Speaker 1 (00:00):
Coming up on Art Palace, 

Speaker 2 (00:02):
People will use integrity as an excuse for being turds is the thing is they'll say like, Hey, I'm just going to keep doing me and I don't have to listen. I don't care if you like it. It's like, okay, then you're doing the wrong thing. 

Speaker 1 (00:30):
Welcome to Art Palace produced by Cincinnati Art Museum. This is your host Russell iig here at the Art Palace. We meet cool people and then talk to them about art. Today's cool person is Travis McElroy, the prolific podcaster who you might know from shows like My brother, my Brother and Me, the Adventure Zone Manns and many more. 

Speaker 2 (01:01):
But when you get to the difference between a $400 microphone and a $500 microphone, you might know it and people who listen to hours and hours and hours and hours of your stuff might know it, but it's not going to be a thing where someone's like, thank you. I couldn't listen to that $400 microphone. It's so subconscious and you don't notice it. But I believe that that subconscious stuff and that kind of quality change, no one will ever tweet at you and say, oh, it sounds so much better, but they'll like it more and they won't know why. 

Speaker 1 (01:36):
They'll 

Speaker 2 (01:36):
Be like, yeah, things just really starting to turn around for. I just felt like they really started to get it together and they won't be able to pinpoint why, but it just starts sounding better and better. And especially for my brother, my brother and me. We just recorded three episode 353, so when you're starting to put out that much content, there's lots and lots. I bet if you did a super cut of one minute from each episode from episode one till now and ran it together, it would sound like the audio quality equivalent of somebody starting at one end of a piano and running their finger down the keys of just like, oh, it used to sound like crap. And now it's totally listenable on the 

Speaker 1 (02:14):
Garage Band mics. 

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Exactly. It's so bad. 

Speaker 1 (02:18):
Did you ever have a moment like that where you're just describing where that you've made a sort of invisible choice that the audience isn't aware of, but it seems people like it, you've said, oh, people responded more. Has that ever happened in a tangible way where you've a sort of imperceptible choice made people respond differently or, 

Speaker 2 (02:40):
Yeah, it happens a lot with, so one of my shows trends like these, there's a lot of interstitial music and at some point I just started turning them all down a little bit 

Speaker 2 (02:50):
And I've never heard a review of it, but right at about the time I started doing that, our numbers started increasing exponentially. And so I think that it was the kind of thing where it was just easier for people to re-listen to it because you didn't have a jarring transition where it's like, oh, got to turn the radio down, now you can turn it back up, back to talking. And I just got the balance better between talking and music and saw a balance in that. My brother, my brother and me, we've been improving our quality all along the way. But a lot of it, the thing is, I've been doing podcasting now for, I think this is my seventh year. We started in 2010, so this would be, yes, about seven years now, a little over. And the thing is, it's such a slow growth medium unless you are already famous 

Speaker 3 (03:51):
Or 

Speaker 2 (03:52):
Unless you have the next Big boom podcast. So for example, a good example of this is the Adventure Zone is only a couple years old, but it's doing very well. It has been a boom podcast, my brother, my brother and me. We've been doing for seven years and it's, it's a very steady thing and it's every year I look back and I'm like, I can't believe we're here now when we were just there last year, and then I have all these other podcasts where I look at and day to day, if you look at it, you don't really see growth, but you look back over a six month period and you're like, yeah, okay, that doesn't seem like a big growth, but if I do some math, that's like a 10% growth month over month. That's huge. And if you keep that steady growth going, and so it's always hard to tell. People have asked before about what do you think contributed to the success of my brother, my brother and me? It's like a thousand things. This person told it. Because that's the other thing is it all comes down to, it's nice because when you premiere a movie or a TV show, you have the opening day, opening weekends. We need to build up a lot of buzz about this and get people out, and it's got to do well opening weekend because very rarely, maybe this has happened before, but I imagine it's incredibly rare. Does a movie open and six months later have its biggest weekend yet? You know what I mean? 

Speaker 3 (05:24):
Yeah. 

