INTERVIEW WITH GARY BASEMAN

"The good ideas give me a reason to live, and the bad ideas just suck."

I talked about creativity with Gary Baseman, American cartoonist and interdisciplinary artist. Here's what he had to say.

I guess we'll begin with questions about you personally and your projects, personality, habits, et cetera. So, what do you create?

Well, before you start asking me questions, I have a few questions.

OK.

So tell me about this project that you're doing personally, and why are you doing this? And what are you seeing from interviewing people about creativity?

I sent you the questions earlier, and some of them were white questions and some of them were yellow. The ones that are white are questions we've asked the other participants. We've interviewed about 10 people at this point and we're just asking some boilerplate questions across the board to try to see how people's answers are the same and how they're different. 

And just to derive a picture of the creative process in general, which obviously it's something you can't completely make scientific or apply rigor to it as you would science, because there is some magic to the creative process. But we're just trying to see what the similarities and differences between different creative practitioners are.

OK. And then also because you are working through Denise who manages my studio. So that's where I knew I was gonna be interviewed about creativity. But how is this gonna be used?

We were hoping to use the audio in a podcast format and to make a transcript to have some documentation of the interaction. And we'll put that on our Distilling Creativity website for whoever wants to learn from you.

OK. Right. Well, hopefully we'll have some answers here.

Starting with what you create. I know you create all different kinds of things. But what in your own words? What do you create?

What do I create? OK. That's a big question. Well, first thing that came to my mind was magic, but maybe that's just a term that's in my head right now. But I mean, I think it's the idea of art or what do I create. I'm creating a universe. I'm creating imagery. I'm creating a language. I'm trying to create inspiration. I'm trying to create something to kind of heal myself or give meaning to this world that we live in, our life itself. I'm trying to create a type of immortality. And I'm just like riffing right now. 

So what do I create? I guess I create all those things. I create characters. I create stories. I create visual imagery. I create emotion. I create for me. It's again, it's also healing. So I create drawings, I create paintings, I create TV shows. I create performance. I create plush. I create vinyl figures of foodie, clothing. So I guess something like that.

Yeah. Your idea of pervasive creativity of boundless creativity that I love.

That's the goal. And that's where I kind of created that term pervasive art. Just the notion of being able to create and not limit yourself where that creativity will go to. And that knowing what you want to say or how you wanna say it. That you've not limited yourself into any kind of palette, any box, and then use anything that's possible to be able to create the richest solution to whatever you want to say and how you want to say it as an artist.

And I guess I'll sidebar myself right from the get go. What sketchbook number are you on?

156. That's an easy one.

Oh, that's amazing. 156 books of your creativity.

Well, something like that in my lifetime that we do know of. The side sketchbooks too. And then hopefully we did number them properly. So that I can't guarantee either. But I went pretty wild when I went. I was just in Spain and Paris. And so a lot of these drawings come from meals that I had out. Also the sketchbooks almost reinvent themselves depending on where I am in this world in my life. And then we had these rains in LA. So, I kind of imagined LA flooding to the top. 

So the sketchbooks are a type of diary, a type of souvenir. In fact, for my travels and the type of way for me to look back at where I am in my life and what I was doing and what I was thinking and what I was hoping for then.

Kind of a marker on the times that we're living in. So, anyway, this one's 155. And then also the front and back usually relate to what I'm working in at the moment.

Oh, wow. Wow.

So this was when I was working on my show in Beijing that was celebrating the life and teachings of my cat Blackie that passed away during the pandemic in August of 2020. So I needed to find a way to honor him and created a multidisciplinary exhibition with multi installations. So the whole idea was to have people who would visit the exhibition who had no connection to Blackie the cat. And hopefully, by the time they left they developed a personal attachment or interest into who he is.

So that was one of my questions. More than any other artist I can think of, your work feels like an invitation into your life. Is that just my perception or is that one of your motivations?

