In 1968, Donald Judd dedicated this work to Dave Shackman, a filmmaker and part-time plumber who helped him assemble this work. According to Judd’s studio assistant Jamie Dearing, Shackman was the one to realize that if Judd reversed the threads on just one of the pipes, all the other parts would fit together. Dearing said, “It was a bit of brilliance that astounded Don and certainly astounded me.”1 The work is square on the north- and south-facing sides, and, as Richard Shiff observed in an essay describing the piece, the east-and west-facing sides are rectangular with the golden ratio of approximately 5:8. In the piece, “every structural element is what it is, a pipe or a fitting.”2 This work and To Susan Buckwalter, 1964, are rare examples of works that Judd titled.