Speaker 2 (05:25):
And so whereas a podcast you might be 200 episodes in before maybe Tom Hanks listens to an episode and tweets about it, and boom, suddenly you're off to the races. But you can keep doing that because it costs next to nothing to keep putting out episodes. And so if you're doing it, and this is my go-to advice when people ask me for advice on starting your podcast, have conversations that you would be having anyways and just record them and put them out. Because if you're trying to create, I'm going to sit down and handcraft the perfect next Big Hit podcast. Unless you work at a radio state, unless you work at an N P R affiliate and you're building something for N P R with their resources and their whatever, you're probably not going to do that. 

Speaker 2 (06:16):
And so if you are trying to just make something that's popular 10 episodes in, that's three months of work, if you're not seeing return on it, you're going to be very, very frustrated. Whereas if you and your friend always get together and talk about pro wrestling, just record that you're going to be doing it anyways. And then if you're 50 episodes and you're a year in and you still haven't quite hit the numbers you want, what does it matter? You'd be having that conversation with your friend anyways and maybe it takes, that's the thing we didn't, my brother, my brother and me didn't join a network until episode 38. I think we didn't start 

Speaker 1 (06:57):
The Maximum Fun Network. 

Speaker 2 (06:58):
Yes, we joined maximum fun.org and we didn't start making, I would say I put money in quotes. We didn't start making enough money to have it feel like a successful job for three years, four years, but at the time that's because at no point was the objective like, well, this is our new job now we're starting a thing. And so if we had had that objective, then we probably wouldn't still be doing it and now we're making a tv. 

Speaker 1 (07:31):
It would've been too disheartening. 

Speaker 2 (07:32):
Yeah, you'd be a year in, you'd be like, I don't know, we're making $200 a month off the podcast. And so had that been the goal, this is our new job, then we probably wouldn't still be doing it. The thing if you look at podcasts that people consider success, you have two different camps. You either have the podcast where it's hosted by somebody who's already famous 

Speaker 1 (07:58):
Or 

Speaker 2 (07:58):
On a network or it's got some kind of force behind it that yeah, of course it's hosted by Nick Offerman and why wouldn't that be a success? All you have to do is say, this is Nick Oman's spot. You don't have to sell it at all. And then the other side is podcasts that have just been going for so long that they have been able to gain momentum and word of mouth that they also have to be good. It is not just like, well, if I can make it episode 500, 

Speaker 1 (08:26):
I'll be rich to be good. 500 episodes of garbage won't get you anywhere. 

Speaker 2 (08:30):
It'd be good too, but it allows time for your audience to grow your audience. If you have five really good episodes and then you phone in the next 10, you're going to just stop. Don't even bother. Because if your first five episodes are an hour where you have great guests and you talk about amazing things and then you put out five episodes that are 50 minutes long of you going, I really didn't have anything to talk about. Wasn't able to get a guest. Yeah, I was supposed to watch something this week, but I just didn't really get a chance to, anyway, see you next week. 

Speaker 2 (09:03):
You think people are going to come back for episode 11. After that, you got to constantly improve because our first 10, 20 episodes of my brother, my brother and me, the audio is garbage. Sounds so bad in our first episode for me because now we maybe get through three audience questions and three Yahoo answers questions. But in the first episode, I want to say we sped through, we were like, ah, question, next question. And we went through 12 things. We talked about each one for a minute. I don't even think we finished most of our thoughts, but then the next episode was better, 

Speaker 1 (09:42):
And 

Speaker 2 (09:42):
Then the next episode was a little bit better. Next episode was a little bit better, and we just kept at it and kept trying to be better about it, both in quality, in the quality of the discussion, but also our awareness of issues. The way that we handled, and I don't want to say the word criticism, but feedback is if somebody was like, Hey, you use this word and you might not know it, but that word is not okay to use rather than whatever. This is our comedy layoff. It's just a joke. We went, okay, noted. Thank you. You're right. We didn't know that and now we do and we want you. It's weird because people talk about like, oh, you just do that to make your audience happy. It's like, yeah, 

