Artist - Gary Hinsche

 Rodney is joined by Dayton-based artist Gary Hinsche to discuss his journey from the days at ArtCenter College of Design, to working on the banner program for the 1984 LA Olympics, to his work for the National Holocaust Museum. 

 Follow Gary on Instagram: @garyhinsche 

Transcript

Rodney  00:00

When you were doing, like working as a designer, where people were expecting you to only stay in your lane. Oh

00:04

yeah, absolutely it is. I mean, in fact, you that's that's, in and of itself, a challenge. We all get comfortable and then and then and then. That comfort works against the freedom of being expressive. The challenge of art is immensely personal. Because every time you you are putting it out there I was, I was telling the young people that the most challenging thing on the planet is a blank canvas. Just go for it. Let's see what you got.

Rodney  00:40

Hello, everyone. This is Rodney veal, and I'm the host of the podcast. Rodney veal is inspired by and I am sitting in Gary henchy studio, who I'm going to introduce you to. We are recording in an art making space, and I'm super excited, because Gary is one of my favorite artists and one of my favorite people he is. He is a true lover of the community, a real lover of Dayton, Ohio. But also, more importantly, he makes fabulous art, and he's always supporting other artists and making and championing causes that allow more art to be made in our community. But more importantly, Gary has had a journey of a life, and I've gotten to know him, and he has a killer house, by the way, that I've actually been in, so I think it's the one of the coolest design houses I've ever been in. So I'm a fan, so I'm flattered. Thank you. You're very, very welcome. And so everyone, here's Gary henji,

01:42

so Rodney, thanks for inviting me. I really don't know where to begin. So, you know, I'll

Rodney  01:53

just ask you a question. I will start it.

01:55

Go for it.

Rodney  01:57

I would say you don't think is this story for me, because you have a very varied background. And the thing is, a lot of times it's not always how someone lands into fine art through graphic design. But I want to kind of start with the be like, what led you into graphic design? What started, we're going way back in the time machine, really, what started this journey?

02:16

Great question. We were just talking about this the other night, a bunch of us. It's, you know, I was at a very young age. I was taking oil painting lessons from the time I was about 10 years old till, I don't know, high school on Saturdays. And so I was sort of trained formally. I can't remember her name, but, but in LA, but, you know, I was painting seascapes and landscapes with that, and with, with, you know, oil paintings and and I was learning all of the, all of the tricks and the secrets and moving and I enjoyed it immensely. And had really thought, well, you know, Hinch, you one day, you know, you just need to be an artist. But now something that everybody will relate to, my family said, Well, don't be an artist. You can't make any money. You won't make a living. You need to do something that you makes, gives you a living. And that went on for a long time in high school, I was scholarship to Art Center, College of Design and Art, and in LA as a junior in high school, and started that program for two years, and was introduced to graphic design. Wow, and that's that's was seemingly more acceptable for the family. You're not going to be an artist, you're going to be a designer. So that was sort of the way that journey began as as as a graphic designer, our center at the time, I think it still is, to this day, was one of the preeminent design schools in the United States, if not, if not the world. They have, they have, they have a they have a school in Basel, Switzerland, and and, and now in Pasadena, a bunch of stories there, but, but it was funded by Detroit. It's one of the great industrial design schools. All of those cars that we drive, I always joke, were designed at Art Center College of Design. Yeah, they and it's and, you know, if you walk through those those halls at Ford and Chevy and Nissan and Toyota, they're full of Art Center graduates. So that was the that was the money behind the school, was the industrial. Design part, but it was, it was a, it was a, it's a, it's a terrific school, and, you know, amazing talent has come out of there over the years. So that's how I was introduced to it. So that was legitimate. I could go to work.

Rodney  05:15

But isn't that the, isn't that the story of every parent? That's

05:18

what I meant. I thought everybody would everybody, that's everybody that's dealt with a career in art has been told, No, you can't do that.

Rodney  05:27

I can actually tell you, Gary from every interview I've had, we're in season three. Everybody has heard a family member or a counselor in high school say, you know, you might want to rethink that,

05:40

right? How do you how do you like eating, you know, but, but I will say that a number, number of the folks that I grew up with in that period of time at at Art Center and then on on to college that became artists, has done perfectly fine. So I would encourage everybody to stop listening to relatives, follow your instincts, follow your passions, do whatever it is. So at after, after college, I went to Long Beach State that that's a story too. I didn't wind up going to Art Center because long I was also, I ran track all through school. And I was, I was a, I was pretty, pretty I'm I ran track of Long Beach State Art Center didn't have any track team or football team or anything else. Well, okay, I could do both.

Rodney  06:38

I didn't realize you ran, yeah. What was your, what was your like,

06:42

100, 100 to 20 a quarter, wow. Sprinter the Yeah. I held the 100 yard dash record at the high school, the 220 dash wrestler record at high school. I was third man on the sprint team at Long Beach State. And, you know, it was, it was, you know, it was good. It was good. Part of it was able to accomplish both things, plus, I think, the Art Center at the time, although it was a bachelor's degree, they always recommended that you go to junior college or community college for two years to get all the academics out of the way, and then you just go there and you study design or art or whatever you're going to study. So I didn't I'm thrilled that I had the academic background too, which I think is imperative, because it isn't just what you can do creatively. It's also how you're taught to learn and how you're taught to think, and how you're taught to address the problems of of communicating through design and art and and the like. That's sort of the short story on how I wound up as a designer. I just a passion always stayed with the art, and I believe to this day that art dictates, dictates in design. It isn't the other way around. The Innovation has always come pretty much from the art side, from, you know, you know, we look at modrian 50s, modrian paintings. They became dresses, they became architectural structures. They became they, you know, that's, that's a really easy step, but so I've, I've always been involved in art, even through the design side. I always said you

Rodney  08:45

were still you were still actively painting and correct at the same time you were like learning this kind of the thing that's going to feed you, which is the graphic design that's pretty wild, and we've talked about that too, because there is that art and design, there seems to be this, this artificial divide that people try to make it like, oh, it's one thing or the other, and they can't, no, because I don't believe that. I just firmly believe that it's all interrelated. And I absolutely agree with you about a liberal arts education. I feel absolutely like, if you can't, if you haven't read, I don't understand you. That means you like the imagination to see different worlds, which is what novels do. Even even nonfiction. Can teach you some things in art and so, sure. And so, you know, we talk about this a lot. I mean, that's why, this is why I love talking to you, because I always feel like, yes, he could. Gary gets it. Why doesn't the rest of the world get

09:46

it? You know, sort of a deal, yeah. So, so, you know, those you were put on these journeys and or missions, and sometimes we just don't have any control over it, you know. So.

