Steampunk at SDCC: Bruce Boxleitner's Lantern City

Custom cover sketch by Joe
Benitez. Lady Mechanika 2
Aspen Comics

Steampunk elements have been appearing consistently in all kinds of media. In comics, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Joe Benitez's Lady Mechanika are good examples. Steampunk concepts have been appearing on television as early as 1965 in The Wild Wild West series (and the 1999 film), and are easy to find in current series like Dr. Who, Sanctuary and Warehouse 13.

Bruce Boxleiter's Lantern City, a television series in development, was soft launched during Boxleiter's signing session at San Diego Comic-Con. The new web site contains a through description of the parallel world of Hetra, the walled city (Lantern City), and all the characters that are trying to find the city, get out of it to the mythical world outside, or protect the status quo. Politics, intrigue and opportunities for exotic technology abound.  The production plans to incorporate fan ideas and designs into the show.  I was fascinated by this concept of fan participation, and wondered how they planned to do this. I was able to address my questions to Matthew J. Daly, writer for the Lantern City series. 

KM: What did you think of San Diego Comic-Con? Had you been to it before? What was the response to Lantern City from people who heard about it?

MD: I thought that SDCC was incredible. I had never been to this Con before, but it was as wonderful as I imagined it would be. I loved the panels and costumes and freebies and meeting a lot of great people. The response for the show was amazing. Many people have visited the site and we have had various interviews so far. The important thing for us to do is keep the momentum going.

KM: Why do you think Steampunk is interesting to so many people?

MD: I know why it is interesting to me and I assume these reasons also attract others. I love that it is rooted in history and/or alternative history and it prizes science and inventiveness. The rules are always being written, which allows for flexibility (meaning, if you asked ten different people to define Steampunk, you would have ten diverse definitions that wouldn't be wrong). It also attracts me because it does not have a work that defines it - the fans have driven this for years.

 
The above is an introductory video by Executive Producer Bruce Boxleitner (Tron, Babylon 5).
If you can't see it, click here to see it on the Lantern City site.

KM: I see that the production is encouraging fan participation. If all goes well, how do you plan to incorporate fan designs & ideas into the show? What are you looking for?

MD:The concept is that the fan submissions will be an ongoing contest. We will look through

the submissions and choose pieces that interest/inspire us. People will not be paid, but

they will receive credit and be featured in a special section on the website.

KM: When I was reading the series description on the web-site, I was looking for opportunities to see some wild gadgets. I noticed Killian (the ruler of the walled city) has a "secret facility," is this a place where we will see fantastic inventions? Would this be a spot you would share some fan designs?

MD: Killian does have a facility where he trains and designs weapons. There is a factory that can produce weapons as well, but it isn't used often. Most of the weapons are holdovers from previous generations that the current citizens will refashion for their own use. This could certainly be a place where we use fan submissions.

Concept art of Lantern City

 KM: The guys on the "collaborators" page, Art Donovan, Thomas Willeford, Tom Banwell and Joey Marsocci, look like they will really shape the look of the Lantern City world. Tell more about how they came together and how the production found them.

MD: These four guys are some of the most respected artists working in the Steampunk community. It was important to us to collaborate with people that the Steampunk community trusted; they have also helped us in assuring that we are remaining within the world of Steampunk. Trevor and I reached out to all of them and it is wonderful to have working artists on board. 

KM:  Where are you in the process? Any possibility this could begin as webisodes like

Sanctuary and some other Syfy series?

MD: The series bible and two-part pilot are written (and have received great response). We are currently preparing for Dragon Con (taking place Labor Day weekend in Atlanta). We have a panel and are properly introducing the show (with a trailer and concept art, neither available on the website yet). The show feels like too big of a production to do as a web series, but we have not closed any doors yet.

KM:  Are you planning any other media? Publications? A Lantern City Comic?

MD: Besides the fact that we are going to be at Dragon Con, I am developing a comic book series that deals with important events that take place before the show (it will be a stand-alone story that will add a dimension to the viewing experience or simply please comic book fans); I am going to start proposing it to comic book publishers soon.