Speaker 1 (10:28):
Why is that a 

Speaker 2 (10:29):
Problem? Why that not be what I do? And it's like, that's not pandering. That's how the exchange works is if my audience doesn't like a thing, that's not better. It's not like people will use integrity as an excuse for being turds 

Speaker 1 (10:48):
Is the thing 

Speaker 2 (10:49):
Is they'll say like, Hey, I'm just going to keep doing me and I don't have to listen to you. I don't care if you like it. It's like, okay, then you're doing the wrong thing. If you don't care. If your audience likes it, you're doing it bad from my point of view. So I want my audience to be happy. I'm making a thing because I want to make them happy because that's why I think the good reason for doing creative endeavors is I like making people happy. I do a lot of shows that I don't make any money off of. Some of them are weird and some of them are little just bit things that I think people will think are funny or interesting because I want to make people happy. So what kind of person would it be if somebody was like, Hey, and they came to me very kindly and very informatively and said, Hey, you might not know it, but if I was like, shut up. What am I doing? Why am I making this thing? 

Speaker 1 (11:36):
It's also whenever anyone's basically saying to you, Hey, you said this thing and that hurt me. And then your response is basically like, no, it didn't. Or Well, you're wrong for feeling that way. Don't care. It's just like, who is that benefiting to just basically discount somebody's feelings or just pretend it's not real, 

Speaker 2 (11:54):
Especially since all you really have to do is keep that in mind when I get that feedback. I think that there's a thing that people, maybe this is being too gracious, but maybe it's that people are afraid that if they take all that feedback in, it's going to somehow corrupt their ability to say something funny or interesting. Now they're worried about, and the thing is, that's just not how that works. Usually for me, it's like, okay, I'm going to absorb that information into my brain and I've got all of these different processes going in the background that's just like, it's filters. You know what I mean? It's like I start to say something and I think, and that's never made my comedy worse. It's never made it worse to just not say the first thing that comes to mind. You know what I mean? There's an idea in improv of A to C, of A to B is what everyone does. You want to do A to C and jump over B 

Speaker 1 (12:56):
Because 

Speaker 2 (12:57):
That's what makes it more interesting. That's what makes it creative. If I say, name a fruit and you say apple, okay, yeah, 90% of people are going to say apple. But if you say mango, if you say pineapple, okay, cool. Or if I say, name a fruit and you say gummy cherries. Oh, all right, interesting. You know what I mean? What you don't want to do is A to four, which a lot of people do where I say, name a fruit and someone's like, I'm going to be funny potato. And it's like, that doesn't help me at all. You know what I mean? And so that's the thing is jumping over B and getting to C is way more interesting, way more funny, way better. And a lot of B is just mean. It's really easy to make mean jokes. It's so easy looking at someone and saying, look at that fat guy. That's the most base. Okay, so you just pointed out something mean about someone else to try to make somebody laugh. Anybody could do that. That's the least interesting thing I've ever heard. Not only does it mean it's boring. 

Speaker 1 (14:07):
Yeah, it's interesting the parallels between comedy and art. When I was in art school, I had to take a class called creative processes, and I always thought, you're going to teach, especially as I'm an 18 year old or whatever, you're going to teach me how to be creative, man, what are you talking about? And it was seriously one of the most helpful classes I ever took. And that was one of the lessons was basically brainstorm a lot, write down a lot of ideas, and skip those first ones because they're probably the same thing everyone else in the room came up with. It's like ignore. It's like your first instinct is probably your first instinct because it's everyone else's first instinct too. Yeah, exactly. And it really is, especially when you're young and you're like, no, no, I trust my gut. It's a really hard lesson I think to hear. But it really was helpful. And usually when I started following it and realized, oh, after I get past those first few ideas, those are the ones that feel truer to me and sort of contain that sort of nugget. And suddenly it would click, you go, oh, that is the idea. That is the funny one. That is the best one. That is the perfect one. Because it was more specific and it's like there's a specificity that resonates with people. I think 

Speaker 2 (15:17):
It also, I got my degree in acting people who have never acted before and never studied. Acting will often say is just memorized in words, 

Speaker 1 (15:27):
Just 

Speaker 2 (15:27):
Walk across the state. That's not untrue. But the thing is, the levels upon levels upon levels is like, okay, you walk into a room in real life and you walk into the kitchen, you pour yourself a glass of water. 

