KAWS in Conversation with Sam Shikiar

well thank you everyone for coming tonight and I'd like to extend a big thank you to the staff of the Y they really went above and beyond and making tonight happen really there's a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes so maybe a quick round of applause for everyone at the Y who made tonight possible I'd also like to thank cause for being here this evening we really appreciate it so maybe one more round of applause for our guests and we're done thank you and we're done thank you very much so so to start things off you you did not come from an artistic family a family of artists so where did your interest in art begin and then also where does the name cause come from you have to start there that's kind of the beginning you know I think it's always something I used art kind of as a crutch I always gravitated towards it in elementary school and you know it's just sort of a way to pass time and kind of like you know I was never really motivated in sports or anything else and I kind of navigated relationships and friendships through art and the name cause it just comes from straight graffiti so it has no special meaning there's no acronym it no it's just um you know I always like the way the letters worked within each other or like how they kind of fit together and you know if you're doing your name several times like I did you kind of think about this and think about the how to look structurally and how it sounds it's a great great reason so we have some great images that we're gonna share tonight to kind of narrate our story and in 1996 you graduated from the School of Visual Arts and working in commercial animation when did you decide to make the jump and become a full time independent artist and leave that career you know when I got out of school my first job was in animation and you know I kind of eventually got worse and worse at that to the point where I thought that they were gonna fire me but instead they told me I could work for my house and how it starts yeah so I thought I thought I was getting called in to get fired and actually I got a bonus and was now able to work from my house so I was like oh I've kind of wishing I got fired and also you know at the time there was this grant that I want and and I just decided you know a little by little I kind of like cut the strings of security away and and sort of shifted into doing stuff for myself you know and I always I was I've never been like afraid of risk you know I thought you know the sooner I could plunge into it the better and coming back to the name for a minute cause do you prefer to be called cos or by your other name I mean whatever you remember call us Brian Donnelly you know I mean make sure I get it right I have friends parents that still call me cos and then you know it just doesn't I'll take whatever I got well I think we lost our slide here hopefully someone can get that back up there maybe I press the wrong button there we go so I think this image is really amazing if I paint to the side of a train and took a picture standing on top of it my parents would say are you nuts what are you doing on that train get down from there was your work early work ever dangerous when you were doing graffiti and how did you get on the train I mean that was actually that we went back the day after and a lot of times when you paint you go back in daylight and he's photograph it this was like in the middle of nowhere at Jersey and I think the highest risk was the mosquitos that were also get you yeah and so yeah me my friend John mace he painted the train next to me and I you know went up for a photo and then he did a very similar photo and in the end I learned very fast you know just from looking at sort of the generations before me and graffiti with how ephemeral it is you really only have the photography so I always was very keen on getting good documentation of the work and so never had any accidents or dangerous moments out there I mean there's danger but you just sort of like you know you sort of weigh the risk versus reward and it always seemed very the risk of seemed very silly well said see if we can get to the next image here starting in 1993 I believe you were painting over advertisements in buffin bus and phone booth cases how'd you even get the keys I started by painting large billboards I think that just has to do with growing up in Jersey City and having just easy access to it and you know with the amount of highways and it just I was interested in graphically I liked advertising I like to you know I started to think about how advertising in graffiti have similarities and starting in 96 is when I moved to Manhattan and I kind of lost my access to billboards and started to paint over phone booths and bus shelters and originally another artist from San Francisco Barry McGee gave me a tamper-proof Bowl to get into a phone booth and then I just kind of became obsessed with breaking into things as one of those yeah so I started to figure out how to get into the master locks like on the bus shelter you can see on the two bottoms there's these master locks but I realized if you can make a key for one it opened up the whole Avenue so there's New York security for you yeah exactly I think times it's a little different now but um and then I had no phone booths yeah exactly I think that that's one thing but also when I was in different countries I just got really interested in being like in a new place but doing very familiar things mm-hmm and would you paint them on site or you would take them home no they'd repaint it I would go and I would take them from a neighborhood that I didn't I wasn't interested in putting stuff back in so I would empty out that whole territory and take him and I paint him I was living the Lower East Side at the moment at that time and I would take him and put them in my route to work and you