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Creative Lessons from a Sculptor (with Christopher Howes) · The Daily Writer

• 0:28
  SPEAKER_06: But as an adult, and especially as the father of a boy who likes all that stuff as well.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_06: I've continued to enjoy those stories, characters, and movies.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_06: I'll have a special interview today with the man who helps bring those characters to life in a very literal way.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_06: His name is Christopher Howells, and he's a sculptor who's worked on films and franchises such as Jurassic Art, Star Wars, Star Trek, and more.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_06: Christopher was a special guest at my college and for the art course as well.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_06: And I thought it would be fun to use this interview here on the podcast as well.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_06: This was a very fun conversation that'll give you a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the creative mind of a true artist who's worked on some of the biggest franchises in history.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_06: After the interview, make sure and check out the show notes at catstanders.net slash 104.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_06: All right, let's get to the conversation with Christopher Howe.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_06: Christopher, this is my introduction to the art class, and today we're talking about sculpture, which of course is why you're the our guest expert.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_05: I had no idea what we'd do part of class today.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I will attempt to provide any insights I can.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_06: Awesome.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_06: I've still got a couple students who will be in here in a minute, but they'll we always have a couple stragglers, so that's good.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_06: So this is Christopher House.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_06: He is a new friend of mine we've actually never met before today.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_06: So he is a friend of a friend, so to speak.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_06: And I'm really thankful that he's taken the time to chat with us.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_06: He is a sculptor and uh obviously musician, as you can see.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_06: So hardly.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_06: Can you remind me you live in the UK, is that right?
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_03: No, I don't know.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_03: I live in Cincinnati, Ohio.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_06: Oh, Cincinnati.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_06: How did I where did I get the impression that you lived in the US?
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_06: I'd love to live in the UK.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_06: That'd be great.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_06: I don't know why I thought that.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_06: Okay.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_06: I was somehow mixed up for something.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_06: So um how long do you have today?
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_06: Like, do you need to get off at a certain time?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_03: No, other than I gotta jump up in just a minute to turn a kiln off.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_03: Other than that, I'm I'm free.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_06: Okay.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_06: So with these, I've got a few of these kinds of uh conversations this semester.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_06: So we can go maybe 30, 45 minutes or something like that.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_06: I don't want to monopolize your time.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_06: Oh, that's all right.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_06: Definitely.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_06: Well, once again, I really appreciate you taking time to uh share with us today.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_06: I have no expertise in sculpture, so I'm thankful that you're here to help us out a little bit with this.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_06: So these guys uh in their reading for today, they've read a little bit about sculpture and are familiar with it.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_06: How many of you know anything about sculpture?
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_06: Okay, a couple of you.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_06: Some of you sort of do, so basically we're all novices when it comes to this art form.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_06: Okay.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_06: So I thought we'd start out with uh if you can give us an overview of your work and how you got into sculpture, and then I've got some more specific questions after that.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_03: Well, uh, let's see, it's uh exactly 30 years this year since I started my career as a sculptor.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_03: Um I actually attended the Savannah College of Art and Design, uh, never taking a single sculpture class.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_03: Uh I was an illustration major, so of course I'm a sculptor.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_03: That makes absolute sense.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_03: Um I actually got into it because here in Cincinnati uh we had Kenner Toys in town, uh, which was bought by Hasbro and later destroyed by Hasbro.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_03: But there was a lot of lot of sculpting talent here.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I happened to actually my mother gave me a uh uh an ad from the newspaper looking for a sculptor, and I thought, eh, what the heck?
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_03: I was working at a uh a convenience store at the time, so I thought I'd give it a try.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_03: And 30 years later, I'm still doing it.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_03: Um basically it was uh a company called Barnum Models, which I became the head sculptor of within a couple of years, where I ended up training Lord knows how many other sculptors, and uh what we did is we created uh prototypes for the toy industry and for the giftware industry, things that you'd uh find uh uh say in a Hallmark store or a Carlton card shop, that sort of thing, plus uh home decor stores, that sort of stuff.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_03: So I had to become a generalist, uh, being able to sculpt in any style that they wanted me to do.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_03: So I I I had the privilege of working on a lot of really interesting stuff like uh Star Wars and uh Star Trek, uh Jurassic Park, these sorts of things, lots of big movie titles.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_03: And so uh that's that's the basic summation of 30 years of my career.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_03: But I also have done a lot of personal stuff and I've done some very large-scale stuff.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_03: Just uh two years ago, I I did all the uh pieces for a uh miniature golf course in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, called Crave, which is a candy-themed uh golf course.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_03: It's three or two stories indoor indoor, outdoor, right next to Dollywood if you ever get down there.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_03: So, you know, I created some really cute stuff for that.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_03: So I've done everything from quarter-inch tall figures to 20-foot-tall figures.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_06: And when you talk about something like, by the way, I'm right here, sorry, I'm I'm like a hand, a random hand.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_03: I can see the hand.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_06: So whenever you talk about something like Star Wars, is this uh, and I'm completely showed my ignorance, but do you create a are you creating a prototype that they then use to create action figures from?
