Coffee Sketch Podcast
Coffee Sketch Podcast is our take on the intersection of old tech and new tech. The space between the traditional practice of the hand-drawn sketch that has been performed by architects and designers for centuries and the modern day use of the #hashtag as a representation of sentiment or a movement! Each week will plan to deliver a new pod about our ideas, sketches, and what’s going in our daily lives as we pursue our love of architecture, design, and sharing this knowledge with the next generation.
Coffee Sketch Podcast
184 - Exploring Creative Anchors
Exploring Creative Anchors and Pop Culture Influence
In this episode, Jamie and Kurt navigate through technical difficulties and dive into an intriguing discussion about drawing, design, and the impact of pop culture on creativity. They explore the themes of nationalism and identity through recent sketches, including a portrait of Frederick Douglass and Marvel characters. The conversation touches on the influence of comic books and graffiti art on their architectural practice and creative process, with nods to figures like Basquiat and Ryan Coogler. They also reflect on the importance of storytelling in architecture and share insights from Evelyn Lee and Janine Grossmann's podcast 'Practice Disrupted.'
00:00 Introduction and Technical Difficulties
00:39 Custom Baseball Hat and Patches
02:45 Summer of Soccer and World Cup 2026
04:58 Dallas Stadium Renovations for World Cup
12:20 Canada Day and Fireworks
15:00 Dual Nationality and Citizenship Test
17:27 Coffee Talk and Greater Goods Espresso
18:52 Discussing Coffee Preferences
20:08 Caddy Shack and Movie Quotes
21:46 Analyzing Sketches and Themes
23:44 Graffiti Art and Influences
33:34 Marvel Characters and Nostalgia
47:40 Storytelling in Architecture
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Our Links
Follow Jamie on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/falloutstudio/
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Coffee Sketch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/coffeesketch
Jamie on Twitter - https://twitter.com/falloutstudio
Kurt on Twitter - https://twitter.com/kurtneiswender
Hey, Jamie. How's it going? Can you hear me? I can. Hello? Oh, all right then. I didn't get a response right away. Welcome to the, the show folks.
Jamie:Hear?
Kurt:No. Yeah, this is the show. Did you not hear that? Oh, it, there goes the, the signal again. I think we're, I think we're good now, right? You can hear, hear, hear me now?
Jamie:Yes. Hello.
Kurt:Yeah. Well, you know, now I have you know, for those that are watching, I have donned my newly acquired custom baseball hat. That could be my new thing. Right, Jamie? It's a lot. I like it.
Jamie:I mean, I just, you know, you showed it to me and, you know, just prior to the episode and, and I, I thought you had seizure. Well, you know, I mean, it was a lot to take in. I was trying to, you, you then, you explained all the patches to me, which was good because. I was like, oh, golf, what about foot golf? What about Flint City bucks? And then, and then realizing that I was maybe making a monster out of this. Like, you know, that you're, I'm encouraging you.
Kurt:There's some white space.
Jamie:There's white space. Exactly. There's
Kurt:space here. There's space down here. I'm, I, I would love to know if I can actually get a patch on the, on the mesh sides. But anyway,
Jamie:you know, this is like, this is like, did you like, I mean, I don't wanna encourage you even more like maybe with your wardrobe, but you know, if you really are into patches this way. Have you thought about a jean jacket?
Kurt:It's the summer. Oh, I can't do, can, can, I guess. I could, I could get one ready. You know what I, oh, alright.
Jamie:Or a vest. You could just do a gene vest. You could just go full biker.
Kurt:I could do that.
Jamie:Do
Kurt:you have a bike? I have a bicycle.
Jamie:Mm-hmm. That works too.
Kurt:I'd be a bicycler, not, not too much of a biker, you know. Alright. I have yeah, a collection, I'll start a collection for, for patches and you know, maybe, maybe some football patches. Not, not this kind.
Jamie:No. The other kind,
Kurt:the the real kind.
Jamie:The real kind.
Kurt:Yeah,
Jamie:that's right.
Kurt:Some bucks, maybe the vert, I mean,
Jamie:this is, this is the summer of soccer buddy, so I mean, wait, every, every summer is the summer of soccer, but Okay. This summer I was, I was
Kurt:concerned.
Jamie:Yeah. This summer is really important because this is the summer before the big summer, next summer when the World Cup is here in the summer
Kurt:at 28, isn't it?
Jamie:No. Or 26? 26.
Kurt:Oh, 26.
Jamie:So next summer, like the world is, is coming to the States, Canada,
Kurt:descending all over the United States. Yeah. And Canada.
Jamie:Yeah. And Mex, Mexico. Yeah. Yeah. It's like North America. It's a three country, like bid. Oh, kind of. Oh, okay. You know, that's cool. Even though Canada and Mexico don't quite get the same love about the stadiums, even though they probably have more people showing up to the games oftentimes. What
Kurt:do you mean the love? Like they're not gonna have the big stadiums.
