Casey McCafferty is a New Jersey-based sculptor and furniture designer who favors natural materials such as wood and stone. He has been featured in publications such as T Magazine. His work evokes Jean DuBuffet and the “art brut” school of thought, wherein raw creative expression takes precedence over honoring aesthetic convention – which is not to say that Casey’s work lacks aesthetic appeal. His sculptures and furniture are playful, and full of personality. Casey sat down with writer Brandon Kosters from Eastern Accents to discuss his creative practice.
What was your point of entry into designing furniture – did you start with sculpture and pivot to furniture?
No. I actually went to school for business and did KYC for banks in New York City. I was one of those kids, though, where my parents let me build whatever I wanted. Tree fort, computers…. They never inhibited me when it came to anything related to using tools and being creative and working outside. At the end of college, I got into woodworking. I didn’t go to any lessons or anything. I just acquired skills through practice, with YouTube and reading. I had a job in Manhattan. Little by little, I started taking custom furniture jobs for friends and family. I moved to California with my wife and started my own furniture company. I was building custom furniture for architects for 5-6 year period. One of the interior designers who I worked with noticed an abstract table on my palette rack. She asked how much I was charging for it. A light bulb went off in my head – “People will buy stuff that I create!” I moved from custom furniture to sculpture. Since that point I’ve done just functional sculpture. I don’t draw a line between any of it – functional versus aesthetic. We just keep going back and forth – whatever idea pops into my head.
Have you been able to leverage your background in business to support your artistic ventures?
In some way. The business experience gives me insight into people’s motivations. Just doing KYC, I dealt with high power people building out large projects. Learning how people talk. It’s almost like a detective job. You’re gaining insight into how people with money operate. Because I’ve taken accounting and economics classes, and have an understanding of certain things… For example, when the real estate market does well, my sales go up. When certain parts of the economy are doing well, that means that all sculptural artists are doing well – insights like that. You still, like, have to leverage your artist brain and leverage your brain that controls all of your admin. It’s still always a task to do the stuff you don’t want to do.
Why do you favor natural materials – what drew you towards woodwork specifically?
I was really into the old school way of building. Cutting dovetails, using hand planes. You can use tools to build stuff that they were using 500 years ago. 1,000 years ago! It was an area that was very approachable, too. You didn’t need a big setup. You could spend a couple hundred dollars to build stuff, and it put me in a spot where I could just get out there and build as long as I had a place to store the tools. And, it’s like my life usually goes… I’ve built computers, I used to work with resin, and fiberglass. I've worked on cars. I’ve done electrical work.. Wood…something about wood kept me on the mission of “let me learn this skill….” There’s an infinite number of ways of using those skills to build something. You can build a box in a hundred different ways. Wood has become the medium that I’m most comfortable with, in terms of transforming whatever I see in my head into something tangible. I use metal and stone too, but those are kind of like hobbies that I incorporate into my craft. Maybe there’s something about wood being a living organism that you can harvest and turn into something beautiful that will last for 1,000 years. Thinking about how everything in life… you use it for a year or a week, and throw it out, and you buy another one through Amazon. I like the idea of stuff that can be passed down from generation to generation, or resold in the secondary market. I want to make things that will last.
Where would you like to see yourself in five years?
I enjoy what I do. I see myself using more materials like stone. There’s something enticing about using materials that you see when you walk into ancient runes where you have sculptures that are preserved for thousands of years. Also learning new skills. Business wise, I’m happy. I never got into this to become a millionaire. Just the ability to sit down and doodle, and try to make them in real life…. As long as I’m providing for my family, that’s it. I have a couple of pieces in museums, and it’s good to know that those are being taken care of, and visible. Speaking of this mission to make things that last – the ultimate dream would be to do some type of public work where I can have something that I can create that would be visible to my community and myself everyday.
Thank you to Casey McCafferty for sharing his insights into functional sculpture, woodworking, and his mission to create lasting works that blend art with practical design. Find more of his work on his website and instagram.