Speaker 1 (15:40):
You don't 

Speaker 2 (15:41):
Have to think about why you did that. You are thirsty, you naturally grab a glass, put some water in it, you drink it. But then add to that the level of consciously making all those decisions because a piece of paper says you need to, or a human being who's not even there anymore told you you needed to, and make that seem still on the same level as you just naturally walking. There is nothing more disconcerting than the first time. You have to walk as a character in a show and figure out why you walk the way that you do, where you are going and why you are going there, but not look like you're thinking about all of that. Then you know, have to pick up that glass. If you don't pick up that glass, the next person's line of are you going to have a drink? 

Speaker 2 (16:27):
Won't make any sense if you're not holding that glass. But you have to do all of that, but not look like you're thinking about picking up the glass. And those layers to me is what I think about when I'm doing a podcast and I'm thinking of the next joke is I can have all these different lines going in the back of my head and think about all of this stuff without having to script it or stop or say like, well, give me a second. I can come up with something. I can come up with something because I am working all that stuff. And I see a lot of people who say stuff, and sometimes I feel like I'm very judgmental of the people who, it makes me think of Ian Malcolm in Jurassic Park of this idea of you stood on the shoulders of giants and you didn't stop to thinking about if you should just thought about it if you could, and you're slapping on a lunchbox and you're selling it, and you're selling is because I think about that because there's lots of people in the modern age now, whether it's podcasts or YouTube or Instagram or whatever, where it's these people that for reasons perhaps even unknown to them, have gained a huge audience. 

Speaker 2 (17:46):
And that's such a weird tightrope because you're doing stuff and maybe you don't know why people like it, and maybe you didn't even feel like you earned it. You don't know why you are where you are. And if that's the case, it's so easy to misstep because you don't have the filters. I think about this whenever there's somebody, a YouTuber who makes a joke that's offensive and people get very upset about it, and it's like, well, yeah, that's because a lot of professional comedians have been doing it since they were 18, and they didn't really start to get popular until they were 40 and they stood in front of a lot of crowds of 10 people at a coffee shop and made a joke that didn't land, maybe even got booed or had stuff thrown at them. And that was how they figured out, this is not only my brand of comedy, but this is the stuff that is, okay, this is where the line is. 

Speaker 2 (18:38):
I found the line because I hid it when only 10 people were looking at me. But now we have YouTubers and podcasters and fill in the blank, where suddenly they have millions of people looking at them and they've never failed like that in front of a small crowd. So the first time they fail big is in front of a crowd of millions of people. It's just a lot scarier if you don't have the tools, you know what I mean? And I dunno, sometimes I worry that there's just so many opportunities for people to say the wrong thing and that they, I dunno, it's very scary. I'm glad that I have the lessons that I do. But even then, even then, then the first couple episodes, first more than a couple, we said some things that, like I said, that people had to say like, Hey, but once again, we failed early. 

Speaker 2 (19:28):
You know what I mean? We failed when our audience was just at the beginning and everybody was like, my expectations for you are very low because you just started and we're going to grow this thing together. We're all at the ground up. If we had waited to make those mistakes until now when it's like, I know you could do better, you've done 300 plus episodes where you didn't say that stuff. I know you know better. At the very least, you should know better somehow you avoided that for the first whatever episodes. So it's way better to fail early, I guess, is what I'm saying. My point is, fail early, fail often, and then take the input you get about those failures to heart. Because I also imagine for every standup comic that I love, for every Paul f Tompkins, who, him, Paul f Tompkins, r Butcher, Cameron Esposito, Ron Funches, these are the comics I love, and they are also nice people. And I imagine that for every comic that has been had stuff thrown at them, whether their fault or not, and has gone, okay, I'm choosing to learn from this. They're also standup comics. I'm just too edgy. You don't get me. I'm going to keep at it. And those people either continue to fail until they stop doing it, or they find an audience that likes the offensive stuff that they're saying and they build an offensive audience that will defend the offensive stuff, and that's worse than failing out of it. To me, 