know things that I would see like on the route some of the bar that I like to go to I think you know and was there a message behind it or how did he come up with the idea to do this for the first time I mean it really just stemmed from when I was doing the sort of more traditional graffiti letter and letter form work when I started to paint over the hours husband's I started to think more about the larger audience and how can I communicate to people that aren't to kind of don't understand the nuances of graffiti because I felt like that was you know it's more like a lot of people see graffiti and they don't really I see a wall and I could you know pick out oh this person's from here this is this you know but a lot of people just see a blur and I felt like I'm working with as I needed to kind of just get into more sort of broader imaging is any of your graffiti still up in New York or has it kind of been painted over in the air see for the most part it's it's mostly gone mostly gone too bad maybe maybe there's you can go back and see bad I guess so in in the end do you think it do you think it helped the brands that you were painting over say over an ad for giving clothing company I don't think I would have contributed to selling another product those brands but um but in hindsight I could you know at the time I really thought like oh god if this whoever finds out you know that would be like I'd be getting sued or getting in trouble and sure and then later you learn that like friends they don't they just want attention and just take it any way they get it so eventually you were painting over ads not only in New York but San Francisco London and even Mexico City travel is gonna be a theme throughout your career how important was travel to your early career I think you said you told me that you learned about geography from trading photos maybe you could share a little bit about that yeah I mean when I was still living with my parents um a friend of mine had a graffiti magazine called undercover and so a lot of kids used to write in and send photos to it and whoever sent in better photos then you know we would start trading photos with them so I'd send you know I'd take my camera and walk around watching tahai it's bronze any anywhere there was a good graph and take photos not just in my work but of all artists you know the ones that I liked and I'd make packets and send them out and so I'd be trading photos with kids in Germany in Spain and it really just sort of got me interested in the bigger picture and kind of where can I go and that's great when you traveled you would have new friends and those exactly I mean first time out of the country was in 96 and it was to do graph and um you know I immediately linked up with kids who were familiar with before I got there almost a pre-internet social media you had going yeah definitely no I know I remember when we we went first like graft messageboard started I think everybody was just scared to even write on them because surely exactly so in 1997 was right after you graduated school you went to Japan tell us a little bit about that trip I understand how you came to your to get your ticket was pretty interesting where he landed was a little bit interesting there it didn't didn't go as smoothly as you might have thought it wasn't unsmooth it was no it was great it was a great trip but you know so and I was going to school visual arts at the time and a friend of Mines brother offered to bring me to Japan in exchange for painting so I gave I gave him a small painting and he gave me a ticket it's a good trade yeah definitely at the time it was a good trade for me and so I thought I was staying in Tokyo but it turned out he lived about an hour and a half outside of Tokyo in like this pig farm area so I got to go into Tokyo maybe two nights out of the week so you thought you were going to Tokyo and you ended up I fully I just assumed like oh yeah same thing you know I mean yeah tell us a little bit about some of the people that you've met in Japan who had a real really large impact on your career as the years went on yeah I mean I went originally just cuz I was excited to go to Japan like everyone who doesn't want to go to Japan when they're younger but then I you know I met a lot of people in streetwear that I continued to work with like to this day and you know the first sort of company I started working with with this company hectic and it just seemed like a really inspiring place there was a lot of people that were you know similar in age that were just super ambitious and productive and so I can't came back to New York like how do I get back there you know I just want to get into work and do things how long did you spend when you were over there I was on there for a week Jona two weeks yeah and then I never there's this there's like people have this idea that I've lived in Japan I've never lived in Japan the longest I've ever been there was two weeks but I've gone about you know 4050 times Wow so you've got some good airline miles a little bit so where and when was the first time you painted the skull and crossed out eyes image and what does it mean you can see it on this billboard in the learning question I was going to say in front of this picture what a coincidence that right there is the first time that I paint a skull and crossbone and my friend titi there was another billboard like right here that he was painting and he was just taking too long but I had finished my piece and he was still painting and so I started to paint these imagery on the right and left of it just to kind of kill time and that was it I still would have been scared of falling but that's just me ya know and they're legends like that you're fine funny plenty of room yeah in 1999 see if we can get the next slide here I just noticed there's a screen right there I don't you don't have to turn her up okay 1999 you did your