I came across this photo of myself from about 13 years ago and it immediately brought me back to one of the craziest art projects I had ever taken on.
I was at an arts festival and at the time I was in the middle of a challenge I had given myself: make and post a new piece of Pez dispenser art every single day for a year.
365 days.
That was the goal.
As it turns out I went past the 365 day mark. Because apparently once I get an idea in my head, stopping isn’t always part of the plan.
The whole idea came from artist and graphic designer Noah Scalin and his project A Skull a Day. Noah had challenged himself to create a different skull every day for an entire year. I thought the idea was brilliant.
What really grabbed me wasn’t necessarily the skulls themselves. It was the freedom that came from taking the subject matter out of the equation.
Think about it. If you’re an artist one of the hardest questions can be, “What am I going to make?” Every time you sit down to work you’re faced with an infinite number of possibilities. Sometimes that’s exciting. Sometimes it’s paralyzing.
With A Skull a Day, Noah had already answered the question.
You’re making a skull. Now figure out what you can do with it.
That simple limitation opened up all kinds of creative possibilities. Instead of worrying about what the subject was going to be, you could focus on the craft. Composition. Color. Technique. Materials. Problem solving. Finding new directions.
I loved that idea.
So I started thinking about what I could do for an entire year.
And then I remembered that I had a LOT of Pez dispensers.
Actually, I had hundreds of them.
So I thought, why not Pez?
And that’s how my year long Pez art challenge began.
Creating a new Pez piece every day forced me to experiment. There wasn’t time to wait for the perfect idea to show up. I had to make something. Then I had to make something else the next day. And then something else after that.
Some ideas worked.
Some definitely didn’t.
But every piece taught me something.
That’s probably the biggest thing I took away from that experience. The goal wasn’t to create 365 masterpieces. The goal was to create 365 opportunities to experiment, solve problems and get better.
After that year-long project, I eventually found myself coming back to Pez again. I had always enjoyed painting objects that had a lot of reflections: plastic, glass, chrome, metallic surfaces. There’s something about trying to recreate those reflections with spray paint that I find really satisfying.
I also love found objects.
That combination eventually led me to used and worn skateboards.
I’ve painted quite a few of my Pez dispensers on old skateboards, and I really like the way the two shapes work together. A skateboard has that long narrow contour that seems almost made for the long narrow shape of a Pez dispenser.
But the fun doesn’t stop with the shape.
I like pairing particular skateboards with particular Pez dispensers and seeing what happens. Sometimes I’ll notice connections between the two that weren’t necessarily there when I started. The graphics, the colors, the wear and tear on the skateboard can suddenly start suggesting something about the Pez I’m painting.
That’s one of the things I enjoy most about working with found objects. I’m not starting with a perfectly blank canvas. The object already has a history.
I just have to figure out what I can do with it.
And now, here I am, about 13 years later, getting back into Pez.
I’m not going to make the commitment to create one every day this time around. I’ve already done that. I’m not sure my sanity needs another 365-day challenge!
Instead, I’m making a different commitment: I’m going to make as many as I can.
And I’m really excited about it.
These new Pez paintings are made the way a lot of my work is made with spray paint and hand-cut layered stencils. Most pieces use somewhere between 10 and 14 stencil layers although some have gone as high as 20. It really depends on how many colors and details are in the particular dispenser.
Every layer adds something different.
I cut the stencil. Spray the color. Move to the next layer and slowly build the image. What starts as a bunch of pieces of stencil paper eventually turns into a recognizable Pez dispenser.
It’s a process I’ve been refining for years.
And that’s probably the biggest difference between the work I’m making now and the work I was making during that original Pez challenge.
I’ve had another 13 years of making art, solving problems and figuring things out.
I’m also using Montana 94 spray paint now which gives me access to a huge range of colors that weren’t available to me when I was making those original pieces. Having that expanded color palette opens up a whole new set of possibilities, especially when I’m trying to recreate the crazy colors and reflections found in vintage Pez dispensers.
So, I guess you could call this round two.
The first time around, it was A Pez a Day.
This time there’s no daily deadline. No countdown to 365. No pressure to come up with something before midnight.
Just Pez.
Lots of Pez.
And I’m curious to see where it goes.
If you like Pez, collecting, skateboard art, stencil art, spray paint art or just watching an idea evolve, I hope you’ll follow along with this next wave of Pez paintings.
I think these new pieces have come a long way from those first attempts 13 years ago.
And that’s one of the coolest things about making art.
You can come back to an idea you had years ago and discover that you’re not the same artist who started it.
You bring everything you’ve learned with you.
So here we go again.
The Pez are back.