Steampunk at SDCC: Darick Robertson & Oliver

Steam-punk Buzz Lightyear.
Photo by Raymond Francisco,
posted on Xerposa.

One development I've been watching from year to year at San Diego Comic-Con is the exponential growth of the Steampunk community. The costumes are amazing; people are not only creating new characters for themselves, but they are also recreating familiar characters (like Buzz on the left) in the Steampunk style.  In the next two posts, I've asked creators who announced new Steampunk projects at the Con why they think Steampunk is gaining such popularity. 

One observation I had myself while people watching at SDCC is that anyone with a creative spark can enjoy it and put together a great costume. You don't have to have the body of Wonder Woman or Superman to have people "ooo-ahhing" and asking to take your picture. It also looks like a fun & supportive community. I started shopping for some goggles myself!

In part one of my Steampunk exploration, I'm talking with comics creator & illustrator Darick Robertson (Spider-Man, Transmetropolitan,The Boys) about Oliver, a new comic loosely based on the familiar Dickens story set in post-apocalyptic London, to be published by Image Comics.

KM: What did you think of San Diego Comic-Con this year?

DR: It was fun and crazy, as it is every year except bigger, always bigger... I did sense a real attraction and support of more than just movie and established character stuff though. The enthusiasm for actual comics seems to be back at Comicon.

Darick Robertson at
SDCC hanging at the Comic Outpost
booth. Photo by Kim Munson.

KM: I heard the big cheer your announcement got at the Image panel. What has the response been to Oliver so far?

DR: Overwhelmingly positive. I half expected a lot of enthusiasm for my co-created project HAPPY! Because it's written by the incredible Grant Morrison, but I thought Oliver might take a little more time to warm on people, but on the contrary, there seems to be a real curiosity and excitement for the whole concept!

KM: Why do you think Steampunk is interesting to so many people?

DR: I think that we are living in a time wherein we are finding our way back 'down the mountain' in some ways, due to tough economic and turbulent times, people are trying to make sense of their world and make due with less, as well as make a little go further. Yet we are simultaneously engulfed in incredible technology; the stuff I only dreamed of as a kid only a couple of decades ago! We're now carrying around devices in our pockets that make Star Trek look antiquated. But since there is no going back, we also collectively long for days in our zeitgeist wherein you could make a little go a long way. Innovation was something you could create in your garage, the way Steve Jobs and Bill Gates did, with their wooden boxes full of tomorrow's triumphant technologies.

The idea that you could invent something wild and new with your own two hands from parts in your yard, things in your workshop, with smelting pots and hammers, gears and clock-works is romantic. Steam-punk captures the idea of imagination and magic combining into useful tools. There's something about Nikola Tesla that reaches out to us from the past and invites us to be inventors, and discoverers. At the turn of the century, technology was something that anyone could harness, now it's a matter of convenience. I don't know that I could open up my I-Phone and make it work again, or fix it if it weren't reliably functioning on it's own. Ralph McQuarrie's designs for Star Wars look like Steam-punk to me.

A Steampunk world, offers the illusion of technology for everyman, with a little bit of elegance and a lot of innovation and imagination. Oliver is such a natural fit for this genre that in some ways, the genre found it's way into our concept rather than the other way around.

If you can't see the trailer above click here to see it on CBR.

KM: Could you briefly describe the characters and setting?

DR: The main story follows the theme and loosely, the plot of Dickens' Oliver Twist. Set in a future London after it's been ravaged by war, young Oliver discovers that he is, in writer Gary Whitta's words "...a Hybrid, the extremely rare offspring of an illegal union between a pure-bred woman and an IVC male. Inheriting the genetically-programmed superior strength, skills and combat instincts of the IVCs (clones) but with none of their weaknesses, Oliver is a unique specimen with astounding, superhuman powers – and the most reviled form of social outcast, declared too dangerous to live and marked for termination by a government fearful of the unplanned evolutionary leap that he represents"..."The cloned humans known as IVCs (In-Vitro Combatants), created in haste by the western powers to fight the war and now its veterans, have become a global underclass. An entire generation of disposable people, not considered legitimately human by society and now surplus to its requirements, they have been abandoned, forced to live in confinement and slavery inside the bombed-out, irradiated cities that have long since been deserted by “pure” humankind".

