(lively music) - [Announcer] "Illinois Stories" is brought to you by The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Illinois Arts Council Agency, and by the support of viewers like you.

Thank you.

(lively music) - Hello, welcome to "Illinois Stories", I'm Mark McDonald.

In Peoria, in the Contemporary Arts Center, and the studio of Preston Jackson, sculptor, and also musician.

Today we'll be talking about his sculpture work, though.

Because you may remember him from the city-wide exhibit in Springfield that was held recently.

He's a native of Decatur, and he's had, his Julianne's Garden Exhibit was in Decatur in the last several years.

And he now lives in Peoria, and teaches in Chicago.

And he has been commissioned to do a number of pieces for Decatur and Springfield, which will be delivered in the next year or so.

And Preston, I hate to take you away from your work, because I know that you're up to your elbows in it, so to speak.

(Preston chuckling) But thank you for inviting us into the studio.

- You're welcome.

- And it's not only fun to meet you, I think for our audience, but also to get a look at the process of what goes into making sculptures.

Because we see them, everywhere we turn, it seems we see a sculpture.

But I mean the work, and the conceptualizing, and the method, all the method work that goes into it, it's gonna be an eye-opener, I think for a lot of people.

- Ah, yeah, thank you.

Yeah, there's quite a bit of work involved, you know.

And it depends on how you look at it.

To me, it's a pleasure.

You know, it's very relaxing.

- [Mark] You, as I mentioned, you're a musician and a sculptor.

You grew up and went to high school in Decatur.

- Yes- - Isn't that right?

- In Decatur, Illinois.

Yeah, in the black community, known in the black community as the sister city to Springfield.

And because a lot of our activities, I mean you know, our actually coming upings happened in Springfield, Illinois, too.

- And you mentioned to me that you, of course, you played music all your life.

But you and your friends used to spend a lot of time just going to clubs and playing in Springfield- - Oh, yeah.

- It was real common for you to go back and forth from Springfield to Decatur, and date Springfield girls, and all that kind of stuff, so it was real common for you to do that.

- Right, especially on Washington Street.

There was a place called "Les Canceler", and that's when I think I was around 18 or so, I discovered jazz.

Les Canceler, tenor sax player.

And he had a club there.

And of course, we would play next door to that, the place.

And large rock and roll review things, you know.

And cross paths with people like Ike and Tina Turner, George Benson, - [Mark] Wow!

- Jack McDuff, I mean a lot of big names.

But anyway, that's where I discovered jazz.

- I mentioned earlier that the city of Springfield and Decatur, commissioned you to do some pieces.

The Springfield commissioned you to do a piece on the 1908 race riot.

- Right, ah-huh.

- And Decatur, on the role of the African-American fighting in the Civil War.

- Right.

- And when we come back into this room, we're going to take a look at some of the work that you're doing on those pieces.

- Sure.

- So would you take us in your playroom first.

- Yeah, I'd be glad to.

- Your playroom, I don't know what you call it.

But that's where you do your metal work.

- Right.

- It looks like a lot of fun.

- Okay, yeah.

(Mark chuckling) Let's walk in- - After you, sir- - All right, thank you.

Well, this is where a lot of the heavy metal work is done.

These are our bronze castings.

Rejects.

That, but of course, I keep the metal.

I cast this quite some time ago.

It's another bronze, it's a bronze casting, and the large head of Marion Anderson, that was the whole body, but I sort of striped it down to reuse the wax, I do a lot of recycling here.

That was for Cleveland, Ohio.

And this piece, you'll see in wood, painted to look like steel, because I wanted to get a look of how steel and bronze, you know, putting the two together, was a piece that I did in Aurora.

So I actually laser-cut the steel, and cast the bronze piece of Marie Wilkinson.

And these are some of the pieces that I wanted to do.

So I was going back to the days when I was a graduate student at the U of I, and when I was non-figurative.

And this is typical of my work at that time, you know?

- [Mark] Now, you said that you went to U of I, you currently teach at the Chicago Art Institute.

- Right, right, I've been there 20 years.

- Wow!

- Yeah.

- And so, you come back to Peoria in the summertime.

- Right.

- Your studio is here, and you really enjoy that, don't you?