Yeah, you're just crazy. I'm kidding. Well, what's important for me is to use what I'm going through personally and then try to take that and transform it to a theme that others could relate to. So, rather than keeping something very, very just personal. I guess most artists have to do that or film makers. Things that are on your mind all the time or the things that you think about or question. And hopefully you're able to find answers by building or digging or discovering things through your art that help relate to the life that we're living. And even more so, within the last 15 years, it's become a little bit more personal in where the themes come from. 

I've been painting now since '99. So that's 25 years now where the first exhibitions were more conceptual and playful. Again, still coming from me, but they related in a much more iconic way. And then in the last probably 15 years, the themes have bubbled up through very personal life experiences. But then even before that, I was a painter, I was an illustrator. And even though I was working with every major magazine and newspaper and solving their visual problems, it was still through my own artistic voice. So I've been very fortunate from a very young age to develop my own approach to mark making, to what my art looks like that is very recognizable, if you want to call it in a Baseman style. And that's how I would be hired in conceiving that. 

But even more so, the personal work has transformed. And that's when I left illustration or commercial work per se, even though I still blur into it. And I'm not afraid to take on an occasional assignment or project or work with a corporation in a way, if there's a way that it opens up other avenues through my art. Like, I've done with Coach when I did those two very large fashion collaborations for the Women To Men collection where they allowed me to really create the narrative and imagery for it.

What are you working on recently that you're excited about?

Working on recently? Well, when you're creating, you're creating on many levels. So the things that you're working on recently depends on ideas that are being born right now. So those are probably the most exciting which I can't talk to you about because they're too new and confidential. And well, they're confidential in the sense that they may not happen. And I may be working with some interesting people and some big ideas. So those are the things that are exciting to me in the sense that I'm giving birth. 

But the things that I'm excited about are some of the projects that are going to be coming out just like, right now, hopefully in this year, by the fall, I'll have a story book that my cat Blackie wrote nearly a decade ago called The Mighty Paw, which I was grateful that he wanted me to illustrate. So it's about 100 drawings, which is the story of his family and ancestors, which has taken a long, long time, a lot longer than I ever thought, because I even wrote a kids book in 1993. Oh my God, like 30 years ago or more. 30? Yes, 30 years ago. And still hasn't been published, still hasn't been finished. So, books projects things. So The Mighty Paw is what I'm really, really excited about. 

Next week, I'm going to be releasing a small group of a mini version of my Manny Moa. So Manny Moa is this flightless extinct bird from New Zealand, which a year ago, I had a museum exhibition called Memento Moa, which was more of a type of celebration and memorial to my favorite cousin Beverly that passed away in New Zealand, which is, I created 36 paintings kind of celebrating her life, but also the existence of the moa bird and use the moa as a metaphor for our loved ones that are lost, which other people can relate to. So people had a small collection of Moas that came with an English mourning locket. So you could put a picture of someone that you've loved and lost. And when you see the moa, it can remind you of that soul.

 But we did a more playful mini version that we're finalizing and we'll be releasing it on a leap year day, February 29th. So that's another more immediate excitement versus what I'm also excited about is I love Los Angeles. And now it's become more important for me with the idea of Los Angeles and Hollywood to create a body of work that really celebrates my own personal homeland, and where I was born and raised and really trying to understand what this place really represents to not just me but to the world. So, that's a few things and I'm sure there's other things that I'm pretty excited about. But right now it's, those are some things.

You're so prolific.

I got nothing better to do.

So when do you do most of your creative work? And why do you think that is?

When? All the time. But like, seriously, if I'm swimming, I'll work through ideas while I'm swimming laps sometimes. But everything I do differently. It's like if I need to just draw and not think about it because what I'm drawing is the idea. It’s already there. I like to sit at a coffee shop and be surrounded by others and I can just create, produce for me. 

