Why You Should Care About Bubblegum Art

Have you ever heard of Pat Riot? If you're a voracious reader of The Baseball Card Blog and have devoured all of its pages, then I'll assume you know who he is. But if you're new to the blog (welcome!), you have to check his work out. His re-faced cards are little masterpieces of pop-culture art.

It's been a while since we heard from him, but Riot's got a new show coming up in Los Angeles. Opening May 25th at the Known Gallery and titled "Out of Left Field," it promises a full gallery of baseball-card and bubblegum art.

What is bubblegum art? Well, it's kind of exactly what it sounds like: art made out of chewed bubblegum. I'll admit it, that sounds gross. I mean, I've been to the gum wall in Seattle, and while impressive, that much chewed gum is disgusting. And yet... check out these photos that Pat forwarded us...

But back to the main question: Why should you care? Besides Riot's work being classic pointillism, and besides it being created using an unexpected material, it's actually great.

I've been thinking a lot about sports art lately. Maybe it's because creating custom cards is fast becoming my favorite hobby, or maybe because The Baseball Card Blog's own Travis Peterson is featured in Beckett Sports Card Monthly in their June "Art" issue. But sports art walks a fine line between legitimate and that horrible, dreadful catch-all word so beloved by critics: irreverent.

If anything, creating sports artwork out of gum is definitely reverential. And if I were Riot, I wouldn't be surprised if the Baseball Reliquary came knocking when all is said and done. Actually, the more I think about it the more this pairing makes sense: they're both based in the Los Angeles metropolitan area; one creates reverential baseball art and the other collects and curates it; and they're both out of the mainstream.

Riot's show will also feature a lot of his re-faced baseball card work. You can read all about the show here.

EXCLUSIVE Pack Break...

It has been so long since I last posted, I feel the need to ease back into it. What is easier than buying a pack of cards, scanning, copying any interesting facts on the backs, dumping it into a blog post. I'm hoping this mindless exercise will get me back in the flow of regular posting.

Everyone does pack breaks of the latest-and-greatest cards. I'm a little too broke to bust any vintage packs. I need to really wow the readers, so Ben and Mike don't fire me. Since baseball season has come and gone since my last post, I'm thinking I should avoid baseball cards.

Hmmm... This is still The Baseball Card Blog.

I think I have the perfect pack. 2011 Topps Heritage Video Game & Arcade Heroes. My local card shop had a whole mess of these in the bargain bin. At only $.50 a pack, it wasn't much of a risk. I suppose these didn't sell very well when they first came out. The shop owner seemed genuinely surprised when I bought a pack. I haven't seen a single one of these cards on the internet before - even on the blogs that post all kinds of crazy non-sports cards.

I think we have an exclusive here!

Here's what the pack looks like:

From what was in the bin, it looks like there are four different pack designs: Mario, Sonic the Hedgehog, Pac-Man, and some guy from a fighting game (Mortal Kombat?) Of course, I went with Mario. I have to admit, I did a little "pack searching". I'm not one of those jerks that bring a scale and weighs packs, or even worse, bends them hoping to "discover" a relic card. However, I'm not opposed to choosing the fattest pack out of a dusty bargain bin.

Okay. Let's check out these bad-boys...

First card out:

 

Card #134 - Left Wall

I dig the 1978-style of the card. WALL? Video Game Hero? Ooooookay... Here's what the back says:

"Left Wall - Historical accounts shows the middle two walls the most favored for hiding beneath, the far left walls proximity to the edge of the field provided an important choke-point in later levels for the spaceship to inflict massive vertical column damage early on in the game."

Maybe the Wall was a hero. Maybe not.

On to the next card:

#73 - Rock

Rock? Are you kidding me? I couldn't get Mr. Dug himself! Those damn rocks killed me more than the stupid, fire-breathing lizards. Nothing but stats on the back. I'm assuming the column with the big numbers (DK) stands for Dugs Killed.

