Yeah.

23:29

Dan Formosa, the designer, Dan Formosa,

23:31

he is one of

23:33

the world's tech pioneers. And

23:36

he said that he doesn't think that

23:38

people are really addicted to their devices

23:41

or the technology. They're really addicted

23:43

to the feeling that they get through the

23:46

technology. And I

23:48

try to hold on to that when I'm doom

23:50

scrolling. And

23:53

that maybe I just really need better connections

23:55

with humans than this specific

23:57

device. And I'm just using

23:59

it as a... stand-in that's not quite

24:01

as successful as I'd like it to

24:03

be. Yeah, I think we're

24:05

in a moment, aren't we? But

24:07

I'm optimistic that we'll find

24:10

somewhere good. We just need to keep

24:12

having conversations like this. We're all talking about it, aren't

24:14

we? We're all having the same conversation, and

24:16

that does need to change in my experience.

24:19

In an article that I read about

24:22

your involvement with this fear, you

24:24

talked about the iPhoneication of

24:27

the experience of being

24:30

at the sphere and seeing the

24:35

unbelievable explosion

24:38

of art and graphics where

24:40

you're fully immersed in this

24:42

environment. It is really transformational.

24:44

It does feel like either

24:46

a religious experience or a drug-induced

24:49

experience. It's really unlike

24:51

anything that has come

24:53

before it. I'm wondering

24:56

how you feel about the

24:58

throngs of people videotaping

25:00

while they're watching and

25:02

experiencing. I want to break that

25:04

into two parts, really, because when

25:07

I said it's like the iPhoneification of

25:09

concert design, I sort of meant that

25:12

when Johnny Ive designed the iPhone,

25:15

in a way, he'd sort of reached the N

25:17

plu's ultra of design of that object because it

25:20

was this infinity pool, this beautiful black thing. In

25:23

a way, no one's really gone

25:25

any further with it because it's like, okay, we

25:27

arrived. This is what this object needs to be

25:29

for now until it's in our body. This is as

25:32

edgeless as it can be, as infinity-edged

25:34

as it can be before it actually

25:37

migrates under the skin probably. We had

25:39

talked with Willie Williams, U2's creative

25:41

director, 10 years ago when

25:44

we were first working with U2. We

25:46

talked about the possibility and the

25:49

desire that we had for sound

25:52

and vision to coexist in one piece

25:54

of technology at a concert because it

25:56

irritated us that there

25:58

were two people up,

26:01

ladders and genies putting

26:03

truss up to hang giant great big speakers

26:07

in front of necessarily

26:09

other people up other ladders putting

26:11

up big screens. And

26:14

we longed for a video screen that

26:16

was permeable to sound. And we actually

26:18

commissioned a lot of research on this

26:21

with our colleagues who made a lot

26:23

of new video technology,

26:26

but they couldn't solve it for all

26:28

the frequencies for an outdoor concert. It

26:30

wasn't possible. And that's where

26:32

I think the sphere has iPhoneified

26:35

concert design. It has just

26:37

simply in an iPhone-y way combined

26:41

the thing you need to do at a concert, which

26:43

is to hear and the

26:45

thing you want to do at a concert, which is to see.

26:48

And it's done a sort of fine of physic, a

26:50

sort of aesthetic move where the

26:52

speakers, and I can't remember how many

26:54

thousands of them there are, but many

26:56

are behind the screen and the screen

26:59

is permeable to sound and that's brand

27:01

new. So that's one piece to

27:03

give you the other answer about how I feel about

27:05

the fact that certainly on

27:07

the opening night, I went back again just

27:09

before the closing and it was somewhat different

27:11

then, but certainly on the opening night, it

27:14

really was like being at in a film studio in

27:17

that everybody is holding their phone because this was

27:19

new. Everyone had to film it. And

27:21

listen, that's fine. Making a film, everybody becoming

27:24

a filmmaker is rather beautiful in its way,

27:27

but it does preclude dancing. And

27:29

if there's one thing I think will be put on

27:31

most of our gravestones, certainly mine if I died tomorrow

27:34

is had a cool life, but didn't dance

27:36

in it. So

27:39

I think who am I? Who am

27:41

I now? So I do think being

27:43

a filmmaker is cool. I don't even

27:45

mind being a self portrait filmmaker, although

27:48

I was at the weekend concert at

27:51

the Olympic Stadium. It

27:53

was a beautiful night, really beautiful.

27:56

And the lady in front of me had her camera pointing

27:58

to me all night. I was like, that's cool. weird.

28:00

And then I realized what it wasn't, it was pointed

28:02

at herself. And she was

28:04

filming herself in front of

28:06

the concert all night long. And

28:08

you could say that's a heroic and

28:11

majestic act of sustained self

28:13

portraiture in the School of

28:15

Dura and all the other great self portraits that

28:17

have been made. That's, that's, you

28:19

know, an important act. So that's a generous

28:21

way of putting it. I

28:26

have found life far more interesting when I

28:29

try to always find an alternative to

28:31

judging. I thought if I can be,

28:33

apply my curiosity, rather than my

28:36

judging bone, life

28:38

just becomes a bit more interesting. The

28:41

sphere is 360 feet tall. It has 580,000

28:43

square feet of fully programmable

28:50

LED exterior. And

28:53

it's a curved 160,000 square foot

28:57

screen inside. How

28:59

did you approach making this

29:02

level of artwork

29:05

for you two and for the

29:07

sphere? Well, first thing obviously

29:09

to say that this was very much

29:11

not something I did at all alone,

29:14

but the project was led by the

29:16

band and by their very long standing

29:18

creative director, Willie Williams, who has a

29:20

wonderful team called Treatment, who

29:22

are beautiful crafters of video. But

29:25

that band very broad in

29:28

their seeking when

29:30

they come to make a show. And

29:32

they gathered together a kind

29:34

of board, creative board that we have been

29:37

working together actually 10 years since the

29:39

Innocence and Experience Tour. So it's that same group.

