Cliff

Ira Joel Haber.

Going through my stuff for my archives at Kent State I came across this transcript. In 1974 I went with John Perreault to visit H.C. Westermann and his wife the painter Joanna Beale at their home in Conn. John was interviewing him for a piece he was going to write about him and had a tape recorder running. I was thrilled to meet them, and for me to be sitting in their kitchen eating sandwiches with Cliff as his friends called him and his wonderful wife Joanna was a great experience. To say that I adored him the minute I met him would be an understatement and for a while until his untimely death we were friends. This is a transcript that still thrills me, as Cliff realized who I was. The piece he is talking about was Box With House and Six Trees from 1970 and is in the neue gallery, the ludwig collection in Aachen germany


H.C. Westermann: Gee, I wish I was familiar with your work, Ira. Do you work in wood?

Ira joel Haber:  I work in miniatures. Landscapes...small.

H.C. Westermann: Wait a minute! Wait a minute!

Joanna Beale: The Whitney Annual

H.C. Westermann: Hey wait a minute. You did that little piece I bet. Didn’t you with the houses? Oh that was my favorite piece in that show.

Ira Joel Haber: Really?

H.C. Westermann: Yeah, And  wondered who in the hell had done it. Because when you said your name, it sort of rang a bell. That’s a beautiful fucking piece. It was buildings?

Ira Joel Haber: Yeah

H.C. Westermann: Tinythe scale was very small. That’s a beautiful piece.

Ira Joel Haber: Thank you

H.C. Westermann: That really grabbed me by the balls, didn’t it?

Joanna Beale: It was very beautiful.

H.C. Westerman: That little piece of his was...Did you see it John?

John Perreault: Oh, sure

Ira Joel Haber: He knows my work.

H.C. Westermann: That’s a gorgeous piece. I wondered who the hell did it at the time I thought, Jesus Christ. It really knocked me out. It really did. It really got to me. It really felt good, as soon as I looked at it. I remember that piece. I really mean it. It was just beautiful...It’s a real pleasure meeting you. I wondered about that piece a lot of times since then. I wondered who made it.

Nov. 10th 1974
Transcript of a tape