I get the design concept. The card design mimics the baseball cards from the year the game came out. 1978 = Space Invaders. 1982 = Dig Dug.

Moving on:





#100 - Mario!!!

Mis-cut with dinged corners... There goes the value.

 

#215 - Fan Twenty-Two

Lame. From the back:

"Fan #22 -Front row and 5 faces from the right, though not well known, it was this die-hard’s unyielding enthusiasm that helped inspire the shocking victory by Little Mac over King Hippo."

Granted, he's not more than a few dozen pixels, but it sure looks like he is wearing sunglasses. Front row, Tyson fight in '87... definitely a major celebrity. Looks a little like David Hasselhoff.

Next...

#239 - Dot No. Thirteen

 



 

I thought the Rock was lame... The back:

 

"Dot #13 in Pac Man - While most experts give the majority of credit to the power pellets, in level 5, - a white-knuckled moment... as all four ghosts surround Pac Man - this small dot allowed the defeat of the marginally fast ghosts. The last dot allowed Pac Man to advance to a level with marginally faster ghosts."

 

Truly... a hero. Shall we see if we can handle more disappointment:

 

#VGV-12 - Singe

Insert Alert!!! Video Game Villains mini card! Dragon's Lair was a cool game I remember as maddeningly difficult. According to the back of the pack, these odds of pulling one of these inserts were 1:24 packs. The checklist for the insert set is on the back of the card. I only recognize the names of five of the 25 subjects. I need to brush up on video game history.

 

#67 - Square No. 21

 



 

This is getting ridiculous. I'm fairy certain that's a cube. 1982 was a good year for infuriating video games.

 

 

Last card in the pack (finally):

 

 

#139 - Square

Well, at least it is an actual square. I've always thought of the square as a bit of an unsung hero. Let's see what the back has to say:

"Square Block - Tetris: After the long blocks erasure of the field, this square gave a double point score with an assist of two full lines. Though the game was ultimately lost, it was a memorable moment that will live in video game history."

I for one, am shocked that these cards didn't fly off the shelves. If nothing else, they got me back to posting.

Let me know if you have any specific requests for cards from this set. I'll see if I can "find" them for you.

(Thanks to my good buddy, Michael Sherrillo, for help with the card back quotes. If you want to buy these cards, I'm sorry. I made them up. That's quite a compliment. Thank you. You have very good eyesight to be able to read this.)

 



 





 



PBS from the NSCC...

Unfortunately, I was not able to travel with our fearless leader, Ben Henry, to the National Sports Collectors Convention in Baltimore. I'm getting married in less than a month. A prenuptial, cross-country journey to support my hobby was strongly discouraged. It's not that I didn't try to persuade her:

"Baby, it isn't just about baseball cards. It would also be important for the blog... Expand coverage, bring in new readers, get some great new ideas for posts..." I implored.

"When was the last time you posted on either of your blogs?" She asked.

Sooooooo... Needless to say, I am still in San Diego.

I really wanted to stay in touch with what was going on at the convention. Following the action on twitter was fine, but it was more voyeuristic than participatory. I felt the need to be a part of the action, so I asked Ben if he could find me some cool cards to inspire some new posts.

Ben has a pretty good grasp on what I collect, so I left it up to him to do the shopping. Here are the first two cards he found for me:

1968 Topps AS - Mr. Rogers

Ben certainly knows what I like! It isn't the famous '68 rookie card that he shares with Daniel Striped Tiger, but nonetheless awesome! Despite the all-encompassing amazingness that this card represents it isn't my favorite one that he bought for me...

1998 Topps Gallery of Heroes - Richard Lederer

This bad boy takes the cake! If you aren't familiar with Richard "Verbivore" Lederer, you really should be. Mr. Lederer hosted "A Way with Words" on PBS radio. I rarely made time to listen to a radio show, but from 1998 through 2006 I hardly missed an episode. The show was (and still is) wonderfully informative and entertaining. While Richard co-hosted the show it was amazingly pun-tacular. I love puns, and Mr. Lederer is the undisputed king of wordplay.