first collaboration with a Japanese clothing company called bounty hunter to make toys that you name companion my first question is where did that name come from well companion I just thought when I saw him that was his name you know I it just it just felt right into him and with bounty hunter I met him through you know originally like the people I met in Japan were through a friend of mine stash he was doing work there and he introduced me you know through hectic I'm a bounty hunter and the whole sort of like harajuku street where world is very incestuous and small and so in that first trip for first two trips i got to meet a lot of a lot of like pretty much all the players in that world tell us a little bit more about this toy how did it come to pass were there many trial versions beforehand no this was it you know it just happened when after I was painting over the phone booths and when bounty hunter when I realized where they invited me to make a toy at first I didn't I didn't even think twice about it I was like ah no I don't make its why would I make and then I started to think about like well this could be a great opportunity to sort of see my work in 3d and I was always interested in sculpture and then I you know at the same time I was looking at like what the pop or with additions and I thought maybe this is a great way that my work could disseminate and so I kind of just took the strategy that I was doing a painting over advertising and applied it to a three day formal and how are you selling them in the in the early days and then I know it changes a little bit later you know instead of taking payment on the first toy I just took product I just took a you know bunch of the addition and I went to new museum and did him on consignment you know I they took three and then six and you know it's I went to Paris to Colette and they started selling the work and just different you know anyone I could find that would take it on consignment I mean it's a pretty like you gotta be really mean not to take it on consignment that's a good point but then in in 2002 you launched a website how did that change yeah that was actually so before that I was like you know bringing product to store and they would tell me when they sold it or maybe not and you know you get paid whenever and and then 2002 I started my own website and that kind of changed everything for me because suddenly I had an idea of who was buying the work and I realized like you know the stuff out of my apartment that I was packing and shipping started going everywhere back to Germany its Japan Asia it likes really cool yeah and it just sort of gave me a confidence and moving forward you know I was taking the money from the first toy and producing in the next two or three and it's not you know at that time I'd have a thing on that just sat on a site and you'd get some orders and I'd pack them and ship them early to e-commerce yeah definitely it was it was interesting and then in 2006 a few years later you opened a store that you called original fake in Japan what motivated you to open a store but did you have Keith Haring's 80s pop shop in mind but what were some of the influences there you know I had done a lot of collaborations with different companies and it seems like when just hearing you say from 2002 my website to 2006 it seems very close but at the time it seemed like a lifetime apart sure and the shop was really just a way to create a home base for the projects I was making you know before this I would do a collaboration with somebody and it would release you know on their timeline in their shops and you know just sort of like roll out the way they saw fit and in opening my own shop I could just have you know all year round a home base for people to come and you know view product and see product and it's like having an exhibition that doesn't close I could see why you had 40 or 50 trips over to Japan yeah I mean I thought when I had the shop I was going like every two months I think that's kind of what Bermejo makes it makes a lot of sense rewinding a little bit so in the year 2000 you did a gallery show actually not too far from here on the Upper East Side at a gallery called maggots and fine art a major artists spotted her talent but you didn't view that show as a success what what was the story no it's not that I didn't view it as a success I just um you know I met a guy through my friend's father it was like do a show and came and I put some pictures in his face I didn't really know you know it wasn't really like understanding galleries and how that could work and do's and dont's but um but yeah at that time you know Jeff Koons came to the show and he introduced to work the darkest you know and doctors bought two paintings and you know I was very excited as I go now things are gonna start and you know I think as a young artist you're always looking for entry points and it seems like a lot of brick walls and I felt like all here's here's an opening and um but then I I couldn't really get another show until 2008 right so after that seemed like a home run to me you know I think that's later it's a long time yeah at that time I used to talk to galleries if I would show them my work and I I think they didn't know what to do at me you know cuz I was really interested in all this commercial work and I felt like that was part of my work and it made perfect sense to me and it didn't to a lot of people that's really interesting so you think the hybrid role that you were taking made it harder for them to digest you in a way yeah at the time it definitely seemed like you can be a commercial artist so you can be a fine artist but you have to like is your lane and you you know one two tracks from the other I'll congratulate you on moving them wrong I'm trying we'll see in 2009 excuse me in 2012 actually you had a float in the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade how'd that happen big big cold called me just mind your own business one day I'd like to float in arbitrate whoo no I was just like when they they it was it was a cold call an invitation to do that Macy's parade and I was on the phone I thought I was like is this even a real person you know and we're talking about and they were talking about you know we like your work we know you you work a lot with existing characters and you're kind of you know we're uncertain if you're taking jabs at them or you're embracing them and we kind of like that and we want to invite you to do a float in the parade and I just thought like this is the best person I've been I've ever spoken here there's a good phone call yeah it was a great phone call and they were great to work with and um you know at the time I thought doing inflatable was cheating because I you know I was still working in these other materials and I think doing this parade really opened my mind to the idea of like what inflatable can do how you can occupy a space or a moment and so did he walk in the parade um I did walk in the parade but I they asked me if I want to be like be on a float with it I was like not a chance so I took I took like a press badge and I got to like run ahead of it and Rumpy I like to take photos so you know I just acted like one of the several photographers running around taking photos and it was great because you get to hear like the crowd you know they'll be like applauding when they see the spongebob or some other thing and then just go silent it's just completely no no it's really it's a it's just like this just totally Smurf what is it different than Santa Claus yeah so so I found it was pretty it was a pretty good day that is a great day so so looking back was there a moment in your career maybe it was this one that you would call an inflection point he said you know I think I think this is really gonna catch on people are gonna like my like my work you know I've been a naive you that like optimistic my whole life I feel like every sort of step that I've taken or opportunity I've had I felt really super excited about it and so you always have these moments like yeah this is it and and then also you have like these insecurities of like well what is this equal you know is this does this add up to something I guess that's a part of what keeps you working as hard as you do yeah I'm still waiting for that real like maybe tonight's that security blanket that just lands on me I think that tonight's the night you feel comfortable in my skin so well this should help you have over 2.6 million followers on Instagram one post about tonight's event generated over 35,000 likes what role would you say social media is playing in your career right now well first I could say about followers on Instagram I mean that that could sound like a good number but then you can click on like some girl doing yoga that has 14 million so then that that immediately puts you right in your place and you're like okay okay let's just not talk about numbers but I enjoy social media I love like you know I spend most of my time in the studio and home at my family and and I feel like that's like a chance to kind of just you know throw bottles into the ocean with messages and kind of see if I don't know explain that bottles into the ocean me know I just feel like you know I just throw it you know I'm not really good on comments I don't really comment back much but um but I like putting imagery out there and I like to you know it's a great way you know before you and say in the 90s you'd meet somebody at a magazine and I'd be like you know we have 30,000 issues right I'm so happy thank you this is really democratized in Iran yeah but no Instagram it's like you don't you know you just sort of you could I can message something about tonight and and then like somebody turns out oh I'm sure we could speak about that for another another 30 minutes but we've got a lot more of your career to cover fast forward to 2010 you had your first solo museum show at the Aldridge Museum in Connecticut and they also produced a book about your work how did that change your career trajectory and well I mean that was that was great there was it was you know working with the people at Aldrich and having that chance was it was great to kind of pull work together and get to look at it together but I think really having the booklet Rizzoli is the first time you know before that I was working say you know toy designer and working over in magazines and that kind of stuff and graffiti and street art painting and sculpture and and you try to explain it to somebody they'd be like lost and kind of walk away but having a book that had that all for the first time I could really sort of like this is and even for myself to kind of see through it and see like what what I felt stronger about what I felt organized every yeah exactly and it kind of let me sort of get my head around things it's a great book I really recommend it this is one my another one my favorite images The Simpsons is now the longest-running scripted show on television George HW Bush I bet he's not quoted at the Y a lot once said American families need to be more like the Waltons and less like the Simpsons The Simpsons characters are common trope in your work and were featured in a lot of your early packaged paintings so first of all maybe you could explain what a packaged painting was and the why that was important and then maybe touch on The Simpsons a little bit I mean yeah the Simpsons that was for you know from like 2000 2004 I made a few paintings but um really that came about because of the packaged paintings because there was a show I was doing in Tokyo called Tokyo first and um I was just thinking about painting and sculpture and you know and going to Japan I realized that there's there's so many young kids following streetwear faun sneaker culture