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_03: Is that uh exactly, and on some things, actually purely by chance, uh say for uh the movie Independence Day, some of my stuff actually got into the movie because they we had we had created uh model kits for Independence Day.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_03: If you remember the film, they had the uh the alien attack ship, which they had modified, and I created a model kit of that.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_03: And when we do this sort of work, the movie hasn't even been shot yet, most of the time.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_03: So uh I had the my model kit was done by the time they were done doing principal shooting, and in post-production, when they're doing the effect shots, they needed a model of exactly that scale.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_03: So they use my model to do some special effect shots with.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_03: Um, so sometimes stuff sneaks in to the movies themselves, and and actually I've seen a lot of my stuff through the years because I've been involved in literally thousands of projects um one way or another.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I've seen a lot of stuff ending up as set pieces on TV shows and and movies.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_03: If you've ever seen the the show Third Rock from the Sun, yeah.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_03: Uh do you recall the the crazy looking gnome that they have that's cutting wood?
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_06: I think so.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_06: It's been a while, but I think so, yeah.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_03: Always in the background in the in their apartment set, and occasionally it's been featured.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_03: That's that's actually something I did for a company called Artline.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_03: And and I'm pretty sure I know why the prop master chose those, or chose him, is because when I was sculpting it, it's a gnome with an axe.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_03: You gotta put a crazy look in the eyes, right?
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_03: So I I uh it it's kind of gratifying to know that someone else recognized that I was trying to make him look insane, and uh he made a good set piece.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_03: Or just recently, uh a friend of mine is actually the prop master on um oh shoot, I'm gonna forget the name of the show.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_03: Uh the cop show with Tom Seller.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_03: Um Blue Bloods.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, thank you, Blue Bloods.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_03: And uh he needed some crazy stuff to put uh on a uh quirky character's desk.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_03: And my my current day job, as it were, is I do a lot of work for a company called Celebra Ducks.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_03: We make the world's finest uh rubber ducks.
• 8:40
  unknown: That's cool.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_03: Uh Celebriducts.com.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_03: And uh we do a lot of uh uh pop culture satire, that sort of stuff.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_03: And uh so just uh month or two ago on the season finale, uh if you can go back and watch that, you'll see there's a young lady with a desk uh full of ducks of mine.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_03: So I get a lot of stuff uh in the movies on TV, just coincidentally.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_06: So when you are are doing something for a company, let's say Star Wars, I'm a huge Star Wars nerd.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_06: As many, as many people are.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_03: I run I run away from you people.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah, some of the Star Wars people are kind of uh they're a little scary.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_06: Do you have to sign uh NDAs and things like that to you're protecting the designs and all that stuff?
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_03: You know, when when you consider that we get access to uh to imagery that during the you know before and during the principal shooting, uh we have to yes, stay mum.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_03: So they they don't want to take that for granted, so you've got to sign a bunch of papers.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_06: That makes sense.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_06: Well, with the the huge profile of especially movies like that, I could I could understand their reluctance to to want to get their material out there.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_06: For sure.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_03: If you're a Star Wars nerd, you'll you'll appreciate this.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_03: Uh I've been to Skywalker Ranch.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, I'm jealous.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_03: And uh tell you what, those people work in paradise.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_03: That that's in the middle of nowhere, isn't it?
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_03: Sort of.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_03: Well, actually, sorta.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_03: It's in uh, and this was coincidental the name of the place.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_03: It's in Lucas Valley, California.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_03: It's uh uh just outside of San Francisco.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_03: So you're you know you're maybe 30, 40 minutes away from San Francisco, so it's not that uh not that remote.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_03: But it's beautiful, absolutely beautiful up there.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_03: The countryside is incredible, it's gorgeous.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_06: So you mostly do work for other companies.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_06: Do you do you do things on your own that you are selling independently?