- Right, my wife and I, we have two residents.

We live on Dearborn, downtown Chicago, and we also live in Dunlap, here in Peoria.

A suburb of Peoria.

- [Mark] Do you have a studio up there, too?

Or is this where your work goes on?

- Yes, yes, I have a studio, a painting studio there.

It's very convenient, I'm only 10 minutes from the Art Institute, so- - It's very convenient, but does it drive you nuts, like it drives me nuts, being in Chicago?

After a while, you just gotta get out of there?

- Well, it's very expensive.

I mean, there's no recreating.

I mean, it's just cost, everything.

And moving your automobile around, or getting into cabs- (Mark laughing) - Because you can never find a place to park it.

(Mark laughing) - Yeah, right, right.

I love Chicago, you know?

But living there is rough, it's really tough.

Young people can do it, you know?

- [Mark] Yeah.

- It'll get you after a while.

- [Mark] Yeah.

Hey, let's go over and look at, you're also in the process of doing a piece for the City of Peoria.

And this is massive.

This is just a massive piece, and I've gotta model here.

What does this signify?

- [Preston] Well, this is actually the side of the drum wall of the Civic Center.

It's about 25 feet, stainless steel and bronze castings.

Actually, you cannot see any of the figurative work here.

Because, well, they're being casted, and I didn't actually draw them on there.

But you could, you can see the outline of the bronzes.

The outline of the bronzes.

Just, and these are templates that I cut out, so that I can have a sense of placing them.

But this will go up another 15 feet.

So it's a massive piece.

I mean, all that mass, it's very linear.

- No kidding.

And what's the significance of it?

Does it also celebrate an event in history?

- Oh yeah, this tells the story of the Abolitionist Movement here in Peoria, Illinois.

That was one of the underground railroad people, was Moses Pettengill and Lucy Pettengill.

And right on this street, where my building is, they have, the slaves actually were taken to freedom, going past this and up the hill toward the Moses Pettengill house.

They were delivered by river boats on the river, crossing the river, right here, right next to the studio.

Very historic place.

- I mentioned the fact that Springfield had a city-wide exhibit of your work.

And you've become very well-known in central Illinois, and of course, your reputation goes way beyond that.

Do you ever feel like you're well-known, or you're like a celebrity, or that you're a favorite son, or people know who you are?

- No, I'm very far from that.

I just ignore those kind of titles.

(Mark laughing) I really do, because all people are equal.

And whether they're beginning sculptors.

I guess, I just on that a little bit longer, and I can look back and see accomplishments.

But if I look too close, the accomplishments are just little steps, you know?

Not always in the right direction.

But I take part in living and doing, just like anyone else.

- We're gonna look at some of your work closer as this program goes on.

But you have talked to me just briefly, about subject and method.

And how those fit into the overall work of art.

- Right, yeah.

Well, those are the two most important elements in art making, you know?

Know your subject, know it well, and know how to go about materializing it to your thoughts, your ideas.

And you can't miss.

I mean, that's just the way it is, and do it often.

- [Mark] You do a lot of research, though.

I mean, you have to know your facts.

Because you kind of see yourself as teaching people, don't you, through your work?

- Right, right, I do.

And I mean, just like I love speaking now, (chuckling), and I love writing, you know?

These things are by-products that come along with the idea of art-making.

So all of that, everything sort of has it's way of blending together to make one kind of event, you know?

- [Mark] Well, Preston Jackson, most people have never been in a sculptor's studio, me included.

And this is a great treat to be able to see you start, sort of work on a work in progress.

We mentioned, this is for commemoration of the Springfield race riots of 1908.

You're also working on one for Decatur, and we're gonna discuss these in detail.

But first, before you start working with the clay, you have to kind of draw it out.

- Mm-hm, right.

- And that's what you're doing now.

- Yes, ah-huh.

- [Mark] And I love the sophisticated tool that you use, a table knife.

- [Preston] Right.

(Mark laughing) - [Mark] But it works, right?

- [Preston] Ah-huh, it's a great tool.

- [Mark] And so this would be sort of, if you were gonna like in this to doing a painting, this is doing the sketch before you actually start doing the paint, huh?