and you know spending money on different thing you know like they'll buy a Toyota buy sneakers but nobody wants to buy a drawing they wouldn't know what to do with it or painting it's just sort of and I always saw that as like you know like I'm obsessed with collecting those sorts of things and I created this package painting a sort of a way of bringing painting a sculpture into one piece and speaking the language of that sort of collecting culture and Simpsons you know just kind of came into it because I felt like you know they just speak to everyone they say you know you can be in different countries in here don't and it is no it is pervasive as their every less homeland reversal image um yeah makes a lot of sense let's speak about your painting process a little bit you start with an image in mind and then how do we go from the image to a beautiful painting like this you know I work on and off the computer I you know I make drawings I bring them into the computer a lot of times paintings come together almost like collages I mean not really that this is more straightforward but in the newer work that I'm doing you know I just sort of I build them in the same way as someone would build a collage and then you know I'll go downstairs and draw it out and that's when I start to think about color at that up until that point it's all just like line art and composition and it's when after I draw it out that I say in front of it and starts to think about you know when what colors go where and where do you place it and and you're very specific about your paint you'll have them specially ordered for you and you can do up to more than 10 layers sometimes of one so yeah I mean just it just depends on you know the colors and how they take to the canvas but I like to sort of like you know work myself into two corners with with different colors and see if I can bring it around and find a balance and sort of get the emotion that I wanted out of it so as a style hard-edged painting typically means a flat colorful surface with clear sharp edges I think of Frank stellar Elizabeth Ellsworth Kelly as early examples do you consider your painting as hard-edged abstract figurative do you even think about those labels when you paint um yeah I pretty much I'd try to avoid all labels we're painting I don't you know I don't feel like I ever want to fit into somebody else's shoes you know I happen to paint really sort of hard edge everything that I paint is free hand and you know it's kind of like when I say in front of it canvas that's really the picture that a great example so I'm not gonna dwell on this but I'd be remiss if I didn't at least bring it up the market success reader art has been beyond remarkable earlier this year one painting sold for nearly fifteen million u.s. dollars to Sotheby's in Hong Kong how did that make you feel how do you navigate that as an artist I think stressful I can imagine you know it's so funny because everybody you know people just they congratulate you and you're kind of like what did I do you know that painting was painted twelve years ago and it's interesting I mean it's it's the art was fascinating there's so many different things about it that's interesting and and the market is its own thing and you know it doesn't take you into consideration so I don't feel like it can you know I just pretty much try to be in the studio make the work that I want to make and for me I feel successful like when the work is finished and I've been able to you know bring a sculpture to fruition or bring you know finished a series of paintings what happens afterwards is it's really out of your hands as an artist I think and I guess the benefit of looking at other artists and seeing their trajectories how it goes up and down you know you just you know if something goes up it goes down and that's that's sort of the life so for other artists who might be here tonight what advice might you share if they have worked starting to come an auction and they get really nervous about it aside of your control just good yeah yeah makes a lot of sense it's a little bit about your personal collection these are more of your images I just wanted to share but tell us about artwork that you collect by other artists do you collect artists who influenced your career do you collect with the goal of supporting young artists do you interact with the artists you collect salt tell us a little bit about that I it's pretty much like peers and heroes and that's that's it there's not lighters and heroes I like yeah it's not and there's no there's no set rule it's pretty eclectic what I collect um you know I I tend to you know I love like a lot of Chicago images and also you know I grew up thinking like why isn't graffiti and I never see any museums or art collections and you know and I kind of saw him in the back of my mind I I'm no point to start collecting that kind of work for the 70s and 80s and hopefully you know I can could build something that can end up someplace or do you think that may change that there may be more institutional representation of some of those artisans no it's definitely happening it's good to see I mean like Henry chiffon has a show up at the Bronx Museum right now and it's a great show I mean what he's done for graffiti is it's priceless you know that's great in 2004 in 2013 excuse me the MTV Awards were held in your backyard in Brooklyn and you designed the actual award trophy and the arena set up it included the 60 foot tall inflatable that almost looked like it was chrome-plated can you tell us about how this came to be and I understand you were a little bit controlling over the process for the trophies I'm controlling about everything I mean it's true except for my relationship but no when they approached me you know they contacted the studio and in my mind I was like why is MTV what do they want and then it's like oh I'd love to do a