29:42

And we spent three days

29:44

together and just

29:46

brainstormed ideas. And I think the first

29:49

thing we knew was there was a

29:51

concern that this giant object, what would

29:53

be the reception of it? Should the

29:56

world have it? Is it

29:58

a good thing to even be part of really? everyone

30:00

was questioning that. And

30:02

I think we wanted to declare

30:04

our awareness of its materiality, that

30:07

we weren't going to just treat

30:09

it as a portal to something. We were

30:11

going to start at the beginning by saying,

30:13

hey, we know the minerality of this thing.

30:15

We know what it took to build it.

30:18

We know the resources that have gone into

30:20

it, financial, mineral, human, planetary.

30:24

We know that there's a commitment to solar

30:26

power eventually, but that hasn't happened yet. When

30:29

you go in, the concretization

30:32

of it was very purposeful.

30:35

And actually, I went back the other day and someone

30:37

I was with said, oh, how are you going to

30:39

get rid of all the concrete panels to reveal the

30:41

LED? And the other person looked up and said, oh,

30:43

I didn't know it had a hole in the roof.

30:46

And I said, oh, yeah, the rain

30:48

sometimes comes in. So it's quite believable

30:50

when you walk in this concrete interior.

30:53

I say when you walk in, that shows now finished, but when

30:55

you walked in. And

30:57

then very purposeful, the splitting apart.

31:00

It's a gesture that's really important to

31:02

me, that line of light, I thought.

31:05

And obviously important to many other people

31:07

including Tadaowando and all sorts

31:09

of people, not just me. So splitting

31:11

the concrete apart to

31:13

then reveal the video. And then

31:15

ultimately, a gesture that Jim

31:18

Dolan and Bono had been clear on since

31:20

the very beginning of their conversations was that

31:23

they wanted to deconstruct the

31:25

sphere and reveal what you

31:27

would see if the sphere weren't there. So

31:30

this reveal of Las Vegas

31:32

built with such precision by industrial light

31:34

and magic deconstructs

31:36

itself. And

31:39

the way that they researched that, they

31:41

unbuilt every building in Las Vegas in

31:43

the order in which they were built

31:46

until you just got back to the planet,

31:48

the place on the planet where we are,

31:50

that space in the desert. None

31:52

of the lights, just that. And

31:55

then we went back ultimately to the species,

31:58

which also called that place. And I think

32:01

we were clear that we wanted to consecrate

32:03

the builder like a cathedral to make a

32:05

sort of offering and say, let's

32:08

dedicate and consecrate this building

32:10

to the species that call

32:12

this place home that don't have any say

32:14

in whether or not we use the sources to build

32:17

a giant dome. So

32:19

that's what that final Nevada arc gesture was

32:21

about. There were two things

32:23

that I was really

32:25

struck by regarding this sphere. One

32:28

is how much it takes

32:30

its shape and form from

32:32

a planetarium and

32:35

how you lose

32:37

sense of there being any boundaries

32:40

when you're in it. It just

32:42

feels as if you're in this

32:44

infinite space literally and figuratively. The

32:47

other thing I was thinking about was

32:50

how almost impossible

32:52

it feels to

32:54

make a film of this show. So

32:57

many shows turn into

32:59

films. Hamilton is even a film. And

33:03

so I was wondering if there was

33:05

any consideration of that when making

33:07

this. I think it's such

33:09

an interesting thought. I think we

33:11

were really focused on making the show, to be honest, in

33:14

the medium that it is. But I

33:16

think there is a version where you could play

33:18

the show as it is and

33:21

intercut it with footage of the

33:23

singers. And if you think about

33:25

it, if you're watching the show from the 400s

33:27

right at the back, which is where, frankly,

33:29

you get the best sense of the architectural

33:32

form of the place, then

33:34

your awareness of the people on the stage,

33:38

they take up a very small percentage

33:40

of your range of vision. So

33:43

if you were playing recorded sound as well

33:46

rather than live sound, I think you'd have

33:48

also a lot of different controls over

33:50

those speakers. I think that system can do a whole

33:53

load of things that we didn't do with it yet

33:55

because we were working with live sound. whole

34:00

nother level you can take it to when

34:02

you're working with recorded sound and

34:04

you would just place footage of the

34:06

performance within that film. I think

34:08

it would be pretty spectacular and hopefully make

34:11

it far more accessible to a lot of

34:13

people to come and see that work. You

34:16

know, even when the band aren't there, I think it's gonna

34:18

be pretty exciting actually for that. Tired

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That's paycom.com

35:33

slash soundrides. What

35:36

gave you the sense after Bristol that

35:38

you are now ready to be

35:42

fully immersed in studying art?

35:45

Well, actually I wasn't, I was such a

35:47

slow bloomer. So anyone who's listening to this

35:49

podcast who considers themselves to be a slow

35:51

bloomer, please join a very

35:53

big club. I didn't have a clue, honestly.

35:55

I didn't know what I wanted to do.