- [Preston] Right, ah-huh.

Just like all works of art, everything starts with a drawing.

- [Mark] And this is one of, I guess, four surfaces for the Springfield piece.

- [Preston] Right, bronze surfaces, ah-huh, yep.

Similar to the one in Cahokia, Mounds Museum.

But very similar.

So these are base reliefs, very high in some areas, as you can see, and some areas very low.

Almost to a point of becoming a drawing.

- [Mark] If we look at the end of the table, down here, you can see what the configuration of the sculpture is gonna look like, it's two sort of monolithic walls that'll stand about, what, 11 feet hight?

- [Preston] 12 feet.

- [Mark] 12 feet high.

And there will be on each of those four surfaces, there will be one of these base reliefs like you said, and you're working on one of them now.

- [Preston] Right.

Yep.

- [Mark] Now, I noticed just a moment ago, you were working from a picture here.

Of the state capital, you were working from this.

- [Preston] Right, that's what we see in this drawing, here.

And I will go in and fill it out, bring it up maybe an eighth of an inch, and that's nothing compared to the larger areas.

So there's basically three stages.

You have things in the foreground, and you have shapes and activity in the middle ground, and this would be considered background.

- So from, you're looking, your perception looking at it is, the deeper foreground stuff, is always comes out farther, it's a deeper work- - Yes, and it's larger.

- As it goes back, and it's larger?

- That's perspective, that's called perspective.

Single point.

- You're gonna start building up like we saw your drawing, but now you're gonna start building that up.

- [Preston] Right, ah-huh.

- [Mark] Now, is this a special kind of clay that you use?

- [Preston] Yes, this is the type of clay that used in the automobile industry, and places.

It's an oil-based clay.

And it's very popular.

We get it from the McLaughlin people.

And they in fact, they supplied me with clay for years.

But it's oil-based, it will never dry out like regular ceramic clay.

And it's easy to take molds from because it has kind of like a silicone solution built into it.

And it's own release agent built into it.

- From start to finish, how long would you say it takes you to do a, this a huge sculpture.

How long do you think it takes?

- Oh well, you mean just for each wall?

- [Mark] Well, from start to finish.

- [Preston] Start to finish?

- [Mark] Yeah from the time you conceive the thing, until you actually deliver it.

- [Preston] Oh, I could do it in a summer.

Yeah, I could do it in about three months.

- You have a little more time on these, don't you?

- Right, we have- (Mark laughing) - Thank goodness.

- All commissions, you gotta careful, because something could happen during the process of casting, or whatever, you know?

You may lose it.

- [Mark] Now, Preston, can I pull you away, just a little, just from what you're doing for a moment?

- [Preston] Sure.

- [Mark] To discuss what is going on with this particular wall, with this piece of work that we're looking at?

- [Preston] Okay well, we're looking at a burned out area.

So actually, this is just rubble.

It's just nothing but rubble.

Here you can sense pieces of an automobile that was trashed during that time, and that's part of that history.

This was the automobile that was used to carry alleged prisoners, or guilty, out of town.

The mob actually trashed the automobile.

So the history about this event always reveals that there were people that were upholding the law.

And that's like not persecuting, or hanging a person, until they're truly found guilty.

So, that's why I wanted to use this scene.

- You have a variety of figures over here.

It looks like a woman with a dog.

- Yeah, these are sight-seers, I guess today- - [Mark] Oh, okay.

- [Preston] We call them gawkers or something.

The people that walk through.

And here's the policeman who finally showed up.

As constable doing his job to keep people from looking, when he should had done his job to keep this from happening.

But anyway, you know, the law enforcement were not always kind to people.

- You know, I noticed that you, that I asked you to come down here, and you immediately started seeing things that you wanted to change.

Is it ever finished?

(laughing) - That's a good question.

- Do you ever get to the point where, I don't think I'm gonna change this anymore.

- Right, I'm always going back.

Even some of the pieces that I've placed in the City of Chicago, I go back, and I'm saying, "Wow, too bad this is in bronze", because I'd get up there and maybe shape it a little different, yeah.

- Well, once it goes to the foundry, you gotta say, "Goodbye".

- That's it, yeah.