moon man but you know who knows and so the guy comes up a studio and he has like a deck you know it's cool I learned about decks then people make a deck it's pretty it's weird when you see it in yourself but um the first page was a moon man like there moon man and I was like amazing this is about you know so they asked me to design the trophy and then when I you know I convinced him that you know how to use my sculptor my foundry to produce it and when I came back with the first goal they asked me if I want to design the stadium and they're happy yeah so I I said you know let me think about that and they left and I was high-fiving my Studios and so then we design the stadium and I wa I went back to them I said well if I'm gonna design the stadium can I have input on all you know all the visuals for the the award show and it was great because it was it was a challenge on how do you how do you make an impactful stadium that can load it into a to a space really fast you know be there for one night event and then load out and people adjust a collaboration yeah so I mean this is what you're seeing is a giant inflatable that after we made the trophy we just photographed it around and then we printed in all black whites and grays so it's not that has no reflective quality it's just printed like that it's really beautiful changing mediums a little bit in 2016 you had your first show at the UK Museum your first UK Museum showed the Yorkshire sculpture park that had this 30 foot tall wooden sculpture in which were trying there we have it small I why did you decide to work in this medium there's a new medium for you at this show right yeah well I had worked small I'd worked in like toys scale and wood and you know I met this this guy Ernest Mormons who was like really sort of an expert on you know he did all this stuff with sotas and he's done a lot of great stuff but so I was talking to we knew we want to work together but we didn't know what we want to work on and then he helped me figure out how to engineer to do you know so the first piece that we did was this one which was 10 meters tall and we figured if we can do that then we can do most everything else smaller so you started with the big ones in them yeah we started with the most sort of ambitious that we can do at the time you know he had this space in kiss wheel and this sculpture fits in it you know with its head tilted so it looks like it's too big for the space and so then we had this at Regent's Park for fries they have a sculpture I was that dafair yeah and Claire Lilly who's a director of Yorkshire sculpture park also curates that and when I met her and she saw the piece in person and you know from that she invited me to do Yorkshire a sculpture park and it was a great opportunity because I feel like everybody just associates me with like this urban context and I think just working in wood material you know gave the sculpture of vulnerability and then putting it in a landscape in Yorkshire just gave it you know just sort of open it up to a new territory did you feel badly would get wet in that UK UK rain you know I always worry about my sculptures outside I I I feel like they're probably bummed to be in the rain don't blame them fast forward to 2008 teen you collaborated with Kim Jones who is Dior's creative director for men on his first Men show in Paris with a seventy thousand flower installation you've also partnered the Uniqlo supreme Nike and I'm sure I'm missing a few how has the fashion world intersected with the world you know I've always been interested in using fashion as an outlet even in the like late 90s like that's definitely undercover in Japan and it's just a great sort of way to exist in someone's life in a very sort of candid way you know I like the the fact that you can be on the train and just sort of be in touch with you know a designer's work so and I mean Kim is like super generous as a person I you know I knew him before he was at the or and we'd spoken about working together but nothing ever seemed right and I know when he you know was moving to Dior he called me and told me and and there was only a few months away that we had to figure out the show for the runway and hope you got a good seat yeah I did it was it was good but I mean this this all came together really and I think two months or something maybe not even that long well it's beautiful and the images only get better from here skip to one ahead do you know how to go backwards there we go in early 2019 earlier this year you installed a hundred and ten foot long inflatable at the Chiang kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei why did you pick that location and what was a local reaction there I just thought you know this is the best location in Taipei you can't really beat it that was I had never been there before and you know we're looking at different opportunities and I just felt like this was a really unbelievable spot if we can pull it off and luckily you know I work with a friend of mine SK in Hong Kong with all these you knows the series called holiday and so we been making fly tables for different locations around the world and I mean yeah I think this week the picture says why I chose that I can't imagine there are many art installations there with large inflatables no you know it's if it were up to me it would be bronze but we haven't found the person yet to do that all right though but everyone out there anyone cares hundred and ten foot bronze let us know then in the spring of this year you floated a hundred and fifteen foot long inflatable into the Hong Kong harbor yeah I can't even get my son to agree to put a new rubber duckie in the bathtub how did you pull this off this was you know it looks very it looks very simple like it's inflatable and just throw it on the water but under it there was 40 ton steel structure that you know kept it because in Victoria Harbor