Speaker 1 (20:56):
I think that I was just re-listening to some old episodes of W T F and I can't now remember Todd Glass was talking about the way that sort of instinct of, Hey, you're too sensitive for me. And it's like, no, you are sensitive. And I thought, oh gosh, that's really true. And when I think about myself at a younger age where basically, yeah, anytime I said something and somebody called me out on it and I would just be like, you can't handle me. And I realized like, no, I couldn't handle being called out. I couldn't handle being criticized. 

Speaker 2 (21:29):
Well, and that's the thing is the problem is just like we talked about, making your audience happy anytime you are trying to make a living at something, it's a business. And I have very strong feelings on art as art and art as business and where those two interact as far as live performance goes, because my friend Jeremy and I used to have, not Jeremy Dubin, different Jeremy, but I'm sure Jeremy Dubin and I would also have this argument, but not argument, debate, discussion about theater as a business and theater as an art. Because you could do the most amazing, most challenging, most evocative and provocative performance of a play. And if no one comes to see it, what does it matter? And you could also do the most bland marketable, you're going to put the most busing seats version of Oklahoma 

Speaker 1 (22:22):
And 

Speaker 2 (22:22):
Make a ton of money, but are you going to feel satisfied doing it? So it's like finding the Venn diagram of how do I challenge but also invite. And the problem is, I think there are too many people who forget that if you stand up in front of people and tell jokes to make money, you should be interested in what your audience thinks about it. 

Speaker 1 (22:40):
You 

Speaker 2 (22:40):
Should be interested in the feedback that you get because if you don't, chances are you not going to be very successful. And maybe you'll build an audience of really offensive people who love your offensive material, but I guarantee that those people, if you really need them, are not going to be there to help you as opposed to kind people that like you and think you are nice and actually support you. Those people will help you if you need them. Those people will show up to your shows and you'll like being around them. And I just so often see this, it was just a joke that these people don't get it. It's like if they don't get it, you are a bad comedian. If you tell a joke and people don't get it, you told a bad joke. And this idea of no, it was just a bad audience. It's like then go home. Because if you stand, even if that's true, even if it's the least receptive audience ever and you tell a joke that doesn't land, if the only thing you walk away from that is like, well, forget them, then it's like, no. You walk away from that and you go, next time I have an unreceptive audience, how do I win them over? 

Speaker 2 (23:45):
How do I work harder to get them on my side? Cameron Esposito has lots of stories of this time that she toured opening for this comedian that could not have been more different from her and his audience just was not interested. But that was her big kind of break was opening for this guy, and it was this proving ground of every night trying to win over this other comedian's audience a little bit more and figure out how to not just play to your crowd, but to every crowd. And that is so much better than no, I know who my audience is and that's all I care about. It's like, okay, cool. Enjoy mediocrity then for the rest of your life. Because if you don't challenge yourself to do better, why should I be interested in anything you have to say? 

Speaker 1 (24:34):
Well, when you were talking a little bit about business and art, that's actually a good transition. I would like to go look at some art with you and some art that started that has some definite business behind it. I just 

Speaker 2 (24:48):
Want to say that's so funny too. I love what you just said. Completely inadvertently, it made me think, I want to go look at some art. There must be a more, there must be a more artistic way of saying that. The idea of looking at someone like, Hey, would you like to go do a museum and look at some art with me? It's just such a, yep, that's exactly what we're going to do. That's a very descriptive, clear, straightforward thing. 

Speaker 1 (25:11):
I'm all about that. 