Rodney  10:01

Yeah, but you, but you, but you, kind of found a way to combine, come, kind of combine them all in a way. I mean, so what I was like, what was your first job out of college with that thing that's going to feed you?

10:16

Well? First job was, was with a company in Hollywood, excuse me, called Porter Goodman and Cheatham. Alan Porter David Goodman and Frank Cheatham. Interestingly, Frank Cheatham was an incredible graphic designer and an amazing painter, and we struck up a relationship almost immediately because, because we both thought the same way. And he was very, very graphic. So that was a very short lived period. Dave Goodman, who basically ran the company, was, was an incredible leader. He was not so much a he was not a designer, per se, but he got and understood how to run a design business and and his partner was Alan Porter in Chicago. And Alan Porter taught at the Chicago Art Institute, and most of the clients that they had were came out of Chicago. We were doing stuff for tester, tester paints and toys and models and designing exhibits for Canada Dry and and, and all that stuff. So one day, Dave Goodman called me into his office, and I was down. So we the office was outrageous. We the office. We were in the in the the summer Taft House, President Taft summer home in Hollywood, in the Hollywood Hills. It was just, it was, it was historic. It was really, really a cool place. But so he we just talking, and he said to me, you know, granted, I'm, I'm a young kid, really, just out of, just out of school. And he said, Well, what do you, what, you know, Gary, what do you? What do you want to do? Or what do you want out as I said, Well, David, I want to be sitting on that side of the table. I pointed at him, instead of this side of the table, I wanted to run my own, my own deal one day. So, so anyway, and it was shortly after that that that I joined Robert miles, Runyan and Associates, which was one of the top graphic design firms in the nation at the time, Bob Runyon was a was a mentor, and everything was about excellence, period. The product. I learned many lessons for him, some of them, not all, were great lessons to learn.

Rodney  13:13

But was that phrase, everything's a teachable moment? Yeah.

13:18

I mean, he was, he was a World War Two vet, you know, went to art center. And, you know, out of, out of,

Rodney  13:27

out of the after the war.

13:31

And he was a, he was a, just, just a, in a lot of sense, a while, he told me one time. He said, You know, I invested most, most of my money in women, wine and fast cars and the rest of it I wasted. And that sounds like a character. He was a character, and he played it really well too. He was, he was, he was an incredible salesman, and had great taste, the just remarkable taste and and I learned that that what we did and how we did it was, was the end game, and he was tough on everything we'd have, we'd have presentations. The first thing I worked on was an identity for Norton Simon. You probably all have heard the Norton Simon museum, but

Rodney  14:34

also, I feel like, wasn't he a major publisher?

14:38

Norton Simon? Yeah, yeah, and, and, yeah. I don't remember how he made all his money, but he was, he was a big deal in Southern California, huge deal in Southern California, but I remember working on that. And this is long before computers. We're doing everything by hand. And we had, we had, we had. A meeting scheduled to go over all these identity elements that we that we were designing, and we put them up on the conference wall, and Runyon would say, Well, you know, he was Friday night, he leaves, and he says, All right, we're going to review all this Monday morning at nine o'clock. Be ready, you know? So we were, we had everything up on Monday and and, and again, I'm a young designer, and we walk into the conference room, and he walks in with this, you know, melodonry, three piece suit, coif to the to the 10s and and with a cup of coffee in his hand and a sword, a saber and and we're, we're all sitting there. And he walks up and down the conference conference room at looking at the wall, and he takes the sword and he goes, that, that, that I want to see it tomorrow morning at nine o'clock.

Rodney  16:01

That was, that was wow. That talk about, like, I'm cutting you down, literally cutting you down with a sword. Yeah,

16:08

and, you know, I'm 23 years old, and going, okay, but you know, you got through that, and then you understood that what he was doing, another one of his, one of his things was 90 90% of anything we do is the last 10% that's 90% of it the last 10% and he would squeeze out of you. He would squeeze that, and you learned the attention to detail, the importance of the of the simplest things. So, yeah, so he was a, he was a big time mentor and a lifetime friend and and ultimately, down the line, many years later, I bought him out of his company and owned the company and ran it. So, yeah, okay, for 20 years, yeah, wow, yeah, so. But he was, he was, he was an amazing, amazing character, and, and I think a lot of his bravado was that bravado was not necessarily,

Rodney  17:19

was, you know, it didn't really, it wasn't really like his personally, not to say persona, but that sense of like he had a really brilliant idea, and he's absolutely right about the 90% squeezing it down to the 10, yeah. I mean, it's that last little bit that produces the we always talk about, that last juicy moment in a rehearsal dance, where you can get that movement that you weren't expecting

17:43

one more time, one more time, one more time, absolutely, yeah, and it

Rodney  17:46

got you there, yeah.

17:49

So that was the discipline that I learned early on and and it stayed with me, well, forever, yeah.