To paint, generally, I need a deadline. So if I have a deadline or something, I'll paint like a madman. And I'll paint 24 hours a day literally, or maybe not literally 24 hours a day. I'll wake up at four in the morning and start painting or wake up at two in the morning and start painting or just find a way to continue what I need to get done, to get these pieces done. But without a deadline, I'm not the kind of painter that will paint eight hours a day or six hours a day and just sit there and do that. 

But I'm always creating. So either working through stories, working through narratives, writing, whenever I can drawing of course. Like with my sketchbook, I carry it wherever I go, and literally I carry it wherever I go. It's rare for me not to be in possession of my sketchbook even if I'm going someplace and probably I'm not going use it. But I have a lifelong history of needing it at some time. And so I will carry it around which has become where a lot of my sketchbooks come from. 

I had this kind of challenge for myself, that I'll draw while I eat and try to capture the moment of the meal through the sketchbook. So I've done that. Either I'm actually drawing the diner and the people around me or if they're not that interesting, I'll create my own characters that will be in this place. Or if I'm working through other themes, it could be more surreal and the imagery could have nothing to do with where I'm eating, but more dealing with some kind of visual. I don't know, you know? So something that is just some kind of emotional drawing based on where I'm at at the time. 

It's hard for me to have true downtime unless I'm binge watching something or something like that. Then I'm not actually creating any more. I’m taking in someone else's creation and feeling the emotion and from that.

You have a very distinct recognizable style. Which of your influences can you see reflected in your style?

Well, I guess in some ways because my first true inspiration as a child was old Warner Brothers cartoons. So at a very young age, I guess when I was watching these cartoons, even though it was probably in the sixties, most of these things were created in the thirties and forties. That to me, was my first love and what I thought perfection was. So the way those characters are drawn. Old Porky Pig or Bugs Bunny represented what I wanted to emulate in a way. Also as a kid growing up in LA with Disneyland, Mickey and that world also. The idea of Disneyland and what that represented, that magic played a big role. 

But growing up as an adult and then being inspired by so many other…well, as an adolescent with MAD Magazine. But then also having a look for music from somebody like David Bowie or the Velvet Underground, films like David Lynch or Martin Scorsese or Quentin Tarantino. 

Or painters like Mark Rothko: he was like one of my first feelings of true love in seeing fine art when growing up here in LA, when the Museum of Contemporary Art first opened and they had an exhibition before they even had the finished building in the temporary contemporary. They had a collection of their work that they showed their permanent collection and they were Mark Rothkos. And I remember being in front of those paintings for the first time and having the feeling of falling in love. And I wasn't sure if it was having a nervous reaction or anxiety attack or something like that. But I took that emotion as a love and I thought, “Wow, if those pieces can make me feel that strong of emotion, if I can create work that others can feel that way.” That's what I would love to do in my lifetime.

So, other inspirations like Andy Warhol and his idea of pervasiveness, taking pop culture and turning it inside out and turning everyday people into celebrities and celebrities into icons. And that idea of it was exciting and living a life bigger than ourselves. 

As an illustrator, somebody like Miguel Covarrubias, who was doing work for Vanity Fair in the thirties and forties, or Casa Cassandre posters, or Paul Colin, also as a poster artist, work that was very graphic and very bold. Miguel Covarrubias was a contemporary of Diego Rivera and Frida. But he came to New York and his caricatures and his way he painted was so beautiful. And then he would travel around the world and do books on other cultures and civilizations. And for me, it was just fascinating. So he's always been one of my biggest influences in a way. 

So again, I have a lot of influences in a way of what I do. And then even for me going from having such an idealistic view about life, which was when I was younger. Everything was very black and white. Everything was going on your permanent record in the world. And not until my mid-twenties was I able to veer away from that and wanting to break down walls. 

And one of my biggest inspirations is Leonard Cohen and his music. And he, through his songs, kind of taught me of the celebration of the bittersweetness of life in a way which kind of represents most of my work. Through this music that would tear you apart, but that's what life was about. That not everything had to be perfect, not everyone would walk into the sunset but that is the beauty of our existence.

