January  2008

 

Philippe Truffault: As I told you, the main topic on this film is the Paris crystal skull, which is in the Musée du Quay Branly. Did you hear about this museum?

 

John LeKay: Yes, and I also know about the Paris crystal skull, I’ve seen images of it.  I haven’t actually seen the real piece and haven’t been to that museum, but I’ve seen photographs of that crystal skull.

 

Philippe Truffault: I’ve sent you some of the photographs made by Man Ray in the twenties, did you see it?

 

JL: Yes

 

Philippe Truffault: He was especially interested in the glances, in the transparencies made by that skull.

 

JL: Right! I think a lot of artists have been fascinated by that for a very long time, by the various crystal skulls, so I’m not surprised!

 

Philippe Truffault: When you say in your video of your skulls, "that the crystal has its own life, and it's growing and doing things through the years", do you mean you have a special process to work on it or is it a natural way?

 

JL: Well it’s a very slow, gradual process. I mean, the way that I usually work with it, well at first, is: I would take a big block, like a piece probably about this size, and carve it, and the method that I use, is just using an ordinary chisel, a chisel I would use for sculpting wood. Because this material is pretty malleable and it’s not so hard, it is a little bit brittle, but I could carve away at it - carve right into it and gauge out the eyes, the mouth. 

 

For the noses - that I added on later.  I had to actually (kind of) stick them on with the material, by melting it down.

 

So it’s a pretty in-depth process. And each piece would probably take me say two to three days. I would work on a piece at a time. The process where it develops and grows crystals, that’s a whole other story altogether.  That happens by just leaving it alone, or by shining lights on it, very powerful lights. Another way is to put it in heated rooms, and the temperature of the room will increase the crystal growth, and so will very bright lights. So I’ve experimented with that.
 

I also experimented with the material by leaving it in sunlight. The problem with leaving it in sunlight is the growth of the crystals is so rapid, it would completely cover the windows of the vitrine within a day or so, or within hours; and the problem with that is that you can’t see the actual piece. So sunlight isn’t a really good way of doing it. 

 

What I meant by it having a life of its own, is that it’s perpetually growing these crystals and it just happens naturally by itself.  And in that sense, I see that these pieces are like constantly changing, so they are kind of alive in a way.

 

That’s what really fascinated me about it; actually creating something that keeps changing and developing, and metamorphosizing into a completely different piece. So that’s really what I meant by it having a life of its own.

Philippe Truffault: But the skulls, like in the British Museum, or in Paris are made of crystal too, and they are not changing, through the ages. The process is the same?

 

JL: Yes, well the ones that are in the Museum, like the Mitchell-Hedges skull at the British Museum, is quartz crystal, so it’s crystal, but it’s a very solid, very hard material. So the way I look at it is crystal.  Even quartz is developed in a very slow way.

 

If you think about a diamond, the way a diamond is formed, is through millions of years in the ground, and through the tremendous pressure of the earth, that it hardens into this beautiful diamond. And so a diamond is also a very natural crystal, I mean all crystals are.

 

This material is chemical, but it’s related to the carbon ring, and it’s created through you know,  the benzene ring. 

 

So if you kind of break it down, it goes back to the same elements, more or less. So there is a relation to all kinds of crystals and organic matters.

 

If you take coal, for example, the way coal is formed, is through vegetation, and through trees, and through leaves and through, you know, thousands of years, until it develops into coal. Diamonds and coal are made out of the same element. Carbon. Pure graphite made of decayed organic matter.  And out of coal, you make benzene, and you make these other materials that go into paradichlorobenzene. So if you really think about it, the way it’s all related, and how it’s made, it’s pretty fascinating! 

 

Philippe Traufault: So if I understand I come back to your work on skulls, you’re carving them like any other sculpture; do you have a video of that process, you working on a molding of a skull?

 

JL:  I’m going to be making some new ones from these molds I made a while back, which I never actually poured. So what I can do, is I can show you a video of it.