"Oliver is a unique specimen with astounding, superhuman powers – and the most reviled form of social outcast, declared too dangerous to live and marked for termination by a government fearful of the unplanned evolutionary leap that he represents."..."As Oliver gradually uncovers the clues that will unlock the secrets of his mysterious origins – and meets his one and only match in Dodger, a cocky and willful bandit girl whose martial arts prowess is matched only by her attitude – he will meet an incredible destiny that has awaited him since the day he was born, and which will change the course of all England’s future."

KM: It sounds like you found a couple of great collaborators, Grant Morrison on HAPPY!, and now Gary Whitta (Book of Eli). What's your process of working together?

DR: Grant is a fantastic collaborator in that he knows what he wants and also sees the value of creative input. We communicate our ideas to each other candidly and respectfully. It's been a joy creating HAPPY! with him. Of course, he travels a lot, so it becomes necessary to do everything through e-mail, and his incredible wife, Kristan, is an essential part of the process that makes it all work.

With Gary, he's local to me and we grew a friendship before starting this project. So we are working together in a way that I rarely, if ever, get to enjoy with a co-creator, in that we get together and hammer out ideas in person. I'll sketch out pages in the same room with him and we'll discuss ideas. That way, spontaneous inspiration and clever ideas are captured in the moment, and find their way into the finished work. Usually in collaborations, everything is so over-thought, edited and reconsidered, that what is in the final product of a comic is either over cooked with too many chefs in the kitchen of ideas or the opposite with distance making it so that it becomes too much one creator's vision, and in turn, I create reactively. With Oliver, we're two friends working together to create something more than what Gary originally came up with when he wrote this as a screenplay years ago, and having fun in doing so. We have a real enthusiasm and excitement to bring to this as we have been patiently waiting for years to actually put this together! I always believe when the creators are having fun, be it in music, or acting, whatever it is creatively, that the audience can sense that element in the work. If we're having fun, the audience has fun too. At our cores, Gary and I are both big sci-fi geeks and we love the genre as much as produce it.

KM: I saw some of your early sketches for Oliver. Is this book an artistic stretch for you? Do you have to do research?

DR: I wouldn't say it's a stretch, as I'm quite comfortable in what I'm doing with this, but it is a new genre for me. I like to draw things in a gritty way, and create worlds that feel tangible. I like to work in detail and I love to be imaginative with design and structure. I always hope to push myself as an artist and for Oliver, I have an opportunity to design and create a whole cast of characters in a world where the Steampunk and Victorian themes have a way of weaving their influence in naturally as opposed to an exploitative way. I actually traveled to London last year and took multiple reference shots to ensure that when I draw my future, war torn London, that I am building upon the real thing.

KM: What are Image's plans for the book?

DR: Image is supporting us in our desire to break the story into a trilogy, with three arcs of four issues each, and in the end, an omnibus. Gary and I have discussed ways to make each arc it's own event, and create a natural beginning, middle and end for each arc. Then we get a breather in between. Which will be good for me as I tend to juggle more than one project at a time and that will help me to keep calm and carry on...

KM: There was just a great article about Image in the New York Times about their support of creator-owned work.

DR: The exciting thing about what is happening right now at Image Comics is that publisher Eric Stephenson has created a business model that allows creators like myself, Grant Morrison, Ed Brubaker, Joe Harris, Greg Rucka, Matt Fraction, Howard Chaykin, James Robinson, Brian K. Vaughan and more, to create titles that we are truly inspired to do. It's more of a structure designed to get the books to the fans reliably but also leaves us to guide our own projects individually, rather than pushing a company meme.

