Martin Puryear: Stone Carving  ART21: What was the process like,
for the stone piece in Japan?  PURYEAR: I think the big
challenge was that it was a piece that was carved. And I have
spent most of my working life making work that may seem to be
carved but which in fact is constructed, made from parts and put
together. And although this was made from eighteen blocks
assembled, essentially the process of shaping the blocks was one
of carving from solid material. And I haven’t carved stone since
I left college, really. And of course, with a piece of this
scale, the carving is done industrially at a big stone
fabricator facility and requires diamond tools and water and
everything, to do it efficiently.  I had to find a way to really
transmit my idea as an artist to artisans and on an industrial
scale. Which required making the wooden model at one-tenth
scale, which was carved from solid blocks, assembled exactly
like the blocks would be assembled in the ultimate stone piece.
Because the model was done exactly to