Speaker 2 (25:13):
I looked at some art today. I just thought, man, there must be a more hoarded toity way of saying it, but I don't want to know what it is. That's 

Speaker 1 (25:19):
Why I would intentionally not say it. If there is hoity-toity way, I intentionally avoid anything. I 

Speaker 2 (25:25):
Just like it. You want to go look at some I do. I do the thing. Let me acknowledge right now. I am not an art expert. I like looking at art. I will stand in front of a painting for hours if given the choice and just look at art. And if someone's like, now let's break it down. I'd rather not thank you very much. I just want to look at it and talk about it. 

Speaker 1 (25:45):
Thank you. But that's the thing is that people have, that everybody has an opinion about music. If I played you a pop song, you would be able to talk about what you think about it. And I think that fear of being uninformed about art keeps a lot of people from talking about it. And that's what I would love to try to see stop. I would love people to feel comfortable talking about art in the same way they talk about movies and music and everything. To me, it's all the same stuff. I mean, podcast, anything a person puts their heart and soul into and makes this thing and they put care into it, there isn't a lot of difference to me. And I don't really personally believe in sort of high low art. It's, it's all the same stuff to me. And we make those divisions a lot of times based on not so great things about class and race and all these other ideas. It's 

Speaker 2 (26:39):
Like wine, you know what I mean? Do you drink it? Did you like it? That's what matters. 

Speaker 1 (26:42):
Yeah. Yeah. So I feel like it is all the same stuff and I feel like people can look at this stuff and of course just like, oh, if we're talking about that New Lady Gaga song and we have one opinion of it, and then our friend who is a studied music for 10 years comes in, they have a different opinion about it, and they probably know some stuff we don't know about it. And that's great, but it doesn't invalidate our opinions on it either. 

Speaker 2 (27:07):
My friend Tybee is one of her big pet peeves, and it has become mine as well as we've discussed it on interbank, but people who treat opinions as facts. 

Speaker 1 (27:17):
So 

Speaker 2 (27:17):
If you're like, I like this song, it's like, well, here's why you're wrong. It's like, you're not wrong. The other day, I last night posted a picture of some eggs I made, and I like my eggs fried hard. And so like, Ugh, fried hard. No, you got to go over medium. It's like, it is a preference. I like my eggs fried hard. I'm not wrong. Somebody was like, no, you trust me over me. It was like, are you telling me how I like my eggs? Really? Really? You look at this like you are wrong. It's like I'm the one eating them. What do you mean? 

Speaker 1 (27:50):
Well, let's go look at some art. 

Speaker 2 (27:51):
Okay, let's do it. Okay. Well, we are in the Cincinnati Wing. We're in Gallery one 11. And so this room, we call the Cincinnati Art Carved Furniture Room. 

Speaker 2 (28:14):
Obviously a lot of furniture around you have picked a very good room for me for a lot of reasons. So what are those reasons? Reason number one, I've done a lot of carpentry in my life. I worked in my scene shop in college, and then I was the technical director of Master Carpenter for the Cincinnati Shakespeare company, and I built a lot of stage furniture there. I am also a big fan of the Antiques Roadshow, so this is conjuring a lot of feelings like that. For me. I also, I have a lot of strong feelings about, well, the modern furniture, and actually had a conversation with Roman Mars about this. He guessed on a show I have called, surprisingly Nice. And we talked about bad design that we liked, and one of them is Ikea, the furniture of the Snap together, anyone can do it Furniture. 

Speaker 2 (29:11):
And the thing is, on the one level, I love that furniture because it's so cost effective and anybody can do it. And there's a lot of different options. And I've moved a bunch, and every time I do, I'm like, oh, I love that this is made out of corkboard and M D F, and I can break it down and carry it down the stairs by myself. But the thing is, nothing I own right now is going to be a thing that my children's, children's children, children, children, whatever, display. And so when watch Antiques Roadshow, I always think the same thing, which is like, do I own anything than in a hundred years? People are like, well, this is a very interesting piece. No. They'd be like, okay, this is just a desk that costs $99, that Ikea, well, I don't care about this. It's worth nothing now. So I look at these pieces and here's what I love. Here's what I love about furniture art, and carved furniture Art is now when it's sitting up on these plinths and they have little labels on them and there's lights on 'em and everything, it's like, ah, what a beautiful art piece. 

