Transcript:
Tom Vaughan:
Alright, everybody, thank you for coming and watching. Actually, I want to introduce Fred Yoko who’s been a really long term client of ours. And we have some of his artwork in our office, I have some in my office. And Fred is a local artist. And I wanted to highlight some of the different businesses within our clientele. So we’re going to start here with Fred and kind of ask him some questions, and just go through some of the pieces that he’s done. We’ll give you some of the contact details, if you decide that that’s something you’d like to do. You know, here at retirement camp strategies, we feel like these people are supporting us, and we’d like to support them. And that’s what this is about. So we’ll, we’ll probably do a few of these. But so Fred, thank you for coming today.
Fred Yokel:
I thanks for having me.
Tom Vaughan:
Yeah. So I just, you know, obviously, you know, we’ve been talking back and forth, you know, on your finances for a really long time and not had as much time to talk about your art. We have had these, you know, art shows, before the COVID happened, we had these different shows in our office. And so I’ve met Fred there, you know, in that environment, has the pandemic really slowed down? Some of that? Because I know we can’t do the art shows, you know, or haven’t. Yes. How’s that?
Fred Yokel:
Yeah, that has been, I mean, last March, that’s when every all the galleries basically closed. Yeah. So as a starving artist, anyway. Yeah. It made it a little more difficult to sell things. It had to go more. I don’t know virtual and personalized, you know, a one on one kind of thing. Yeah. Until they reopen galleries don’t get a lot of traffic anyway. Yeah, it’s a it’s street traffic and clients that are repeat customers that show up once in a while. Yeah. So they basically stopped having receptions, which is the good thing for artists because they get a lot of people all at once. And shows are there different kinds of I think I’ve been to every fruit and vegetable show, right? We have in the artist community, a lot of people look at them as art and wine festivals. Okay. And I participate in one in particular in Palo Alto, which is only clay and glass, there’s no wine, although, probably bring some I don’t. And that one specific to clay and glass artists only. Okay, it’s just kind of nice. And it’s a pretty high quality show. It’s usually in July, but that’s been delayed also. And we did have it this year. And just last month, you know? Okay. So some some picking up again. Yeah, yeah, Max, there’s more of them showing up now. Good, good. Life is maybe getting back to normal, a little sort of, you know.
Tom Vaughan:
I actually had one question, you know, your background when I was reading up on you here getting ready for this, you know, you would say as a state, which is where I went, so that’s kind of cool. But then you work for some pottery houses before you went off to the California Institute of Art. Correct? Right. What did you do at the pottery house? I’m just curious.
Fred Yokel:
You know, well, when I was at San Jose State, I took ceramics that was my concentration. Yeah. And I was fortunate to have a really good program in my high school which got me started anyway. Okay. And I was mostly a potter, then I was interested in utilitarian where, and I happened upon this job with one of my best friends. That was doing production pottery. Which means we made I made personally mugs of beer steins. This is the 70s Yeah. Wind, God was windy Cantor’s platters bowls, all kinds of stuff like that, by the 1000s. Wow, I’d make hundreds a day. Oh my gosh, really. And that was that was my main income at the time. You know, like in college for a couple of summers anyway, and I got burned out on it. Because making hundreds of 1000s of pieces all the time every day in and out gets to be a grind. It’s a great thing to do you become very well versed at making a particular piece and knowing how to do it. Yeah, accurately. But I was more interested in single pieces, one of a kind pieces. I like to concentrate on one thing and, and putting in a lot of detail in it. So I kind of let that slide. I haven’t stopped doing it. I still do it. But I don’t do it those quantities and yeah, I mean, mostly, that’s incredible. Yeah, you’re on an assembly line, essentially, basically, human assembly line. So then how did you transition because you’re basically your own. Now, for all intents, yeah, well, they, the people I was working for decided they didn’t want to do it anymore. Okay, that helped. Was like, here. Go ahead. Yeah, I yeah, I was thinking that as you were talking that that type of activity might not be happening here in the valley as much because they can, he does. The show in Palo Alto has a lot of water production workloads, really nice work very refined. Now, you know, in the seven years, it was a little more looser and cruder, but it was still nice. Yeah. And so that started it. And then later on, in another class I was taking, I was going to community college, West Valley here. Okay. And that’s where I really got interested in figurative. And one of a kind pieces. Awesome, awesome.