What my colleagues are of doing within their titles doesn't affect what I'm doing in mine, and they are all truly creator owned. The incentive to get the books done and have them be all they can be falls squarely on the creators' shoulders and that's a good thing, as we all have skin in the game, so to speak. When you're drawing or writing someone else's property, you're doing so from a nostalgia for the property, and personally, I try to bring my 'A' game to everything I draw, but there's something wonderful about bringing to those that like my work, something that comes from a real inspiration and desire to collaborate with people who challenge me artistically. And in doing so, bringing out something totally new. Image has provided me a platform to bring new writers to the comics medium and really co-create.

KM:Is there anything you'd like to add that I haven't asked?

DR: I want to say thank you to the fans that are supporting this movement with such enthusiasm, as a party is no fun if no one shows up. The turn out for the Image panel in San Diego and the response Image is seeing in sales figures and attention says to me that there has never been a better time for creators to push the envelope and and really find the potential of this incredible format to tell stories. Like Steam-punk itself, comics look simple, but the combining of great words and great art, is always a bit of luck and a lot of passionate, devoted work to create something that works and entertains.

Comic Arts Conference Wrap-up SDCC 2012

One of the most amazing things about San Diego Comic-Con is that it contains more universes than that bag of marbles at the end of Men in Black.  There are so many different communities getting together that it would be just about impossible to touch on all of them. I’ll never forget the year that I went into a room early to catch a spotlight on J J Sedelmaier, and found myself in the middle of the Klingon Lifestyle Presentation, an annual drama featuring the crew of the IKV Stranglehold. It was so cool! And great costumes!

Anyway, not so many costumes at the Comic Arts Conference, the comics scholarship conference that celebrated its 20th anniversary at this year’s convention. The instigators, Peter Coogan and Randy Duncan  (still co-chairs and active participants) were awarded the Inkpot this year in commemoration of this feat.  The CAC room is like a sea of tranquility in the midst of a hurricane of craziness, and I am constantly slipping in & out of the room while the festivities are going on. You never know who you will see; comics professionals, independent scholars you never see anywhere else, professors from around the world, students & young scholars presenting for the first time … it’s a great experience.

The first CAC panel kicked things off with Subaltern Counterculture and Strengths of the Underdog, a group that opened my eyes to all kinds of viewpoints I hadn’t thought of. These included Crisis on Indigenous Earth: Comic Art Indigene Mateo Romero and Antonio Chavarria (Museum of the Indian Arts & Culture); Mexico City as the Field of Signification: Creating a Subaltern Hero in Daniel Munoz’s El Pantera Sam Cannon (U of Texas, Austin); Cyber-Blackness and the Ethics of De-Racialized Characters Kane Anderson (UC Santa Barbara) and Rebel Yell: The Physical and Racial Identity of Storm Ayanna Dozier (Chapman University). This last one, with her discussion of the “bad girl” punk version of Storm, really set me up for the next panel I was going to, CBLDF’s forum on women’s issues in comics.

I caught a number of great presentations on Friday, beginning with a humorous and provocative look at US comics from the Canadian perspective (it’s not all about you, USA) called “So that’s what an angry Canadian sounds like!” Fan Responses to Alpha Flight by Amanda Murphyao (Carleton University). Following her was the Revolution & Reaction panel, kicked off by the always amazing Trina Robbins (Lily Renée, Escape Artist) talking about her recent research on the art and life of Holocaust survivor Lily Renée Wilheim, one of the most successful women cartoonists during World War II and Fiction House's only woman cartoonist to draw covers as well as interior stories.  The rest of the panel was also interesting with a theoretical look at McCay, UM-CHOW: Winsor McCay’s Political Object Relations Eyal Amiran (UC Irvine); Make Way for the Fat Fury: Herbie and the Postwar Consumer Matt Yockey (U of Toledo) and a fascinating look at the comic-book-style evangelical tracts of Jack T. Chick by Cori Knight and Sean Sagan (UC Irvine).