Rodney  17:58

Oh my god. So so you owned, so you owned your own design firm? Oh, yeah, for 20 years. So then, because I know we've talked, and I'm trying to remember the memories of, like, Okay, our conversations about things that you've worked on from a graphic design perspective, which is, I've, that's what shocked me, like, you know, because when did you, when did you work on? Didn't you work on the LA Olympics? Oh

18:21

yeah for sure. In fact, in fact, Robert miles Runyon And associates designed the the mark, the graphic for the for the 1984 Olympics, the stars in motion that were, again, phenomenal. I wasn't directly involved in that, but, but everything we did in that, in that firm was he made it competitive. And I don't know if that happens in dance. I mean, you know you're looking, you're looking for a dancer, and you want him to compete just like on, just like on a sporting event I want, I want the best. Yeah, give me your best. That

Rodney  19:09

is, there is competition. So, so

19:11

he always, he always presented it as competition. And yet, at the end of the day, it was always collaborative. It was maybe, maybe, maybe you relate to that being a choreographer. You understand the importance of having that, that dancer, and then you also understand the importance of that this thing has to work collaboratively with everybody. And I, you know, and he was really, he was really good at that. I was said, he was he wasn't. If he was here, we'd have a big argument about it. He wasn't the best designer, but he was the best director period. He was the guy that could take it that last 10% and he had a really he. Challenging way of doing that you just couldn't, you know you in that environment, you either stepped up or you didn't survive it. And so it was, it was, it was so instrumental in my life. Incidentally, on that same note, at the same time, there was a an architect in LA by the by the name, by the name of Craig Elwood. And Craig Elwood and Bob Runyon were great friends, and I became a very close friend of Craig Elwood through Bob Runyon. It got, at one point, it even got to be really silly, because Craig wanted, wanted me to go to work for him. And he said, Don't worry about Runyon. I'll take care of Runyan. But I never did that. But I was, it was, it was flattering. So Craig was, Craig was this bigger than life guy as well. He it was an incredible talent. He he wound up designing Art Center in Pasadena. It's a, it's, it's, it's, it's a bridge. And he's been compared to, he hated this, compared to Mies van der Rohe in Europe, who started building all these buildings out of steel? Well, Craig was doing it here, and he didn't, he didn't have any wasn't like. He was emulating anybody. It was, it was, it was his style here in it. But it irritated him that everybody said, Well, you're, you're look, you're just looking like, like, you know, and, and he wasn't, so he wasn't Mies van der Rohe. It was Craig Elwood, and it was, it was Southern California. And right after the war in 1945 that the there was a magazine that was produced, I don't know if still produced or not, but it's called arts. Arts and Architecture magazine set up a program for the in the United States called the case study house, so architects were challenged by arts and architecture to come to them with with designs that would stretch the the concept of how we live and and most of those case study houses, for some strange reason, wound up being done in LA, and became sort of the the, the LA style of of at the time, and it turned the country on its on here. What the heck's happening there? With Craig Elwood designed many of them, a guy in Long Beach by the name of Killingsworth Neutra, who is an incredible architect and very well known and Charles Eames, all were designing these houses for Arts and Architecture and and they became, they became very significant, and that launched ellwood's career. And then you started doing massive, well, massive big, big office buildings and, and, you know, but so in the reason I'm just probably taking longer than I should. So no,

Rodney  23:27

no, no, no, this is this is us. This is our conversation.

23:33

So Craig wound up lecturing at Yale and and struck up a whole relationship with Joseph Albers and Craig. Craig and I would have these, have these conversations, always impromptu, almost like what you and you and I meet, you know, yeah, Friday night, have a glass of wine and hey, here's but

Rodney  24:00

let's talk about, let's talk about our architecture and design and so

24:04

so creation. Craig started painting and and, and that also spurred me on to all right, I gotta study this more. I've got to paint more. I've got to understand more about what this so it goes back to the Bauhaus days, where Joseph Albers came from, where, where it was, where, where we started this conversation. If you're a designer, you're an artist, you're an architect, you're a designer, you're in curator design. There's nothing you can't design. Absolutely. The whole idea of Bauhaus was

Rodney  24:38

you. It was everything. It was like, it was it was living. It was like, down to just learning diapers, exactly. I mean, absolutely, yeah.

24:46

So that had a that also had a pretty profound impact on on me and how I approached, not only my design, but and you've seen all my work, my work is very architectural. It's, it's.

Rodney  24:59

Is sitting, we're sitting surrounded by it, and it's like, and it's,

25:04

and it's, it's very graphic. And I tell you, everything I do is designed, yeah, so, so I didn't walk away from

Rodney  25:12

design videos, just

25:13

I've let it merge,

Rodney  25:16

yeah, and synthesize it, like, into the into the art making practice, which it's a really interesting thing, because I always feel like that's a that's a conversation always happens in the arts, like, I remember going to grad school and auditioning, and they said, Well, why doesn't your work reflect your degree in visual arts and political science? I said, Well, there's not a lot of political discourse in a ballet. You lift the girl, she's a bird. I mean, I don't have a lot of room for but I'm willing to learn. And so then it becomes a different and that's where that experience, we talk about that like, you have to have these different life experiences. It informs everything that goes forward. It can't be just one thing. It's got to be a multitude of things, you know, which drives everyone around us crazy, yeah, sure, because they were, but they actually, like, when you were doing, like, working as a designer, where people were expecting you to only stay in your lane and then vice versa. The same thing with art

26:11

making, right? Oh, yeah, absolutely it is. I mean, in fact, you that's, that's, in and of itself, a challenge, because you get you, we all get comfortable, and then and then and then, that comfort works against the freedom of being expressive in a way, you know, because you, you man, I can do that. Yeah, I've done that. I know. I understand it. So it's, it's a the challenge of the challenge of art is is immensely personal, because, because every time you you are putting it out there, and I would say, I think you need to have some pretty tough skin, because it's, it's, yeah, I always, I always tell the young people, the the the most challenging thing on the planet is a blank canvas. Yeah, just go for it. Let's see what you got. But yeah, so later on, after all of this, you asked about the Olympics, yeah? We had, yeah. We had, man, there were, there were three, essentially three firms that, that three and an architectural firm that did and basically created what the look and the feel of the 1984 Olympics were architecturally John jurdy of the jurdy partnership in LA was again one of these amazing talents, great guy, but he essentially was designing malls for Kenneth Hahn out of LA and and he reinvented the whole mall concept, And by a sidebar in that story, he also told, I was in this meeting. I was in this meeting when, when he, when he was telling the it wasn't Kenneth Hahn, but it was another mall developed. So first of all, first of all, you have to you, you must understand that the life of a mall is going to be 10 years. It's done in 10 years. You have to reinvent that in 10 years because, because, and nobody believed that. And look at what's happening to all these malls today. Love it. Here's the guy saying, hey, like you

Rodney  28:49

read or reinvent.

