Story Frame 20 – Ex Nihilo: Out of Nothing

Among his numerous works of art, artist and sculptor Frederick Hart is perhaps best known for his Three Soldiers bronze, part of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on the National Mall in Washington DC, and also one of his “Creation Sculptures” at Washington National Cathedral, Ex Nihilo.

Ex Nihilo comes from the Latin for "out of nothing." The sculpture, unveiled in 1982, is an intriguing writhing mass of figures representing God creating the cosmos and man out of a swirling vortex of nothingness.

Out of nothing, could there be a better description of the career I was building for myself?

Knowing Dr. Braddock & his wife wanted to commission Hart to create the enormous bas relief that would cover the back wall inside the Basilica, I read up on him.

Hart had been a student at the Corcoran School of Art in the 1960s when he stumbled into sculpture. Having lost his sister to cancer – something he and I would soon have in common – Hart turned his grief into art. He believed it was his moral responsibility to create something that would give “hope to the darkness.”

“Art,” he said, “should be a presence in everyday life.” This resonated deeply with me.

After Hart dropped out of the Corcoran, he attended art classes at American University, my parents’ alma mater. In 1967, he got a job as a clerk in the mailroom at Washington National Cathedral, according to his website, “just so he could pester Roger Morigi, the Italian immigrant who was the Cathedral’s master carver, to take him on as a sculpting apprentice.” In short time, Morigi became his mentor and father figure.

In addition to Morigi, Hart was also influenced by the raw, earthy contours in the sculpture of Auguste Rodin. Having spent a summer as a nanny in the Paris suburb of Meudon, just steps away from Rodin's former studio, Rodin was also a personal favorite of mine. I was beyond excited about making a film that would document Hart’s creative process.

Alas, it was not to be.

At this point in Hart’s career, he had stepped away from marble in favor of working in transparent and semi-transparent acrylics. He passed on the commission.

He did, however, invite the Braddocks, Martin, and me out to his home out in the Virginia countryside where a number of his stunning new art sculptures were on display. It was an interesting afternoon, but also a frustrating tease knowing the opportunity to work with him had eluded us.

In his place, Hart suggested hiring a shy young sculptor named George Carr and it became Carr’s task to conceptualize a bas relief based upon ‘The Universal Call to Holiness’ – and ours to film the process, from rough sketch to installation.

Preoccupied with his film on Bonhoeffer, Martin took me at my word when I’d asked to work on the film. He instructed me to pull together preliminary research, come up with a shot list and then an initial draft of the edit plan for the documentary. He gave me some general directions for how to go about this, then left me to it.

I had a room with two windows on the second floor at the back of the documentary workshop, overlooking the alley haunt of Sister Gretchen’s cats. It was up in this perch that I began laying out on the floor my research notes and the various storylines we wanted to include, arranging and rearranging them within each other, looking for a sequence of how they would flow when braided together. This took a long time.

Periodically, Martin would come in and stare down at the floor, looking at my color-coded notes and papers, make a few comments, then leave me to re-think the process.

He told me about the rumored rivalry between Washington National Cathedral and the Basilica: the Episcopalians versus the Catholics. Both religious structures are located on hilltops in Washington DC – the Cathedral in the northwest, just down the street from American University, and the Basilica on a one-hundred-acre parcel of real estate in the northeast quadrant of the city.

Theodore Roosevelt was on hand when the National Cathedral’s foundation stone was laid in 1907.  Modeled after the English Gothic style of the late 14^th century, the Cathedral (where Hart worked as a stonemason for many years), is famous for its carved gargoyles and stunning stained-glass windows. It is the second largest church in the US.

On the other side of town, thirteen years after National Cathedral’s cornerstone was laid, the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception was erected adjacent to Catholic University, which donated the land. In the coming years, Martin and I would go for a life-changing helicopter ride over the Basilica; only it wasn’t my life that would be changed, but my father’s.

Musing over the Basilica’s uniquely American interpretation of the Byzantine style of architecture – popular from the middle of the 6th century under the rule of the Roman Emperor Justinian until the fall of Constantinople (today’s Istanbul) in 1453 – I gave our documentary the working title, American Byzantine.

Titles are important. They need to tell what a film is about but at the same time, leave something unanswered, setting up a little mystery and intrigue. The best ones leave potential viewers with a sense of wanting to know more and therefore more inclined to watch the film.

In just two words, we would be acknowledging the Basilica was not an example of classical Byzantine architecture – anyone with two eyes could see it wasn’t – but rather a modern American interpretation of it.

It was also, of course, a playful take on “American Gothic,” the famous 1930 painting by Grant Wood of a pitchfork-holding man standing next to a dour and prim looking woman in Iowa – and a tongue-in-cheek nod to the rivalry between the Basilica and the National Cathedral.

Coming up next … Dust to Dust: From Panino to Pietrasanta