Moving on to questions about getting started, questions of the process. When you're creating something from scratch, how do you start?

It's called the spark. It depends on what you're starting. So if you're asking me, where does that idea come from? It comes from taking a blank piece of paper and jotting something down or you go for a walk and an idea forms, or you take something that's painful and you're trying to understand why it is that way and you come up with some imagery that kind of represents what that was and how to solve it. 

But if you're talking about something like illustration, that's a little different. People would give me a visual problem. So they'll give me a story that needs to be illustrated or they have a unique selling point. And then I would take that and work through ideas and work on a bunch of bad ideas until there's a good idea. You take what's the most obvious and then you keep working through it and working through it, and finding something that, how do you make it more interesting? 

But then as an artist beyond painter, beyond whatever you'll call me, how do I make it my own? And that's something that is easy for me. But we, with my studio, created this course for Domestika in a way it was how do you get people to develop confidence in themselves? And for me, the most unique art is art that is created by someone that couldn't be created by anybody else. So how do you look at your background with your interests, your hopes and dreams and be able to create work from that? 

But going back to you another way, just like every question you have, there's probably like 70 different answers depending on where you want to look at it, right? I don't know about the starting point. But why do you create something from scratch? And for me, the reason I'm creating what just popped into my head was, and the way I kind of looked at it in the past, was that in many ways I feel like I'm worthless unless I create something of value. So if I create something of value, I have value. So on this earth, if I do nothing on this earth, I've done nothing. I never gave back. I've never had any kind of meaning. 

And so for me, the importance is to create something of meaning. And how do I do that? And for me, if I create something of value, I have value. And that's where if I create a drawing out of nothing, if I went someplace and I created something of it, then there was a reason why I was there. Or if I went through something painful, if I could create something beautiful from that pain, then it was worth going through. So that feeling of accomplishment and the idea that something didn't exist until I produced it and now it exists and then I can I have something to show for myself.

Do you begin with the end in mind or do you let it evolve organically?

Both. Yeah. Depending on what you're working on. Back when I was an illustrator, you come up with a solution, you get it approved and then I have to complete it with the end that people saw, that they approved. So then I know what the end is going to look like. And I'm finding hopefully an interesting way to get to that ending. And maybe I can challenge myself through how I play with color or mark making or collage or something to get to that solution and keep myself interested as a painter. 

I'm working through a body of work for an exhibition, even though I may have an idea of what I want to paint. I'm not the kind of painter that takes something and then either projects it or follows through just to finish it based on something that was done. I love the act of actually reacting to what I'm placing down. So I place something down. I want the freedom to rework something, to move things around, to add things that I had no idea until I place things there on the canvas. So I like the relationship of me interacting with the painting until it's complete. So it's not like, “OK, I already got the sketch and now I gotta follow through with it.” 

So everything is a little different. We, just like with our performance, have a broad idea of what we're trying to do and how we want people to interact. But then in the process of working with dancers or performers or musicians, or like with a play in theater, you may have a script and you have all these things, but how people will interact with it. How do you work with the audience, seeing what's working and what doesn't work? 

And by the end, you hopefully have something that's special. So for me, the artistic process gets boring if you're not able to experiment and take risks and then to go further with that as a painter. Or somebody as a drawer or a mark maker, when I put my marks down, for me even though I may have done it a million times, I want to make it, when I do put it down, it has to feel as if I'm putting it down for the first time. And I use the analogy of like an actor, an actor who has a script has to read his lines. But when it comes out of his or her mouth, they're saying it for the first time. It has to feel as if there actually saying it for the very first time, because that's what their character is doing. 

And that's how I want with my work. I want the work to feel spontaneous and fresh and real.

And you said your characters naturally arise from trying to understand your emotions and themes. Can you explain that a little bit more?