28:50

These aren't monuments. These are shopping experiences. You're creating an experience,

Rodney  28:57

right? And we see that malls now have figured like they're starting to try to evolve, but then they always get behind the times. It's like, like, I always use the example of, oh, Easton is a walking concept Mall. Let's do that everywhere. But then you do it, and then some are successful and some are not. And it's like, not taking into account like the geography and the people and the culture of a community, because it's not monolithic. Every place is different.

29:28

I'm Bonnie miles, membership coordinator of CET. Thank you for listening to Rodney veils, inspired by this podcast is a production of CET, and think TV two local PBS stations as PBS stations, the work we do online, on air and in the community is supported by listeners like you. If you're enjoying the show and would like to support our work, please consider becoming a member@cetconnect.org or thinktv.org Plus, when you sign up to donate at least $5 a month, you'll get access to special. Members Only streaming videos on the PBS app through passport. Learn more at CET connect.org or think tv.org If you're

30:10

enjoying this conversation. The art show, also hosted by Rodney veal, is available to stream anytime from anywhere on YouTube or the PBS app. So

Rodney  30:18

I mean, was la like from I'm kind of curious, because there's this notion of like, you know, like you were, you're doing design, you're you're working in these circles with these amazing people. I mean, especially in doing the being on the team to design the kind of look of the graphics, which is another question I have, because wayfinding signage is a real thing. People ignore it at all times, and it's usually to the to their detriment, to the organization that didn't put a sign out that said arrow this way, but do it in a nice way. What was I mean was that just because of that, was LA, always this kind of hotbed of the new I like. I always envisioned it as being like the hotbed of the new idea and the new sort of, like everybody's working in their space and coming into close proximity. There's

31:13

a book out that's called Rock Me on the water. I forget who the author is, but, and they highlight the 70s, the early 70s. But that how la changed everything. The music industry moved to LA from New York, you know, with, with the Troubadour and and and, and the people that came out of the troubadour, the Jackson Brown, Linda Ronstadt, the the what were the guys? I mean, it was, it was prolific. And so the record companies all start, and that that was a monumental change. The politics changed in California, you know, of course, being, you know, the liberal state, but there was, there was it. It had a significant change the book. The book is a quick read. It's terrific. And then, and then the arts. The arts started, okay, in in in Los Angeles, in a little gallery, the Ferris gallery in Los Angeles changed the art scene, not just in LA but it had an impact that was nationally. Is it? Is it has been it is considered one of the 10 most important galleries in art history. Little, little this little gallery, the Ferris Gallery, and, and, and it was started by, I can't remember his name right now, but it was started by, by kleinholds. Ed keinhold started was, you know, nobody would show his work, so he basically said, Well, I'm gonna start my own gallery. And he didn't know anything about running a gallery, so he hooked up with with this, this fellow from New York, Irving bloom. And in Irving bloom, nope, nobody knew who any of these artists were. So it's like, it's like, nobody you know today. They're today. They're all like household names. Andy Warhol's first solo show was at the Ferris gallery in LA Wow. And I believe that was early 60s, 64 something like that, but, but the other artists that that really came out of that whole era in Los Angeles, where Ed Moses, who is not, he's not necessarily household word, but, but terrific, incredible, important artists, John altoon, Kenny price, Billy al Bankston, Jasper, Johns, Frank, Stella, Roy Lichtenstein, I mean, the place like it happened. It was happening. I didn't know what's happening. Nobody else knew it was happening, but it was happening. And so history looks back. So all this was happening in Los Angeles and turning it turning to LA. The spotlight was on. La, so the architecture, the architecture through the case studies, the art through the Ferris gallery, the food scene, all of a sudden began to be incredible. Little guys that nobody knew, like Wolfgang Puck. Who the heck is, was you're going to go to Wolfgang Puck's? Who's Wolfgang Puck, right? Well, he changed. He changed the way we eat. I mean, you know the

Rodney  34:45

so here's this world, this world that was formative, exactly.

34:49

It was all happening simultaneously. That's what this book's about. It just, it, just how, how influential and what, and what happened at that period time. So the, the. Yeah, the the arts, the architecture, the food, the politics, the music, all was happening there and then, and then, you know, going even so further. And the whole group that, let me back a minute. So they were, there were four firms. John girdy, that was the guy that came up with, how do we present this stuff? Because the Olympic Committee had run out of time. They had a graphic the identity, designed by Robert miles Runyon and Associates. Keith bright of bright, strategic design. Designed the icons that you know. And John jurdy, how do you do all this in in a year? How are you going to put all this together? His architecture firm figured that because what they started, what they did, everything was built on scaffolding. The whole structure of all of these events, signing. Everything was built on scaffolding. And then Deborah Sussman, of Sussman prasia, developed a color palette and a system she called, she called it a kit of parts. So instead of looking at at individual, individual venues, let's design a system of of elements that we can pick and choose and move around. And they become to your point. They become identification elements, so that you know, you know, you know. You've got a 50 or 45 foot scaffolding, and all these graphics are coming off of it, so that it just said Olympics. And then we were taxed with tasks. With we designed a banner program that that, that I was called, we gift wrapped the city of Los Angeles. It was, it was, at the time, I don't know if it's ever been the largest, the largest banner program ever, ever done in the United States, period. And, and it took off, like, like, like, Wildflower and, and I could go through the details of what that took, but we did. And then we were doing all the arts venues, which you would have loved. Rodney, oh, I