Lily Renee. A great story by Trina Robbins

Following this were two important panels on Kirby. I’m sorry to say that I missed the first one, Jack Kirby and the Auteur Theory of Comics with Arlen Schumer & Randolph Hoppe (Kirby Museum) joined by Kirby scholars John Morrow (The Jack Kirby Collector); Charles Hatfield (Eisner Winner!) and Craig Fischer (Appalachian State University). I am happy to say that the whole thing was caught on video, and has been posted on Comics Journal for your viewing pleasure. Schumer’s article is also included in the current International Journal of Comic Art (Spring 2012), along with a rebuttal by Barry Pearl.

As regular readers of this blog might know, I have long been interested in researching and writing about Jack Kirby’s collages, so the next panel Jack Kirby, Modernism & Abstraction turned out to be one of the most exciting panels I witnessed at the Con. Andrei Molotiu (Indiana University; Abstract Comics Anthology & blog) and Mark Badger (Batman: Jazz, Martian Manhunter) succeeded in tying Kirby’s work not only into works I’ve written about before (Richard Hamilton, Hanna Hoch) but also Modernist masters like Wassily Kandinsky, Franz Kline, Lyubouv Popova and the theories of Clement Greenberg. It might not seem like it works, looking at this tiny picture of a Kline on my blog, but when you see Kirby's vibrant work and these dynamic paintings side by side on a big screen, it's a really strong argument.

Franz Kline (American, 1910-1962). Mahoning, 1956. Oil and paper collage on canvas.
80 x 100 in. (203.2 x 254 cm). Purchase, with funds from the Friends of the
Whitney Museum of American Art. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

© 2009 The Franz Kline Estate/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Saturday brought us a visit from John Lent (publisher of the IJOCA, and more books on international comics than I can name) who came to speak in San Diego as a sort of detour between Malaysia and a conference in South Africa (bet some airline owes him A LOT of miles).  The Pioneers of Comics Scholarship panel, moderated by Randy Duncan (Eisner nominee!), included Lent, David Kunzle (History of the Comics Strip), Vicki Green (The Indian in the Western Comic Book) and Joseph Witek (Comic Books as History, editor of the Conversations series for U of Mississippi Press). It was great to hear the stories of how they all started researching comics, how they overcame discouragement, and where they thought scholarship was going in the future.

Following this was an interesting trio of papers on the ideas of economics, ideology and politics in the writings of Grant Morrison by Marc Singer (Howard University); Jason Tondro (UC Riverside) and Karma Waltonen (UC Davis). Singer’s presentation, Morrison, Incorporated was particularly interesting because he collected together several storylines where Morrison made corporations a villain, or even an actual character, and I thought it was a good commentary on the Occupy movement and the financial crisis we find ourselves in. I also enjoyed Jade Hidle's (UC San Diego) presentation on comics exploring the Vietnamese view of the US/Vietnam War experience. In one of those "only at SDCC" type stories, she's a local girl and long-time Con attendee, there to present for the first time with her Dad in the audience, who finds that the writer/artist she wrote about, Eisner nominee GB Tran, was there and wanted to sit in on the panel, and it was moderated by Scott McCloud (Understanding Comics) who she cited extensively. I was so happy for this girl, and she did a great job.

My husband Marc and I couldn’t help comparing the Pioneers panel with the panel that closed the conference, a presentation of field studies by students that were looking at the culture of comic-con (organized by Matthew J. Smith, Eisner nominee!). Many of them were Con virgins, and it was interesting to hear their responses to fan culture, endless lines, getting into Hall H, mega-marketing, etc.  Stephen Cunningham (U of Central Arkansas) commented that it was the first time he’d ever been to a Con, and the first time he’d ever been to California, and he was shocked how nice people at the Con were in comparison to people attending a Razorbacks game. As I listened to the response from the audience (“oh, you didn’t see this person push me”… “oh, this line was terrible”), I was thinking to myself, “Boy… you people have never been to a Raiders game have you?” People at Comic-Con, with all 120,000 (plus) of us jammed in together do actually try to be mellow and get along. We are all happy to be there, with our peeps, in the one place all of our separate universes collide.

A Raiders fan in the Black Hole. Who knows? Maybe
he comes to SDCC dressed as Skeletor...