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_03: For example, something I've just been meddling with.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know how well this will show up.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_03: I'm a big Edgar Allan Poe fan.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_03: I love that.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_03: And uh this actually started out as a um uh as a uh cold cast bronze and iron sculpture, and that is a candle version I just made of it, which I thought was kind of fun, the idea of being able to burn an Edgar Allan Poe candle.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_03: Um and interestingly, that actually developed out of a bust I did for uh an opera star named Rene Papa, who is a uh bass, he's he's known as the Black Diamond Bass.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_03: Um he's a fellow from from Germany, and uh he's a big rubber duck fan.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_03: So we did a rubber duck of him for him, and then I uh he invited me up to uh uh to see him in Parsifal this uh last let's see, when was it?
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_03: It was last year in February at uh the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, which is kind of cool.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_03: I got to go behind the scenes and there and then sit through five hours of Bagnarian opera, which wasn't my favorite thing in the world to do, but uh was pretty cool.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_03: Um so anyway, I I did a bust of him and then I took that and modified it into Mr.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_03: Poe there.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_06: There's something very appropriate about Edgar Allan Poe's head melting like wax.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, exactly, exactly.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_03: I'm glad you recognized that.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_03: Wasn't sure if that was just me or not.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_06: No, I think he would appreciate that quite a bit.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_03: Excuse me for 10 seconds while I turn my kiln off here.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_06: Sure.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_06: So make sure you guys think of some questions while I'm QA session at the end of this QA growing.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_03: Sorry about that.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_06: No problem at all.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it'll teach me to turn something on before I've got a meeting.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_06: What has been your favor one of your favorite projects to work on?
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_06: Whether something you did individually or something you did for a studio or a movie project?
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I've done some memorial projects for friends who've lost loved ones, and I'd say that's that's the most meaningful things I've done.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_03: Uh as far as fun, I personally am a fairly big Star Trek fan, and I did a series of high-end uh 12-inch figurines when um Viacom, which owns Paramount Studios, they uh it was in the oh late 90s, they tried to do a Disney store kind of uh experience in Chicago.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and we did a gosh, I don't even remember how many of these Star Trek figures, but I did a whole bunch of Star Trek figures, very highly detailed.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_03: That was uh that was a lot of fun.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_03: Um but pretty much, you know, one of what you know, one of the nice things about this business is that everything is different, every project is new, so it keeps me from getting terribly bored with my work.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_03: So everything, I would say every project I'm working on at the time is my favorite project.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_06: Are there some projects that you work on, and obviously you're not gonna name these specifically, but sometimes you're working on a project where you think I'm creatively not very invested in this, but this is part of the deal, and I'm just gonna create it.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you gotta get into that mindset when you're doing commercial work like I do.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_03: Like, for example, My Little Pony.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not exactly an a My Little Pony fan.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and yet when they came to me and said, We need this new My Little Pony, well, alright, I gotta make it.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_03: So there has to be a certain disconnect, but you can you can get into any project without thinking about the the greater meaning of it, just in in the sense of uh how do I say this, in the sense of understanding the structure, how it's put together.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_03: So even a project that I wouldn't be thrilled with has its uh has its pleasures or it's or it's lack of pleasure.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_03: Sometimes it's drudgery when you've just got to struggle through and get something done.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_03: But that's kind of life, isn't it?
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_06: It is, it really is.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_06: Can you walk us through the process of you're finished with a sculpture, it's it's comp it's as complete as you can make it.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_06: What then happens to that sculpture from the time it leaves your hands to then the time it winds up being reproduced on store shelves?