Rodney  37:13

know you know me. Like was, which is amazing to me, because we talked about that, because I'm researching or something right now about that a lot of people don't know. Is it the in the early part of the 20th century, there was an arts component to the Olympics where they were awarding medals. Yeah. And so one of the parts of this day now, do city? Does everyone does it as like, you know, presenting theirs, but they were actually giving medals. And so it was essentially Jor George Bellows received a bronze medal for his painting, and he's the one that does the they did those kind of, like realistic, not realistic, but kind of like ashcan artists boxing matches like those. And really, really, really cool stuff. And so it's this notion of La being, like, all this thing you're talking about, which is absolutely true, that came out of that. And you're making, you know, you're doing this banner system that, like, so you know, like, how you created an identity for a city, in essence, to kind of rebirth itself as truly a global force. Yeah, the Olympics has that kind of power, but it has that kind of power because of design. It has a kind of power because of art. It has like people be having a vision, so to speak.

38:36

So when the when we got the call to do this banner program. We had no idea what, what it would entail, nor did, nor did the Olympic Committee. We got a call from Larry Klein. Larry Klein reported Harry Usher, who was the number two guy in the Olympic Committee, and Larry Larry Klein, who's another really great guy, an interesting guy, great story too, with him, but, but said, you know, hey, you know, we want to do a banner program. Can you guys do it? Sure. So we, the first thing we had to do is we went to the city to get, to get, we needed to know, you know, how, what? How many light poles are there in the city of Los Angeles? So, you know, we, we, you know, sure we can design that. And we had to, we had to determine, you know, how we had to know how many Poles, how many light poles that we could incorporate, we could use in the city. So we asked the city if they could provide us with that information. They said, Well, no, we don't have a record. We don't have any idea. So the first thing we had to do, we counted and documented every light pole in the city of Los Angeles, and and and. And we had teams that went out to certain areas. And one of the, you know, you always get criticisms, right? Gee, you know, you. Rodney, how come you didn't do? How come you didn't do, use this move in that thing? Well, you know, you always get, there's always something

Rodney  40:06

that's never right with someone exactly. Well, I would have done it differently. Did

40:11

you really, really want those, those tights on, but, but so the criticisms were that, well, the banners are too small. But what people didn't understand, we had to design the banners to to the wind loads of the smallest light post, not the most robust. Otherwise, half of those would have been blown down the post and everything. So, So, but anyway, the point is, the criticism comes with no knowledge. So anyway, anyway we, we, we then, then we, we, when we understood how many Poles and how many banners were needed, and then how much time was left before the Olympics were that that currently, at the time it was, it was like, I don't remember the exact number it was. It took, took about 20 minutes to hang a banner. And there's no way that we could have hung those banners around the city of Los Angeles, it would have been ready a year later. I mean, there was an impossibility, so we didn't, but we had, we had, we contracted, had a system designed so that we could hang a banner on a pole in something like 30 seconds, 40 seconds, and now that same system is used. Everywhere you see him in Dayton, there's these little clamps that go on the pole come out, that banner goes on. But we had so, so we, we figured that out, and and, and got, got this system going. We got, we got the bad then the other problem was everybody, I know, everybody, people were stealing his banners off the poles like crazy. So, so, you know, the budget had been blown and everything else. And Harry Usher said, I don't care what it costs. Keep those banners going up. People want them. They can have them. It's all good. We wound we wound up almost not experiencing any of the Olympic events. And we could have gone to all of them, because we were, we were continually hanging banners and getting banners done, banners made, and running out of material. How are we going to get this done? So it was, it was a whole incredible, incredible experience. Wow, so, so, so, yeah, we, and we had a studio. The actually, the Olympic Committee had a studio downtown, that was the design center. And those four firms I just talked about jurdy Sussman, US and Keith bright all had meetings there and workspace there on an ongoing basis for a solid year to get all this stuff done and organized and and and put together so much talent involved in this. It was not a at all, one, one person deal. So it was,

Rodney  43:25

here's your part of your part of, like the legend of the LA Olympics, because I feel like that. That was the first modern Olympics that we all paid attention to. Do you know, says, and it's and it was, shockingly so well done on and it was, and there is a Dayton connection, because, if I remember correctly, didn't Edwin see Moses win his first Olympic gold medal in LA So, yeah, I mean, I mean, someone will probably test me on that knowledge and history listening to the podcast. But I'm pretty sure. Well, nobody would

44:00

pretty sure Ed Moses was as good as it gets, period. Yeah,

Rodney  44:06

sure. Phenomenal, phenomenal runner.

44:08

But so after the, after the Olympics, we

Rodney  44:16

almost, how do you top that? I mean, really, how do you go from the

44:21

I mean, do you want more on the Olympic Olympics? No

Rodney  44:23

one know. I might kind of know. How do you how do you know? I'm just saying, like, as an observation, how do you top doing this big, massive world attention all eyes on experience as a design firm and as a designer, where do you go from there? What is, what's the next project? How do you Well,