Jamie:They don't, they don't get as many games. Oh. Oh.'cause of the like,
Kurt:okay. So US is the lead, quote unquote, lead. Bitter. Yes. And okay. It's, isn't it, it's not based in a city then.'cause I thought it was gonna be ba Oh, but that's what I got confused. The 28 Olympics is gonna be in LA and that's different.
Jamie:This is not the Olympics. This is bigger than the Olympics, most likely is the World
Kurt:Cup. It is, you know, financially. That's cool. So, so is, does Austin have a, a, are they gonna host a game or Dallas? No, not big
Jamie:enough. Dallas. Dallas, yes. Dallas actually gets the most games out of any city in the
Kurt:country or in all three countries
Jamie:in the
Kurt:Oh, that's fascinating. Yeah.
Jamie:Jerry World. Yeah. Jerry World Is there. They're actually, this is a fun, this is where we slip, slip back into the architecture folks like,'cause you're like, what are they talking about? This is where we go back to the architecture. We'll come, we'll come back to the soccer, I promise. But we go to the architecture for a second. And so fascinatingly enough Dallas, who was sort of on the bubble in a sense for their,'cause all the cities have to bid, right? You have all these cities with all these stadiums and the cities are trying to put together their, their advertising package. Yeah. And there's money. Exactly. And, and so Jerry World you know Jerry Jones, owner of the Dallas Cowboys has this really, really expensive stadium, right? And when they designed it in Arlington, they didn't think about the other. In Arlington, right? Not in Dallas. We do have the Cotton Bowl, but that doesn't, that doesn't count. Which hosted Brazil in the Netherlands, which I saw in 1994 during the World Cup when it was like here the last time, which was amazing. Wow. But wow, that's a, that's a, you know, could, can go down that rabbit hole another day. Back to Jerry World. So Jerry World, they designed this really, really expensive building for one sport called the American football. However, like the world wants to come and he wants the world to come for all these fast, fascinating games, you know, for the summer of soccer, that's gonna be next summer in the States for World Cup. And it's not quite big enough. It's not regulation fifa, it's not regulation size. The field isn't regulation size. For football for the beautiful game.
Kurt:Really?
Jamie:Yes. It's not So they're going to do, gonna be No, no, no. They're gonna, they're spending the money to do renovations in the interim so they, to get it seats. Oh, yeah. So some of those luxury boxes, when you're watching the Cowboys and you're like, oh, there's those people that are in those little, all some of those seats and stuff are gonna get all kind of renovated and maybe, you know, mixed up and stuff. Ah, yeah. Oh yeah. It's like there was a whole deal and they even, they even mock, you'll love this, they even mocked it up to put the,'cause the corner flags, you know, for the corner kicks couldn't be in the right spot under the current configuration to make, to make it, you know, work for. The fifa, actual, you know, regulations. So when you see matches in there right now, it hasn't been quite modified. So the field's actually a little bit narrower than, than normal. And so, and that is a problem in, in a couple of these, you know, US stadiums. So when you have these, when they call soccer specific stadiums in the us, which is kind of a thing now, is that, oh, the light bulb went off and everybody's like, oh, well we can make the field regulation international size because the American football fits inside it.'cause it's smaller. So you make it to the right size and now you can host these bigger events, these world events and not have to do all this, you know, construction, gymnastics to make it work or accept it the way it is. The funniest one right now is the New York FC. When they kind of started their franchise, they're building a stadium now a soccer specific one for themselves. They've been using Yankee Stadium, and so they've been playing on a baseball diamond in a stadium that, you know, it's for baseball. And so it's not quite big enough. And so it's the smallest pitch in, in North America for, is it that they're playing these, that they're playing these kinds of games on, you know, for a professional franchise. And so when you watch the game, it's like, it's kooky. Like the, the sidelines are all weird, you know, the, it clearly does not look like they're playing on a real regulate. The camera angles are all funny. Yeah, it's, it's strange. And so tactically teams that come into play there are like, what the hell? Like, they, you know, they're hitting the ball too long, you know,'cause the, the fields, you know, the wrong dimension. It's, it's. You know, design matters folks. Design matters.
Kurt:Well, yeah, that's, that, that is, that is a good design segue. But the the, the fantastic show Ted Lasso taught me that I thought that there was no regulation size or that within, is it just in the what league? That, that it can vary. Is it in England?
Jamie:I mean, they vary. Yes. There's a, there's a, there's a tolerance and there's a variance, but
Kurt:FIFA has a dimension,
Jamie:has a dimension that they expect for like internet. Because you're, because at that point you're sort of, you know, conceivably leveling, leveling the playing field for a team from Guam versus a team from South Africa versus a team from the Netherlands. Like they're all playing on the same size pitch.
Kurt:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, I suppose, I mean. American football is the same dimension. Canadian football is a different but same dimension to their, to their league baseball. Well, the rules are different too. Yeah. And base baseball fields vary in overall outfield length. The base path is always the same.
