[powerpress]
We’re all creative beings.
And yet we’ve built this intransigent notion that artists are a different species — born special, wired differently, operating on some frequency the rest of us can’t access. We admire their work. We go to museums and stand before it. But they’re not like us.
I’ve had many people on the show over the years who have done their best to disabuse us of that idea. But it persists. It’s stubborn.
Tom Sachs shatters it.
Tom is a contemporary artist and cultural provocateur who turns the detritus of consumer culture — plywood, duct tape, branded ephemera — into objects that force you to confront your relationship with capitalism, ritual, and identity. Chanel guillotines. A Hermès plunger. A full-scale space program built from plywood and faith that earned him unofficial artist-in-residence status at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. His work lives in the contradiction between loving the brand and dismantling it — and he’s comfortable there.
I see him as equal parts Werner Herzog and blue-collar craftsman, with a comedic levity that sneaks up on you. His new book, The Tom Sachs Guide, isn’t an art book. It’s a blueprint for the principles, codes, and disciplines that define his creative practice and his iconoclastic philosophy of living.
“Creativity is not a leading strategy. Use only when necessary.”
- TOM SACHS
Here’s what we get into:
- Output Before Input & the Subconscious Mind
- Why Creativity is the Enemy
- Circular Problem-Solving & Giving Up Immediately
- The Barneys Nativity Scene & 300 Death Threats
- Sympathetic Magic & the Plywood Space Program
- Brand Iconography & Consumerism as Secular Religion
- Always Be Knolling & the Ten Bullets for Life
- Persistence & the Calvin Coolidge North Star
Whether you’re an artist, a creator, or just somebody trying to live with a little more intention — you’ll get a lot out of this.
For those who prefer a visual experience, the conversation is available on YouTube. As always, the audio version streams wild and free on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Peace + Plants,
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