Art With a Smile November 2006

by Dan Koffman
Photos by Adrienne Gammiere

Dan has been creating his smile-based art for more than four decades. The light-hearted art he creates is the product of a man who is on a serious, interesting, and inspiring mission.

I’ve been doing Art With a Smile for 41 years. The kind of “smile” in my art is a persistently good-natured one. There are sufficient leers and jeers in the world so my smiles are designed to lighten people’s hearts. I intend that people will leave my gallery with a piece of art in their hand, perhaps, or simply an impression in their minds, either of which might bring a smile to their heart and face.

I’m really serious about my light-hearted art. I create my art around subjects that people are passionate about — everything from martinis to Einstein. I have art subjects that resonate with nearly everyone’s passion.

The Path to My Smiling Art
I began my professional career as a Design Engineer working on the Mariner Mars Project and eventually segued into architecture. All my building designs looked like they belonged in Disneyland. I won a gold medal for design from the State of California and thought that I could leverage that into a position with Disney. Before I could put the plan into action it dawned on me that I didn’t want to work for Disney; I wanted to be Disney. I wanted to be the creative genius behind a light-hearted empire of my own.

I started to pursue that goal by producing comic books and event posters with Wolfman Jack. In the process I discovered that my main strength lay at the intersection of engineering design, illustration, art, and humor.

During the late 1960s, I combined my art with my talents as a Consumer Product Designer and over the course of the subsequent two decades designed and produced more than 1,000 consumer products. I handled all the marketing, merchandizing, advertising, and packaging tasks. In some way I managed to incorporate a sunny smile into every product whether hardware items, housewares, children’s lunchboxes, or executive gifts. A smile always differentiated my products in the marketplace. After distributing millions of packages people often say that they’ve seen my art but don’t know where. This isn’t surprising because my smiles have been everywhere.

I decided at age 20 to stay in that business until age 40. My 40th birthday marked my last day in the industry. We packed up our Malibu home and moved to the Monterey Peninsula. We had vacationed here for 15 years and always fantasized about living here.

The cooler weather was a relief after the often-stifling heat of Southern California. We especially loved the forests. We purchased property in the Asilomar area in Pacific Grove and had our own forest of Monterey Pines on our half-acre property.

Once I was located on the Peninsula I began to reinvent my work, focusing on foreign language packaging for domestic manufacturers. I found an easy access to market my products. I simply returned to the trade shows I had always shown at and converted former fellow exhibiters into clients.

The media for my art are broad including acrylic, pen-and-ink, pastel, airbrush, and photography. Twenty years ago I began using computers, which provide a great set of tools for any artist. The final step in production includes photographing and digitizing each image. Then I produce prints as giclee (say ‘gee clay’) prints of any size, which are highly textured. Giclee uses pigment-based colors that will be color fast for more than 100 years.

My Happy Art
From the time I arrived here I began to build my body of smile-based artwork. I began with delicatessen foods. I created and produced works for the Museum of the Delicatessen that was installed in the Roll & Rye Restaurant in Culver City. The collection included such characters as Salami Davis Junior, Rye Rogers, and Phyllis Dill Pickle. After 16 years the collection still makes people laugh.

A dozen years ago I was commissioned to create a body of work for the Lollapalooza Restaurant around the theme of martinis. I got the commission the day after I returned from Paris, so my first piece was an Eiffel Tower skewering an olive as though it were a toothpick, which I produced in acrylic on a giant 6-foot canvas. The series included such things as Martini Man and the Beetles shown as olives. A large canvas showed the raising over Iwo Jima of an olive on a toothpick. The Martini collection ultimately included 80 works. All were giant canvasses designed to go with the restaurant’s tall ceilings.

I discovered that after a couple martinis myself I could be better than Picasso. My next collection focused on the game of golf. This was when Tiger Woods was just beginning and Bill Murray had been chided by Pebble Beach for his antics. The Pebble Beach officials shortly recanted and even sent Murray special thanks for his comic behavior. My collection eventually came to include Nude Golf Ball in Red Chair done in the style of Picasso. Golfers Grapevine was another work in the series, as was Hooma-hooma-golfa-golfa, which featured a hula dancer wearing a golf ball bra. My Night at Klub Golf was done in the style of Lautrec and featured dancing golf clubs for an appreciative Monsieur Golf Ball.