Jamie:Correct.
Kurt:But soccer can, can have some very deviation to it. But fifa, see, this is the summary. This is the, you know, the cliff notes. But FIFA wants a standard dimension. Yeah. Which is now what is the FIFA dimension compared to say, the European and English fields? Like who is it? Is it bigger or a little bit smaller, you know, than some of the.
Jamie:Well, I mean, I don't know which European, I don't, I would have to, like you have so many countries in Europe that have their own professional Well, I know. So, but where do
Kurt:they, so it would be interesting to find out, like, okay, how did they arrive at their dimension? Oh gosh, I know there's so much variation.
Jamie:Well, and that could be, then it's like, then you could go down the rabbit hole of like, where did the soccer come from? You know, where was the first soccer game played? And then, then you have all kinds of narratives around that. And so that's a, we gotta park that one. I mean, that's a,
Kurt:I I think we've just discovered Jamie's PhD dissertation.
Jamie:Yeah, I could, I could do that. Yep,
Kurt:yep, yep, yep, yep. I like this Start. Let's start your application process now. You have one year. Exactly. One year to complete. Right by the next World Cup. So, yeah, that's it's kind of a fun little segue. All started. By this conversation starter hat that I'm wearing.
Jamie:Yeah. That and this
Kurt:Canada Day.
Jamie:It's Canada Day folks. Like that's what really started. Yes.
Kurt:And we all know what Canada Day is because we learned it in the green room.
Jamie:Yeah. Kurt learned everything in the green room, folks. So
Kurt:I'm like a newborn. I, everything is new to me now.
Jamie:Canada Day is not like National Pizza Day or International Coffee Day. What about in the, over, gosh, in the oversimplification of things Canada Day, similar to you Americans who described July 4th as the birthday of America or the United States? Canada Day is often referred to as the birthday for Canada. Again, both are oversimplifications, but yes, it's you know, when Canada, effectively, it was also called Dominion Day. So they were, you know, effectively a dominion within the British Empire. You know, consolidating, you know, Canadian provinces that considered themselves Canadian. I mean, it wasn't that they like, suddenly, like that day, like woke up and go, oh, let's call ourselves Canada or call ourselves Canadian. They were already considering themselves that but
Kurt:so do they do fireworks? Yes. Traditionally, yes. Really? But, but see, what, what's the relevance of fireworks to, to Canada Day? Like, because, well, at least what, when, when, when I was in grade school, in, in the us mm-hmm. You know, they, they, they told us that fireworks represented the bombs bursting in air. Right. You know? Right. The war and the independence and the fight and the blah, blah, blah, blah. Which I think is, you know, there's just like many things. There's probably a little embellishment in the history books.
Jamie:Yes. Well, I, I, I would say instead of answering your question, like directly, I will say, have you heard of the Chinese New Year? Mm-hmm. Have you seen images of folks celebrating the Chinese New Year?
Kurt:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so you're just saying fireworks are a celebration item? Yes. A vehicle for Celebr. Okay. Okay. You're like,
Jamie:note to self.
Kurt:Cheat sheet for that quiz.
Jamie:See now when you say quiz, I will just point out to the folks who maybe don't know this is that yeah, I'm a dual national which, you know, in today's world and this week in particular is kind of, you know, maybe a bigger deal than I ever thought it was gonna be. Again, I did take the test, so there's that. Yes, there's a test. I've got opinions about the test and that process. I'm not gonna go there, Kurt. I'm not, not even gonna go there in the context of everything else.'cause there's plenty of other things to talk about. But yeah. Isn't it ironic in a sense that Canada Day is July 1st and July 4th is only a couple days away? So it's like, it's like for me it's like double fireworks.
Kurt:Yeah. I mean. Are you lighting any off? No, I don't. Your little, no,
Jamie:no,
Kurt:no. I don't do fireworks, but I mean, when I was a kid, I mean, I, I think How many Canadian neighbors do you have?
Jamie:Exactly.
Kurt:It's like too soon, buddy.
Jamie:Well, well,
Kurt:although around here there's fireworks going off since last weekend.
Jamie:Yeah. Well that's going, yeah, I mean, it could start any minute now here in Austin as well. And it's not for
Kurt:Canada Day, unfortunately, it's, it's for, you know, 4th of July. I gotcha. I gotcha. But you could say it's for Canada today, today,
Jamie:you know. Well, I'm also that guy. You know, I'm also that guy who goes to, you know, a game. And when it's a Canadian team, like, you know, I get both national anthems, right? So, and actually know the words to both. So anyways, take the test. Well, that's part of the, take the test. I took the, I took the test. It's not on the test. Your, your test is 10 questions. It's dealer's choice to folks. So whatever agents you get, it's their, their choice what 10 questions you get. So answers
Kurt:are A or B, or C, no, no, no. Or B,
Jamie:and it's an oral exam. It's not on paper, you know, so it's, it's, yeah. So it's, it is, it is quite, you know scary. Well, yes. We'll just, we'll just leave it at that. I
Kurt:mean, if you're unprepared and so, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Jamie:Well, I mean,
Kurt:so, so. What then is in your coffee cup to make that Thank you for asking. Beautiful, beautiful transition.