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_03: Well, first of all, you've got to get it approved.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_03: And sometimes I will say it's done, and they'll say no it isn't.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_03: And you've got to go back and change it.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_03: And particularly uh when dealing with celebrity types, um, there's often a little vanity thing that they want done to it.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_03: Um and then let's let's say we've got it through all the hoops, it's finally signed off on.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, then I send it off via UPS or FedEx or US mail.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_03: And um let's let's take a rubber duck, for example.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_03: We do, and most of the industry does, most of its manufacturing in China these days.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_03: Um, this wasn't the way it was 20 years ago, but this is the reality of today.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_03: But we do try and do some manufacturing in the US, uh, most of it goes to China.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_03: So let's say I've got a duck all done, I wrap him up, send him off to Hong Kong, and then someone someone in Hong Kong picks it up and then takes it across the border into Shenzhen.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and there in Shenzhen at the factory, they will start by taking my original clay, they'll make a quick silicon mold on it, from which they will produce wax duplicates.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_03: These wax duplicates are then used to make uh electroformed nickel molds.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_03: Now, what you do is you take the uh you take the wax, you you paint it in a silver conductive paint, and then you stick it in a tank of chemicals which have nickel uh dissolved in them, and a current flows through it, and the nickel slowly deposits and builds up a layer on top of it.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_03: And once that's done, the thing's entirely encased in in metal.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_03: The reason for it being wax is obvious then, because then they can burn the wax out of it.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_03: So they're they end up with an empty cavity.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_03: They do a little machining on it to get it ready, make a bottom for it.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_03: That then is uh, and they make a number of these, uh they're put together in a rack, uh, which is then put into what's known as a rotational molding machine.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_03: Um rubber ducts are actually not rubber in the sense that they're not latex, they're they're made out of uh vinyl, soft vinyl.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_03: So a little bit of liquid vinyl is squirted into each of these cavities, it's put into the machine which heats it up and rotates the molds on several different axes so that the interior gets coated.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_03: Once the interior is coated and it reaches about 350 degrees Fahrenheit, it solidifies.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_03: Then they pull that out of the machine, and then a worker comes along and pulls each duck out of the mold.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_03: Then there's some finishing stuff, they need to paint them, uh put a bottom on them to seal the hole, etc.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_03: Uh then it goes on to packaging and shipping, and eventually uh onto a ship that takes a couple of weeks to come back to the United States.
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_03: And uh that's how a rubber duck is born.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_06: Are you ever able to go into stores and see your work on a shelf and know, hey, I made that?
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah, all the time, actually.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_03: Well, more in the past than than recently, since I'm sort of semi-retired from the toy business, other than ducks.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_03: Uh actually, there was an occasion when I was it was uh actually it was 19, it was 20 years ago, 1999, I was visiting a friend in Savannah, Georgia.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and uh uh there's a place called River Street, which is a big tourist place down on the river, and there's a gift shop.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_03: And I walked into the gift shop, and I with mounting horror, as I looked down and I was in a circle of products, and I realized that I was surrounded by uh things I had done, and they're all staring at me with accusing eyes.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_03: It was uh it was a bit of a scary moment when I realized how ubiquitous my work had become.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_03: You've actually, all of you, I guarantee, have seen my work.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_03: You just have no idea that you've seen it.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_03: Uh since I've been in the business so long and I trained other sculptors and involved in so many projects, it's just everywhere.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_03: And I know someday I will pay the price for adding so much junk landfills.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_03: But uh it is what it is.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_06: But you could also say you've brought a lot of joy to people's lives.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_06: I I love those positive, yes.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_06: What would you say some of your creative goals are for the next few years?
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_06: Like when when you look at five years from now, are there some things that you like would like to accomplish that you haven't done yet?
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_03: Well, sure.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_03: Uh well, first of all, I'd like to win the lottery, so I don't have to accomplish anything.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_03: But beyond that, um, you know, I'd like to I'd like to explore some more large-scale stuff.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_03: Uh perhaps, you know, uh in the bronze arena.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_03: I have a friend, uh Tom Sushia, who is the uh official sculptor of the Cincinnati Reds and of the Baseball Hall of Fame.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, he gets to do these giant things every day, giant bronze bronze sculptures.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_03: And uh there was a you know at one point we we agreed that someday we should switch places so he can do some some small stuff and I can do some more large stuff.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_03: So I'd like to do something like that.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_03: Um I don't think I have any real specific Visions in mind, but uh you know the luxury to do what I want at the scale that I want would be nice.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_06: We are here in St.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_06: Louis, and uh of course many of these guys are St.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_06: Louis Cardinals fans.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_06: Uh oh.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_06: And one of the big things in the new bush stadium, which has been around for a few years, is a giant bronze sculpture of Stan Musual.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_06: And every time I walk past that, I just think it must be an amazing artist who can create that.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_06: That just blows me away.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_03: Well, it's a lot of work.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_03: There's a reason why large bronze sculpture costs tens of thousands of dollars or hundreds of thousands of dollars.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_03: Um but yeah, it's uh it's quite a process.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_03: Um, though it's actually much easier these days in terms of getting the large-scale uh uh uh clay up and running because now we have the advantage of we can make a small maquette, have it scanned into the computer, and then uh have large blocks of polystyrene foam uh carved out, which serve as a uh an armature, which then you just skin over with clay and add detail.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_03: So it's it's been streamlined like many other things by technology.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_03: But um yeah, it's a it's a big process.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_06: Who are who are some of your favorite historical sculptures?