 

The way that I’m doing it now is pouring it into a mold.  When I am carving it, (which is a very long and very tedious process and I’m also exposed to the chemicals) I wear a mask and protective clothing and gloves. But by pouring it into molds, it simplifies the process.  Because basically what I do is I heat the material at a certain temperature, melt it down, pour it into the mold, leave it for two to three days, outside, especially in the winter time it’s easy in the cold.  I then break open the mold and rework it a little bit with a chisel and some other tools that I have.

 

But I can make a video and show it to you, of the process, step by step, so you can see exactly how it’s done.

 

Philippe Truffault: Yeah, it’s fun, I would like to see that. When would you do that?

 

JL: I can do it this week-end, I think. I should be ready to do it. The one I’m going to be actually working on is a skull. It looks very similar to the Mitchell-Hedges skull. The mouth is closed and the teeth are together, so there’s no gap in the teeth. It’s just a very simple skull. This is kind of based on the Mitchell-Hedges and the other skulls.

 

Philippe Truffault: It’s a long time you’ve been working with skulls, I’ve understood it’s from the nineties? What brought you to the skulls?

 

JL: Actually, I mean, artists have been using skulls for hundreds of years, it’s very traditional. There’s a painting by Cézanne, a skull with a still life, that he did. 

 

There’s also a Van Gogh painting that I really love, it’s a skull, I think it’s with a cigarette.

It’s really those paintings that inspired me to really want to think about working with skulls. I actually started working with them, looking back, in the eighties. I think it was in the eighties that I saw this film, about the Mayan crystal skull, made by Arthur C. Clark. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it, but it’s a pretty interesting documentary that he made. I think in the late eighties or the early nineties. I can’t remember exactly.

 

But after seeing that video, and looking at this crystal skull I was just kind of blown away by it, thinking that these people made that skull, theoretically hundreds of years ago. I know they have theories that say it was made a thousand years ago or even older than that.  You know I don’t really know when it was made.

 

Just looking at it, looking at the image, I found it to be really fascinating! And working with this white crystal at the same time as seeing that, and seeing the resemblance, in the crystal, I thought “Ok, I have to do a crystal skull”.

 

So one of the very first pieces was based on looking at the Mayan crystal skull. What happened then, I went and actually bought a skull, and used it as a model to look at when I was carving.  I started carving these crude, simple, they were kind of child-like skulls. In a sort of “art brut” type of way - very rough, a little bit abstracted.  I wasn’t so concerned about making it realistic and making it look exactly like a skull, I just wanted to capture that form, and that feeling, and simplified it.  And some of them were very child-like, and that’s how I began working with the skulls.

 

 

Philippe Truffault: Ok. After the crystal skull, I’ve seen you’ve been working mainly with heads, with the “Levitation” pieces, and your strange skull with the mouth behind…

So it’s not only crystals, you’re working with a lot of things around heads!

 

JL:  Yes. I’ve done that, after thinking about heyoka doing things backwards. I like turning things on its head or inside out.  I remember years ago reading about indigenous people, I think it was about the shamans in, I can’t remember if it was in North America or South America, I think it was South America. Talking about where the spirit resides inside the head, and their fascination with the head.  And that whole concept of using the head. 

 

I also find the face and the features more challenging than the body. Using the head as a form of expressing emotions, and energy, thought and spirit, rather than using gestures, hands and the body. And figuratively, I find you can do so much with the head. I find it is probably the most powerful part of the body, as a form of expression.  Looking at portraits, paintings, which I began making art as a portrait painter, in the seventies, that’s how I started out. I was always drawing and painting portraits of people when I was really young, so yes, the head is the most challenging for me.

 

Philippe Truffault: Actually, I find the Levitation piece, I’ve seen the one in your video, the first one, I think the head looking like Hellraiser. You know the guy with the pins in the Hellraiser film!

 

JL: Oh, Hellraiser ! yeah, the pinhead guy…(laughs)  I forgot the name of the guy who made the film… 

 

Philippe Truffault: Clive Barker maybe?