Sherman, Nottebohm & Clerque in SF

Saw the Cindy Sherman (born January 19, 1954 in Glen Ridge, New Jersey) retrospective at SFMOMA yesterday. Although it was laid out more or less chronologically, I viewed it backwards (as usual) seeing her most recent work, the Society Portrait series first. These ¾ to full body heroic scale portraits were stunning. I'm sure I’ve seen all the women she is referencing, old money; the aging trophy wife; the philanthropist; the New Yorker with terrible teeth and a bad dye job. As a female person of middle age, I recognized the struggle of these characters beneath the glossy surface, trying in vain to hang on to beauty & status.  I also couldn’t help thinking about Renaissance female portraits and the the abundant symbolism employed in them to tell the viewer about the good qualities and status of the sitter, with the obvious symbols of wealth and taste like diamonds and Hermès scarves standing in for pearls, rubies, and the other traditional signifiers of purity & devotion.

Cindy Sherman, Untitled #465, 2008;
chromogenic color print; 63 3/4 x 57 1/4" (161.9 x 145.4 cm);
courtesy the artist and Metro Pictures, New York; © 2012 Cindy Sherman

Source: http://www.sfmoma.org/about/press/images/919#ixzz21nrrFQcE
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

This left me in the perfect frame of mind to view Sherman’s History series, in which she parodies the styles and motifs often seen in classical European painting. These works, with their exaggerated prosthetics and deft manipulation of the subject matter, consider changing artistic processes, social mores and gender roles in Western society.  The giant noses, bellies and breasts make an interesting commentary on the changing meanings of words like “sexy” and “desirable” from one era to another (good article on these here). Seeing these very theatrical portraits juxtaposed with the raw vulnerability of the Centerfolds series in the next gallery was a breathtaking contrast. I finished at the beginning, with the photos that first brought Sherman to prominence, the Film Stills. It was great to see these all together in order. I was lucky to be there on a weekday, and there was space to step back and see entire series as a composition. They have a rhythm together that you would never get looking at them individually in a book. Comparing these with her newest work (the Society Portraits in the next gallery), I felt that the artist has great awareness of humanity & inner life, as seen through the lens of the culture she skewers so well.

Andreas Nottebohm. AN-2001, May 2012, oil on aluminum 29 x 48" at Modernism

Around the corner from SFMOMA, I stopped in at Modernism, where the works of Andreas Nottebohm (born 1944, Eisenach, East Germany) and Lucien Clergue (born 1934, Arles, France) are on display. While Sherman’s work delves into the inner life of her characters, these works are lovely and very much about the surface. Nottebohm distresses the surface of aluminum panels with power tools, and then paints them with glazes of oil. They have a luminescent holographic quality that has to be seen to be believed. The most interesting (to me) of Clergue’s photographic works were a series of female nudes striped by the shadows of venetian blinds.

Lucien Clergue. Zebra Nude, 1997. gelatin silver print, at Modernism.

 Nottebohm and Clergue are at Modernism on Market Street July 11 - August 25, 2012.  Cindy Sherman is at SFMOMA July 14th - October 8, 2012

San Diego Comic-Con 2012 Photos

Getting caught up from SDCC. Another overwhelming and amazing con. Great panels, friends, announcements, books and toys! More posts to come.

If you can't see this slideshow, click here to see it on Flickr.

Ceramic Artist Emil Yanos

Emil's design for the Kitayama Cup
competition.

Today's interview is with Emil Yanos, AIFD; ceramic artist, florist and all around amazingly creative guy. I visited his ceramics studio not long after we both participated in the Kitayama Cup Floral Design Competition.

KM: Thanks for having me over to your studio. It was fun to see you at the Kitayama Cup competition. I was really surprised that you didn't win! There was a big AIFD presence. You are the outgoing president. Can you talk a little about the AIFD? Everyone seems friendly.

