Philip Clausen makes art out of home furnishings carved from huge pieces of wood full of burl. I made this portrait of him as he discussed the scale of the ornate housing for a dumb-waiter that stands before him. This picture has interchangeable contexts and subjects. We can say it is a picture of a piece of art, with the artist shown as context. Or we can look at it as a portrait of Philip Clausen, and use the wood as context for his art. I prefer to see it as an environmental portrait, wrapping the artist in wood both in the foreground and the background. I like the way he took possession of the wood as he talked with us – it is a piece of him as well as piece of art. I stressed the context here – it is much larger than the man himself. Yet it serves as an extension of the man as an artist.




(A sad post-script to this image: On October 23, 2014, eight years after I made this photograph, I received an email from Philip Clausen’s daughter in law. She told me that Philip had recently died, and that the Clausen family wanted to use this image at his memorial service, and for his obituary. She said “of all the images we are looking at, we feel that yours really captured his spirit.” I sent her a copy of the photograph, and told her that I was honored to be of help to the family. Philip Clausen was 88 years of age, and he did not die a natural death. He perished in a fire. His studio, home, and all of his unsold work were destroyed. The piece of wood that he holds in this image is now ash. In the face of such tragedy, this photo assumes an additional dimension and purpose. It recalls this artist as he lived and worked, and in its own way, it will serve to keep his memory alive for those who knew him.)