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_03: You know, that's interesting.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not this may sound counterintuitive, intuitive, but I'm not that uh into sculptors.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_03: I had to mention artists of the past that uh are particularly important to me.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_03: Well, Arthur Rackham, the British illustrator from turn of the last century, is like my number one artist ever.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_03: Um and of course, and you know, the great artists that the pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, I love their stuff, and those who kind of uh latched on to the movement.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_03: Um you know, going back, you gotta you gotta give Da Vinci and and Michelangelo their uh you know a salute or two.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_03: Uh but really, if you ask me who's your favorite sculptor, I'll just basically look at you with a blank look in my eyes.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_06: If somebody wanted to get started in sculpture, how would they go about doing that?
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_06: Like what sort of baseline artistic artistic skills would you need to be successful at a basic level?
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_03: First of all, if you want to sculpt realistically, and the number one skill I would say is learn how to draw.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_03: I've never met a good sculptor who can't draw very well.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_03: Um so that would be the number one thing because that just gives you it it teaches it's an easier way of teaching you how to see in the first place.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_03: Um then when you add the third dimension, which is actually very, very difficult.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_03: Uh I'll I'll say this.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_03: Every sculptor I know knows how to draw and paint.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_03: Most painters that I know do not know how to sculpt.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_03: It's a it really is an entirely different discipline, but you need that that foundation first.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_03: Um, unless, you know, I'm sure there are there are genius sculptors out there who jumped right into to sculpting without having to bother with other skills, but I would really start uh learning how to draw.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_03: Good draftsmanship.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_03: And then as you get into sculpture, it's very important, at least from the from my point of view in the commercial realm, uh before you jump right into being a sculptor, you first have to learn how to make molds.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_03: I always make my sculptors who I train, I always make them learn how to do a mold first.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_03: Because if you don't understand the needs of the mold maker, then you'll make a lot of mistakes that have to be corrected before the product can be can be molded and cast.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_06: What questions do uh do you guys have?
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: I have one.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_06: Um okay, and go ahead and say your name.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_06: Speak loudly so that uh we can all hear.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Deanna, and I was curious if you get your sculptures back after they make the products or use them on the sets.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_03: No, they generally just get trashed.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I have to say that in recent years I've lamented the fact that I did not keep copies of you know all the pop culture stuff I did when I've seen people on these, you know, on TV shows paying ridiculous amounts of money for stuff that we threw in the garbage.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_03: But uh yeah, most of the time I I don't get the original back, though I will get sometimes get uh the commercial version.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_03: Like uh well, I've repainted his his uh thing he's on, but that's the Clemson Tiger, um which we did last year for a line called Rubber Tovers for a very nice fellow uh who's trying to get a company established doing sports figures.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_03: Um so sometimes I'll get the final product, but that clay I send off to China goes into a deep dark hole somewhere.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_06: The Chinese black market or something like that.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, exactly.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_03: I figure at least you know someone's kids get something to play with.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_04: What else?
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_04: Other questions?
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_03: Uh my name is Kenanaya.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_03: I'm just wondering what your favorite and least favorite medium for making a sculpture is and why.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_03: Well, that's interesting.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_03: What I use most of the time is uh here's a Edgar Allan Poe is working on is this clay which is known as Chivant NSP, non-sulfur plasticine.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_03: It's uh a very, very versatile clay.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_03: Comes in usually not quite so filthy, but in in blocks like this.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_03: I tend to use the medium and the hard mixed together.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_03: Uh that's my daily material that I use.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_03: However, there is a material I used to use a lot of, uh, which was made by a lady in Louisville, Kentucky, called Castelline.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_03: It's a sort of a wax clay hybrid, very good for uh high-detail stuff, and it can be burned out of molds directly, so you don't have to make a wax if you're doing something that needs to be burned out.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_03: My least favorite sculpte, the uh polymer clay that you can get at the hobby store.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_03: Um it's you know, you it starts out very soft and then you bake it and it uh hardens up.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_03: It's actually it's actually a form of vinyl.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_03: Uh that is my least favorite material to use.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_03: But it has its uses.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_03: Even if it's not my preferred thing if I need a if I need a hard prototype of something, that's what I go to.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_03: Other questions?