EY: Yes, I'm the outgoing president of AIFD Northwest.  If you don't know AIFD is a professional floral organization whose purpose is to promote design excellence, floral education and professionalism in the floral industry.  We try to put on programs that educate the public as well as our current members.  Subject could range from design techniques to shop practices.  Of course we want to promote people in our region.

Emil at his studio.

KM: Well, I love flowers, but I'm really intrigued by your ceramics. You tell me that the floral designs and the ceramics are really separate disciplines to you, but I see lots of organic forms here, especially this cone-shaped series you are working on now.

EY: I really see flowers and ceramics as separate entities.  I'm not saying that either can't be incorporated together.  I would like each to be able to stand on its own.  I have made containers for flowers.  The aesthetic for those were determined by function.  Of course you can put flowers in my other work but their primary function is art.

In general my work deals with texture and contrast.  You can see a juxtaposition of rough with smooth, shiny with matte, and everything in between.  In many cases, color is kept to a minimum because there is so much visual interest.  At the same time I occasionally will add a vibrant color when I feel the piece needs it.

Ceramic candle holders by Emil Yanos

KM: Can you talk a little about these Illuminations candle holders? I love the texture of these, rough on the outside and smooth and shiney on the inside. Another interviewer commented that they reminded her of lava, personally I'm a big sci-fi fan, so they look like dinosaur eggs to me. What was your real inspiration?

EY: Its funny my votives remind you of dinosaur eggs.  Thats what they remind me of.  If you go to my ceramic page on Facebook, you'll notice the photo I use.  I had those pieces shot with eggs.  To me its kind of like an egg fossil.  As I told you, my objective was to work within my capabilities.  When I first started doing ceramics, my pinch pots (which is what these are) did not retain moisture, they became dried and cracked.  I decided to use that feature to my advantage, instead of working against it.  It comes down to knowing you skill and materials and how to use each to its full potential.

Large "coconut bowl" by Emil Yanos

KM: I love these bowls and platters made of strips. You told me an interesting story about these.

EY: I began making the "Coconut" bowls when I developed tendonitis and I couldn't thow.  Making coils was the only thing I could do without injuring myself any further.  The coils are pressed into a form then smoothed out.  I wanted to high light the exterior so I decided to put on a wash of iron oxide, which fires to a warm toasty brown, and keep the "color" on the interior.  When they came out of the kiln they reminded me of coconuts.

Two photos of works from Emil's Maui series.

KM: You told me that you've had a space here at Ruby's Clay Studio for a long time, and that a different artist's work is shown in the upstairs gallery every couple of weeks. Do you have one coming up soon?

EY: Ruby's has a new show every two weeks.  I was part of the Open Studio show last October.  Every October San Francisco has its open studios.  I participated in open studios the last two or three years, featuring my latest work, the Maui series.  This is the series that was inspired by the back of leaves.  I've used used this inspiration and transformed it into the varying shapes.

There is a great interview with Emil on the Handful of Salt design blog, and you can see the wide range of his ceramic work on his web site limegreen.

If you can't see the slideshow above, click here to see it on Flickr.

Sigur on Japan, Decorative Arts & Art History

Hannah Sigur

KM: This is a conversation with Hannah Sigur, an art historian who recently presented on the Japanese influence on American decorative arts at the Legion of Honor in conjunction with the Cult of Beauty exhibition. Hannah, would you mind repeating your story of the Japonesque room you discovered (re-discovered) recently? I love stories about discovery through research and serendipity.