Jamie:Yeah, so I I decided, as you can tell, I'm a little animated for Canada. This is the for Yes. Works that week. I gotta be up. I got two big holidays all in one week. It's like, it's like when I first moved to the States and mom like tried to do both Canadian Thanksgiving and American Thanksgiving until we realized after a year of that, that was ridiculous. So
Kurt:that is kind of cool though. Lots of food. So what are you drinking then?
Jamie:So it's the espresso roast from greater goods. Yeah, it's, it's it's pretty sharp and kind of a
Kurt:is greater goods local. I.
Jamie:Mm-hmm.
Kurt:Greater goods. Yeah. I don't know if I, have you had it before? I don't remember that name. Yeah.
Jamie:Yeah. It, I mean, it's, it's, it's small batch. You know how you talked about the, the, the batch and the small batch? It's, they generally sell the small batch, which it's more of like a treat, you know, like a, like, when I get it, I consider it because it's more like, you know, smaller and precious. Also a little more expensive. But it's good. I mean, I really, you know, it's, it's well crafted. This has that sort of brown sugar kind of in that dark roast, which is good.
Kurt:I like this. I like those. That's cool.
Jamie:What about yourself?
Kurt:Well, let's see. I think I'm still working through the Odyssey blend of the Starbucks bag that I bought oh, a couple weeks ago. And I like it. It actually has a little, I mean, it's not as intense. Intensely fruity or berry ish. Mm-hmm. Like say some of our rootless favorites. But it has a little bit, it's kind of, kind of subtle subtly there. So, so I like it. All right. You know, but I, I'm planning my next, my next something, you know, my next choice. I haven't, I haven't yet decided. I'm gonna try, try something new. Go, go off the script as, as, as if there was a script, right, Jimmy?
Jamie:No, I mean, well, I mean, that's important, you know, I mean, yeah. We don't have scripts here, folks.
Kurt:Yes, exactly. I mean, otherwise, you know, this hat would look completely different. It was, if it was scripted,
Jamie:you know, like, I like, I like, I like to fill all the white space with lots of patches. You remember I got my room right here.
Kurt:Did you watch Caddy Shack? You familiar with Caddy Shack?
Jamie:I know, I know the film. Yes.
Kurt:And Rodney Dangerfield's character.
Jamie:Mm-hmm.
Kurt:And he's in, he's in the clubhouse, right? And he's shopping, right? He's like, gimme this, gimme that. You know, gimme a box of tea, gimme some of those. And then he looks at this hat and he's like, oh, I bet you they give you a free bowl of soup when you buy this hat. And then Judge Smails walks by wearing the hat, same hat. And right at Dangerfield, you know, rolls his eyes and says, looks good on you though. Now, hopefully for those that are of the era can understand that about my current hat. If they're not, if they're not watching and only listening, you need to go back to the. To the video at, at Twitch or YouTube for the live stream and the, the recordings. But yeah, it's
Jamie:well, I just, I mean, I just love, I like the hat, I love this about you is that you're able to, even though when folks are like, where's Kurt going? He's totally off script. Then he pulls this movie quote from like 1982, like just, and sets the scene Flawless, flawless, buddy.
Kurt:Oh, thanks. When you watch something as much as I have, it's like it's I probably know that better than I know. The US National anthem that's
Jamie:Oh, right. Can do a different test. Can I do a different,
Kurt:can we just do, We have a few, we have a few sketches to talk about today, and I think we should dive in the there, there're interesting, interesting, let's say collage. And well, there's a couple, well, a couple of overlapping themes I, I guess, that Jamie was kind of getting at. And it's a to span a few different days and I'm, I'm trying to set the stage a little bit, Jamie, but I'm gonna pepper you with a bunch of questions because there's, if you're, if for those that are watching as we talk through some of the sketches which we, we, you know, don't often do three at a time, but you know, we'll try and kind of weave it all together on the left for those watching or checking into the show notes. Frederick Douglas Sketch, which amazing portrait sketch. Then followed by, on the same pa, on the, on the opposite side of the fold, but in the same frame here is an individual doing a little graffiti artwork. I don't know if that's a fictitious person or is that a person? Person. I forgot from the caption that you posted, however, before you get into that, then followed by two sketch, two frames of sketches of some Marvel characters from the recent Captain America. I'm gonna forget the subtitle, but Jamie's gonna fill us in on, on the marble lore. But I think there's a, there's a little bit of a thread that we'll weave across all three. But yeah, I guess. First question is, who is this person doing the graffiti artwork in the first frame?
