“Nothing is ever done. But we quit at the point where the work begins to cover up the evidence of the work” - Tom Sachs x Werner Herzog x Van Neistat x Ed Ruscha - Paradox Bullets
Lockdown was full of evenings spent going down YouTube rabbit holes. During a particularly bleak one last winter I rediscovered the brilliant film by Tom Sachs - ‘Paradox Bullets’.
Created as part of the NikeCraft x Tom Sachs collaboration, the film stars the artist Ed Ruscha, is narrated by director Werner Herzog, and directed by Van Neistat. It contains a series of five paradoxes based on Sachs’ ‘10 Bullets’ - a code of conduct for his studio practice.
One of these is ‘know when to quit’ vs ‘never give up’.
Sachs argues that in every project we reach a ‘point of maximum return’ (or ‘quitting point’). This being, where the amount of time spent correlates to the optimum completeness of the task.
As Herzog narrates “After the point of maximum return our efforts will begin to ruin our work. We rely on our carefully tuned intuition to quit precisely at the point of maximum return to ensure the fruit of our labour falls within the desired ‘magic zone’”.
This struck a chord with me because knowing when to quit is an art in itself and something which is a constant effort to master. Whether this be through writing less (i.e. not burying the point of the presentation in detail). Or refining that creative idea before sharing it with others.
According to this theory “Nothing is ever done. But we quit at the point where the work begins to cover up the evidence of the work”. This, in a sense, is the “magic zone”.
Accepting nothing is ever finished, can be a wonderfully liberating idea. Not only does it leave room for the idea to evolve and grow over time, but it puts guard rails around the temptation to ‘perfect’. And risk ruining the work, or never getting it out in the first place. Two things I’ve spent a lifetime trying to fight.
Until next time 👋 ,
Harriet