HS: It was the Japonesque parlor of Henry Marquand, first president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The mansion, by Richard Morris Hunt, the most famous architect of the era, and its Japonesque room, were considered major highlights at the time, and there was much hand-wringing when the property was sold and mansion demolished shortly after his death. His famous art collection, he intended for the Met, was sold; the "Japanese room" disappeared. About 6 weeks ago, a good friend who is a well known glass conservator was brought in by an appraiser for a project at a 1905 house in Connecticut being prepared for sale. They found remnants of what had once been a stunning Japonesque interior and some unidentified period photos and wondered if it was Jeckyll. She sent me those, and her own photos of details and asked what I thought. I said it didn't look like Jeckyll. But, quick research on the owner of the 1905 house showed that he had been very significant in his day, and casting about for the kind of social circles he might have been in, I remembered the Marquand mansion and sent her a period NYT article about it, which had rudimentary photo reproductions of the Japonesque interior. They matched the original photos exactly. So we have found the long lost room. But it is in such reduced state, and because it is up for sale, it's hard to know what might unfold with whoever the new owners turn out to be. The designer, Manley Cutter, fell rapidly into obscurity after this remarkable debut and finding out much about him is for the moment elusive. But I think it's an important find because of its quality and because it gives a sense of what these now largely lost rooms were like. And, maybe with Cutter we'll uncover something interesting.

KM: This event was hosted by the American Decorative Arts Forum. I recognized many people there from Victorian Society of America events, and other things we’ve attended together. I have to admit that before this I didn’t realize what an active community of collectors there are in the bay area.

Hannah utilizing a group of wallpapers to illustrate the cross-pollination
of design elements between Japan, the US, and Europe.

HS: The ADAF is as good as it gets in the Bay Area--it encompasses very wide ranging interests and it seems to be very well-run, and it has a lot of very smart, friendly members. I've been to several of their lectures, and all were well attended, although mine was exceptional--I think because Cult of Beauty is so gorgeous. They also benefit from some sort of official relationship with FAMSF, although my impression is that the museum administration and curators aren't necessarily attuned to what an excellent asset the ADAF is to them. ADAF had asked if I would do a gallery walk-through, for example, and the curators turned it down. At the Met, or any other major museum, they would have jumped to have a specialist for something like that. The museum should be requiring that their docents all attend ADAF lectures--they bring people in from all over the country, so it was quite an honor for me to be invited to speak.

KM: Often when we talk about local museum exhibits with Asian art connections, you tell me that you feel things have been misstated or misunderstood. What questions should we keep in mind while looking at these shows?

HS: That's a tricky question. At the FAMSF and SFMoMa, the curators seem to have little real knowledge or deep interest in Asian material culture, and if you're going to reference it, you need to be accurate and up-to-date. But they are not motivated to do it on their own, and because there is no mentality of collaboration with the academic community here, they do not ask them or involve them in any way. This leaves major gaps. It was not rocket science to see the Japanese elements in the "Iznik" dish, and that dish became much more expressive of Aesthetic philosophy by revealing them. There were other issues--the Hokusai reference for the Godwin cabinet was doubly wrong. If the curator had mentioned the other artist, it would have been acceptable because it's a much more recent assessment, from a Japanese scholar who had recently published a significant book in English on the Japonesque in Britain.  At the Asian, it seems to be a slightly different problem--leaving out things because of the presumption that people do not need or want to know--thus preserving the sense of exoticism and exclusivity. One of my students even was told "The common people wouldn't understand" by a docent. My general advice is to take a tip from Ronald Reagan: "Trust but verify."

KM: You’ve been teaching Art History for a long time. What do you think the benefits are of learning about the art of a different culture?

HS: Material culture doesn't lie, although people sometimes lie about it, it confronts us honestly and it is only what it is. If you respect that, you learn so much from that of another culture. You learn who you are, by learning who you are not. You learn that outward differences amount to different solutions to the same kinds of human problems, passions, and fears that all people have, and thus that there is a common validity among societies. You also learn that in truly respecting another culture, that demands you acknowledge not just its beauties, but also its evils--and all societies have them.
   
KM: I know you are about to finish your PhD dissertation on Japan and the World’s Fairs. I’ve seen you speak on this subject, so I’m sure your paper will be amazing. Do you have any other speaking gigs lined up?

HS: Not at the moment. I've submitted an abstract for SAH 2013, but haven't heard back yet. I'm glad you got so much out of this one--the subject is enthralling. It hits all the marks for me.

Hannah is the author of The Influence of Japanese Art on Design (Gibbs Smith, 2008) and, with Alisa de Jong-Stout, A Master Guide to the Art of Floral Design (Timber Press, 2002).