35:57

I knew I liked reading. And

36:00

I loved making artwork, that's all I knew.

36:03

But what I did do was I listened

36:05

to advice. And

36:08

somebody said to me when I had

36:10

just come back from visiting this beautiful

36:12

room at St. Martin's College, because

36:15

I had a place to go and do another, I was

36:17

going to do another three-year degree. You know, I

36:19

had done my three years of English. I'd

36:22

done one year of foundation course, which is very

36:24

general and a lovely course. And I was about

36:26

to do another three years. It

36:29

was only really a phone call from my then

36:31

boyfriend's dad, who said, when are you going to earn

36:33

some money? Because my son... I still

36:35

can't believe it. My son

36:39

can't support you anymore. Well,

36:41

it gave me a bit of a wake-up call. Anyway, I

36:44

did think I'd better get a job, because

36:46

I might be out of

36:49

the house. So I was

36:52

all set to do another three years. I was just

36:55

curious. I want to

36:57

try photography. I want to try printmaking. I want

36:59

to keep honing my painting skills. I was very

37:01

privileged, you know, that I had this boyfriend who

37:03

was older than me. Anyway,

37:05

I walked into another room on

37:08

the advice of several tutors. Different,

37:11

you know, in three different people send you to the

37:13

same place. You go, OK, I better send this out.

37:16

And I just walked in, and it was

37:18

a room I felt at home in, because

37:21

it was an extension of that corridor. I guess

37:23

there was a lot of different things happening at

37:25

once. There was people reading

37:27

poetry and listening to opera

37:29

and making costumes and making

37:32

little models with cardboard. It

37:35

had a kind of fog of people

37:37

hadn't slept or washed often, which I

37:39

kind of... Is this the monthly theater design

37:42

course that you did? That smell definitely defined

37:44

it for you, yeah. The old pot noodle.

37:47

It just felt suitably feral, and, you

37:50

know, that people were so passionate about what they

37:52

did that they weren't going to

37:54

leave. And actually, I'll be honest with you, I

37:57

was still uncertain, because it was a theater design course,

37:59

and I hadn't. really been to the theatre very much.

38:01

It wasn't, to be honest, I'd

38:03

been a few times, been to Pantomine when

38:05

I was a kid, a few musicals, Andrew

38:07

Lloyd Webber in the 80s I liked. I

38:11

didn't go to the theatre much. So I wasn't like, oh, I

38:13

want to do theatre. I thought it was a bit

38:15

old fashioned, to be honest, people shouting and

38:17

stuff and acting. So I wasn't obsessed

38:19

with that. So the thing that swung it

38:21

for me was that that

38:23

studio never closed. And I

38:25

knew that whatever I did, whenever

38:28

I was making anything, I would work all night at it.

38:31

And I thought, well, at least the studio, even if I don't

38:33

like the theatre thing, I'll have an all night studio.

38:35

Whereas that central St. Martin's one, they kicked you out

38:37

six, I was like, oh, that's the

38:40

decision then. But it was literally that arbitrary.

38:42

And I think that's worth saying as well, that

38:45

sometimes decisions that you make, even

38:47

if it feels a bit arbitrary, that you make

38:49

a decision based on what time the sugar's gonna

38:51

close, whether you like the feeling

38:53

smell of it. I think trust your instincts on

38:55

things like that, because it adds up

38:57

to a day to day and it adds up to a life and

38:59

it adds up to your life. So I

39:01

do think those choices about how you

39:03

will spend your day are pretty vital

39:06

in the detail. You

39:09

designed six pieces at Motley.

39:13

And at the end of the program, you

39:15

competed for the Limberry Prize for

39:17

stage design and won. This

39:20

gave you your first professional commission, Christopher

39:23

Marlow's, Edward II, at

39:25

the Bolton Octagon Theater in 1996. And

39:30

you built a giant white bathhouse for

39:32

the play and wanted the showers to

39:34

run red with blood. And the

39:37

plumbers at the Octagon said, it couldn't be done.

39:39

And I love this story because I feel like

39:41

it's sort of a wonderful

39:43

snapshot into your drive and

39:46

persistence. What was your response

39:48

to the plumbers? Well, to

39:50

understand the context of this, I'm from the South

39:52

of England And I had

39:54

a privileged upbringing in my way. Although

39:57

It wasn't so much money, there was

39:59

a sense. In the I was

40:01

still in education and here I am

40:03

arriving in the North of England and

40:05

I'm being thrust into this position does

40:07

have one a bloody competition in and

40:09

then the see put that who really

40:11

do not do that? hope they know.

40:13

How did he set design and not

40:15

at a plumbing and there's this little

40:17

thing showing up knowing. Nothing

40:20

but. Mighty. To term.

40:24

Sir. Sir Sir have the plumbing.

40:27

In the way that I wanted it

40:29

to look, even though it probably was

40:31

not the way that it should work

40:33

on. So that there was a kind of

40:36

the beginning of what. Against has persisted

40:38

throughout the practice of showing

40:40

up in situations where I

40:42

really don't know the techniques.

40:45

You know, I don't know

40:47

how to build the things

40:49

I design and make. I

40:51

don't know how they work

40:53

in detail on I am

40:55

absolutely more more I'm humbled

40:57

and respectful. Of those

40:59

people here know the intricacies.