Over the past ten years I’ve maintained a production rate of a new piece every two days. My current archive contains over 2,000 images in 25 collections. Now I’m starting on an expanded seafood collection with such works as Critters of the Sea, Life is a Crabaret in Monterey Bay, and Hairy Otter.

About eight-and-a-half years ago I began looking for a retail location and had a great opportunity to get a place in the Portola Plaza Mall, which is adjacent to Customs House Plaza and to Fisherman’s Wharf. I had realized a goal of being a gallery owner/artist and for the first time was able put my full body of works on display for people to see. The results were gratifying.

Business people from conferences that were being held at the nearby Monterey Conference Center would stop in and provide me with a natural and comfortable segue back to creating art for corporate applications.

I’ve had the pleasure of working with such companies as Toshiba, Diner’s Club, Honeywell, Libby Glass, and with several major medical product manufacturers. Monterey County Bank became my most enduring and pleasurable client. They commissioned me to do a number of crazy permutations of Charles Chrietzberg, Jr. He has appeared in more than 100 guises including Uncle Sam, George Patton, Buffalo Bill, and as a symphony conductor.

The campaign has been written up in national publication and Charles’ images have appeared on TV, in movie theaters, on event banners, and rolling billboards. All of Charles’ permutations served to greatly increase the business of his bank by advancing the philosophy that since it is impossible to out-spend your big competitors, you have to out-think them. Thinking creatively and then moving into action quickly is easier for a smaller institution like Monterey County Bank than for one of the big international banking institutions.

Since opening my retail gallery I’ve shipped tens of thousands of pieces around the world in both open and limited editions. At least one of my pieces hangs beside a Picasso in somebody’s home. I’ve seen it!

Embracing the Peninsula and the World
Underlying all my work is my own passionate participation in both the local and world communities. Art is best when it is communicated and my Art with a Smile message seeks to create connections among diverse people for the purpose of better understanding.

For the past 20 years I’ve been aiming to create a global impact through my Flag of Peace and Freedom that has the message, “We all live under the same sky and are warmed under the same sun.” I have been trying to get countries to fly my flag on September 21 during the International Day of Peace. So far 32 countries have begun doing that. My goal is that the banner will eventually fly over all the nations of the world.

I’ve been reaching out on a local basis for the past ten years with my Community Links program, which I offer at no charge to all community organizations in Monterey County as a way of advertising their upcoming events and activities.

Community Links was a multi-media outreach in print, TV, and radio — the basis of which was an interactive database. Each community organization is responsible for its own data entry, making the zero fee possible and placing responsibility where it should lie.  So far, more than 700 community organizations have participated in this.

In 1991 my wife and I began the Pacific Grove Eco-Corps. For ten years we have coordinated the work of hundreds of volunteers in planting many thousands of Monterey Pines and other native plants.

For these activities I have created related graphic elements using in each case a bold, friendly, and happy feel.

My hope is that some people will follow my example and respond in some way to challenges in their communities. There are no inconsequential acts of kindness and participation. In fact, small acts performed over time is almost the only way to create large results. We the people become powerful by simply doing over and over the things that we can do.

I know a little bit of how the Lorax in Dr. Seuss’ great poem felt. During the past ten years the ancient Monterey Pines on our property and in the larger community have been tremendously stressed. Part of the problem is the plague of Pine Pitch Canker that has swept across our Peninsula. Another reason for the decline is that so many of them are coming to the end of their 100-year life cycle without being replaced in sufficient numbers.

The loss of these beautiful trees was one factor that played in our decision to find another forest to live in. My wife of almost 30 years, Sandy (who was a four-term mayor of Pacific Grove), and I decided that it was time for a new adventure. We believe that we’ve found the “Pacific Grove” of the Pacific Northwest at Camano Island, Washington. This magical place lies within the rain shadow of the Olympic Mountains, creating a banana belt-type region characterized by weather patterns that are nearly identical to those in Monterey. We have found a magnificent heavily forested acre-and-a-quarter to be the site of our new home, production facility, and gallery.

We are leaving Monterey physically but our impact in the area will continue. Many local art galleries and businesses will carry my Art With a Smile productions, and my campaign for Monterey County Bank will continue. So I guess you can take the guy out of Monterey but can’t take Monterey out of the guy. We’re not pulling up roots but merely stretching them towards new locations. °

For more of Koffman’s work see www.artwithasmile.com.