Tom Vaughan:
Okay, good, I actually went ahead and made a little, grab some pictures off of, there’s studio website, which we’ll put the link here, you know, in the email when we send out this video, and put it at the bottom of the video, too. So people can see there’s some unbelievable pictures in there of some of your art, I just kind of had some questions, I happen to be a huge fan of what I call 3D art, you know, just statues of all types. So I like painting a lot, also. But 3D arts, the thing that really interests me the most, but as I let me share my screen, and so we’ll go up in the corner of the picture here, so to speak. And then this kind of tell me about some of these pieces, because I actually have, which is good.
Fred Yokel:
This is more of a, this is more of this figurative sculpture kind of thing that I’m doing. Now, I kind of abstract to human form, it’s not very accurate to anatomy, right? And I, I have them doing something usually that is found in my twisted brain action that they’re, they’ve achieved or they’re doing, they’re caught in the middle of it’s kind of like photographs only in a 3D form. Some kind of motion that’s captured. Yeah, I’ve got three of them here. I’ll just show them quickly. And we could ask you some about it too. But they also have names, which it’s kind of interesting to me, because this one’s called about this. And then, you know, we have one that looks a lot like this in our office. And over and over here. And this last one is called Piece of Cake.
Fred Yokel:
So what’s that cake, they’re all three letter name, three word names, that one of the things that I was really trying to do with a lot of the pieces is make three words, that would explain what was going on. Yeah. I like to keep it at three because it was like, the ability to do a full sentence with three words. Yeah. But they’re suggestive, but they don’t tell the whole story so that the viewer can look at it and go, What is he doing? Which is always fun. And sometimes I get people saying that’s exactly what my dad said, you know, you know, talk to the hand or, oh, yeah, whatever it is, I’ve tried to use those into three words, just that’s just a challenge that I have for myself. And this guy piece of cake happens to be trying to get away from this environment that he’s in, and he thinks it’s real easy to escape. Got it. It’s piece of cake to get up. He’s caught in these weird organic forms that happened to mimic his pattern on his body. How Yeah, see, now that’s that’s the part I really love about art. There’s all these little, you know, I have kind of a twisted sense of humor. So a lot of my do very silly. Yeah. Yeah, I like it.
Tom Vaughan:
I mean, it’s really interesting now, when you when you make these pieces. And, you know, we came out to Fred’s house already and had an interview, Lisa, from our office went out and asked, and so you create these add up a coil.
Fred Yokel:
Yeah, it is a thick coil, essentially, it’s basically a coil based process, which is real, the ancient way of making pieces you start at the bottom, you work your way up. Yeah. And you kind of form it as you go. And it’s a clay is time consuming, anyway. Yeah. And that process is very demanding, because you have to figure out what you’re going to do with that form ahead of time, because as you work on it, you can’t do the whole thing all at once because clay soft. Yeah. And if you try to do that, a real tall piece, for example, it would start sagging and fall over. Oh, I see at the bottom section, stiffen up as you go along. As it is. It’s stuck. It’s, it’s decided. So you have to go with that flow sometimes.
Tom Vaughan:
I’d say you have some idea, though, of what what you want to do before he applies a lot of times ahead of time.
Fred Yokel:
Yep. I’ve done and I say, Oh, I’m gonna make this piece. Most of the time they don’t turn out exactly like the drawing. Okay, which is a real easy thing to do.
It’s hard to follow from 2d to 3d. Yeah. Okay.
Tom Vaughan:
And then these all have a very unique look glaze guy called call it for surface a better word. Yeah, surface and describe that. I mean, because there’s not they’re not typical to me. They’re, they’re very interesting.
