The Most Organized Person on the Planet

Getting on With Her Business THE MOST ORGANIZED PERSON ON THE PLANET

NICK POE It was part of her artistic practice. It was not just about making something, but about preserving and keeping it, and about editing it, too. She was an artist and she cared about the way things looked. She worked really hard to have things a certain way. She was always trying to keep things out of the house. My dad is really the opposite: he didn’t really care about that—it wasn’t his thing. He’s a pack rat. Everything had some sort of significance to him. They really clashed over that. He was allowed to have his desk area and there was a spot kind of tucked away behind a wall where she couldn’t really see it. He could do what he wanted with that area.

JUDY HUDSON Sarah was the most organized person on the planet. The IRS audited her. She showed them who not to fuck with.

CHARLES TRAUB She was organized to a fault. She wasn’t going to miss a detail. And, frankly, intimidating in that way.

GINA NANNI She would put her mind to something and she would just do it. She was one of those people that had no idea when she was offending someone, and it was very, very easy for someone to take her intent completely the wrong way. I remember running into her with my husband—we were dating then. Sarah walks right past me, says hello to Glenn and gives him a great hug. He said, “Sarah, I hope you’ve met my girlfriend, Gina.” She said, “Yes,” and walked away. She was just very matter-of-fact and getting on with her business. It just didn’t occur to her. I didn’t like her for a long time.

LAURIE SIMMONS Sarah and I were going to a party and we were charged with bringing the beer. I don’t drink beer; I don’t know anything about beer. So we stopped at this place on Spring Street that I think was called the SoHo Market and they were known for having a variety of European and Mexican, all these exotic beers. We needed two six-packs, two of those whatever you call them. Sarah started taking the beer and putting them in and arranging them: one from this place, two from that place. “Okay, that’s good, let’s go,” I said. And she was like, “No, I’m not quite sure if it should be this or it should be this.” She would pull more beer out and put the sixpack down and look at the beers next to each other. I was like, “I think that’s good now. Okay, let’s go.” And she’d say, “What do you think about this dark German beer next to this light German beer?” And I was like, “Great, let’s go.” Thirty minutes later—thirty minutes later!—we left the store with these two sixpacks of perfectly choreographed, arranged beers. I would tell her that story throughout our entire friendship, to the point where she would say, “I don’t want to hear about the beer story again.”

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Allegory of the Arts; 1995, from the series Doubleworld, cibachrome print with mahogany frame, 51” x 41”.

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