Jamie:Hmm. So it's it's, it's, it's sort of twofold. It's, it's a little bit out of my head but it's also, it's an homage to a couple different things at the same time. So there's a, a great album cover from Lincoln Park from their Meteora album where someone's doing graffiti sort of painting kind of in a studio setting, kind of crouched, kind of over the artwork on the ground, sort of spraying something. And so kind of aerosol art, graffiti art. And so I, I, you know, modified that sketch a bit. And, and I wanted to pair it with the Frederick Douglass.'cause sort of as you're, you know, thank you for the compliment on the, the portrait. But the thing that I found in doing that one was I was really fascinated with the line work, and it was super intense. It was really doing a lot of when you kind of zoom up on the, the, the line work, especially in his coat, it's, it's not, I don't do the crosshatch that I normally would do to get that texture. I did it all with sort of single parallel lines, but just sort of figuring out different angles to kind of create the different color tones and sort of to layer the fabric. Really enjoyed doing that sketch. Really kind of, you know, lost myself in it. And, you know, was thinking about him and, and sort of thinking about a lot of stuff at that time. And that sort of was sort of a juneteenth kind of, you know, I. Precursor kind of moment. But also knowing that this no Kings Day was kind of upon us. So thinking about the two things together is that when I kind of reverted to this sketch of sort of in interpreting that Lincoln Park cover graffiti artist and sort of making kind of the hand handmade DIY signage that you saw in a lot of the protest marches. You know, what was interesting for me was when I saw some of those imagery and, and you know, that was sort of being pervasive across different cities was the way that they were drawing a crown to me is indicative of Basquiat, who, you know, you know, how I feel about his work as a graffiti artist from the eighties and, and and so I kind of tried to draw that and then. Just like the aerosol can that's there. That was a gift from Kurt. You know, there's also a little pocketbook there of Basquiat's thing. So a lot of these photographs and images of the work, sort of as I'm, you know, I'm doing the sketch, but then I'm sort of thinking about what, what else is going on in my head at the time. You know, this is the ephemera related to the sketch. You know, does it improve the sketch, eh? But does it tell a good story? Absolutely. Mm-hmm. And so, yeah, but what was interesting about the line work was when I did the person, I really, really wanted to figure out could I, could I almost draw this person without drawing the, the outer edge? Could I do it all with just sort of the lines? And I got really close on, on, on quite a bit of the sort of the blocking of the form.
Kurt:Yeah, that's, I, I can see that because I mean, there's, there is a bit of an edge boundary condition, but, but primarily made up of, of these various hash or hatching patterns. And what I was trying to do of sketching over top of this top with a little bit of a highlighter color, the different angles of hatch this sort of was jumping out at me and it's some, a question, and I didn't get too deep into the, the Frederick Douglas one. There's a little bit of a cross hatch and really different angles. And the question, the, another question I thought of is that, have you ever thought of like an angle? I. That actually traversed across both pages with two different compositions. You know, so there's a line angle of a hatch that actually is then picked up right? In these two sketches. There's really not a parallel line. But something to kind of plant the seed for maybe some other feature.
Jamie:Well, you, you know me well,
Kurt:sketch iteration, because that could be really interesting. Yeah. As a, as a, so if you think about the hatch patterns as like a, a field, right? Or this, this sort of infinite repeatable grid or, or layer. But, but then like as it sort of stamps down into a drawing, like could it be a way to create this interesting collage. Like you were saying with the, the graffiti artist iteration on the right, trying to avoid edge through line work or contour line, but, but building up the field and so then like this sort of patchwork of, of hatch being a, a condition that sort of plants on the page, but then sort of did density alters to create a different, I I'm going off on a bit of a tangent, but this could be interesting way to treat concept of collage with pen, right?'cause it's not really a collage as far as combination of material, but more like combination of these patterns.
Jamie:Well, and, and I like, I like the way you used the word almost like stamping the images within this field of lines. I'd never, ever thought about it, described that way. And so it's, you've definitely planted the seed. There's a project that's coming up in the next little bit maybe before the next time we record. I won't say anymore. Haven't told you about it before, but hearing you describe it in the, that kind of a context maybe helps me get into that project in a different way.
Kurt:Cool. I mean, it's something that, I think that's something we've never really talked about in, in that way, right? The, the, the development of these patterns. We, we've talked about the hatches plenty of times, right? And, and the use of parallel line. A bit of a stylistic or, you know. A sketched approach. But yeah, so looking forward to that. Yeah,
Jamie:I mean even just the way you sort of blocked in over the top of this with sort of your diagrams. I mean it does suggest and, and it, and that is somewhat conscious of mine when I am doing the para, like I did the first one, not knowing I was doing the second one as the subject matter. I knew I was going to do a sketch that complimented the first one. I didn't necessarily know what it was when I did the first one in this, in this case, sometimes I kind of have an inkling of where I'm going on the other, on the other page. But I did know that I wanted to try and play with the two line works together, you know, at least sort of riff off of it hadn't necessarily intentionally composed the two together. And so you're kind of seeing suggestions of that is great because I think it helps me maybe rethink sometimes what I'm doing in the sketchbook. As I'm sort of selecting material and moving forward, sometimes, you know, folks, the left side and the right side have nothing to do with each other. It's just sort of what's in Jamie's head. But
Kurt:oh yeah, I mean, there's a, well some, like, there's one that we didn't post up for today, but I, I remember from the Boston trip to then your other follow-up trip, two different cities side by side where it was like Trinity Church on one side and then the Austin the Blanton. Right, right. On the other side. So yeah. But that's the nature of the sketchbook, right? It, it, it doesn't have to relate. And, and, but then by not being related equally, they are related, if that makes sense. Yeah. That's the fun part about. The drawing process. Right.