Well, when I'm working through an exhibition, I'm not creating a character. But usually when I do have exhibitions, characters develop and rise. So basically I'm working through an idea or something. And then from that, that's where my characters will bubble up, develop, and grow and then they will grow further through the amount of paintings that I do and the body of work and by the end, it's like I have something that's kind of that was given birth and that now exists from it.

Your work is very character driven. And Charles Schultz from Peanuts fame has said that his characters were just different facets of himself. Do you feel the same way about your characters?

Yeah. Probably, pretty much. I mean, again, he was an amazing writer. And through his strip, he was able to get across ideas of his life and the world and each character probably plays a different aspect, like it's different elements from his mind. And with my exhibitions, it's even a little bit more so that each character is probably coming from what was going on in my life at that time. And that need to express that feeling. 

So when Dumb Luck came out, it was about one thing or Toby came out, it was about another, or Ahwroo came out of vicious things. I was going through something very specific at the time. So all those things, or even Boo… All these things come about through what I'm dealing with personally in my life or loss or love or success or failure or something that I needed to express through a body of work.

Chefs call it mise en place or other people call it fertile soil or getting in the mood. How do you set up your conditions to create?

I am crazy all of the time. I don't know if I need to set up. It's not like I'll light candles or something like that, or something like fill the house with perfume, or buy like 1,000 balloons or something like that. 

But if you mean sometimes I just need to go for a damn walk or go for a hike and that's where I'll work through ideas. Or I go out somewhere and I just need to jot things down. So I need to be surrounded by people or something like that or you need to go somewhere till there’s that spark really happens or sometimes you just gotta get it done. So you just gotta sit down and just start doing it and then something comes from it.

That said, when you have your initial idea or your initial spark, how do you nurture it or coax it or interrogate it into a finished product?

A lot of drawing and taking notes, I think.

And what percentage of your creative time is spent prototyping or experimenting?

Prototyping or experimenting? If I'm working on a figure or something to somebody else who's building the prototype based on my drawings.

I’d say even sketching is a form of prototyping.

Sure, for your finished pieces. But then also in the sense of when I'm creating something larger, like an art installation or an art performance, I'll usually work with Denise, the managing director of my studio, and we go back and forth. So she's very good at organizing ideas and thoughts and structure. Wait, what articulating? She likes the word articulating. I go structuring and then we go back and forth and sometimes arguing until things are worked through.

How much of your creative process is routine or habit and then how much of it is spontaneous or improvised?

I mean, I'm creating my creative processes every day so it could be habit. All of its habit, but spontaneity. But that's what the goal is from the habit. Something spontaneous comes from it.

Excellent. Excellent. I love that. What makes one idea more promising than another?

There's good and there's bad. And the good ideas give me a reason to live and the bad ideas just suck. And you wanna throw those away and let some sad, other, mediocre artists use those. So, for me, if I create something that I feel is brilliant, it gives me a reason to live. It gives me that moment. It makes me feel. It's like that's actually the feeling of true love. 

When you create something that's really clever and smart and brilliant and it's like, “Yes, this is it, this is.” And you feel great for a whole hour but then you go back to just killing yourself or something like that. But it's just the idea of you wanna live for those moments. But then, even with a brilliant idea, does anybody else care about that idea? 

And how do you make it successful? A whole other story is, what is success? Is it just getting out there? Is it being profitable? Does it open up other doors for other possibilities? Everybody has their own definition of what success is.

What is your definition of a successful creative project?

Again, it depends on the project. But generally, you want a lot of people to be able to see it and be inspired by it. You want a lot of people to talk about it. You want to open up new avenues. You want to be profitable so that you're able to compensate everyone who worked on it and yourself, so I can keep going. And you want the idea to be, to hopefully live on forever and inspire others for other generations. 

And the big goal is with everything that we're creating and hopefully generations and generations and generations down the line, we'll look back at this and see it and be inspired by it and understand this is what to mankind was important or found it interesting. And this is the way they lived in the year of 2000.

When you're working on something, how do you distinguish when it's time to test or try new things or when it's time to dig deeper or double down on your current idea?