The Gallery of Heroes inserts from the 1998 Topps Gallery set were a pretty tough pull at 1:24 packs. I didn't buy more than three or four packs that year, and beat the odds by pulling TWO of them! Of course, both were Jeff Bagwell. Nothing against him, but I am pretty sure every insert card I got in the 90's was a Bagwell.

But I digress... Did you now that Richard Lederer is the father of poker superstars Howard Lederer and Annie Duke. Annie got a card in this year's Allen & Ginter set. Now I have a card of her dad too!

Thanks Ben!

I'll continue posting some of the best cards that Ben found for me at the National...

Maybe.

Interview with Pat Riot, baseball-card artist

I think it was 1996 or 1997. I was a senior in high school and completely obsessed with the Pop Art sensibility of using old images in new ways. For me, it culminated in making about 200 copies of a blown-up 1930s clip art image of a toaster and posting them everywhere in my high school. (The janitors hated me. Not kidding.) 

Glasses, Shepard Fairey, 1997

Around that time I found out about Shepard Fairey. I became obsessed with Fairey's "Obey Giant" artwork, and when Fairey launched his online print store, I saved up the $22 and purchased a great poster he cribbed from the Russian avant garde cinema posters of the 1920s (see image at right). (That $22 poster, tack holes and all, now hangs in my living room.) 

There is relevance in my bringing this up. I was convinced then that Shepard Fairey was on the cusp of the next step in art. He was pulling seemingly random ideas – with their own individual meaning – out of pop culture and mashing them together in anti-establishment ways to create a new meaning: the tongue-in-cheek graffiti artist warning against the police state. That his work eventually found notoriety and mainstream acceptance at established art museums would not have surprised 17-year-old Ben.

So when Pat Riot contacted me about his custom cardwork series "Discard," I sat bolt upright. His work is in the same vein as old-school Shepard Fairey, and evokes the same feeling: that this is a next logical step for art. 

Riot's work turns the traditional hero worship inherent to baseball cards on its ear, forcing the viewer to question the very purpose of a sports card while poking fun at the covetous nature of the hobby. 

I don't mean to characterize Riot as an amateur; he is not. He is a working, professional artist. His body of work as a collage artist is impressive (I recommend his "Race War" series, colliding NASCAR with Civil War–era imagery). He's had solo shows in the Greater Los Angeles area, and his work sells.

Nor do I mean to characterize baseball-card art as a new thing. Clearly, it is not. From renegade Punk Rock Paint to sketch cards officially sanctioned by the card companies, I would say that we are currently in a baseball-card-art renaissance. 

The Baseball Card Blog caught up with Pat via email.

BBC Blog: What is your background?


Pat Riot: Having dropped out of art school, I am more interested in the do-it-yourself variety. Art categorized as "outsider art." Henry Darger's work ethic is a huge influence. And I like a lot of "street art." Space Invader is great. I like that he's playing a game with his art. I also love the absurdity of Surrealism.

BBC Blog: I think your baseball-card-based work is ingenious. How did you decide on baseball cards as a medium?

PR: It's always the simple things that seem so ingenious, right? I wish there was some big, smart moment when I made the discovery, but honestly, I was just messing around in my studio one day back in 2005. I had been cutting up a lot of old books and magazines for a collage and also had some old cards that I had lying around so I decided to give it a try...

BBC Blog: You refer to this series as "re-faced cards," which begs the question: Do you have a card in mind first, or a re-purposed face?

PR: A little bit of both. Usually I just sit down with my cards, scissors and a high stack of potential.

BBC Blog: Tell me about the cards.

PR: My story is all too familiar. My mom threw away my collection. It was pretty worthless, anyway. I buy most of them from the era when I remember collecting, the 70s and 80s. I found some amazing uncut sheets of cards on eBay that I've been working on. The '87 woodgrain! It looks seamless and awesome as a whole sheet. I DEFACED the Barry Bonds rookie card!

