An Interview with Dirck Bass Classical Rugs and A Philosophical View by George O'Bannon

ORR: Do both you and Susan participate in the rug collecting?

Bass: As collectors, initially we both showed equal fascination with rugs. I have a much greater fascination still than Susan, although she enjoys them quietly. I propose the purchases; she doesn't anymore. But we still buy in concert and in equal consideration. I think at this point she considers it a bit of a whim on my part, since grand concerns of middle age are all about us. But this is one of these eccentricities one carries through life, and I don't know how to get rid of it; these rugs give me so much pleasure. If I were to stop, I would have to get rid of them all.

ORR: How would you describe your rugs?

Bass: Rugs that have enough breadth of detail and grandeur of line and composition that I can enjoy them from a great distance. I'm not a myopic kind of viewer; I really like to see them far and at a certain distance, without a central design. Somehow a field that repeats itself gives me room to get around in it. I need to get focused. These are ways for me to escape from the very narrow kind of focus I have to apply to a drafting board -- and the very smallness of mind that falls on anybody whose trying to support himself and live this life of 20th century America. Somehow the designs of these rugs are always bigger than the majority of ideas I have in my mind. I like to go swimming in them; they are a great relief. If it is a lattice or a floral design, let it wind around and not repeat itself so often that it gets frantic. I just like grand open designs.

ORR: As we look at these pieces, it is only the Karachov and the yastik that have medallions. Everything else is an allover repeat.

Bass: That's right. I only have two pieces with centered designs. I probably have 20 pieces in total that I hang on the wall, and only these two have central designs. The open field Ghiordes is just big enough to get into. I also am inclined to like narrow borders which mean that the field has a larger sense of proportion. But, especially this Qashqa'i, I love it that it has this skinny border. I don't want to be hemmed in.

ORR: It is obvious that all of these pieces are quite old and no synthetic dyes are jumping out. How important have age and dyes been to you?

Bass: Good question! I am a very inconsistent collector, although I sound like I am consistent. Old pieces tend to have a great sense of openness and better drawing; that is what has pulled me to these rugs. That they are old in themselves means a bit: I think living in California where everything is new, I am delighted that something is older than anything I see. So age means something in a romantic sense but not in a visual sense. As for dyes, the color in a rug means a great deal to me; but I have bought many rugs with synthetic dyes and have come to like them, but I don't have them anymore. The synthetic dyes were not a stumbling block in buying them, but rugs from the synthetic dye period fall away from my center of interest; they have less of the mark of time in the way they are drawn. Things that were made 150-200 years ago really speak of another time, and that's what I am looking for in these carpets. All my feeling for a time past really comes from a European culture and from European music. I'm not interested in 19th century buildings and paintings; I'm interested in the music of the late 18th or early 19th century.

Dirck Bass and friend Early Kurdish lattice carpet

Bass: I know this may sound like Arthur Pope; he taught me to think in terms of Persian carpets as too grand, almost as a religion. They're not, mostly material stuff, but rarely if ever have I been so gratified with the quality of line, drawing, that shows up in early Persian carpets. The best line work, the best that shows up in these carpets is far better than those of the Chinese or any European with the possible exception of Botticelli. That a line can carry on for so long with its twists and turns and say so much is like a symphony. I think the Persians are absolutely geniuses at lines. And that Kerman fragment perhaps proves my point: I think the best line in a Persian carpet is equal to the best line out of Mozart.

ORR: Earlier you said something about your first purchases being red, white, and blue. What was their appeal and how did you break away from it?

Bass: Well, the majority of Oriental rugs really are red, white, and blue. They were the first things shown to me when I was pounding the shops and auctions in New York City. I looked no further than what was being offered; we were conformist in our early purchases. But it began to nag at me. The real color gratification was not in the red, white, and blue vernacular; it was the subtle tonalities that were giving me a charge. How green can modify either red or blue in small quantities began to twist me. The secondary colors -- yellow, cream, purple -- have to be present in a rug for me to be fascinated by its color scheme. I think you need a very broad palette.

ORR: Well, these two Turkish pieces stand out with their purples and magentas.

Bass: That's about as far afield as you can go. It is the small rugs that can have these complex and more expensive dye compositions. Obviously a large rug is a different challenge. In a rug shop, the mentality is: who is going to make it and dye it? Better to keep it simple. Use some white wool, red is the cheapest dye, indigo is the safest thing to work with -- unless a piece is small, a home production piece. Then the sky is the limit.

ORR: Do you have any theory about why this type of thing appeals to you and why you collect?