If it's working, then you keep working on it and if it's not, then it's like, “I'll put it away and let me try to start again.” OK? So it's the interaction, it's a personal thing. But then again, back when I was an illustrator, the goal is you're just getting it done. And what I used to do sometimes is I would do like three to five different solutions of the same piece and see what I liked. So that was a whole different kind of thing. 

But as a painter or whatever I'm producing, just even an hour ago, for this new release I'm doing, I was playing, went round with line art. And some of the line art I like better than others. And if I didn't like it, I kept, I took out some more paper and kept trying to draw it until I got it the way I liked it. You see what works or doesn't work.

And how do you know when something is done, when you're done with a piece?

The piece grabs you and gives you a big kiss on the lips. That's how you know. You know when you know. It's like it's done.

I've never heard that one. I like that though. It does grab you. You when it resonates, when it hits you and you know not go any further, I guess.

Or it's gotta go out or you're gonna miss your deadline.

Where do you find inspiration?

Right in here and it's in your soul. It's a silly response but it starts there. But then you seek it out in your life, in your friends, in your hopes and your dreams. Inspiration is a lot of places. I like to travel. I like to go to different cultures, meet different people, see different things, learn their religion, their history. There is digging back into my past, looking at old photo albums. Digging through my childhood finding recently like a lot of my inspiration is based on my old photos and old toys from when I was a child. And that has been a major inspiration right now. 

When my father died – which again, he lived till 93 – but it hit me and I was able to sit with him on his deathbed and watch him die. He looked great when he died. He looked better dead than most people alive. I thought, “Wow, dad, what a present to let me see that there's nothing scary about being dead or dying afterwards.” It freaked me out and I didn't cut my hair or shave for like nine months. People didn't even recognize me. And at the same time, I felt like I needed to get closer to him and understand him. And that forced me too. 

I got a Fullbright Fellowship in Riga, Latvia. And then I had friends take me back to my father's original hometown where he spent his entire life, telling me never to go back there that there's nothing to see. But I needed to go back to his town of Bena and walk the land and smell the air where no Jews even live anymore because everyone was mass murdered there 60 years ago or more, 70 years ago now. And that's where I found so much inspiration. 

Inspiration is all over the place. It's just like where you are at this time right now. I have inspiration in the idea of not being afraid to experience the world and allow yourself to lose yourself and take risks after coming through the darkness of the pandemic. So a lot of my inspiration now is from going out on hikes in LA and developing a very personal relationship with Griffith Park. Inspirations all over the place. And you look at it from deep in here. 

I like having things that inspire me. You can see from things that I collect to prototypes, from my travels also. Little things that I would collect or little art pieces, old books, old photo albums, mannequin heads, things of the past, I'm a… what's the word? I know I'm just trying to think of the term, when you care about little things in your life. I'm sentimental. So I like to have objects of the past, objects from my family, objects from my friends. And having it around me, that inspires me.

I love it. That was one of my favorite parts of your Domestika course, talking about how to almost mine yourself for inspiration. That was amazing. When and where do your lightning bolt ideas occur?

You never know that. You never know when you're gonna struck by lightning. Could be anywhere, you know? OK, walking through Carnival in Brazil. And that is when my Noche de la Fusion came from seeing everybody in Brazil, celebrating life in the most vibrant, exciting way. Full cities of people dancing, celebrating our existence. I was in Tokyo or was it Kyoto when I came up with Happy Idiot, the snowman who melts himself down to let his love, the Mermaid, live within his body of water. From visiting the old toy shops there or just going to the temples in Japan and then eventually in Taiwan and in China, more in Taiwan. 

But ideas from things that are in my life and when you get it mixed with another culture and their ideas or learnings, and then something pops in your head. You jot it down in your sketchbook and that idea is not leaving you and you just build on it and you go further and further. So, it's like wherever you go, just being open to it when it happens.

You're a conduit, right?