 

JL: Yeah, Clive Barker, that’s it. Actually it’s funny you said that, because someone else said that to me. I’d seen that film, when was that, twenty years ago or so? That’s right, probably subconsciously, that came in.

 

Philippe Truffault: But the crystals, they're Swarovski crystals. In Hellraiser, I think he used nails, didn’t he, or something like that?

 

JL:  I don’t remember.

 

 

 

Philippe Truffault: You talk about Swarovski and do you have a factual connection, or?

 

JL: Actually yes, through a friend of mine who is a friend of Nadja Swarovski, who has the factory in Austria. A friend who was a fashion designer, so that’s how I got all the crystals. That’s how I began working with them.

 

Philippe Truffault: I guess I will shoot, not in Swarovski, but somewhere in Ida-Oberstein, you know that place, in Germany, where they’re carving crystals. They’re doing traditional… Ida-Oberstein is a small town close to Frankfurt, where they’re carving, so I will shoot there I guess to see how traditional crystals are made now. You don’t know the place especially?

 

JL:  I’ve heard of the place, or I’ve seen… isn’t that where they do traditional type sculptures, isn’t that the place, or…

 

Philippe Truffault: Well they’re doing of, well bears… and sheep… all in crystal… not a lot of skulls!

JL: Fine, yeah!

 

Philippe Truffault: Where do you show and sell your work?

 

JL:  I haven’t sold in a while, but I have galleries that have exhibited my work, in New York. I also exhibited in London, in Germany, in Austria, in various countries in Europe – I can’t think of others now. But mostly in the United States and in New York City.

 

Philippe Truffault:  And when somebody buys your work, is it still growing and changing in the years?

 

JL: Yes, it does, actually there’s one art collector, who bought a piece, and there are various art collectors who bought the pieces in different states, like in Dallas, Texas, Miami, California  where I’d have to fly down to take the piece there, because these pieces are very fragile and difficult to move. 

 

So I actually had to take them on the plane with me, the last time, this is a few years back, you know  I had to travel a lot out of  New York. 

 

So yes, that’s very challenging to actually move these pieces around. So I thought of various ways of doing it.  I mean the best way is to do it by car, so it doesn’t get bumped around too much, because if you knock it, the crystals can fall off, and they’ll start re-growing back again, but I have to be careful with it.

 

Philippe Truffault:  I’ve read you’ve started something, I don’t know if it’s against, about the Damien Hirst work, around skulls!

 

JL: Yes, I haven’t actually seen Damien’s skull. I’ve only seen images of it on the internet.  The first time I saw it,  it was interesting for me, because you know I’d been working on these skulls for a long time.  Seeing him do it, the way he did it, with diamonds, didn’t really surprise me to be honest with you.

 

I think all artists find inspiration through various means. The way he did it, conceptually – it’s kind of a very different idea from mine, even though he says that he’s also inspired by the Mayan, Aztec skull. I mean, no one has a copyright on a Mayan skull.

 

Philippe Truffault:  Yeah, the problem is, it costs so much money, it’s a bit…

 

JL: Yes, how much is it, a hundred million dollars or something? It’s quite a lot of money, but it’s diamonds, you know, the diamonds probably cost him 15 million. 

 

Philippe Truffault:  It’s 15 million for diamonds!

JL: Yes, just for the diamonds alone, it’s an interesting concept. It’s very very funny, because I had the idea of using real diamonds back in 1992, and I actually spoke to my art dealer about it.  We used to have the same art dealer, who represented both of us, we were in the same gallery.  I remember clearly talking to my art dealer about making a piece with diamonds, with real diamonds, when I showed my crystal skull there, but I couldn’t afford it, it was very expensive!

 

So back then, what I was working with, were these crystals, actually made by Swarovski again, but they were crystals that were used in costume jewelry, used in earrings, in bracelets and in necklaces.  What I did is, I took the crystals out of the jewelry.  At the time I was making these sculptures, these skull like sculptures out of soap. I would take bars of soap, grate it, and then steam it, steam the soap and then make these skulls on the kitchen sink by running hot water over it, and then with my hands and finger nails, I would make the shapes of the eyes and the mouth and everything out of soap.

