Construction Exercise: Account from Bruce Hannah

“I think I have to explain the ‘construction’ exercise. This was probably about two weeks into my sophomore year at Pratt and I was still living at home, dragging my projects to school. When Miss Reed assigned the construction project I immediately thought of the teeter-totters that Richie Pignata and I made on the beach on Staten Island. Richie and I entertained ourselves by building giant seesaws from the timbers that washed up on the beach, lifting ourselves 10 or 15 feet into the air and then jumping. Everyone else in Miss Reed’s class brought in some found objects, mostly kitchen garbage that they had ‘constructed’ their sculptures out of. Mine was outsized and way too complicated, but Miss Reed let me struggle with my giant mess, made of stuff I found on the beach and dragged into class.”

—Bruce Hannah, BID 1963; Professor Emeritus, Industrial Design