41:02

Of house on the technology works and know

41:04

how to build things and everything but yeah

41:07

at the very beginning of my tribe probably

41:09

find look back now and so that person

41:11

anthony place in the mouth and doing with

41:13

come out we sat on the soft illness

41:15

but anyway federated with. Said. That

41:18

he will You spent the night. A thing

41:20

going through. Plumbing manuals to figure

41:22

out how it could indeed work.

41:24

And ultimately, you were able to get it to

41:26

work. Is that correct? The up with

41:28

sound way much bread many many people

41:31

helped. Is

41:33

it true that. You got your first job

41:35

with the director true been then be trading

41:37

him a letter. Oh My.

41:39

God. I was the arts letter writer.

41:41

I would write to everybody in I

41:44

I. I had done a few little

41:46

things at the beginning and. I had

41:48

love the pictures of them and I put

41:50

me in an envelope and I remember one

41:52

designer I wrote to saying please give me

41:54

a job anything anything and he very sweetly

41:56

when he saw me he said let this

41:58

said copies must be quite expensive. Made you

42:00

want a back. Excellent assault rifles.

42:04

But yeah, this is just persistent

42:06

arm and and I guess I

42:09

was. I was really longing. I

42:11

a taste of what it might be like

42:13

to make what then you know? Having not

42:16

really thought about it once I started. Making

42:19

work that on a T. I

42:21

can still remember the smell of

42:23

the angle grinder. Of the

42:25

steel in the workshop at the ball

42:27

to not gonna when I smell if

42:29

i go into a works of them

42:32

and i smell angle grinders and so

42:34

would source the smell of people making

42:36

stuff and makes me some p in

42:38

I am I guess I got addicted

42:40

to that pretty quickly. One

42:43

of. My. Favorite pieces

42:45

that you've created is the

42:48

worth that you did for

42:50

her the Ninety Ninety production

42:52

of Herald Countries paper trail.

42:55

Which is really been one of

42:57

my favorite place since I saw

42:59

the film in Nineteen Eighty Three

43:02

that start Jeremy Irons and Ben

43:04

Kingsley which I think is to

43:06

the one of the the great

43:08

movies of Iona last hundred years

43:11

or so. I think that it's

43:13

just a magnificent, magnificent play and

43:15

movie. Herald Center

43:17

employees were verse chronology in the

43:19

play so time does backwards and

43:21

in every. Production prior to

43:23

yours. The sets were very spares

43:26

am I saw production and New

43:28

York recently with Tom Hegel stand

43:30

where it was just a. Chair.

43:33

Chair. That was it. A black box at a

43:36

chair. It.

43:38

Is really amazing to to

43:40

see what you did herald

43:43

tint assistance the. He

43:46

didn't pay any attention any regard to

43:48

the states direction and you design the

43:50

fuck out of it. It's. Preserving

43:53

the best government as you get

43:55

for somebody like Herald better use

43:57

projector images of children between the

43:59

scene. conveyor belts and you

44:02

said you were inspired by Rachel White-Reid's

44:04

monumental 1993 sculpture, House.

44:07

Talk about how you approached that play

44:09

and sort of the courage that it

44:11

took to do something that really flew

44:14

in the face of everything that had come

44:16

before it in regards to not just

44:19

betrayal but just stage design. The

44:22

thing is it was all founded on

44:24

utter instinct and ignorance honestly. I

44:27

think it was a convergence of me literally

44:30

skipping. I skipped

44:32

when I came out of the meeting with Trevor

44:34

Nall and realized I was going to do this

44:36

project. For me it was such

44:39

a dream having just graduated

44:41

and done this prize project

44:43

that really pretty much a couple

44:45

of projects later was for me the epitome of

44:47

what I wanted to do at that time was

44:49

to work at the great National Theatre of Great

44:51

Britain. So I was excited

44:54

beyond belief and I

44:58

had a sense and this is very odd when I

45:00

look back at it now it's very strange but

45:03

weirdly the thing that I thought was most appropriate

45:05

when I read the play was

45:08

to perform it at

45:10

somebody's sculpture literally and that's

45:12

it's interesting that that was my thought. I

45:15

just thought where does this play need to happen and it

45:17

was very much in the press at the

45:20

time because Rachel White read a phenomenal artist.

45:23

It was a moment in the

45:26

90s where Britain was sort of emerging

45:29

from 20 years of conservative

45:32

Thatcherite politics and

45:35

there was an emergence of artists

45:37

they were called the YBA's the Young British Artist

45:39

and we felt a real sense of hope I

45:42

must say we felt really that the Tate Modern

45:44

was being planned it was to open in 2000

45:47

there was a real sense that our

45:50

country was finally changing real sense of

45:52

positivity and we

45:54

all got behind this sculpture that she made

45:56

it was so beautiful it was a monument

45:58

in the East End she filled a

46:00

house with concrete and then she took

46:03

the house away. This was a condemned house that

46:05

was about to be knocked down anyway. She

46:08

took the house away and it was

46:10

this exquisite sculpture of the volume of

46:12

time and space inside a building. It

46:15

was everything that I, what

46:17

we've been talking about on this

46:19

podcast, about houses

46:21

having life and voice.

46:25

And it was plungent, it was sad

46:29

as well as potent. And

46:32

to me, the piece that

46:34

Harrod had written, Betrayal, was

46:36

a series of rooms speaking. It

46:38

was rooms to me, I think it's quite a

46:41

particular take on it, but to me it was

46:43

rooms remembering. Rooms

46:45

remembering time and humans passing through rooms.