- And it, and that, it's gotta be a feeling of, I guess great exhilaration, but loss, too, right?

- Right.

- Because you can't do anything with it any longer.

- Right, it's no longer yours.

(chuckling) - Although it is yours forever.

(chuckling) - Yeah, yeah.

- It's pretty permanent.

- Mistakes and all.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well this is fascinating.

This is the part, this is probably, if I were a sculptor, I would think this is the most fun part.

Because you get to really get your fingers in there and work with.

- Right, yeah.

I mean, you see it happening direct, you know?

What you see, is what you get, and you watch it actually grow like a plant.

- Now it starts with, like you said, every piece of work starts with drawings, I guess?

- Right.

- And you work from, as we can see to your right, there, you work from a lot of historic photographs.

- Oh yeah.

Not only photographs, but written statements, letters, people talking about this.

People from the 1920s interviewed, being interviewed, and somehow getting this information, and carrying it over into my work.

This allows me a chance to visualize, to create from words, and that's part of, it's an important part of the creative process.

You build from your imagination, what you can imagine it was like, see?

I made a lot of changes in this.

Not just from photographs, because that's kind of boring.

You copy something and just do it.

- Right.

- This is nothing, there is no photograph that I have, is in this compositional configuration.

But, there are elements of facts, like the automobile, whether it had lamps, you know, kerosine lamps, ballon-like tires, metal, or wooden spokes.

So I have to keep this stuff somewhat accurate.

Like the grill on 1908 Ford did not have these louvers, especially the sedans, (Mark laughing) but it did have these little plates here, that covered the cylinders, and kept, these are hood parts.

But I chose to add the louvers because of the repetition in the lines that work well with the repetition- - I see- - like this wheel, and this wheel.

So, I'm always thinking about elements, design elements.

- That's where your artist eye comes in.

If we can look, I hope our photographer can do this, to his right, we can look at a couple of those other large walls, that you have not started to work on yet.

This is what it looks like before you really get going on it.

- [Preston] Right, we have to cut out the shape.

These are the actual shapes, size and all, you know?

So here we're pretending that we're working on a canvas here.

And somewhat direct, because you know, when we install these, what you see is what you'll be getting.

And we see the drawing taking place on that one, the soldiers lined up, guarding the people out of town.

As they got on the train to leave Springfield, once their lives were in jeopardy.

- This, when you're finished with this, this will then become, (car horn beeping) you'll take a cast, a plaster cast of this.

- Right, we'll take a large cast of it.

- And you'll get to show, you'll show us that process, a little about that process, anyway, because the Decatur piece is further along, and you've already done that.

- Right, ah-huh, yes, yes.

And it'll be the very same process.

- [Mark] Well, Preston, let's turn our attention to the Decatur sculpture that you're working on.

And this commemorates the role of the African-American soldier in the Civil War.

- [Preston] Yes.

- [Mark] And this will be a, sort of like an obelisk that will have numerous sides, and there will be action going on, no matter which way you walk around this- - Right.

- You'll be able to see a base relief going on.

I find it fascinating that you've made some notes to yourself here.

One of them is, "Keep the emphasis on soldiers".

- Right.

- What do you wanna leave people with?

- Well, I want people to know that these were African people, you know, that were brought over and put into slavery.

And through generations they became Americans, African-Americans.

And with all of the pride and love there was to offer to the country that they helped build.

So I want to make sure that we know that, you know, the features?

Because they actually fought to become soldiers, and people spoke up for them.

Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, and the Abolitionists recognized the fact that the only way to win this war, is to put African-Americans in the field, so that they could help.

- You mentioned Lincoln and Douglass, and right behind us there, in between us, we can see that one of the walls is under construction right now.

- [Preston] Right.

- [Mark] And you have a lot of clay work to do on that yet, but it kind of gives you an idea of what one of the sides is gonna look like.

- [Preston] Yes, ah-huh, that's one of the reliefs.

- [Mark] Yeah, now this is further along, I mentioned, than the Springfield piece.

And if we walk down there, we can see that some of this, you already made a plaster cast of.

And that would be the next stage, I guess?

- Right, right.

I guess, you know, artists are very touchy about.