Fred Yokel:
One of the things especially about my figurative work, I glazes per se are usually shiny, right? A lot of them. And I’ve always said, well, humans don’t walk around with shiny clothes, unless it’s the 70s and you’re wearing patent leather. Yeah, so I like matte finishes. Got it. Non shiny. So I use something called underglaze which is more clay than glaze, I guess I would say and more pigment. And it fires on to the clay in a more matte look. Okay, the other thing I do is I scrape the clay when I finished my pieces. I scraped them with a metal rib. Which makes it look like stone to me. Okay, got it. Well, that’s something else that is always influenced me as nature. Yeah, stone, wood erosion rust, that kind of stuff. I like all of that surface. Natural surface look to make it look a little bit like stone and then a color it which is not like stone too much. Yeah, although I have some that look like rock. Yeah. Also, it’s a drier look. Yeah, perfect. That’s my next piece here that I brought up that gallery. Perfect example of the combination of stone and wood. That way, it’s all clay. That’s crazy. Just a lot of carving I make the basic shape of that. And then I go back and spend hours carving what I think looks like wood. Yeah, and I am what I think looks like stacked fieldstone stones or some kind of cobblestone or something. Now because I go back and color it that the depth in the stack stones to a really interesting to me, I mean, because that’s a solid piece. It’s a great looks like a bunch of these stones glued together or stacked on top of each other to me, I have one piece where a couple of the stones I’ve pulled out and made it look like they’re actually removed. Oh, I see a tree basically, the pieces hollow. Walls are three eighths of an inch thick, maybe. Okay. And that guy’s about a foot tall, maybe. Yeah. And then I just go back with an exacto knife and a needle and carve those lines back in. And I try to get in pretty deep because I want to make them look like they’re actually separate pieces.
Tom Vaughan:
I was gonna ask how you got because some of these lines in the wood here are really deep.
Fred Yokel:
Yeah, they are. go pretty deep to make it look like a little old weather. Yeah.
Tom Vaughan:
Now, how often do you mess up and have to change because you could get going down the path and there’s no return? I would think at some point. Always. Yeah. Does that just become a different piece than you thought?
Fred Yokel:
It does happen a lot. I, do something or the the good thing about clay is as long as it has moisture in it. Ah, it can be brought back to life. I can cut a piece off and go I don’t like that, you know, cut his nose off spite his face. Whatever. Yeah. And or is complete head if I don’t like the angle, I can cut it off and turn it in another direction. Okay, it’s a pie in there and make it angled. Right. Because in my experience I’ve got over 50 years doing Yeah, I kind of know the limits. Okay.
Tom Vaughan:
Yeah, that sounds as fascinating. Yeah, like anything you know, you put your 10,000 hours in you get Yeah, I’m still learning I never stopped learning. It’s always there’s always something new.
Fred Yokel:
Yeah, I would think so. I mean, this this wood is just it’s fascinating to me. I just kind of thing lately for me, I do it a lot. lately. I haven’t noticed.
Tom Vaughan:
The next one I have is kind of what you mentioned also, which is kind of building on nature. This rust color. How do you get the rust?
Fred Yokel:
The Rust is a combination of texture that i i apply to the scraped clay I kind of smooth it all out at first. Yeah. And then I scrape it and that leaves little holes in it because there’s
matter in the clay that’s rough. Yeah. And then I go back and I blob on clay and texture with either cloth or my fingers and maybe even dry clay to make it look like dried crust
See the surface and then the key is coloring it to make it look like rust, which I’m still perfecting. I’m close. On some of them. It looks. It looks pretty good. But you know, I have what I have in my head that I want to emulate. It doesn’t always match, but it’s close. I really liked that piece because of the combination. And it’s an abstracted Rhino, you know, no Rhino looks like that. Anyway, yes, Lucky’s got armor on it.