46:49

And I said to Trevor, why don't

46:51

we do the play at

46:54

this installation? And of course we couldn't because it

46:56

was outdoors and was about to be knocked down

46:58

anyway, or maybe already had

47:00

been knocked down. So I wrote to

47:02

Rachel and it was an odd thing to do seeing

47:04

as I was just beginning my practice, one would have

47:06

thought I might have wanted to make my own mark, but

47:09

I actually didn't. I just sort of wanted this thing

47:11

to happen. I said to Rachel,

47:13

can we make a wall that

47:15

remembers all of the locations in this

47:17

play in the style of

47:19

what you do? And she said, oh, absolutely

47:21

you have my blessing. Put it in the

47:23

programme. So we made a ball

47:26

of plaster and I went

47:28

and researched around London and found and

47:31

I didn't go to it, but I looked at pictures, found

47:34

exact photo-real references of

47:37

where we thought the play probably happened. And

47:40

then I made impressions of them onto

47:42

this concrete wall. And

47:45

then we also had the wall remember

47:47

by projecting onto it. We filmed, we

47:49

made a film actually. And

47:51

remember this was in the 90s, it was

47:54

very unusual to put projection in

47:56

a theatre. They weren't departments for that, you had

47:58

to sort of get an application. The

48:00

agency, the common. The

48:02

so expensive to pay for someone

48:05

can make a film to put

48:07

on your face to face project

48:09

is a big noisy little complicated

48:11

it and we films Trevor Nones

48:14

children. And and the children.

48:16

So he made a hold on a

48:18

family movie out of it. Ah man.

48:20

and we had the furniture passing through.

48:23

And actually the soul of the peace. Because

48:25

in my mind, again, just because I was

48:27

just. Like my instinct

48:29

was to just associate and because it

48:32

has some features made out of says

48:34

to complete. The National

48:36

Theatre bears the imprint of the

48:38

make Him for National Theatre is

48:40

got that sorted Fly impression on

48:42

the concrete said to me was

48:44

already halfway there. I was

48:46

conflate in their. Architecture. The

48:49

building with a piece of concrete that remember.

48:51

Place isn't to me, it just seemed like obvious this

48:53

is how at to be done. But

48:55

obviously. It is probably

48:57

the last thing that poor play needed for

48:59

it is so have survived. Think. I

49:02

love the fact that after the play

49:04

Harold Pinter introduced you to someone on

49:06

opening night and said have you met

49:09

as Devlin She wrote the play essence

49:11

of as Possible Copper I think you

49:13

could give a successful you get sesame

49:15

of back. And at one more

49:17

of a sophomore a slap the

49:19

of anyway. I'll take it. In

49:23

the New Yorker, writer Andrew Oh.

49:25

Haggan in wrote that each of

49:27

your designs is an attack on

49:29

the notion that is set is

49:31

merely scenery and when you first

49:33

started in this into see as

49:35

set design was not supposed to

49:37

be it's own character. give this

49:39

story away or turn everything into

49:41

metaphors that could take the audience

49:44

out of the play. You.

49:47

Don't do that, but your sets are

49:49

very much of the play and in

49:52

the play. How are you able to

49:54

avoid taking the audience out of the

49:56

play? As of really

49:58

that question. Is goes to the S. of

50:00

the mystery, I guess, or the technique or the practice

50:02

of what we're trying to do. And

50:05

yeah, the way I was taught was

50:08

definitely don't shout too loud, do

50:10

less. But equally, I

50:13

was also taught that the answers

50:15

will be in a process.

50:17

So if you read the text, if you research,

50:20

and if you start with nothing and see what

50:23

you really need, and I guess adding

50:26

a layer, not just responding to the

50:28

text and what it needs, but also being

50:30

cognizant of what the space needs. I

50:33

walk into a room and treat each space

50:35

as a patient, you know, when I come back, my

50:37

family laughs at me, when I come home, I immediately

50:39

go around the room and move just a few things

50:42

that really annoy me or the lights have to be

50:44

a certain way. So

50:46

I think spaces, you know, look for

50:48

correction or, you know, help

50:50

medicine. So I think you can

50:52

respond to the space, as well as the play and how

50:55

the play meets the space or the music or the artwork,

50:57

whatever it is you're putting into space.

51:00

And I think you respond to a

51:02

moment, you know, it's not

51:04

just the moment when the piece was written or

51:06

the songs written or the artwork was written. It's

51:08

the moment that you are communicating with

51:11

a group of people. And I think the

51:14

more and more actually, I realized

51:16

how precious you know, I sort of fell

51:18

into theatre. But now after 30

51:20

years, I realize having done many other

51:22

things, how unique, rare

51:25

and precious it is for

51:27

a group of people to gather together.