But I wanna keep in mind that the relief that we just looked at, of Lincoln and Douglass, that's only blocked in, that's not finished.

- [Mark] Right, right.

You gotta get your fingers in there, and work that around a lot, don't 'ya?

- [Preston] Right, exactly.

(Mark laughing) - [Mark] But that's the fun part, too, right?

- Yes it is.

(Mark laughing) - [Mark] Now this, but this side now, this has already been cast, and plastered?

- Right.

Well, actually we've taken a print from a positive, a clay positive like we just looked at.

And we've recorded it, and you were looking at a negative taken from a positive pattern.

See?

And so, we do that in plaster, then we brush wax back into the negative, and that will be, the wax will be seen at another time, during another process, as bronze.

- Now we're looking at this upside down.

So let's see if we can get the camera to come around here, and we can take a look at this from, and here you can see, here's a head, and face- - [Preston] Here's a large head and face, because that's much deeper, because in reverse, it will meet the eye sooner than the shallow pieces.

- [Mark] Now I notice that there, you spend a considerable amount of time digging clay out of this.

Is that an on-going thing that you deal with, whenever you cast something?

- Yeah, that's part of the process, to reduce the undercuts, and peel the clay out.

Just in some places, places it tends to stick.

And so, if the clay actually sticks, or it's caught by the undercuts, that's telling me that it should be shaved down, the mold should be shaved a little bit, so it can release the wax.

- [Mark] And you made, how many times might you take a plaster cast before you get one that is just what you want?

I mean do you- - Oh, we do plaster once.

But then we take several waxes, and each time I take a wax, it becomes more, it's cleaner, and less work, because actually when you pull the wax from the mold, it's cleaning out your mold.

All these little pieces of clay that you see, those will not be in the next edition.

- [Mark] You mentioned the wax, let's go down to the next table.

Because what you can show us, show us one of those wax molds.

And this is taken from the same, is this from the same piece that we just saw?

- No, this is a different mold.

And I will take three or four sections, because of the size.

And this is the upper mold, as you can see.

It's not as deep, it's rather shallow.

But there are water marks, so this is definitely a reject.

But it served it's purpose already, because it has cleaned my mold.

So it has served two purposes.

One is to reveal to me the undercuts, and also to take the pieces of residue and plaster, and clay, out of the mold.

- [Mark] And it's quite flexible, actually, more than I would have thought it, it looks like- - Well, we're going to add harder wax, more microcrystalline beads into the wax so that it will stiffen up.

- Now, I noticed that we had this set out for a reason, and I want you to handle that, because I don't wanna be responsible for breaking anything.

- Well, we'll probably do another copy.

This isn't bad at all.

This is the hand, from the male figure in that other mold.

So this is an actual hand, and you see it's missing a finger, and these are Band-Aids, and rags tied around that finger.

But that has it's own story, also.

- [Mark] Now this is what, not this particular one, but the wax, is what will go to the foundry, and become bronze.

- [Preston] Right, mm-hm.

- [Mark] And that must be a heck of a procedure.

- [Preston] Yeah, yeah, it's quite, you know, I've done casting practically all my adult life.

And I taught foundry at Western Illinois University.

And of course, I was instructed where I got my B.A., and my M.F.A, at Southern Illinois, and the U of I, in foundry working.

- It's important to understand in the process, so you know afterwards what can be accepted the best way.

Is that, how would you describe the process of getting something ready for the foundry?

- Well, I think you have to be very familiar with your piece.

Either through photographs, or just memory.

If I'm working on this piece everyday, and I see something like this.

I know they don't belong there.

So, you have to memorize a lot of things.

And those were air bubbles that were actually in the mold, in reverse.

They were holes.

And when we pour a wax, they become little spheres, like that, you know?

- Jackson says, he will have the pieces finished and sent to the foundry by August of this year.

And in November, the Decatur piece will be dedicated, and the Springfield piece will be placed in Union Square Park in February of 2009.

With another "Illinois Story" in Peoria, I'm Mark McDonald.

Thanks for watching.

(lively music) - [Announcer] "Illinois Stories" is brought to you by The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Illinois Arts Council Agency, and by the support of viewers like you.

Thank you.

(lively music) (musical uprise tag)