Maybe for myself, for my own idea. You're not, I don't know where that comes from.

How much of your creative process is solitary and how much of it is in collaboration with others?

Most of the ideas give birth to on my own. But because I can't really do much, I mean, I draw but producing things, I need other people. And I can't do sculpture and a lot of things that I need to work through or even art performance or things like that with music or with putting stuff together or working it through. I like to collaborate. So that's where you kind of work with somebody else or others to make things happen. But as someone who's a natural drawer, a lot of that kind of stuff is done on my own.

And what role if any does feedback play in your creativity?

Good feedback plays a role, but that's from people that you respect and care about, who you think are smart enough, who have an interesting eye. Versus most people that when you talk to them, they usually just talking about themselves and they're not looking at the idea or they're not looking at you. 

Even if someone's trying to give you advice about yourself, they're usually just giving themselves advice.

So lots of feedback from people. It's an important process, but I don't take it because I know what I wanna say and how I wanna say it.

What is the hardest part of creation for you?

Well, Denise says narrowing it down. That's what she thinks. The hardest part of creation for her is me coming up with a lot of ideas and her getting me to narrow it down. That's not my hardest part. My hardest part is enjoying it. I have a lot of expectations, unreal expectations. So for me, the hardest part is to take a step back. And when it's done, just enjoy the act that I created something that was special to me and experience it and not having these unrealistic expectations. I feel like nothing is good enough.

It doesn't sound like your creativity ever stops flowing. But what stops your creative flow faster than anything?

What stops? It doesn't stop my creating. But if I feel like something really failed in a way, especially if something was brilliant and amazing, but then failed. That will keep me from wanting to continue producing more of that. If that makes any sense.

That makes absolute sense. Yeah. Yeah.

But just like, I haven't done a film since Teacher’s Pet, a feature film, and I think that film was brilliant. I had such a great team. I think Bill and Sherry wrote such an amazing script and Tim Borland did a great job directing it and we got such great reviews and the actors were amazing. I think it was such a smart, playful film. 

But the marketing department at Disney and the way it was put together was not supported properly. And it was a different type of medium, because we came from TV animation, not from feature animation. So the budget and the approach to introducing our characters and our world to the marketplace was nil. And so watching that fail in the box office, even though it was really critically acclaimed, kind of really broke my heart in a way that kept me… I mean, I wanna do film again and I wanna do TV, again, but having something like that… maybe take a step back. 

And that's where I went further, more into “OK, I'm gonna just concentrate on painting because that's something I can control more” where before we were producing something. And even though I thought I had amazing partners and collaborators in this project with not having the right people marketing and putting it in the right theaters in the right way. I wanted to concentrate on something smaller that I can control more. 

And how do you avoid ruts and preconceptions?

What do you mean?

How do you avoid redundancy or getting into ruts in your work?

Right. Right. Redundancy. Well, redundancy means just repetition, just repeating the same crap over and over again. Or that feeling like nothing's good enough. Or not gonna, because those are two completely different things. 

Everyone has a certain sense of repetition, and that's like even the way I draw or create is my own visual language, except I always try to keep it fresh in my own personal way. Sometimes I have other friends who want me to completely explore things in a whole different light. Like you should be drawning with your foot or something like that or using something or even exploring how you mark make in a whole different way or something like that. So there's ways to just really kind of experiment or grow with different ways that we create. 

A rut could be just a feeling of nothing's gonna ever be successful where nothing is good. Why should I even try? Or I think it just combination of pushing yourself through it, and hopefully you have friends who help you get out of it. I think again getting out of the house or traveling or doing, you know?

Can you think of a time that a constraint was beneficial to your creativity?

That's a good question. Probably. I probably won't come up with something right now. Although restraint isn't a bad idea, just like I put restraints on myself all the time. In fact, at one time, one of my works, I felt it was getting too “colorful.” I put restraints on how I would draw or paint just trying to do it all with just one color, and then went from one color to just two colors, and just putting a restraint on my palette, helped watch my work grow. 