51:30

And as my friend Lindsay Turner,

51:32

the director says, still the ego for the

51:34

greater good. So

51:38

unusual that we and she puts it like

51:40

this very brilliantly. She

51:43

said we all agree, the actors

51:46

agree that they'll pretend the audience aren't there,

51:48

the audience will agree to pretend that they're

51:50

not there. Everyone agrees to do

51:52

it at 730. We all still

51:55

the ego for the greater good. And when

51:57

you are sitting watching a play, or

52:00

any performance really. The opportunity for

52:02

things to go wrong every

52:05

single second is so

52:07

multi-vastered. The opportunity for humiliation

52:09

for all concerned. The

52:12

fact that we all keep the balloon in the

52:14

air, we will keep blowing the balloon up

52:16

together, is a very

52:18

beautiful human thing. I

52:21

really more and more value that presence, even to

52:23

be honest. Even if I go to a theater,

52:25

it's not very good. Sometimes

52:27

I just, I went to see a play straight

52:29

after lockdown, I was just so excited to be

52:31

in a theater. The play wasn't

52:34

very good, but the audience was

52:36

so beautiful. I was like,

52:38

I'm loving this audience, but don't really matter about

52:40

play, they were so quiet. They

52:42

were so connected to one another. They were all,

52:45

sometimes an audience is doing something

52:48

which is just tolerating. Sometimes

52:50

you can hear the sound and the

52:53

beauty of an audience tolerating

52:55

a second rate bit of work from

52:57

a first-class artist. They know the artist

52:59

is brilliant, they put faith in them, they believe in

53:01

them, they've all turned out for them. They know that

53:04

this night just isn't quite working, but

53:06

there's a beautiful sound of audiences

53:08

being patient. And it's so rare. As

53:11

you've since gone on to design

53:13

more than 50 theatrical productions, that

53:15

does not include hundreds of other

53:18

projects in opera, dance, film. And

53:20

as I mentioned in the intro, ceremonies

53:22

like the Olympics and the Super

53:25

Bowl, you've collaborated with Jay-Z and

53:27

Beyonce, YouTube,

53:29

Billie Eilish, Adele, Miley Cyrus, Shakira

53:31

the Weeknd, Lenny Kravitz, Dua Lipa,

53:33

Lady Gaga. What

53:36

is it like going from

53:38

a small black box theater to

53:42

creating sets for audiences of

53:45

what can sometimes be 100,000 people? Well,

53:49

the logistics of

53:51

a touring concert are brutal,

53:55

because the main thing that has to happen is people have to

53:57

be able to put it in a truck in

53:59

a really tight way. amount of time and get it out of a

54:01

truck in a really tight amount of time

54:03

and get it up and get it safe. And

54:06

it has to do a job of broadcasting the

54:08

music and often an image of

54:10

the performer. So there's quite a

54:12

lot of constraint to that aspect of my practice.

54:16

That said, when you are among a

54:18

crowd of up to 100,000 people or going off, I mean,

54:20

we just

54:23

did the Bad Bunny concert open in Salt

54:26

Lake City recently and is now Toy America.

54:29

And to that audience, I must say,

54:31

I hadn't experienced that particular audience before.

54:33

Every audience is a different species in

54:35

itself. And this audience was so joyous,

54:38

so joyous. It was

54:40

luminous to be there. And

54:42

yet the concentration you get when everybody

54:45

is focused on a text in a

54:47

small theater, like The

54:49

Hunt we have on at the moment, actually in New

54:51

York at the Sands Warehouse, I think

54:53

that only thinks about 250 or 300 people are filming very small. And

54:57

a concentration that you can't, you know, no

55:00

one's breathing barely. And then actually,

55:02

there are some plot points in that that are somewhat

55:04

shocking. I mean, not in a terrible way, but they

55:06

surprise you. And the audience, you can

55:08

hear them go all together. You

55:11

know, it's very beautiful to be part of an

55:13

audible gasp, you know, just in a plot point.

55:17

Yeah. And I want

55:19

to talk to you about your

55:21

book, your first monographic museum exhibition

55:23

at the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design

55:25

Museum. It has

55:27

an accompanying 900 page monograph. Both

55:32

the show and the book are titled An

55:34

Atlas of Es Devlin. And it's

55:37

a survey of the last three decades

55:39

of your practice. Is

55:41

it true that the book took nearly

55:43

seven years to complete and was much

55:45

harder than you expected to make? It

55:48

did. It took seven years. My kids kept

55:50

saying every day as we got close to the end,

55:52

that if you finished it, yeah, you finished it. I

55:55

mean, it was such an

55:57

immense undertaking. And it's shocking in a

55:59

way. in the – if you think of

56:02

these big stadium things and this is just

56:04

one little book, it was

56:06

like an implosion. Well,

56:09

it's sort of a wonder –

56:11

it's almost like a show in and of itself. It's

56:13

in this box. You take it out of the box.

56:15

There's a wonderful video on your website of

56:18

some of the making and the gluing

56:20

and the inserting and the book was

56:22

designed by your cousin Daniel Devlin and

56:24

it includes 700 color images.

56:28

It documents 120 projects. It

56:31

includes pullouts, acetates, accordion folds and

56:33

even a limited edition print which

56:36

was a big surprise and very

56:38

exciting for me. You've

56:40

described the book as a sculptural object that

56:42

required you and your team to get

56:45

under the bonnet of how a book

56:47

works. What did you discover in

56:49

that process? Oh my God. I

56:51

mean every time – I feel that humans

56:54

are out there most vibrant

56:56

when they don't – you know, they're curious and

56:58

they don't quite know. You don't quite know enough.

57:00

You're just a little bit out

57:02

of your depth and certainly I was

57:05

because there are a whole set of rules

57:07

to making books and actually it's

57:09

a little bit akin to learning

57:12

music because when you learn

57:14

music, you have to learn what the bass

57:16

clef does and the treble clef and a

57:18

four-four time signature and literally in the books, as

57:20

you probably know, they're made up of signatures and

57:23

it has to be a multiple of eight, sixteen,

57:25

four and so you have to get yourself into

57:27

this sort of time signature of eight. I

57:30

had a sense seven years ago I made a mock-up of

57:32

this book seven years ago which didn't look

57:34

that different to what we have so I knew

57:36

the kind of sculptural object but

57:40

of course that was just the sort

57:42

of shell of a book I needed then to work

57:45

out how I was going to organize the

57:47

stuff in the book and

57:49

how I would make it look like the object I

57:51

was dreaming of with the stuff that I had and

57:54

every version that I made of it made

57:56

beautiful mock-ups but they were just

57:59

sort of exhausted. to experience, you would

58:01

open it and you'd go through it all.