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Sam.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um is there any sculpture that you're particularly proud of and why?
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_03: I'm sorry, please repeat that.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_03: I barely heard you.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: Is there any sculpture you're particularly proud of or just proud of?
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_03: Well, again, uh the ones that have an emotional uh consequence, as it were, uh for you know the like the memorial things I've done, um, which brings some level of comfort to people.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_03: That's what I would be most proud of.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_03: Things that actually make some sort of difference.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_03: Um I would say, yeah, that other than that, uh actually there's one piece in that that Crave project I mentioned, which is uh at the end of the golf course, the ball return uh hole is uh this large, supposed to be a cotton candy tree.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_03: And um, I had a lot of fun with that.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_03: I was rather proud of it.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_03: It's got a face, it's an anthropomorphic tree.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I snuck in sort of a portrait of my father into it, and uh I find it amusing that people are are you know uh putting balls into that all day long.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_04: That's great.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_04: Other questions.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_05: I'm Charles.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_05: So how much does one of your sculptures or any type of pieces cost?
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_03: Well, that's a difficult answer thing to answer because of the everything is different.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_03: Uh no, there's no flat rate for anything.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_03: Um you know, if if I were to say like something like that tree I just mentioned, it's about 12 feet tall.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_03: So there was just the cost of the of the foam I carved it out of, which was probably a couple thousand dollars.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_03: And uh then on top of that, I took me maybe two weeks to do the whole project.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_03: And there's other other materials involved, like if there was a coating on it and paint on it, etc.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_03: So with with my labor and material cost, it was probably an eight or ten thousand dollar piece.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_03: Whereas, you know, if I whip out something like my good old uh my good old Ho candle, you know, I'm selling those on Etsy for like 60 bucks.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_03: So you know, it's a range depending on what it is and how many copies are made, that sort of thing.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_06: And when you talk about that, that particular piece on Etsy, are those all those are all handmade individually, or those are all molds of something that you have uh I have my molds which I then cast the the wax into.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_03: So if I were to hand make them individually, you know, I'd have to charge a thousand dollars or something.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_03: But you know, I made the the prototype, made uh silicon molds on it, and then I actually offer it in uh uh material known as cold cast bronze and cold cast iron, which are significantly more expensive than wax, where one takes uh actual bronze or iron powder and mixes it into a resin uh and then casts it in the mold, and then you buff it away, and basically you're left with an all-metal surface.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_03: So it looks just like hot uh poured metal, but it's much uh much easier to make and much less expensive.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_03: Um so you know that that I'll sell for I think it's I I have a 20% sale going on at the moment.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_03: Uh for I think it comes out to about 160 bucks or something like that.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_03: Uh whereas if I were to make it an individual, again, it would be a couple thousand dollars, probably.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_03: There's a lot of work that goes into it.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_06: When you are asked to create a bust of someone, what are the materials that you are given to work with?
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_06: I assume it's it's always 2D flat images of some kind.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_03: Um well, for example, I did a uh I did a life-size bust of uh of uh Gordon Ramsey.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_03: And um what all I did was I hit Google and you know got a hundred different images from as many different angles as I possibly could, found a few videos, and uh sometimes I'll have yeah, I've got two screens on my computer going, I've got uh two iPads going all at once with my reference material in front of me.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_03: So and and sometimes even on the TV in the corner too.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_03: So I like to surround myself with with the imagery.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_03: Um but yeah, it's it's the more the merrier when you need reference material.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_06: Deanna, I think you had a question.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: I did.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um so when you're in the middle of of creating your piece of work, what tools or ways that you handle the tricks up your sleeve to handle anything that you might mess up on, or it's not exactly the way you want it to be?
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: You get what I'm asking?
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_03: Well, well, first of all, nothing is ever the way I want it to be.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_03: You you have to you have to realize that you that that you have to settle at some point.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_03: And actually, that's that's a that's a key skill is understanding when you should stop.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_03: Um because you can you can be going along making a great piece, looks fantastic, and then you think, well, I'll just do one more thing, well, I'll do another thing and ruin it.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_03: So there's part of the skill is knowing it's good enough right now, and if you continue to work on it, you're just gonna stand the chance of messing it up.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and you know you develop a feel at some point for do I actually need more detail here, or can I leave it slightly impressionistic and get a better result?
