How the Texan art hub of Marfa taught a creative entrepreneur that something could be made out of nothing
- The town of Marfa, in the Chihuahuan Desert in Texas, has been a cultural hub since minimalist artist Donald Judd moved there from New York in the early 1970s
- Kate Jones, the Hong Kong-based founder of creative agency At Liberty, explains how it changed her way of thinking and opened her mind
A place of pilgrimage for art lovers and a living artwork in itself, the town of Marfa, in the Chihuahuan Desert in Texas, has been a cultural hub since minimalist artist Donald Judd moved there from New York in the early 1970s. Today it is home to numerous public artworks, galleries and artists.
Kate Jones, the New Zealand-born, Hong Kong-based founder of creative agency At Liberty and eco-friendly online gift retailer Get.Give, tells Richard Lord how it changed her life.
I heard about Marfa when I was about 20 but didn’t get to go there till I was 36. My friend’s parents were talking about it at the dinner table. They were documentary makers, and they’d recently been.
New Zealand is such a remote place, and especially as a teenager and in your early 20s, you can feel stuck. I remember what struck me was: here’s this other really remote place in the middle of nowhere where everyone is going – like the fact that my friend’s parents had made a point to travel there from New Zealand.
I started reading about it, trying to find out as much as possible. There wasn’t so much on the internet then. I was studying graphic design, and I went to the library, but there wasn’t much there, either.
As time went on, I came to really love Donald Judd and embrace his way of living: in open space, always having everything on show rather than tucked away. He was just himself.
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I heard the story: he was on a bus ride through Marfa, loved the light and stayed. I love the fact that he had a feeling and then just went for it and everyone came to him. I know it can’t have been easy.
His spontaneous decision to make it his home and the town’s subsequent development into a cultural icon reinforced in me the power of collaboration, community and taking risks. It changed my way of thinking and opened my mind.
Then I moved to Hong Kong, and a good friend here started talking about going there. I have friends living in Santa Fe (New Mexico), so we all went together. It exceeded my expectations.
It really is remote, and I saw instantly what Donald Judd saw in the place and what lots of other people have seen in the place.
It was really cool to be surrounded by creative things. Everywhere I went there was an interesting person or something to see. Everyone there was feeling the same thing, so there was a nice energy there – a curious energy, not arrogant.
With At Liberty, the whole foundation is to collaborate with different people depending on the project; there’s always a mix of people, who can work in whichever way they see fit.
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Going to Marfa and seeing what was happening there, I thought, “OK, you can literally make something out of nothing.”
I was about to go back to Marfa just as Covid hit. Now I’m talking to friends again: “It’s time – let’s go back.”