the waters so choppy and to keep the balloon you know to stay perfect and seem like it's floating above it you need pretty much a ship under it well not to mention all the machinery to constantly keep the piece inflated well my favorite part of this project I mean I loved where it was the final location but you know we assembled it off-site and had it tugboat it to its location to cool right and getting all the footage and photos and stuff Wow like going through Hong Kong and with the cityscape is really I think I mean I don't know where were you during that ride review on the tugboat I wish no I I don't know exactly where I was I was probably stressing out making sure that photographers were getting good photos it sounds about right yeah I mean I learned like I that was one of the benefits of like you know graffiti when I was younger I learned that the photo is really kind of what you know the same project if not photographed well can only be spoken about but you can't really so we try to when we do these to get as much coverage as we can and now you have 2.6 million photographers out there keeping an eye out for you I mean Instagram has been amazing for meeting photographers honestly you know if I'm in a country like Doha you know I just met some new photographers out there with a piece that just ended yesterday and um it's great cuz guys you know they're young and they're ambitious and they contact you and then suddenly you're friends and you know you're hiring them to do other things and that's great that's great I mean gun you've got a great fan base that's for sure thanks we mentioned the National Gallery of Victoria earlier in Australia they recently hosted a large show of your work in commissioned this bronze sculpture can you tell us a little bit about the show I think you're heading back there in a few days we'd love to hear a little bit more about it no I'm going back to Melbourne next week but this was a piece called gone that they commissioned for the courtyard and eventually it's a seven meter tall bronze and after the show it will go to a permanent location for a new park that they're building and the show consists of the last 25 years of work well so it's really the first time that I'm showing like the regular usually I start showing stuff like what the phone booths just because that's the only tangible stuff I had but this show includes like photographs of walls that I did with graffiti and you know black books that I had and that kind of work which was fun because I think in the beginning I was so conscious to keep that stuff out of shows because immediately no matter what I make I cannot get you a sculpture and bronze like this and somebody's like graffiti sculpture I don't like what are you looking at you know so over time now I feel like I've done enough other things that I can kind of bring that back into the fold what goes into planning a show like that and the logistics and cornish I imagine I worked on it for probably probably almost two years yeah and just working with the curator there and just kind of you know you you first established the space that it's gonna be in and then you start to think about the flow of timing I I like to not you know keep things chronological because I find often do different materials I return to imagery and so I like to show like the connections between you know how a product can relate to a painting and vice versa how much control and influence will you have over the installation of the show the placement of works or we leave that some museum curators you know I'd like to be involved as much as possible I really love rooms I love responding to architecture and I definitely for me there's you know like I enjoy placing works and I'll enjoy like you know working on different sight lines no that's great this past summer you had an installation at Mount Fuji in Japan this is a photo I believe from sunrise yeah the sunset by yeah I think five and you and some fans camped out right in front of the inflatable is that right I mean we invited 2,000 people few casual friends yeah you know we had a raffle where you can you know not just people I knew but just general people could enter and common camp and actually so my friend asked who I mentioned earlier with this company all rights reserved first we just want to do something in front of my Fuji mm-hmm and then we found this look first we were gonna do it in water and then we found this location and it was a campsite so we're like let's do camping you know I started as a joke and then suddenly we're thinking about where these people stay what do we feed them and so it became this whole you know bigger project that um it was 60 super fun until arraigned a training the whole day of the opening and the whole night like poured like there couldn't be more water in the air but but yeah that morning there was this shot and then for most of the day you couldn't see the mountain and then the next morning the mountain appeared so I mean it's kind of it was kind of amazing that you felt like it was a gift on us when the mountain came out it's a beautiful thing and clearly the photography is really important tell us a little bit about your team it's clear this is a lot of work going on a lot of projects you always have 26 balls that you're juggling in the air have you been able to find great people and attract really good talent to work with you yeah I mean I you know I have a my Studios very small it's 11 people total that's maybe seven administrative four that are painting with me and no they've been great and then also I've been very lucky and building relationships with foundries and you know I tend to if there's somebody that I work well with I'd stick with them and you know like the first the people Metacom who makes my toys I met in 2002 and I pretty much don't work with anyone else because I trust them trustees yes is there it's the same