BBC Blog: Do you create pieces to exist individually, or are they meant to be viewed together as a whole?

PR: They stand alone as one-offs, but they carry a lot of punch as whole set. They look nice in a book, too!

BBC Blog: Are any cards sacred to you?

PR: No card is sacred. I'm actually ADDING value to these old (in most cases) cards. I'm giving them new relevance and view ability... [Though] I would never hurt a Mark Fidrych card. Or a Hank Aaron.

View more of Pat Riot's work in our Custom Cardwork gallery, and at his official website.


Check out more of The Baseball Card Blog interviews from the past five years here.

Happy Anniversary, Brady Bunch!

This morning, while watching the History Channel, I noticed an interesting tidbit scroll across the bottom of the screen. On this day in 1969, The Brady Bunch debuted. I watched a lot of Brady Bunch growing up. Actually, I watched a lot of EVERYTHING on TV growing up. But, I can't think of a television family that I have spent more time with than the Bradys. In honor of their 42nd anniversary, I decided to give the Bradys a gift. Coincidentally, the proper, traditional gift for the 42nd anniversary is cardboard*:

1969 Topps - #665 Rookie Stars Brady Adults

*Since I couldn't find a list showing the traditional gift for the 42nd anniversary, I had to assume it was cardboard... That's what I'd want. Oh, and apologies for Mr. Brady's position. I couldn't resist.



Muppets... Origins

As you probably know, the world of Muppets didn't begin with the Muppet Show. Many people will place Sesame Street as the origin of the Muppets. Sure, Kermit got his start as a reporter on Sesame Street, but there was a Muppet way before that. I may not be old enough to have seen it, but in the early '60s Rowlf the Dog was the first Muppet to become a star. He was cast member on The Jimmy Dean Show way before he played Dr. Bob in Veterinarian's Hospital on the Muppet Show.

Here is one of his few cards that pays tribute to his first gig:

TBCB Muppets - #7 Rowlf the Dog

I really couldn't resist dipping my toes into the Sesame Street pool as well:

 TBCB Muppets - #8 Oscar The Grouch

I had forgotten about his best pal, Slimy, until I delved deeper into Muppet Wiki:

TBCB Muppets - #9 Slimy



I feel kind of bad for entombing Slimy, but not too bad... 'cause THAT is hilarious.

On Our Current Baseball Card Renaissance

While the big-money players in the baseball card industry have been in a bit of turmoil lately, the guys on the fringe have been quite industrious.

When I started blogging in 2006, there were two baseball-card-related books out there that you'd find with the normal books (not the hobby-specific catalogues): The Great American Baseball Card Flipping, Trading and Bubble Gum Book by Harris and Boyd, and Card Sharks: How Upper Deck Turned a Child's Hobby into a High-Stakes, Billion-Dollar Business by Pete Williams. And that was it.

Since then, there's been The Card by Thompson and O'Keeffe, and a slew of others: Mint Condition by Dave Jamieson, Cardboard Gods by Josh Wilker (which I haven't seen for sale anywhere), and my personal favorite: The T206 Collection: The Players and their Stories by Tom and Ellen Zappala.

I got an advance press packet for T206 and I have to say it looks awesome. The authors set out to document each player who appeared on a card from the original tobacco set, with a picture of the card and a short biography of the player. It's a huge undertaking, to say the least, and I've heard that the initial print run is going to be very low. It's going to be a coffee-table-type book: over-sized, full color on every page, the works. Sounds really cool.

Also, yesterday I got an email from Gary Joseph Cieradkowski, the graphic designer behind Oriole Park at Camden Yards, announcing Series 1 of his Infinite Card Set. And yes, I bought a copy immediately. Take a look at it here.

And speaking of baseball-card art, I've finally figured out how to present my "Casey at the Bat" project in a tangible form. I'm planning on offering the set as a poster and as individual cards (in their correct sizes). If you're interested in obtaining a copy of the finished piece (or pieces), let me know.