Gary Baseman walks into our interview with a box full of colour pencils held shut with a hair tie, and a sketchbook, “the 138th in my lifetime”, he says. Baseman is here for the opening of his exhibition “Play With Me Or Else” at Groove@CentralWorld, featuring larger-than-life sculptures of his playful quirky characters, including a 2.4m-tall "Toby".
'Bad Bad Pets' at GROOVE@CentralWorld.
A renowned artist and prominent figure in the international contemporary art world, Baseman works across many mediums and boasts an incredible range of works. With a background in illustration, he has created works for magazines such as The New Yorker, Time, The Atlantic Monthly, and Rolling Stone. He also designed the board game Cranium, as well as the Emmy-winning animated series Teacher’s Pet.
He reveals the rich narrative behind his seemingly bright-eyed artworks, the depth beyond the paintings or the plush toys, the stories behind each character that capture the essence of life and love, passion and pain. He talks of his upcoming film projects and hints at future collaborations with graphic designer Shepard Fairey, as well as a New York fashion house.
How would you explain who you are?
I’d generally introduce myself as an artist from Los Angeles, California. I created the term “Pervasive Art”, which means “is perceived everywhere”.
I create art that breaks down walls and boundaries. I work in many mediums. Even though I draw. I’m also a painter, a photographer, a director, and TV show creator. I love performance art. I would love to bring performance art to Thailand and collaborate with Thai composers and choreographers.
What about your characters? Who is Toby?
That’s actually another way to describe what I do. People know Toby, who was created to be your best friend and the keeper of your dirty little secrets, somebody who loves you unconditionally and hides in your dreams.
Gary Baseman.
He has been my alter ego for many years, coming into being in 1992 when I wrote a kids book that was never published. He became so precious I didn’t want to use him until the exhibition “For The Love Of Toby” in 2005. There were 200 of him as a plush toy. I wanted to blur the line between fine arts and toy culture. I think the importance of art is the message itself and not necessarily the medium.
Basically, Toby had lots of girlfriends that were all different but were all named Marilyn. Most of the time, one Marilyn is gifting Toby to another. It’s an idea of giving your intimacy and your secrets to somebody else.
I took him on a trip to Rome. He was still a prototype. I was in an unhappy marriage and even though my wife is beautiful, she refused to be in photos while we were there and I wanted to have some kind of photos as memories of the trip, so I had to use Toby instead.
I brought him inside the Sistine Chapel and I wanted him to meet Michelangelo. The exact same day I took that photo, the pope dropped dead.
Is there a specific message you are conveying, then?
Creating has kind of been my way of survival. I create things that I want to say, and to understand themes. A lot of them deal with a sense of discovery, of self-expression, but also the discovery of one’s true self. I work with the idea of who we truly are and try to remove the masks that society has made us wear so we can fit in. How do you discover your own respect for yourself, your culture and your past? How do you use that respect and love to look towards the future, towards your neighbours and your friends and other cultures and have that same respect and drive to learn from them? And how do we share? To me, that’s what art is all about. It’s a communicating tool.
What inspires you?
In a way, it’s life itself. I try to celebrate the bitter-sweetness of life. Life is short and you have to be very playful and make challenging works.
Tell us about the exhibition that just opened in Taipei.
Rather than just having a traditional exhibition with white walls, I wanted to create an environment that made people feel comfortable. I created a home and every room represented a theme in my artwork. The dining room was about celebration, the hallway about journey, and so on. Viewers can sit in my sofas and chairs. The furniture is actually my parents’ furniture from the house I grew up in. The title “The Door Is Always Open”, is an honour to my father. He always told me, in his broken English, that no matter where I was in my life, his home is my home. The exhibition is very personal, but at the same time, even if you don’t know who I am, you’d be able to get something out of my artwork.
What else are you working on?
I’ve been working with the band Nightmare And The Cat and their album is coming out. I’m kind of inspired by the way Andy Warhol worked with The Velvet Underground. I’m working on a live-action film, a beautiful tragic story loosely based on my characters. And a documentary supported by the Sundance Institute, conveying the stories of my parents who were Holocaust survivors. It’s a very dark journey but relayed through my art. I’m going to go back to my parents’ hometown that was once in Poland and is now a part of Ukraine.
Your recent works and upcoming works have a lot to do with your parents. How much of their life stories are also yours?
I grew up in Fairfax District in LA where most of my neighbours were Holocaust survivors. And even though I was born and raised in America, growing up in the neighbourhood has inevitably influenced my experience. My parents lived through the most horrific event of modern times. When I lost my father, I realised I was the keeper of his story. I started discovering his secrets that he never told his children, and his heroism.
For me the goal is to tell the new generation that take things for granted that there’s a legacy here that they need to know and to appreciate, and to use that appreciation to create a better place.
'Toby', the keeper of secrets.
