worries or something that’s outside
of me. We have friends that have
started yoga schools, and my wife’s
a psychotherapist so we’re both
interested in that. You can go
overboard with these things, but if
you really step back and look at it
and see the value in that, it’s very
helpful. It’s a good way to start the
day, in New York especially.When did you start collecting ritual
masks, frames and old rocks?
Oh boy! Well, for the frames, I had
to go into the military down in
Detroit for some time, while livingAbove: Although
Wyman is
adamant he is
no typographer,
he produced the
logo for the 1970
United States
Bicentennial, along
with a typeface.
Below: A portrait
of the artist as a
young man – a
student at General
Motors Summer
Program in 1958,
to be exact.
in Missouri. I had a little Sunbeam
Alpine convertible and when I drove
up there, I had never seen so many
antiques in my life! And a lot of what
they had were frames like you’ve
never seen. They made all their own
frames. And in the military they pay
you money, so I had like hundreds of
dollars! So I started collecting them.
As far as the masks, I was
studying Spanish – I lasted not
much longer than one class, but
in the process I met a couple from
Princeton and the guy was working
at the museum of anthropology on
his thesis. He was getting masks
from the outer villages around
Mexico City, pre-Columbian masks.
The museum had told him if they
didn’t need any of them for their
collection, the guys that were doing
their doctorates could have them.
So three months later he came back
with a potato sack full of masks!
They’re amazing! They’re from
an area of Mexico called Guerrero,
which translates as ‘war’. I mean,
even the government doesn’t bother
these guys so much! A lot of the arts
and crafts that come out of there are
authentic because they haven’t been
messed around with very much. It’s
pretty closed off to outsiders. And
the thing I love about these masks is
some of them are really grotesque,but somehow they keep a sense of
humour, too. In some of the other
areas in Mexico they’ll copy some
of this stuff, but the grotesque stuff
really sucks, you know? Somehow
you can get into seeing the humanity
of grotesque with these ones.What’s your latest project?
Well, when I go back to New York
I’ll only be there a couple of days,
then it’s off to Mexico City to present
an identity for all of the modes of
transportation in the city. So the
Metro, the bus, the trams – I’ve got it
worked out now where they all look
like they’re part of the same centre.
So that’s where my energy is going
now and I think it’ll probably be the
first major city to do this. And that’s
pretty amazing, because generally
the departments of major cities don’t
really talk to each other.
So for these guys to come in and
have the attitude of wanting to work
together is great. And having the
mayor, who’s a woman, and many
of the team that are involved with
programming this stuff are women –
I think it may be because of that. I’ve
always loved working with women
because they have... I don’t know
what the hell it is! There’s a kind
of nourishing I think that happens
when working with women.COMPUTERARTS.CREATIVEBLOQ.COM