Bass: Well, I remember my mother was always knitting sweaters and my grandmother went to Guatemala where she learned to weave; she used to sit on the porch, throwing the shuttle on her loom and weaving those kinds of fabrics. So I became familiar with fabric when I was young. When I went to college, I had to sew and darn my own clothes. I found that the needle was my friend; it got the work done, and it was my friend. I didn't have to invent stitches, I sort of knew them. Then when I went on to start mending rugs for a while in New York City, I had no trouble understanding the structure and imitating it. I probably was not a great restorer, but I didn't seem to have any trouble honoring what the fabric needed. So I had a natural feeling for fabric undoubtedly from my grandmother and mother. I've got eyes for beauty. I remember imagining once that, if I were wealthy, I would fill my house with great paintings. By some slip of fancy I can fill my walls with warm rugs that probably delight me more than paintings, which I couldn't afford. I've got more books on paintings than on carpets, but I never open them.

ORR: Did you collect things as a child?

Bass: Yes, as a child I fancied myself a collector of antique firearms. That was just my fascination with the shapes and wonderful hand- filed machine parts that you see in pre-industrial handwork; but eventually I liked the ones that had the best woodwork, the highest polish on the metal. They were visual events for me.

ORR: Once you were buying rugs, was there a point at which you deemed yourself a collector?

Bass: I'm not sure I'm a collector yet. It is just one decision at a time; I'm not building a collection. If I were a collector, I would have to be very consistent, I would be more responsible. I am still almost all whim in this hobby of mine.

ORR: Where do you find your pieces?

Bass: I have acquired them from the people I enjoy. Half of this collection was acquired from auction houses in New York City and some of the big dealers, but the half that I like the most is what has shown up here on the West Coast. I don't have the time or the energy to travel to find the carpets; I just like to go to the few galleries in San Francisco and see what's there. If it has to be bought and I can afford it, I bring it home. I'm not an acquisitive kind of person; I'm not always in heat about the next piece that is going to come my way. For the future, I will be visiting my friends at these galleries and enjoying what they have and exposing myself to the opportunity to purchase something if I get hooked.

Dirck Bass and the Devarian Kurd fragment

ORR: Where did you get this rug fragment?

Bass: One of my earliest mentors in rugs was a very open, generous man named Vartan Devarian in Rochester. He was in the process of closing his shop permanently and going into retirement. This was one of his sample pieces that he would throw out to gauge your taste and your budget. He would keep flopping small pieces down in front of people. This piece caught my eye instantly. I had no idea, but it was quite the measure of my taste for a long period of time. He had cut it out of a large carpet, a corridor carpet, that was in excellent condition for a client. He told me he had regretted doing it, but it just didn't fit the space; so he had this piece left over. I would love to see the rest of the carpet; I have a feeling that before my days are over the rest of this carpet will reappear in the marketplace someday. It has such stunning wool and dyes. I fantasize that I will see it in some publication and say, "Ah ha, I have the little baby piece that came out of it."

I can remember people bringing Vartan rugs that he would just scissor up. He would take the rug, cut it to size, glue paper on the back, and return it while they waited. He did it with humor and a certain amount of anguish.

Mr. and Mrs. Vartan Devarian

Bass: Someone tipped me off that he was there and that he wasn't a stuffy dealer. I showed up with my two-year-old son and Vartan had the patience to sit around and talk to me. I wish I had bought many more pieces from him, but he was very reluctant to let things go quickly. You could never buy anything until you had sat with him for three hours enjoying yourself, and then on the way out you would say, "I really would like to buy something today." He would tell you which of the five pieces you have been staring at the most was the one he would let go. That's the truth! He knew you, he knew what you were looking at, he knew what you could buy, he had appraised your budget, and he never spoke about prices. And then he would let it go for what he needed to get for it, but you could never get him to give you a price on anything unless you had looked at it for half an hour. If he put a rug down and you asked, "How much is it," he was offended, which I respect. His approach was really in conformance with honoring the carpet and also honoring you. Very old world.

ORR: When you see a piece, what do you look for or what talks to you?

Bass: Something that I have never seen before. There has to be quite a new twist in color, drawing, and space.

ORR: Have you made any mistakes?

Bass: Yes, I think my batting average is just a little better than 500. And there is probably a 50% chance that I will have these same pieces 10 years from now.

ORR: How do you know a mistake?

Bass: I fall out of love with it; it offers me nothing anymore. The drawing can begin to nag at me. I begin to see a tightness in the quality of the space. It's like people: you can meet someone and in the first 30 minutes think he is the nicest, sweetest person and then in the next 30 minutes find that you have bumped into all of his walls, and he is really not much fun to be with.

ORR: What do you do with your mistakes?

