Christopher Cairns at Cantor Fitzgerald Gallery, 2005

(Installation shot Closing Time)

(Installation shot Closing Time)

In April 2005, Christopher Cairns marked his retirement from Haverford College, after 35 years of teaching, with a solo show at the school called Closing Time. Twenty-seven life-sized figures, in bronze and plaster, invaded Cantor Fitzgerald Gallery en route from their former home in Cairns’ on-campus studio to a new home in a converted firehouse, now a studio, in nearby Havertown.

From Synagogue as AIDS Memorial to Lazarus Rising, the show featured some of Cairns’ most arresting work of the previous decade. Of particular note was the Rochbergtorium, an installation dedicated to his close friend, composer George Rochberg. Featuring plaster and bronze sculptural portraits, a painted portrait by son Nicholas Cairns, a video interview by son Peter Cairns, and a recording of Rochberg’s Caprice Variations by Peter Sheppard Skaerved, the Rochbergtorium functioned as a sort of living memorial.

(Synagogue as AIDS Memorial, plaster)

(Lazarus Rising, bronze, 1996, Lasalle University Art Museum)

(Rochberg head, wax)

Closing Time was reviewed by Philadelphia Inquirer art critic Victoria Donohue, who wrote, “Cairns has developed a life-long morally charged attitude toward his art and toward the portrayal of human life episodes…This show should go a long way in according Cairns his due recognition, for, by any standard, he is one of the truly accomplished sculptors working today.”

(The Mound, plaster)

Peter Cairns documented the show in a short film, below.

A statement by Cairns’ long-time friend Charlie Angermeyer was posted near the entrance. Read it here.

Closing Time was dedicated to Ingrid Muan, a friend and former student who died earlier that year at age 39. Two small paintings of Ingrid’s and a statement about her were included in the show.

See more photos from Closing Time on our Flickr page.

(Tanit, Electra, plaster)

(Spring, plaster)

(Evidence, plaster)

One Minute with Francoise Andre

This minute-long clip is an excerpt from several hours of interviews Peter Cairns conducted with painter Francoise Andre in 2002. I will post the additional footage, which is of a higher quality, when I can get it.



Learn more about Francoise Andre on her profile.

Charlie Angermeyer on Christopher Cairns

Poet and writer Charlie Angermeyer wrote this piece on the occasion of Christopher Cairns' 2005 show at Haverford College, Closing Time. It was posted at the entrance to the gallery. Cairns and Angermeyer met in 1963 at Oberlin College.

The Sculpture of Chris Cairns: An Appreciation by an Old Friend

CREATION plus “M” equals CREMATION. I don’t know why I thought of that now. For me, it seems original, but I know everything is derivative, and it probably has occurred to some poor devil who writes crossword puzzles or some Scrabble players in a think tank. I stand in my crow’s nest. I imagine F-16s buzzing my head, youth in Asia, old punctured love dolls wishing they were dead. I know “Dial M for Murder”, but I don’t stop eating M&M’s. But art is imagination under some kind of control. Words and labels can’t change what’s already done. I don’t judge it. Art should be beautiful, but never in competition any more than slaves bought with gold.

I watched Chris in our first college art class draw his first melted choir boys. We rented separate rooms in Mrs. Morgan’s house; she was a sweet old lady with a short memory. One cold winter night, Mrs. Morgan opened the door, recognized me, and said, “Who is your friend?” (Chris had his scarf wrapped around his head.) I said, “This is my sister.” “What a surprise! How long will she be staying?” Mrs. Morgan said. Then, after Chris took his first sculpture class, he started tracking in plaster dust. He had it all over his shoes and clothes. He loved drawing and making figures, and he’s still at it as you can see. Bones are made of plaster, and bronze makes fine, expensive, caskets. Thus, there was the Bronze Age. Maybe we’re in the Drywall Age. When you get old, the back bends, and your skull feels heavy. Pinch yourself. Feeling alive right here, right now? Some old philosopher wrote, “Existence precedes essence.” Your body was a thing before it thought. It’s all in Sartre’s novel Nausea, if you have the stomach to read it. Chris is more tactile than most people—Mr. Touch, I’d call him.

Try looking at these things on display as if you just woke up but you still feel like you might be dreaming or watching T.V. Think about the space you are filling now and what happens to it after you leave. For me, these sculptures are all music and light—the way water flows around a stone or flames dancing or the way the wind shifts sand dunes. Chris gave me a big, coal black, bronze head. It sucks up all the light in my room. It’s so damn dead it makes even me feel almost alive! You are part of the show. The content may be at first disturbing, but, for me anyway, it quietly becomes beautiful as the content recedes while the form overwhelms. I wrote a poem that fits, I think:

If looks could kill,
then all the dead
would be beautiful.

Charlie Angermeyer lives in Tokyo with his wife, Mari, and his cat, Nicky. He is currently working on three books and a screenplay.