Candyce Garrett – Artist Spotlight (2007)

SN: Who are you?

CG: My name is Candyce Garrett and I am a granite sculptor from Galisteo, New Mexico who has had the privilege to instruct at both Camp brotherhood and Silver Falls.

SN: What life experiences affected your direction in art?

CG: My first time in the Northwest was a trip to Camp B in l996. Up till then, I had been carving figurative pieces in marble and limestone. Since then my work has transformed into monumental abstracts in granite.

In l998, Tom Urban told me about Anderson Ranch Art Center in Snowmass Village, Colorado. I was able to go up there for a two week granite workshop with Jesus Morales. Two years later I was his apprentice. During that year, everything about my work changed.

SN: How do you develop your ideas?

CG: When beginning a new piece, I usually work with the idea in my head for a while, and then I might draw some sketches or make small maquettes. Sometimes I do all three.

For many years I spent too much time polishing large stones. Wanting to get more work done faster, I just recently decided to design and do pieces that don’t require polishing.

SN: What tools do you use?

CG: My everyday tools of choice are: a chainsaw, a drill, an acetylene/oxygen rig and grinding wheels. But my very favorite tool of all is my TH-83 Caterpillar fork lift. I am the envy of all the guys in Galisteo because my forklift has a 47 foot boom and lifts 8,000 pounds.

SN: Where do you work and has that influenced your art?

CG: For four or five months in the winter, I sculpt at my Val Verde County ranch in West Texas. It is typically twenty degrees warmer there than in Galisteo. As a reflection of Val Verde’s rugged terrain, I started doing rougher pieces.

SN: Tell us about one of your pieces.

CG: When I started doing larger pieces, I found that I could, with notching and piercing, connect pieces together to make them even bigger. One of these is The Spur. I sold it to the San Antonio Spurs NBA team. When finished, it will be placed in front of their state of the art practice facility in San Antonio, Texas.

SN: What life experiences have affected your direction in art?

CG: For twenty years I had a sign shop in Ruidoso, New Mexico, about 75 miles west of Roswell. I carved mahogany and Sugar Pine board signs to support myself and my two daughters. Sometime in those twenty years, I started to carve marble figurative pieces and sold them to pay college tuitions.

It was after my two girls graduated that I apprenticed with Jesus. I only planned to stay a month, but that turned into a year. I learned more from him than I ever dreamed possible.

After my apprenticeship ended, I bought my present home in Galisteo. I don’t have a studio there so I just carve in the street.

SN: What sculptures are you currently working on?

CG: Right now I’m working on two ten foot columns to be installed in the new Railyard Complex, a 60 acre development next to the long established Santa Fe Farmer’s Market.

Another project is a granite fountain for Eve Ensler of “V-Day” (a nonprofit, grass roots movement dedicated to ending violence against girls and women around the world). This will be installed for the tenth anniversary of the Women’s Shelter in New Orleans.

SN: Any final words?

CG: You bet. At the end of the day, I want to express my thanks to Brian Berman who brought me to Camp Brotherhood in l996 where I met Tom Urban who sent me a brochure for Jesus Morales’ workshop at the Anderson Ranch Art Center in Colorado. These are the connections that changed the direction of my life. Thanks to all of you who had a hand in that.