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_03: So um I see a lot of of young sculptors come into the business who think that they have to have sub-millimeter detail on everything, and that just that ruins a lot of stuff.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_03: Uh so so with my advanced age and maturity, I've learned to let things go and let it be what it is, even if it's not the exact image that I had in my head.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_06: And is it also true that economics plays a part in that?
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_06: Because the more the more time you spend on something, the more you can't be working on other stuff, that would actually be more advantageous financially.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_03: If you're gonna pay me a hundred bucks, you're gonna get something a lot sloppier than if you pay me a double.
• 36:48
  unknown: Yeah.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_03: Other questions?
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh this is Isaiah.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_02: I was just curious, you mentioned working with the Star Wars.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_02: Which which items did you create for that?
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, good lord.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_03: Uh all sorts of stuff.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_03: Um everything from action figures to vehicles to uh we did these uh what was that company?
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_03: Uh craft house was the name of this company, and they had these like do-it-yourself painting medallions.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_03: Like you get a little kit, you get the medallion, and you get the the brush and the and the paint, sort of a paint by number kind of thing, but in slight three-dimension.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_03: Um, so I did a bunch of those.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and and the way we do those, you know, they end up being, oh I'm gonna guess they were maybe three inches in diameter.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_03: We do them uh four up, like like 12 inches, and then they get pantographed down.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_03: There's a machine called Panagraph, which um uh reduces or enlarges the size of something.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_03: Uh by the they run a stylus over the surface and a cutter in a block of resin or other material, then reproduces it at whatever size you want.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_03: So I did a bunch of those.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_03: Um think we did any other Star Wars.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_03: Just well, you know, Kenner being the company that had the Star Wars license for all the figures being here in Cincinnati.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that was uh that was most of the the Star Wars stuff we did was the action figures.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_06: So when you're doing figures like that for Star Wars or Star Trek or something else, what materials do they give you?
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_06: Are they giving you like 3D computer models?
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_06: Are they giving you flat images?
• 38:41
  SPEAKER_03: You know, that that might happen somewhat these days, uh, but in general, again, it's it's uh like say if it's a movie in production, we'll get costume shots, this sort of thing.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_03: Umwhere I have you know pictures of of next generation characters in their costume-fitting shots, and you see uh safety pins, etc., holding their costumes together, which is kind of amusing.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, which I should probably put on eBay.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_03: I bet someone would buy those.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_03: But anyway, probably so.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_03: Though I might get in trouble for that.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_03: But um, yeah, you know, so you'll get uh production shots.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_03: Uh like or like but here's a deep dark confession.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_03: If you ever look at a list of worst action figures ever, I very proudly always make that list for uh Jurassic Park.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_03: I did the uh I did all the figures for the first Jurassic Park movie, and it was before they even cast the actors for the roles.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, so and this was through Kenner at the time, and they so they provided me with design drawings.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_03: And uh the if you remember, Wayne Knight played the character Nedri.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_03: And Wayne Knight's a big guy, but he's not exactly a heroic-looking guy.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, but they decided in their infinite wisdom at Kenner that they needed added play value as it is, and the character was just described as big.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_03: So, what does he look like, Arnold Schwarzenegger?
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, people will put this on lists of bad toys all the time because it looks absolutely nothing like the like the actor.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_03: And I have to say this, I blame Steven Spielberg.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_03: It's his fault.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_03: But I will claim that.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_03: If that's my one claim to fame, I'll I'll take that.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_04: Are there questions?
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_04: No.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_06: Okay.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_06: I think they're they're questioned out.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_06: Okay.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_06: Well, this has been a lot of fun, Christopher.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_06: I really appreciate you taking time to do this.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_03: I hope it was helpful.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not sure how much wisdom I imparted, but I uh I hope you enjoyed.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_06: Absolutely.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_06: I've well I've learned a ton.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_06: I hope these guys have.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_06: So, yeah, this has been a lot of fun.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_06: Hey, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Christopher.
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_06: I really loved hearing about the process of creating a sculpture and how it goes from one man's creation all the way to mass production.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_06: I've also increased my appreciation for all the art and the toys.
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_06: Remember that somebody has artists and engineers and four five.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_06: Remember that you are going to create