So there's always a restraint that isn't bad. It just gives it a different kind of challenge that just forces you to come up with a hopefully a more interesting solution and how to make that work. Hopefully you can come up with something that's even more interesting than what you just expected, doing it the way you'd normally do it. But I'm trying to think, is there an example where somebody put a restraint on me, and then it worked out? I'm sure there is, but I can't think of it right now.

And what's a telltale sign that it's time to abandon an idea.

You're talking about me getting off, leaving this interview right now?

I hope not.

I'm kidding. All right. What is a telltale sign that it’s time to abandon an idea? I don't even know how to answer that right now because in my mind, I'm thinking of other things of work. If you're working with somebody and the project isn't looking good, how to abandon it? 

But how to abandon an idea? But I don't like an idea if it's not there. I probably have like 20 other things that I'm dealing with. So that idea probably just gets left as a footnote in a page in an old sketchbook that never went anywhere.

What kind of type of work would you like to do that you haven't done yet?

Well, one big idea that we've been playing around with is to create a type of amusement park in a way, but a different type of amusement park than you would expect or something that's kind of an interactive installation where people are able to transform themselves in a way going through the  experience.

OK.

What else would I like to do? I'd like, again, even though I did like stuff with Coach, I would love to do more fashion. I would love to collaborate with more filmmakers and storytelling. So, even with TV, there's a lot of things I'd love to do within the sense of collaborating with brilliant people to produce things that are greater than ourselves.

What do you think the different creative fields have in common or is there anything universal?

You’ve got to explain that again. I'm sorry.

You've worked in animation and you've worked in fashion and you've worked in performance art and you've worked in fine art and toys and all these different avenues. Is there anything universal to this process or is there anything they have in common?

God. God. I'm trying to think of something. I mean, everything is based on an idea. And there's some kind of loose narrative, so it's all creativity. I don't have an idea of what the umbrella would be in the sense of all these different things. So what do they have in common? Because they're all avenues that I like to express and challenge myself into. So, they're just another type of canvas.

Is there any skill or technique that you would like to borrow or bring into your work from a different field?

Everywhere, everything, I guess. I don't know. Depends if it's print making. I would love to be able to explore that or even pottery or product or all those. There's so many different skills in sound, music, every other. So editing is an important skill I can film or anything. So there's a lot of different talents that I would love to be able to work with. Others to be able to work, even in with 3D rendering or even where an I could possibly go to use it as a proper skill and not how it's used today. 

There's just so many possibilities and for me, it's not so much as the skill as back to people to collaborate with, who have those skills and how we can work together to create giant sculptures or things or, working out with paintings, photography made, there's a lot of excitement out there.

I just have three more questions for you. Who do you think of when I say most creative person?

Mhm. Most creative person, most creative person, my cat Blackie. He was probably like one of the most creative people I know. Most creative people person… Any of my inspirations that I mentioned before.

Is there anyone you can think of that you think we should talk to for this project?

I would have to think about that, but I'm sure there are a lot of creative people you can talk to. 

Last question. I know it's difficult to choose between your “children”. But what is your favorite work that you have done so far in your career?

My favorite work? Good question. Well, I guess if I had to pick one immediately right now, that's just on the top of my head, I'd just say my plush of Toby.

Well, that's a good one.

The keeper of your secrets. Who loves you unconditionally. Blurring the lines between fine art and toy culture and when you gift Toby to somebody your gifting your intimate personal self.

That's a good pick. I like him.

I didn't make him. Somebody else made that. But for me, the idea of him.

I just want to thank you for taking your time to speak with me. And you have illuminated a lot of different things that I hadn't thought about and you have a very unique perspective on things. 

Ok. Well, thank you very much for the opportunity and hopefully I didn't ramble too much. 

No, when you ramble, that's when you get to the honesty and you get to the good bits.

Thanks, and have a good evening, Gregory.

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