The Talking Room: Adam Savage Interviews Tom Sachs
Tom Sachs is a New York-based sculptor, artist, and maker of wonderful things. His works include meticulously detailed foam core architecture and Space Program: 1:1 scale recreations NASA vehicles and equipment. Join Adam Savage for a conversation with Tom Sachs on the culture of making, contemporary art, Tom’s studio environment, and many other shared obsessions.
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Holy crap, this was unexpected, I was hoping for a Sachs visit/interview… and given that I’m about to pull an all-nighter this is perfect timing. :p
Oh wow, much respect to this interview. Didnt know these two were associated. Love this!
Any chance that these Talking Rooms can be made into podcasts?
I went to see the Victory Boogie Woogie, love the tape structure on it! Didn’t know there was also a Broadway Boogie Woogie 🙂
Wow, fascinating! I love this video series, it feels really intimate.
wait….”our friend, Ricky Jay” – Adam, you are friends with Ricky Jay?! Quick! Get Ricky to the Talking Room!!! …..pls.
Best.One.Yet.
I love the gun talk! Totally unexpected, but it’s always been hard for me to justify how much I love guns as objects because I’m not a gun-nut in the usual sense and I’m, you know, kind of a liberal. But real guns, sci-fi guns, blasters, it’s all just way too cool. The hall of weapons at the Ford Museum, for instance, is one of my favorite collections of “stuff” in the world.
The extended Barbie commentary was good too. This interview is chock full of otaku obsession, love it.
lolz at “It’s a very toxic thing that should only be done recreationally”
That architect reminds me of The Fountainhead. I feel like there’s not enough respect for how something works and how its built…. maybe it comes from being an engineer.
In n Out fries are bad? I think they are awesome!
I did the Barbie thing too as a kid.
wow that was great, I had herd of Tom Sachs but I didn’t know Adam would be such a good interviewer for this.
Still watching, but the brief discussion of ADHD medication piked my interest. I’ve been taking various medications for my ADHD for the last 10 years or so; and I won’t pretend I know everything, but I’d like to give Adam one nugget of advice in relation to his child’s ADHD: I have tried 4 different medications so far, only 1 has actually worked, but while taking all of them I could have sworn they were working fine. If you haven’t already, I suggest you test out a few different options unless you think your son’s ADHD is very well controlled already.
A really fascinating interview, thank you!
I must say, I’ve enjoyed the hell out of every one of these Talking Room episodes. Keep up the great work!
Absolutely wonderful talk. Honestly, you guys had me at welding and then it just got better from there…
Speaking of welding definitely set up the TIG. TIG is like a magic ray gun compared to MIG. I learned to TIG weld while building a friend’s race car chassis and I couldn’t believe how much more control I had. My friend had this old welder that used to belong to Schwinn- the thing was the size of a swamp cooler but it still worked really well. Gas welding is probably the hardest to do but for certain applications it’s the way to go. If you TIG weld Aluminum sheet and then try to form it the weld can crack but if you gas weld it the weld is much more ductile so it’s more forgiving to form.
This was by far, the best episode of this series.
The bins of what?! THE BINS OF WHAT?!?!
Amazing interview! I went and watched the 10 bullets and color videos, which also were great. Makes me want to come up with a “Code” for my shop as well. The idea of forced limitations on materials and color is very intriguing. In today’s landscape of nearly infinite choices, a structure system like that could be very refreshing.
Although I saw this when it was just posted….which my mind was instantly blown hearing the Sachs interview. Another tech site picked up your interview (Gizmodo) today. Hopefully we’ll see The Talking Room becoming a podcast sometime soon.
I think that this site (tested.com) might beone of the very best sites out there, no joke.
The amount of knowledge, skill and pure “know-how” present(ed) here, is astounding. In addition, these clips and interviews take the time to show every aspect of the build or process of thought, or in general the train of thought, from idea to finished product, and you guys don’t rush through it, but take your time! I find that to be very satisfying and kind of calming.
This is now my favourite site, and I eagerly await every new episode.
Sicerely,
K (Norway)
I know this interview has been up for a long time, but I just watched it and have a question. Tom mentions looking something up in “that book” at 19:19. Does anyone know what book he’s referring to?
he’s referring to the duchamp bio
I just realized where the inspiration of a certain project in The Fountainhead came from…. The Habitation (not sure how to change the spelling to make it French) is where Roark’s low-rent housing (which was likewise massacred) was pulled directly from.
On the subject of ADD … I had it before there was a name for it. Since there were no medications at that time I was, fortunately, never drugged. I have one advice for those dealing with it or who have a loved one who has it … it is not a “disease”. It is a way of being. Different brains work differently and where some (lazy teachers) see “disease” others with more open minds see “opportunity”. I won’t bother going into the endless list of creative people who identify as having ADD, but I will point out that those who were not drugged, developed coping skills that gave them tools for a lifetime. One example: I could never do arithmetic. In order to cope, I broke a problem like 2×11 into (2×10)+(2×1) which I could do in my head much quicker than you’d think. Those two problems are identical except that the second is actually an algebraic formulation that I was using some years before teachers thought we were old enough to deal with algebra.