thing so if you find somebody that that you trust you try to do whatever you can to nurture that and hold on to that and that can really apply to any different industry exactly yeah that's right so I know we have a lot of questions from the audience that I want to let save time for but it's the last question for me looking ahead to 2021 the Brooklyn Museum is gonna be hosting the first survey of your work in your home city interestingly the museum curators kept mentioning that other artists originally were directing them to focus on your work how important is it to have this local show this local support given your global career to now have something really right in your backyard no I mean it's an honor it's amazing I'm really looking forward to it you know my kids were taking classes there when they were little it's a place that I frequent they're the first New York institution to acquire work and that's great so now we have some questions from the audience that I'd like to switch to so the first one this is a great one who is on your proverbial Mount Rushmore of graffiti who are some of the artists who you really admire whoever asked that you're just gonna make on like a thousand other people really mad at me that's true if I could say this without thinking without holding me any any you know this is just as a quick thought only with friends tonight can the Mount Rushmore be several more heads no I mean there's there's so many there's so many heroes in graffiti I would say like Leake Winona is is right at the top of the pyramid Dandi future a zephyr blade great names yeah this one comes from Benjamin who's aged 13 and he wants to know that when you were his age did you know what you wanted to do with your life and maybe we can come back a little bit to the early days of your career in deciding absolutely not and when I was 13 I didn't even thinking art was it could be a profession you know it's something I love doing and I always thought that I would have to like have a job to subsidize what I was actually interested in doing they just sort of you know what I assumed that's maybe a natural segue to the next question and that is the art world can be a very difficult place to navigate what advice would you share for a young artist in the earlier days of their career that's tough I don't know it's a weird world run so no I think you know it's it's all people if people like when you say the art world a museum world or any other world you got to understand it's just people and there's good people that you'll meet and there's people that you probably won't want to hang out with and you just sort of try to try to you know figure out who the good people are and you interact with them yeah that makes a lot of sense the next question is growing up in Jersey City tell us a little bit about the geography and where you would travel and and and your modes of transportation and and how you got your start so the path train was a small you know walk or skate from my house which that was you know I felt very fortunate that when I was little I was able to come into the city and like skate the Brooklyn banks or go to saman Square Park or Washington Square Park or anywhere downtown I want to go was in you know it's a dollar train ride or an easy squeeze through and you know I don't know I really enjoyed growing up in Jersey City it was like if for graffiti was a playground under the 1-9 you know it was just sort of free-for-all and great freight trains and billboards all right there do you think some of the developments and building in New York has limited graffiti space I know five points some different areas come come no you know I think well definitely just but also growing in up in Jersey City and always being upset I was always obsessed with New York I just want to be in New York and I think having that outside perspective you know growing up here I might not have had that sort of appreciation because I would have been here so there was always a sort of mental drive of um you know when am i moving out you know I tried to move out in high school it looks here for a little bit but my tell me to my legs went back home and then eventually you know the day after college I'm moving to Lower East Side other people have started appropriating or even copying your work and there has been some issues with copyright issues and fakes out there do you take that as flattery is it something that worries you how do you how do you think about that I mean that's it's kind of conflicting um if somebody's copying your work and they're saying it's they're copying your work that's that's great but if they're tricking other people and selling you selling people work that they believed was yours then that's not cool so here's a fun one what do you like to do in your free time if you have any free time what's that yeah no if I have time I want to be with my my family and mostly you you've met many famous people and collaborated with many great brands in your work how do you how do you stay grounded have you ever been starstruck hmm Saurus Rock oh excuse me no I don't know you just I mean I'm it's it's great to meet it like I get so lucky that I get to meet a lot of talented people but yeah I usually there's there's a talent in the persona and then there's the personality and you know there's definitely people I wish I never met because I was such a fan and then but you know so great yeah I don't think starstruck so good that's better well I want to thank you again for being so generous with your time and so open with us tonight maybe we can have another round of applause for cause [Applause] [Music]

Channel: 92nd Street Y

Views: 1,712

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: 92Y, 92nd Street Y, KAWS, sam shikiar, Brian Donnelly, modern art, graffiti

Id: w_HInEwQJ2E

Length: 48min 22sec (2902 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 05 2019