Jamie:Well, and, and, and it's, you know, it's, the sketchbook is also this record of thoughts and, and things that you're kind of working through as a concept and as an idea. And, you know, Kurt's really getting fascinated with this sort of patterning of lines that is sort of appearing in, in this sort of series of sketches. But yeah, these, these three certainly are all related to one another and they're all done kind of in sequence actually. So
Kurt:right.
Jamie:Yeah, it's
Kurt:like chronologically they, yeah. The, the, the left first, middle then. Right. So I mean, the other two are, are more closely related to themselves, right. Character wise. Right. The, the Marvel, right. Captain, what's it called? Captain America. What was the, was there a subtitle to it
Jamie:For the movie?
Kurt:Yeah.
Jamie:New World Order.
Kurt:New World. Oh, nice. Well, so then there may be more closely related then We first thought, or at least then I First Or Brave
Jamie:New. Brave New World. Excuse me. Brave New World. Think they should've made it order. I was thinking of this New World order. Maybe it was that when they first talked about it, but anyhow, you get the idea
Kurt:Or was that book, the comic book itself versus Yeah. The movie. But I mean we've, we've talked a lot about comic book characters Marvel, the, the. The, the, the sort of superhero genre within sketches. I mean, something that if I could unfortunately ever unearth from my mother's house, the my earliest sketches, which got me into architecture school you know, my own interest in Spiderman, and
Jamie:I mean, mom is our biggest fan on the podcast. So,
Kurt:I mean, I, I have to go diving through the, the storage unit.'cause as, as we all know, that you know, mothers don't throw anything away, right? No.
Jamie:Or they just, they, or in my case, they pack it up and then they put it near the door and they're like, you're taking this with you. Right? So. I wish my mom did that, but she just kept, keeps it herself. Yeah, she's curated. I mean, she's funny about it though, with the artwork though. She does curate a few things out of the pile that sh that are her favorites. But she did that, you know,'cause I mean, I, I have said it before, my dad painted for a little bit and has, I mean not trained or anything like that, but so yeah, there's a lot of dad stuff kind of in and around that, you know, mom's favorites and, and and so on. But yeah, we've got these sort of comic book characters. But they do sort of relate to this whole nationalism kind of, you know, part of the conversation. As we were saying with the first sketch, really kind of around the lead up and then the day of the No Kings protests. So which if you think about that in sort of sequence was only just a few days before Juneteenth. And so in my mind I'm thinking, how are these two days so closely related, you know, to world events and what's my brain gonna do when I get in my sketchbook? You know, just, just to process, you know, my own thoughts. And so, you know, some of it is also going to things that are, you know, of comfort for me, which is sort of the nostalgia of comic books and things like that to kind of explain the world, you know, as sort of through fiction and narrative you know, or music or reading or, you know, amazing theorists and, you know, advocates you know, that inspire. So, you know, Frederick Douglas started this, and by the end I'm looking at Captain America, so, you know and you know, black Panthers in there as well, so I might have also seen Wu-Tang and run the jewels in this same period of time. So,
Kurt:oh yeah, I saw that picture.
Jamie:There is that. So, and,
Kurt:and, and you know, Charlie our, our music musical what do you call it? Our, our our theme song, collaborator, musician. Collaborator he went to the San Diego show. Nice. I think, I think it was like the same week or, or the week after before yours. This was all in the same window of time. Very, very funny. I'm really crossing, crossing fingers that I go to the, the Detroit show. So coming up, I think later this month,'cause I have, I have a friend who used to be killer Mike's security guard. Anyway, that's a whole non-sequitur.
Jamie:You need to make this happen and you need to wear the shirt. That's all I'm saying.
Kurt:Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Well, you wore the shirt. Did you get any compliments?
Jamie:I did. So,
Kurt:yeah, people did, did you get any like you know, like questioning?