Bass: Then I'm in trouble! I probably have overstated the value of the rug in my own mind, persuaded my wife that she is going to enjoy it and that we can always get our money back. So I find I don't really like the piece and it is time to sell it. Well, the market doesn't really like to take pieces back in a hurry. It really doesn't like to buy my pieces, because I'm willing to buy things that are damaged or have some peculiar twist to them anyway. I never buy the standard Eagle Kazak. When I have fallen out of love with a piece, I can't praise it to someone else. So it has to be consigned, and maybe it sells a year later, probably at a loss, but by that time I'm so relieved to have some money back and the piece off my mind that I am satisfied.

ORR: What advice would you have for someone beginning to collect? Bass: It would be all about the pitfalls. I don't know how you get started except by looking at lots of pieces. Hopefully, that would be in museums or getting yourself in sideways with a dealer or someone who has the patience. It was much easier 20 years ago to look at rugs than presently. Dealers have had to consolidate themselves so that can stay in business. Their schedules are tighter. They have reached middle or old age. Those were heady times when everyone had so much to share and and so much time to do it in; it was wonderful. My concern is that if things don't change a bit, there will be no rug shops to go into 20 years from now.

ORR: How long have you been collecting and when did you start? Bass: The first rug we bought must have been in 1974 or 1975. We jumped in with both feet, Sue and I. We probably acquired 20 pieces, all gone now. They were bought in the first three years; they were learning pieces. Twenty dollars could get you a good day's entertainment, making friends with a new way of weaving and a new pattern. That made it easy to make mistakes and get rid of them. That gets back to advice to new collectors. I think you need to buy lots of inferior pieces, in poor condition, in a big hurry. Learn about fabric, color, and the beauty you like. Don't try to build a collection. Don't think about making a major purchase until you have wasted a few thousand dollars and have at least 10 pieces behind you. Then you may have the judgment. There is no substitute for looking at these things. I also don't think that rugs belong in the home exclusively; I think they belong in the work place. American work places have always been sterile. There is a very sterile understanding of what a work place is here in American today. I think we are way off target about what people need; they need the effort of humanity around them. Rugs were conceived as work; they were not an alternative to domestic efforts. They were domestic effort and intended to go into conspicuous public places. They should not just be in residences and quiet little collections.

ORR: You referred earlier to the aging of dealers. Do you have any thoughts on why there are no new dealers coming into the trade? Are young architects interested in rugs?

Bass: I examine this all the time. One concern is that collectors in America don't feel secure enough in themselves to show what they do very often. It is the material world and the material world is stuff, so why make a fuss over things that are disintegrating? I have friends who collect cars and all kinds of things; every one is extremely reticent to show his or her collection and talk about it. Maybe they don't want to show them; maybe they are embarrassed because the collection could be considered conspicuous consumption, when our schools and our towns and old people are not receiving any attention. And maybe, when you have tied up cash in a collection, you feel guilty about it. I feel slightly weak on that point myself, but I am always eager to see if my friends are seeing what I see; I love to share my thoughts with people. But nobody does it, they look away. Other people collect ashtrays. You can go into their house and say, "Goodness, you're a collector of ashtrays. Look how far out you have gotten on your subject." Silence. "Oh yes, I like ashtrays." But they won't pick up the ball.

Now that is half of the whole business of whether people are going to go on enjoying rugs. They are going to have to share their thoughts. Does it happen? I don't know if it happens in any venue of collectors. Everyone wants to get in the glossy magazines and be touted as a great collector in his or her old age. But people with great wealth love to be publicized. Everyone wants Andy Warhol's 15 minutes of fame. But what about the fun along the way? I don't know how people are deriving fun from it. I say I derive pleasure from this. I would like to shout and stomp and say yippee with my friends, but it doesn't happen. That is the kind of enthusiasm that would sell rugs and that would bring in the next generation.

ORR: What books would you recommend someone read?

Bass: After you have 20 rugs, read a book. But there is hardly a book that does it all. One book, but far from complete in its scope, is Opie's book. I love the way he writes; it shows enough of the wealth of the culture and a love of the rugs themselves, in personal terms, that it is a very winning way to be introduced to rugs. That is the approach that might captivate a new reader. The most important book for me was Pope's 1926 Chicago catalog, Early Oriental Carpets. It told me about space and drawing; it was very formative for me. It is not glossy enough today to capture someone's attention. These days, with attention spans so short, any rug book read closely can be informative. I went on vacation recently and took Woven from the Soul; I thought I would enjoy looking at the illustrations. I need to take something to entertain me. I was forced to read that book with extreme care; I have not read a book so closely in years. I was rewarded for every minute.