 

Then afterwards, I would take these crystals that I took from the jewelry, and stick them into the soap pieces!  That was really how I first started working with the crystals. And it went from using soap, looking at crystals in the soap, and then, having seen the Mitchell-Hedges skull as well, it just all came together.

 

… silence.

 

Philippe Truffault:  Fine! If we come back to the basic idea of crystal skulls. Do you have something to do with all the Mayan studies, the prophecies about the thirteen skulls…

 

JL: Thirteen skulls? Yeah, I’ve heard the one about the thirteen skulls, and about 2012, and what is going to happen and some of the mythology about the crystal skulls, and some people believe they were used as computers, and they can contain all this esoteric knowledge, and all kinds of knowledge…

 

And also the stories about Atlantis and the crystal skulls, so there’s a lot of different stories and histories, regarding it, which I find, I mean I think it’s all fascinating.

 

I don’t know honestly whether, you know, I tend to be a little skeptical about all things, until I see evidence. I personally like to see scientific evidence before I kind of form any opinions about this sort of thing. But I like to keep an open mind and think anything is possible.

 

Philippe Truffault:  Well, it means that for you, crystal skulls are, not only, but mainly a plastic thing, graphic or something interesting you for their look, more than for mystic reasons!

 

JL:  Actually, it’s everything. I really love mysticism, and indigenous cultures, and shamans, and medicine men.

 

I personally know medicine men from many indigenous cultures. From American Indian. I know a guy that was in South America. I know indigenous people from Australia. So these people fascinate me, and these objects were used by the medicine people, so that’s a real strong element of what interested me with these objects.

 

And the other thing that interested me is trying to understand why they were made, how were they used and what were the rituals that they were used in.  But of course, as an artist, I’m going to be attracted to the esthetics, because I think they’re really really beautiful objects. I just love the way they look, the colors, the way the light hits them, and things like that.  I find all these things fascinating, so yes, it’s a combination of all of these different things!

 

Philippe Truffault:  Actually I’ve shown one or two photos that you’ve sent to me, to a guy in a museum, he was very impressed by… He didn’t know your work, and was very impressed. Do you have some other photos of your work, that you can send me through the internet?

 

JL: Sure, of which pieces, the crystal skulls?

 

Philippe Truffault:  Actually I’m mainly interested in the crystal skulls, because the movie, the film I’m making is about the crystal skulls so… So I would be very interested…

 

JL:  Ok, because the new piece I’m working on, I’m actually thinking of doing thirteen crystal skulls, I mean I’ve had this idea for at least, I would say, ten years, of doing the thirteen crystal skulls. I actually wanted to do them in various colors, you know, make the mold, and make thirteen. That’s the concept of the show. I mean I actually made the mold already.

 

I would like to do an exhibition, having the thirteen skulls in a circle, and all crystallizing, with light, and just use the colors of the spectrum, going from, white, yellow, all the way around to orange, to red, to purple, to blue, and in a circle.

 

So I could maybe show you some of those when I make them as well. 

 

 

Philippe Truffault: Yeah, it sounds fine.  Just a last question,  Is the Indiana Jones films bringing some interest to your work?

 

JL: I don’t know.  I actually only just found out about the Indiana Jones film very recently. I didn’t even know that they were making that film.  There’s always been interest in my work, through all kinds of people, you know people outside the art world.  I know that I have a little bit of a following by musicians, film makers and actors and all kinds of people. I’m really not sure whether it will bring any interest when the film comes out, that might bring some more interest in the future.  It’s really hard for me to gauge it at this point. 

 

Because a lot of the time, the feedback, you don’t really hear anything. I mean other people don’t really tell you.  Sometimes you’re the last person to know what people are thinking or what they’re saying about you.  Unless it’s in the newspaper, and even then, a lot of the time I don’t even read the newspaper, I don’t really care about reading the newspapers or the art magazines anymore, I kind of stopped that a long time ago.