44:42

we had, we had gained a lot of notoriety, and, and, and not just us. I mean, a lot of these firms, you know that all of a sudden, all of a sudden, we were on the radar. Now, of you. And we started getting calls from we got some somebody saw an article in CA magazine about our firm. We got a call from Korea. And next thing you know, I'm on an airplane from I was in Martha's Vineyard with the family. Had to fly back to LA in an airplane to go to a meeting in Seoul, Korea, to meet with with the president of Kumo Corporation. You know, this is one of these huge Korean companies, Kumo tire, all right, they own ASEAN airlines, and they were developing this, this resort south of Seoul, and they brought us, brought us out there to to look at the resort, and hired us to do all, all the identity, all the branding, all the graphics for the resort. And then we wound up doing off of that several, several projects in Korea. You know, for Samsung, Samsung came was, people don't know this. There's no reason they should, but Samsung had was producing their and designing and building their own car, and we introduced that car. We did all, all the, all the all the graphics, all the brochures and everything for this car that be sold, sold in Korea. And the reason nobody knows about it is because after about a year, the government shut it down, because they all these Korean companies they were into. They were breaking these, these big companies up. So really, what do you want to do you want to be an electronics company? We're doing electronics. You can't be an electronic company, a resort company, an airline, Ayre company, and and and a car manufacturer. They were breaking these companies up so that they they could manage their their growth, and their and of Korea. But yeah, I mean, it was, it was pretty wild. So we started getting involved in more and more environmental graphics stuff. We we got, we were asked to do 5000 square feet at the at the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, to correspond with the night the 19 what, 1988 Olympics. So because, because they wanted to tell the story of how Hitler used the 1936 Olympics to legitimize the knots, the nazification of Germany. Wow. And, and, of course, that's all but so we got it. We got into that. We, we wound up working with historians and and designing this, this, this, this 5000 square feet, and then, and then redesigning it to a much smaller size, and it traveled around the world. I mean, it was just,

Rodney  48:08

it was these are power, that's, that's, that's powerful stuff. And

48:12

like they wanted us because we'd had had the Olympic experience, and, and, and we were doing all this, all this environmental stuff at it was, it was pretty amazing. You know, it's, it was a, it was, it was pretty incredible. So, fast forward, other, other important, yeah, important people in

Rodney  48:37

my life, yeah, okay, yeah, because we've, we've talked, I mean, so who else is important in your life at this point?

48:43

So again, because, because of the of the group that we were, we were in the people that we were socializing with, they were friends, they some were colleagues. They were all were friends. But it was great we'd have, there was a group of us, all of them. I could tell stories about every one of them that are just amazing. But Keith bright, Jay shyat of Shiite day, Charlie White, who, Charlie White, who basically conceived and he, he designed Bellagio, he designed three or four resorts. He didn't do him architecturally. But going back earlier, John jury was the architect, but, but Charlie White was, was the was the whole he invented the hot, invented these, these places, I mean,

Rodney  49:46

as experiences, exactly of the experience like you, exactly that concept of which is really fascinating, because it is that, that concept that's kind of still just with us today, design where you. Yeah, design at all, like, literally, it's like from the curb right to to the doorman's outfit to the the letterhead to the how, where the screens are, plants, everything towards the singularity of the experience.

50:14

So at the same time as this, as this little group of designers and artists and architects, and Frank Gehry walks into the place and not and and we we want. We wound up doing a number, a number of projects, a number of Frank Gehry projects. We weren't working for Frank Geary. We were working for the client, his. It was his client, you know, but, but he would say to us, you know, well, we need to develop. They would say, the client would say, we, well, what are we gonna do with the graphics? Well, you know, here's a couple firms you need to talk to. One of them was us. And so, more times than not, we wind up working on, on all these Frank Gehry projects. So Frank. Frank Frank is the one that got me going with plywood,

Rodney  51:06

really, with the Pioneer plywood, because he does incorporate, as an architect, he

51:15

had this thing that we're going to only use natural materials, nothing artificial. He had done shy of days, office in in Santa Monica, that was just outrageous. The whole place was done in plywood and, and you've seen my plywood

Rodney  51:33

walls, right, talking about Gary's home, because I fallen in love with it so

51:37

and then all this plywood sculpture that I do, I started, you know, that came, that came from him, and he was also, you know, obviously, obviously, very significant architect. But when Toine him, he considers himself an artist, and he is. He's an artist, absolutely. And, I mean, look at those buildings. They're sculptures. They're not, they're not, they're not buildings like you would, you know, but, but so he had a, he had a, certainly a profound influence on me and how I approached, how I approached my, my art as well. So, you know, we, I wasn't, like, super close with him, but, but, you know, I would say that we were friends, friends, and I've lost contact with him since being here in Dayton, but, and he's older in dirt now, and he's got to be, he's got to be 90, wow, but, but he's still going strong.

Rodney  52:36

He's still going strong. And, you know, and what I love is the fact that there is, there are Frank Gehry buildings in Ohio. There's one in Cincinnati, on UC scams, there's,

52:44

there's one up in Cleveland, at, Case Western, Case Western, yeah, yeah.

Rodney  52:50

So it's like, folks, yeah, that's what I love about the fact of this la influence. And so I'm it always blows around, because I'm having known you, like, what got you to Dayton Ohio? I mean, I'm just like, because how do you go from to date? Not to do I'm not just seeing on Dayton Ohio. Please write letters or or anything that might No, I mean, it's a journey. I mean, we, that's the whole purpose of this. You know, at

53:20

the height, at the height of all of this, at the, I think it was 2000 right around 2000 2001 we Harry Usher, who I'd mentioned earlier was the number two guy at the at the Olympic 1984 Olympic Committee, we became good friends. So it was where, wherever Harry went. We had a new business. We had a new business. So I got a call one one afternoon from Harry saying, you know, Hinchey, we're putting this we have this opportunity. We're putting this company together. Can you meet us? I met, met with him, and actually him and Peter huberoff. So GE cap had had purchased all these catalog companies. There were hundreds of them, you know, they that that would produce dollhouses or paper flowers or or all these hobbies that were sent out catalogs all across the country to, and people would buy

Rodney  54:23

the by the materials to, yeah,

54:26

so and, and and it included sports memorabilia and sports stuff, you know, baseball signed by Lou Gehrig or or jersey, you know, whatever. So the world was changing with, with, with the advent of the whole shift to digital and and, you know, the catalogs were, we're not. We're not particularly smart. Smart idea. So GE told Harry and and Peter that if they could turn they were losing $140 million a year. If he could turn it, if they could turn that company black, they could have it. They want out of it. They just want it off the books. They want to clean. So Harry said, Okay, we'll do we'll, we'll, we'll do that. And he rapidly sold off all, got rid of all those catalogs and just kept just the sports stuff. And then he set up a network with DIRECTV, and he had licenses from all the sports venues, NHL, the you know, NASCAR, pro basketball, pro football, pro baseball. And we started producing. We were producing, I think it was six or seven catalogs every two months, and not in small quantities like, you know, like millions, hundreds, hundreds of 1000s of probably hundreds of 1000s, not millions, but, but we're so and, and he was rapidly changing it over to also, we were going to get rid of the catalogs, because everything was going to going to go through two, two venues, one, one venue was in, one venue was in, in Times Square, and the other venue was in LA at Universal Studios, studio walk, which Charlie white designed by, though he designed Universal Studio walk, so So, and he was in the process of moving it from Secaucus New Jersey.