Jamie:No side eye, no
Kurt:copyright, side eye. No, no. But the with, while we're on the con, because you brought up a point about the, the theme of the, the sketching that I thought was actually interesting from a, the left brain, right? The, the artistic side, the, the creative side is when things feel a little, I, I'll, I'll attribute it at least to the, to the left side of the brain. Because maybe, you know, for us being an architecture where more of the creatives, creative thinker, creative mindset than, than the, you know, the other technical side. But my point is this idea of like feeling, finding u using, in your case, nostalgia to recenter and find. A familiar state that, you know, I guess if I were to just squiggle it down here for a second, right? As we go through, if, if there was a timeline, right? Maybe like this, you know, and, and you start exploring, you know, other things this may not be, you know, let's, let's just go like this, right? We explore different concepts, ideas, and sketches, and you start to get out here, right into this realm and, and, and something happens, right? And then it, it might, it might make the most sense, right? To sort of circle back. Not to use a weird term, weird jargony term, circle back, but you kind of bring it all back right to, to what you know before sort of. Making another venture out. And I'm not trying to be a psychologist and, and break down, break down therapy session here, but I think I think in, in the creative process you know, finding a way to anchor back to, to a known whether it's life or the work, kind of getting us lost I think is, is a, is a, a intuitive thing to do that is a positive part or pro positive force. Right. Does that make sense? Without getting too heady or anything like that, but I think you know,'cause what, what it's done right? We like, I, I guess what my, my biggest point is. Like I said, we've talked a lot about over the years, we've talked a lot about various Marvel characters, right? And now it kind of, kind of opens this question up in my brain is like, if we went back to the timeline of the podcast, the seven year history, and we looked at when these mar gonna psychologically analyze Jamie by, by when he sketched the the Marvel characters. But this, I think, kind of creates an interesting thing to think about while we've, you know, we've discussed the, the nature of comic book character sketching, creator, or what's the term superhero, you know figure, you know, action figure, style, drawing, comic book drawing. Thematically though, then there's this whole other layer of, of how, you know, you can sort, sort of come back to these and then move, move back out forward, right. Through a trajectory, maybe even something like this, you know sort of graffiti artist sketch on the left. Right. Well, and it's also influence influences,
Jamie:right? I mean, we, we talk a lot about influences and sort of, you know, both pop culture, but also sort of, you know, you know, things that are maybe more academic or, you know, or, you know, really, really specific. So you know, I think graffiti and graffiti artists and things like that have, have always, you know, been fascinating to me from a, from an artistic point of view. And I. And really kind of got really into, you know, a lot of the things that were, you know, moving from street to gallery and kind of what that looked like and kind of why, and, you know, trying to think that through and kind of trying to understand it. Again, it's, for me it's, it's it, you know, admiration for the work, but also trying to understand kind of how that process works.'Cause didn't necessarily have a lot of examples of it. And, and I approached architecture the same way, you know, and we've talked about that. You've talked about that, you know, about, you know, those architectural influences and trying to understand how particular architects, collaborators, firms, studios that you admire their work, kind of what's the, what's the DNA, what's the thread? You know, that's sort of, you know, you know, influencing their work as well. But yeah, with these sketches it's, it, it is a bit of a touchstone, kind of going back. I don't do that. It's not always because things are dark but you know, sometimes it's also just sort of moments in time. Right. You know, we've talked about Ryan Coogler, you know, and, you know, black Panther was sort of a seminal pop culture moment for a lot of reasons. You know, Chadwick, you know, was, you know, genius casting, you know, for, from a movie standpoint. You know, that film was amazing. But, you know, we've also talked about Hannah and sort of her world building, you know, working in partnership with, with Ryan. And so I don't know if you've seen Sinners yet, but if it's not like in the best picture nominations, like fantastic film, I mean, and I'm not like a horror guy at all, but that's a, that's an amazing, amazing movie. And so for me, you know, the, the pop culture moment on the left side of the thing is I did the Black Panther one, thinking about going to see Run the Jewels you know, because this was like a cover of a recent, you know, book and, and. What's interesting is they did a recent reprint of, of some of that work and who did they ask to do the forward for the reprint Killer Mike? You know? So it's like, you know, it's, you know, game respects game Right. And, you know, you know, across genres. And so I think that that's really, really important. And you know, when you think about historically people who hate on these things from a pop culture standpoint and they say, oh, it's EDI or it's this, or it's whatever, you know, sorry. You know, you know, black Panther as a character in mainstream comics was like, is decades old, you know? It's historic. Yeah. Historical fiction in some case. And the companion to that, I mean, admittedly there aren't enough of those characters and enough of those stories, that's a different issue. But the fact that they did exist and they were, you know, part of the mainstream was, was, was key. But the other one was Captain America's partner, the Falcon, you know, which is from the seventies, you know, and look at that little figure there. And then the, the comic, you can totally, that's seventies woo boy, you know, that is like disco, you know, costume. So, but the point is, is you know, when, when the films that we are seeing today are reaching back into, you know, try and understand, you know, what talents were playing with in terms of artistry and world building and narrative, and then. And then reinventing it, doing the remix, which is great. You know, I, I I love that. You know, the issue there is, is a, just a really old one that I had because I was sort of fascinated with that particular character moving to the United, when I moved to the US it was like, you know, there's, there's certain things, there's sort of emblems and things that, you know, as a little kid, you know, you're reading comic books and you're drawing pictures, and that's the bicentennial issue, right? So it, it all these sort of current narrative moments, you know, that we're living in as a time, you know, they do sometimes have to be explained through fiction, you know, and through pop culture moments. And so for me to kind of make those connections for myself now is like, I, I see it. I mean, it took me a long time to mature into realizing where a lot of that stuff comes from, but I've just chosen at this point in my life and, you know, is just lean into some of that stuff.'cause it's like I draw the way I do because I was self-taught. I, you know, read a bunch of comic books, you know, and I'm, and I know I'm not the only one'cause I've met a bunch of architects who say the same damn thing.
