The two artists – who trained together in the early 60s – discuss understanding the world through mass, weight and gravity
Michael Craig-Martin: I saw the current show at Gagosian in New York, the double gallery show. And to be honest, Richard, I’ve seen an amazing number of your shows. I’ve probably seen more of your shows than anybody else. I saw the show in the Castelli Warehouse in New York. It was with the lead pieces.
Richard Serra: You saw that?
MCM: I saw that show in 1969.
RS: Those are the beginnings.
MCM: Well, the only way I know how to do this, Richard, is by asking you things that genuinely interest me. And one of them is when we first knew each other. We’ve known each other for a very long time.
RS: Probably 35, 40 years.
MCM: More, since 1961. We had both arrived as students at the Yale School of Art. You were starting your postgraduate MFA course, while I was a very green and naive undergraduate. Because there were less than half a dozen undergraduates, they had no course for us, so we were simply thrown in among you graduate students to sink or swim. So we shared the same studios, the same courses and the same teachers, and that’s how we got to know each other. And, of course, your commitment was so total and so passionate. I’d never experienced anything like that with anybody.
RS: Yale was a very competitive place. It wasn’t until I left that I realised what an extraordinary time it had been and what extraordinary people had been there. If you think about it, Brice Marden, Chuck Close and myself all ended up having shows at the Museum of Modern Art, and that’s out of one class.