Tom Vaughan:
That’s really incredible. Actually, that’s in combination with the wood. And what have you, too. I know when Lisa and Chris came out to visit you there at your house, which is where you kind of have your studio. She said you had a rusty nail. That was clay, but it looks exactly like a rusty nail was really amazing. A railroad spike that I’m
Fred Yokel:
Oh yeah. Yeah, it’s all clay. Yeah, that’s cool. Weird to make a spike outs. It’s yeah, but that’s where the rest would come into. And so the last piece is I have I have four of the animals, which I really like, there’s my favorites, too. And you’ve had some of these at our show. There’s a camel and the cat are called stripes here. And the lion. And you’ve got lots of these different ones. I just choose the and then a couple of draft buddies, and so they’ll have that similar kind of roundish shape and to tell me about some of the years ago I made a sphere. I like spheres. That’s another thing about clay. I always say this is from the earth. Yeah, the Earth is round. Maybe that’s why I like round things. And I like clay. So I’ll go with it. So I made these, this sphere. And I did a couple of abstract things on it ended up looking like a really abstracted bird. I thought it was kind of cool. I think I’ll make some real animals their round number in Me, says you know, this is biologically crazy. A giraffe like that little tiny short stubby legs. Yeah, cartoon very cartoony. But I got obsessed with it. And I’m trying to make basically a complete alphabet, or more any animal that I can come up with it as a sphere. Okay, and so they have shorter necks sometimes. I’ve done raccoons beavers, you name it. I’ve done a shark. Everything, anything that I can come up with. And as a matter of fact, an entity. I don’t know what they were they came up with animated CG round animals.
Tom Vaughan:
And it’s called if animals if animals were round out there. Yeah.
Fred Yokel:
Yeah, you’ll see exactly my kind of humor in in a it fall was very close. They’re all round animals. It’s hilarious.
Tom Vaughan:
I will. I would think that these would be popular at your shows, too.
Fred Yokel:
They are they are people and they’re all They’re only about the size of baseball. Yeah. Beads of clay in them. So they’re rattles. Also, I have a turtle. Okay.
Tom Vaughan:
So you can hear them? How interesting. There’s a story behind this. The number of beads that are in there. There’s there’s either 13 beads or 22 beads? Because that’s the birth dates of my kids.
Tom Vaughan:
Oh, 22nd. Oh, I love that. That’s really cool. Private things. Yeah, that’s right. All those pieces that are going out there and how would people buy these pieces? And what’s the what’s the mechanism that you have for kind of as, as with most artists?
Fred Yokel:
Well, no, I guess there’s different venues. I do the show in Palo Alto. But that’s the only show I do. Yeah. So once a year, I’ll do that show. And I’ll be at that. Normally.
Otherwise, it’s galleries and contacting me directly.
Tom Vaughan:
Okay, good. The gallery is good place to go see the work?
Fred Yokel:
Yeah. My home studio isn’t the best place to see work. I’m not really set up with a gallery or anything here but I’ll talk to people. You know, I’ll always negotiate with people on how we can set up if they want to see something I’ll bring it to their house even if they want if they’re local. Okay, yeah. And so I will do that. But like I said, I have a gallery in Berlin game and one in Lafayette right now that both have my work. And I guess we could link that somehow if you want. We I will. Yeah, exactly. Those pictures came off of Yeah, yeah. Excellent pictures and another video.
Tom Vaughan:
You did that I’ll probably put a link on this video also, that I thought was really well done. So, but this is great, I really appreciate the chance to learn more about, you know, what you do and how it works. And, you know, it’s it for somebody like me, I don’t have a tremendous amount of artistic talents. You know, my grandmother, I started painting, you know, there’s different things that happened. But was nice that you appreciate it. And that’s, yeah, that counts. And that helps the artists out there, you know, yeah, yeah. I believe, just, the less you can do it, the more it’s just magic. I want to do it all. I like to paint too, and all kinds of stuff. So, yeah, that’s amazing, do anything. I mean, you must have really unbelievable control on your small motor skills and such to be able to do all of these things, actually, I mean, look at some of the, like, the wood and, you know, that that part, I just don’t have either. So it’s I always find that fascinating when people are ready to do practice a little bit. Yeah, I would think so. Yeah, like, say put in the 10,000 hours. So yeah. Alright, Fred. Well, thank you very much. And I want to thank you for you know, you know, agreeing to do this and I’m so happy we’ll get this set up and look forward to continue to talk to you about it.