58:03

And the way we were originally organising it

58:06

was for each project we would show a

58:08

little bit of text, a little bit of

58:10

drawing, a little bit of photographs,

58:12

and then we'd go on to the next one. And

58:15

it was like going breakfast, lunch, dinner, breakfast, lunch,

58:17

dinner, breakfast, lunch, dinner until you wanted to basically

58:19

vomit. So I hit scrap

58:22

now. I said,

58:24

actually, let's treat it like an

58:26

event, like a day. Let's

58:29

say you start in the morning and you're in

58:31

a studio and you're just

58:33

looking at the drawings. So you keep

58:35

a unity of type

58:37

of material that's in that first part of the

58:40

book. So it's mainly stuff that I've drawn in

58:42

the first chunk of the book. And

58:44

then I became obsessed that

58:46

I couldn't deal with the white

58:49

area around the objects

58:51

that I wanted to show in the

58:53

book. So if I had a drawing,

58:55

I didn't understand what the white frame

58:57

was around the drawing. I couldn't

59:00

figure it out. So I figured

59:02

out that I needed portrait pages

59:05

and landscape pages and

59:07

square pages to accommodate different

59:09

items. And that

59:11

there were some drawings that I didn't

59:14

feel were good enough or made sense on

59:16

their own, but they were interesting if you could

59:18

see them in sequence as

59:20

a storyboard, as a

59:22

kind of graphic of unfolding

59:25

of time. So I wanted

59:27

to have these unfolding long landscape

59:31

presentations. And

59:33

that was, of course, all impossible to

59:35

do within a book that I was

59:38

keen to cost. At the beginning, I wanted it

59:40

to be £50, which

59:42

weirdly on Amazon, I just checked and it was like

59:44

$88, which isn't far off £50. So

59:46

I'm pretty pleased about that. But

59:49

just the limited edition print is

59:51

worth it. I think it's the

59:53

bargain. And Amazon both run. So

59:56

then I realised that, you know, first it

59:58

was all impossible impossible. But

1:00:01

then Thames and Hudson and Daniel figured out

1:00:03

that we could maybe do the things I

1:00:05

wanted as long as they rigorously

1:00:08

stuck to this time code signature

1:00:10

of the foldouts could happen as long

1:00:12

as they only happened every 16 pages. But

1:00:15

then of course the stuff that I

1:00:17

had chronologically, you know,

1:00:19

I didn't happen to have a project

1:00:22

with a beautiful set of storyboard images every 16

1:00:24

pages, you know. So I had to

1:00:27

really fiddle with the chronology to make

1:00:29

sure it stayed chronological pretty much and

1:00:31

fit it into the different rigid chronology

1:00:33

of the book. Anyway, you

1:00:35

get through the white part, then you

1:00:37

get to this kind of hiatus, which was the

1:00:40

lockdown. Because of course mass

1:00:42

gatherings, which is my practice across any

1:00:44

genre, is pretty much mass gatherings. And

1:00:47

as you know, they became temporarily extinct

1:00:49

for a number of years. So

1:00:52

that's the sort of chunk of the

1:00:54

book, like a missing tooth. And

1:00:56

that's just me talking to colleagues and

1:00:59

friends. And then you come out the

1:01:01

other side, and you go into a

1:01:03

segment of the book that's all really comes

1:01:05

back to the beginning of this conversation, that

1:01:08

line of light I saw when I was a

1:01:10

kid, just going through different forms, all emerging out

1:01:12

of darkness. And then the

1:01:14

final segment is just colour. That

1:01:17

organisation of works, as if you're

1:01:19

finally having been in the studio,

1:01:21

you've gone to the theatre or cinema, and

1:01:23

now you're finally in the art gallery or

1:01:25

on the stage, you're

1:01:27

sublimated in colour at the end of the

1:01:29

book. So once

1:01:32

I got that organising principle at last, you

1:01:34

could read it and only

1:01:37

be somewhat exhausted, not completely

1:01:39

exhausted. Our

1:01:41

exhibit at the Cooper Hewitt

1:01:43

features many, many project models,

1:01:46

a remarkable replica of your

1:01:48

studio, which is very

1:01:50

interesting to see you in your

1:01:52

studio now and have seen you

1:01:55

in your studio there. Hundreds

1:01:58

of sketches, multiple screens. of

1:02:00

motion graphics and films. And you

1:02:02

and the curators map through lines

1:02:04

connecting your teenage paintings to your

1:02:07

stage designs, to your contemporary

1:02:09

installations. And it

1:02:11

also features archive material that had

1:02:13

been living in storage. Now,

1:02:16

is it true that some of the work in the

1:02:19

show was discovered in the many garbage

1:02:21

bags full of art? You

1:02:23

got back from your long ago ex-boyfriend whose

1:02:25

father told you to go find a job? I

1:02:28

love this story. I love this. I

1:02:30

know. May he be greatly thanked

1:02:32

to remember Clive Martin, my boyfriend

1:02:34

of 13 years. He, when

1:02:37

we very amicably parted ways, I

1:02:41

moved on and didn't think about stuff,

1:02:43

objects. I was moving on to different

1:02:45

places and things. And

1:02:47

years later, when he sold the house that

1:02:49

we had been living in, he

1:02:51

came around to my house with two

1:02:54

giant garbage bags or more. And it

1:02:56

was probably more like six giant garbage

1:02:58

bags. And he said, oh,

1:03:00

I was just clearing out the attic and I found this stuff.