Rodney  56:41

Okay, okay,

56:44

back to LA. In the meantime, he's working out of my office so So, and we were on a we were on $134,000 a month retainer with GE camp. And we had added people, we added space. We had to get rid of all the computers and all the software, because if you look back at that period of time, 2000 everything was pirated. You didn't know whether, whether you had whether, and we couldn't take a chance of being sued, or putting them in a position of being sued and and you had DirecTV involved. And it was so, so we're just jamming along with all this, all this business and on on a on a Monday morning, I got a call, and the that Harry, Harry had died on a on a treadmill in Secaucus New Jersey, got up in the morning, went downstairs at the hotel and was running on the on a treadmill and had a massive heart attack, died, and so a week or two, I mean, it was devastating. A week or two later, I get a call from a very polite, nice gentleman, and the conversation went something like this, Mr. Hinchey, we're really sorry to you know that for your loss, you know, we know you're close friends with with Harry Usher, and we're really sorry about that, but I'm here to tell you that we're not going to pay you. We're bankrupting that company, and you could sue us, and you would win. We've had all these contracts, but I have a building in Manhattan full of attorneys, and I can keep it in the courts for 10 years. Can you do that? That was, that was something that you cannot even fathom. And in in your life, that phone call like that, I mean, I had, I had personally guaranteed all the computers, all the leases, all the everything. So I got a call from this company here in Dayton, Ohio, Sabatino. Day Greg Sabatino called and said, Well, I got your name and I never met him. Didn't know him from Adam. What? What what are you going What are you going to do? And I said, Well, you know, I had no, I had no idea what to do, you know, obviously, I talked to my attorneys, you know, and then my attorneys all said you need to bankrupt, bankrupt the company, bankrupt it because you can't, you're not going to, you can't afford. You got to bankrupt this thing. And I didn't do that because a lot of the people that I that I worked with and were personal friends and associates long term relationships, and I just figured I. Somehow? Well, not somehow. I would pay everybody what is owed So, long and short of was that we had several meetings, and Sabatino said, well, let's just put the companies together and we'll figure it all out. We'll get it because they got they had the same phone call. He had the same phone call. Gee, Mr. Sabertin, we're really sorry we're not paying you so. So then it wasn't a couple years later, a year later, that he said, Well, why don't you go to Dayton and we'll run the creative out of Dayton, and we'll downsize the LA office because it was costing too much money and everything else. So that's how I wound up in Dayton,

Rodney  1:00:42

Ohio, Sabatino Day, which I mean, as a native daytonian, I remember that name was there. It was everywhere. I mean, they were big company. They were a bit they were big,

1:00:53

you know, Gary day. Gary day is, is a dear, dear, dear friend. It's just been wonderful with with, with the people. And, you know, getting to know you same thing. I

Rodney  1:01:04

mean Exactly. I'm grateful that I'm like, Oh, we go. I can't even remember how we met. I mean, to be honest with you, how did we meet? Did we meet through the art show?

1:01:16

I don't even, I don't remember either.

Rodney  1:01:21

We just Yeah. It's like, we've never, we were never friends, not friends. I guess it's like, I just, I had so much, but

1:01:28

it was, it was instant. It was instant, yeah, I mean, I just remember that it was instant. It was like, I

Rodney  1:01:33

like this guy, I just like, we just, right, yeah? Because I well, I think it's our philosophies. I think is our similar philosophies. And I love like you talked about, you didn't want to just, you weren't going to just take the money or do something and run and leave everybody was hanging. You were always thinking about, like, you know what, I have friendships and connections and people who depend on you're going to let those folks down. And I think it's that, that you have such integrity as a human being. I mean, I know seriously, you really do. And that's, I was like, I felt it. I was like, yeah, yeah. And authenticity, well, thank

1:02:11

you for that, too. And it was just, you know, I'm sorry. It's just, it was just the right thing to do. It is that was it

Rodney  1:02:17

was that was absolutely the right thing to do. And that's why we that's what our conversations are about. We talk about Dayton because of the thing is the fact that we're folks. We're working together on this with this group called Epic, and it's this group of us just trying to do cool things in the city and involve as many people as we can and inspire and connect and engage and educate and get folks to kind of see that, you know, you can do amazing things in the Midwest, in this in a city the size of Dayton, Ohio, and that's and that the people who, for whatever reason, if they're not A native daytonian, they become daytonians by design or by the journey, and that you can this is fertile ground, yeah, yeah,

1:03:08

yeah. So it's, it's, it's that, it's that stuff that that keeps me going. I mean, you know, we started this, we started this gallery, and

Rodney  1:03:26

when did you guys? When did you guys start together? I

1:03:29

couldn't remember. I think Dean and I were talking about this the other day. I think, I think, announced about six years, six years ago. But, but to your point, you know her, her, her vision, her image, about about this gallery was, what can we give back to this community? What can we do to support the visual arts in this community? For me, it was far more selfish. I wanted, I wanted to. I wanted my art in some of the big, you know, the big art the big art fairs and, you know, in Miami and LA and all that. And you had, and you had to have a gallery, represent, represent, representing. A lot of people don't understand that

Rodney  1:04:13

this, that this larger requires some you have to have some components before they entertain looking

1:04:20

so directly. So my goal was, well, okay, well, going back to Ed Kinos, we'll start a gallery. And Dana and I, neither one of us knew do anything about how to run a gallery. And I naively, I can, I can remember myself saying, Well, you know, we'll figure it out. It can't be that hard. So so many and you know, five, five years later, later, she's been amazing, incredible, incredible. She's a gallerist, she's a curator,

Rodney  1:04:53

and she has a compassion for the community and a passion and a passion, correct. And a passion.