Kurt:And, and actually future architects and future architects too. One of, one of one of my recent students Madison gets a shout out which we're gonna have to get her on here. Oh, her
Jamie:stuff is amazing.
Kurt:And yeah, and Cormick Cormick would agree with you too. He, he, he also got to teach her in the fall. And not to create a, a tangent. Tangential segue on, on students. But yeah, I mean, I think that's the idea, right? What, what you're getting at is, is some, some people say like, draw what you know, or, you know, go, go with what, you know, it's kind of like finding your inspiration or find, finding your, your starting point, right? And, and, and where do you evolve from there? But as I said, and for a lot of people it's in the, the characters, right?
Jamie:Right. But as you said too, it's like, you know, I mean, why do people read books? Why do people go to, you know, concerts? Why do people go to movies? Is they need a little bit of escapist fiction, they need a little entertainment, you know, and everybody's kind of got their genre or you know, thing that they kind of like, and that's great, you know, you know, getting outside, you know, thinking re all that stuff, all those things. It's, it's, it's great what some of the stuff centers me, right? So there's that. But at the same time, it's also I think there's elements of it when we've talked about this sort of just in sort of that whole, you know, Hannah Ryan, you know, Chadwick sort of conversation that we had. I mean, Ryan Kler folks was a keynote at an a I A conference. You know, I mean, and there's a reason for that is that, you know, as architects we're also storytellers and it's world building and its craft and its team, and its collaborators and it's sort of doing the history, doing the work you know, getting the details right, you know, and so some of that influence completely, you know, at face value different than the work that you're doing can also influence the work that you are doing. Right. And for me, a lot of that sort of takes place in the sketchbook. You know, we've talked about you hit that creative block, you know, and you know, so, so some of that, you know, creative block needs to, you know, get pushed through by, you know, things that are maybe familiar. And that's, I think what Kurt's sort of diagram analysis was, was really appreciated for kind of pulling those kind of thoughts together.
Kurt:Yeah. It's not as, as curated or fine as the sketches that you made, but just trying to diagram the, the, the concepts in the conversation. But the I think it, it really opens up a really interesting theme that we can not, we're not gonna continue to unpack tonight, but we can definitely go into as, as we see some more of this there.'cause I have lots of thoughts about lately about. Storytelling within the profession of architecture. And, and I think, but, but I'll, I'll leave it at that.'Cause it'll definitely emerge again as, as something we could talk about. But I think, oh, well, one more thing.
Jamie:I, I'm just, as you sort of say that, you know, and that you have some other thoughts that we will get back to I will just say, I just finished our Good Friend Evelyn's 200th episode before we recorded. I listened to that today in two parts, kind of the drive to work, the drive home and Janine was on with her, so her original co-creator of the, of the Patrick Practice Disrupted Podcast which both of us have been on. And I will say that there. I, it's an excellent episode. Highly recommend. But I want you to listen to it. It's in the queue for Exactly, yeah, for exactly what you were just talking about, the sort of the storytelling aspect of things and sort of, kind of rethinking some of the narratives that we, that we both experience, that a lot of us experience and sort of the practice of architecture you know, both as a student moving through the profession but then also sort of where we find ourselves at different episodes. And, and now for you as an academic, you know, who is teaching another generation, you know, presently, I think that the two of them have some really, really great thoughts on their own journeys and their perspectives on it. And it's so great to hear both of their voices talking about it because that dynamism between the two is really, really evident in the podcast and they don't necessarily always agree. Which, you know
Kurt:Sure, sure.
Jamie:We love, we love about them anyways. But yeah,
Kurt:I, I, yeah,
Jamie:yeah,
Kurt:yeah. I, I, I saw Evelyn post about it and it's definitely I, in my podcast queue, it's coming up. Can't wait. And yeah, I think part of that idea of the storytelling is what I was alluding to.'Cause I am working with Janine on something that we, that you know about, but, you know, our listeners may not really know about yet, but it's just having the dial, the, the conversations about you, you can't always, so at least for myself, I can't always think about a, my own story, I guess is, is what I'm trying to get at. But anyway, like I said, I digress. I'll probably clip this little bit out'cause it, it's probably irrelevant until people know what's going on. But yeah. Thanks Jamie. It was fun. It was fun to see kind of do three together in, in that way and know it probably went a little long, but yeah. Thanks.
Jamie:Good stuff. Thanks.