1:03:02

Do you want it? I said, oh, sure.

1:03:04

I just put it in another storage, an

1:03:06

attic where I was living next. But

1:03:09

it was everything that is in that show. Everything

1:03:12

that is in that second room with all the kind of stuff I made

1:03:14

when I was 13, 14, 15. So

1:03:18

the moral of the story is don't chuck your kids

1:03:20

stuff away, parents. And don't chuck

1:03:22

your own stuff away, kids. Keep your

1:03:25

stuff. When

1:03:27

I saw you speak at the Cooper Hewitt when

1:03:29

the show first opened, you stated

1:03:31

that most everything in the show no

1:03:33

longer exists in physical form and

1:03:36

that most of what you've created over

1:03:38

the last four decades doesn't really exist

1:03:40

anymore. How do you hope

1:03:43

your work will endure? It's

1:03:45

such a good point. And I think that

1:03:47

is the great medicinal quality of the book

1:03:50

for me. It has had such a

1:03:52

positive effect on me

1:03:54

personally. I think I'm just calmer

1:03:57

having made it because it's

1:03:59

a work. way to gather the threads

1:04:01

of myself that I have, I

1:04:04

think, quite purposefully threaded in

1:04:06

in life and time and to

1:04:09

view, to actually see really, it's a lens. The book

1:04:11

has become a bit of a lens to see what

1:04:13

I've been doing. So

1:04:15

in many ways I think the book's most important thing

1:04:17

for me that I've made, even though it's very

1:04:20

small compared to the big things. The

1:04:23

last thing I want to ask you about is

1:04:25

something you stated about how we

1:04:27

name ourselves. You state, pay

1:04:30

a lot of attention to how you name

1:04:32

yourself and don't limit the naming of

1:04:34

yourself. You can be multi-hyphenate. Anything

1:04:37

can be encapsulated between the hyphens

1:04:40

of the title that you give yourself and

1:04:42

you can change it daily. And I

1:04:45

love that. I think it should be on a t-shirt. How

1:04:49

has naming yourself

1:04:51

over time helped you

1:04:53

form who you are now? I think

1:04:56

you're so right to pick up on this and I

1:04:58

think it's not just naming of self, which I

1:05:01

will come back to to answer your question, but

1:05:03

it's also a daily practice

1:05:06

of naming, learning

1:05:08

people's names and

1:05:10

of naming projects as well. I'm

1:05:13

a real sticker for changing the

1:05:15

title of an email. You

1:05:17

know, if an email has started to just thread

1:05:20

on and on and it's called something that doesn't

1:05:24

really honor and

1:05:26

express what the endeavor is, then

1:05:28

I change the title and

1:05:31

give it a name that I consider to be

1:05:33

honorable and consider to be communicative of what the

1:05:35

endeavor really is. And

1:05:37

in terms of one's own name,

1:05:40

you feel, I think, quite

1:05:42

nervous about trying

1:05:45

to have a bearing

1:05:48

on what people call you and how

1:05:50

people express what you do. So

1:05:52

we're sometimes a bit trepidatious about it. I

1:05:55

know I was when I made a first project

1:05:57

in 2016 that really was a big mirrored art

1:05:59

in the world. installation. And

1:06:01

they put a little sign outside it, the commissioners

1:06:03

and they said about the artists and I was

1:06:06

really flustered. I thought, Oh,

1:06:08

you can't say that people call me some jumped up

1:06:10

set designer, it'll be really embarrassing. You can't do

1:06:12

that. And they said, No, no, we've

1:06:14

paid for this art. And you made us a piece of art.

1:06:17

And you'll be the blood. You know, they were like,

1:06:19

no, no, we've got to be an artist. So,

1:06:22

and they were also very nice about it.

1:06:25

They said, No, you should just and

1:06:27

no one batted an eyelid. You know,

1:06:29

in such a world where when

1:06:31

you do stick your head above the parapet, sometimes

1:06:33

quite easy to get shot down, but no one

1:06:35

is how to go at me about it. So

1:06:38

I just pressed on. And it

1:06:40

makes you feel different. As

1:06:43

Devlin, thank you for making so

1:06:45

much work that matters. And thank

1:06:47

you for joining me today on

1:06:49

this. It's been such

1:06:51

a pleasure. Thank you. You

1:06:54

can see the exhibit and atlants of this

1:06:56

government at the conference of students through August

1:06:58

11, 2024. To read more about

1:07:02

as Devlin you can go to as Devlin.

1:07:06

This is the 19th year we've been podcasting design

1:07:08

matters. And I'd like to thank you for listening.

1:07:11

And remember, we can talk about making a difference,

1:07:13

we could make a difference, or we

1:07:15

can do both. I'm Debbie Millman and I'm looking forward

1:07:17

to talking with you again. Design

1:07:21

Matters is produced for the TED audio

1:07:23

collective by Curtis Fox Productions. The

1:07:26

interviews are usually recorded at the Masters in

1:07:28

Branding program at the School of Visual Arts

1:07:30

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1:07:32

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1:07:35

Editor in Chief of Design Matters Media

1:07:37

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