1:05:01

Let me go on back to Epic. Epic is because, is because of Dana Wiley, yeah,

Rodney  1:05:05

absolutely. And the thing is, you know, but what? But it's also because of you, and it's because of John and Lori Doherty and Jamie and rich. And, I mean, there's a lot of people involved in this kind of group

1:05:20

of folks, and nobody asking for anything. That was the thing.

Rodney  1:05:23

It's like we found, like the whole premise is not, Oh, am I going to gain all these No, is the community going to be better, right? Is it better than the way we left and because we talked about, like, we talked about, what is our legacy, right? Is our is our legacy going to be because I have a phrase. It's on my dry erase board at work, and it says, Chase excellence, not gold. And I live that mantra, right? It doesn't matter, because I also have the humor of the fact that my mother is the most humbling human being on the planet. When I want to we want our first original Emmy for the TV show. I called her excited, and she said, Well, that's nice. She goes. So when are you coming out for dinner? And I said, Mom, I'm going to vacation after the show. Okay, well, Lucy, you want to get back from vacation? Love You Like so I am. My mom will be mad about that, but, but that, in and of itself, told me everything I needed to know, like it's, it's not about that. It was the fact that here were, I was working with Lynette Carlino and Richard Nordstrom and John PAP and they and the station having this idea of, let's promote art, and let's promote art and culture in southwest Ohio. And it was a win win scenario, and it wasn't about me becoming a TV star, because that is that was not on the bingo card of life, right? Like and it points to the journey. It points to the conversation that we're having, that your journey is not it's not linear, it goes, how you go from designing, and all of a sudden it's this thing that then says, okay, you know to come, come to Dayton, Ohio, here's a place and you're making this, but it's your work. When we look at your work, and I'm looking at it, it's informed by what you're telling us. And that's really fascinating to me. I think when people, when you get to see Gary's work, you're going to see, and you listen to this podcast, you can sense there's a deeper, contextual, subtextual story. It's never just what's on the surface, which I think you comes through in your work. And that's why it was I remember, I do kind of remember looking at your artwork and just being drawn, like fascinating, like I would just stare, and I look, and I'd see that it was I got, this is more than just, I'm mapping things out on the geometric grid. This has to do with something the grid is above a story of life, yeah, and that, yeah. So that's how, that's why I'm a fanboy. Sorry, so I know Gary, I'm, like, one of those guys, FANBOYS. I fanboy Sorry.

1:08:12

It's, it's gratified and and greatly appreciated, but, but it's, it's fun. It's fun doing this. It's fun talking about this. It's fun because the you know, rarely do you really hear a life experience or, you know, so I mean, it's, it's a journey is a great word. It's, not linear,

1:08:43

and it isn't. It isn't so many of us make the mistake of planning our mission or our vision, as opposed to letting the mission find you. So you want to make a plan. Watch God laugh.

1:09:12

Well, yeah, it's,

Rodney  1:09:12

I'm laughing because that's,

1:09:14

that's the point, let the mission find you. Yeah, you have to be open to that. But

Rodney  1:09:24

that's a tough one. That's a tough I want to I think a lot of reason why people don't let the mission find them is fear, the fear of letting go. When you describe it as visually opening up, and I believe in that an opening means you're embracing, that you're allowing an embrace. And the Embrace may be uncomfortable, but it's a worthy embrace. So you got to be, you know? You got to kind of be prepared for it.

1:09:51

Get vulnerable, yeah, that's what it's that's what it's about. Stop feeling comfortable. Comfort is. Is, I don't know it's a dead end. I mean, you know, just Yeah, yeah,

Rodney  1:10:07

that's our thing. So you touched upon something. But I want you to get you to have the honest to god last word in this, in this podcast, before I say sign off. What advice, because we're talking about the journey, what advice would you give to someone who is considering this notion of art and creativity and it being a part of their life and them being a part of their community? What would be your advice to them

1:10:39

that really tests a person that's not an that's not an easy path, or a or a preferred path, you know, per the advice I got as a young man, and you got as Well, you know. Now you gotta, you know you can't make a living. You have. You have to know. You have to know what you want, you want. You have to know what you're willing to give up to achieve that. And you have to know that ain't gonna be easy, I guess. I mean, it's, I don't know it's, I've thought about that a lot, and I have given advice a lot, only to find out that it's that it was, I mean, coming away feeling well, that was pretty superficial. You know, it's pretty hard to be profound about that, that that question, because it's, it's, it's a cliche. Well, you know, it's all about hard work. Well, it's not all about hard work. It's also about what's important to

Rodney  1:11:58

you. And there we have it. This is why I wanted you on the podcast. So Gary,

1:12:05

Gary day used to say, I'm probably gonna misquote this, but, but if you're gonna have a point of view, take a point of view. I mean, you it's, it's, it's got got to have some meat in it and something behind it. It's not like, well, I believe this really, what are you doing? I'm not quoting that correct, but the point is, yeah, so my advice would be,

Rodney  1:12:28

but you live it, you embody it, that that's the thing. You live it like you that phrase walk the talk, that cliche trophy sort of or phrase, you walk the talk, so it's evident, and you don't have to do that point of view. It's like, it's very clear, if you as a viewer or an audience member, is paying attention, you get and it's right there, it's right there. It's right there. In the work, it's right there. When someone meets you, it's there.