Speaker 2 (30:14):
But when they existed out into the wild, somebody put their clothes in that somebody leaned on that mantle, somebody slept in that bed, somebody painted on that, somebody displayed their books in that bookcase in their own house. And so to us, it's a beautiful art piece, but to whoever owned it, it was a thing and that completed their home. And you might say, well, that's true of a lot of paintings. That's true of a lot of works. It's like, yes, but also nobody opened those paintings every day to get a book out of it or to put their China into it or to get their clothes out of it. So it's not only very attractive, they're very beautiful, but it also has practicality designed into it, and you have to get good as opposed to, I don't know a lot about painting, but as opposed to brush strokes, you also have to worry about structural integrity. So it's not just like, is this pretty, it's also is it going to fall apart 

Speaker 4 (31:11):
If 

Speaker 2 (31:11):
I open the door? And so I have a lot of feelings about car's, furniture, art. 

Speaker 4 (31:17):
I'm going to pat ourselves on the back actually for a little bit, because when you've talked about the books over here and the bookcase, that's one of my favorite things about this is that the books on the bookcase, so this belonged to Alfred t Shorn, who was the first director of the museum. And these are books from his collection. So I love that they're actually the books from the person who owned it, and they're all kind of period and fitting with it. So they would be books that would have been on the shelves. And 

Speaker 2 (31:46):
Not only that, oh God, this is so dorky, but these books fit exactly. They are the exact height of the shelf. And so there's something about that to me that is somebody owned it and went perfect. You know what I mean? This idea of the excitement that you can imagine somebody getting when they pick up a book and go to put it in the shelf and they're like, yes, this fits. It was made for this. And it might even have been. That's the thing is, I dunno, maybe he owned the books first and had a bookcase commissioned to fit that book perfectly. But there's something about that that feels so satisfying of like, yes, perfect. Exactly. 

Speaker 4 (32:31):
Well, I love also just looking at the pottery on the bookshelf too. I don't know, it's actually the objects on the shelf become more interesting to me than they would be if they were displayed. And a lot of this is, this middle piece, I'm pretty sure is a Rookwood piece, and we have tons of rookwood in the next gallery over. I am more excited by this, seeing it in this context. And it just, it's a, I dunno, sometimes for me when things are more like, I call it Disneyland effect, where you're sort of creating a little miniature world for me, I get way more into it. So I like imagining this sort of environment. 

Speaker 2 (33:08):
I think that that's it. I think a lot of times the reason I like rooms and stuff set up in context is out of context. You look at something and you're like, Hmm, yes, that is very pretty. And when you see it in context, it creates a world. It creates, I mean, I've done a lot of scenic design for theater, and it's, I love scenic design, but what I love more than anything is set dressing. 

Speaker 4 (33:36):
Because 

Speaker 2 (33:37):
You can build a room where it's like, yes, here's a couch and a chair and a coffee table and a bookcase and a dining room table. And it's like, okay, cool. That's great. It looks great. And then you say, and I'm going to put some coasters on the coffee table. And it's like, yes, and I'm going to put a pillow here, and maybe there's a stain on this couch cushion, and I'm going to put some flowers in a vase on the dining room table, but the flowers are about two days too old. And in the bookcase, I'm going to put some books, but they're on their side, or this level isn't quite filled up yet, and I'm going to put something underneath it, maybe an old sock or something underneath the bookcase. And it's like, yes, yes. Because the more you do it, it's just like I was talking about with audio quality, people might not know that. They might not look at it and say, ah, I like this because the remote control is under the couch instead of on the coffee table. But they'll walk out and be like, oh, it all just felt so real. 

Speaker 4 (34:37):
It felt 

Speaker 2 (34:38):
Like it was there. It felt like I was doing it. And they don't know why, but it's because in real life, nothing is perfect and context less and everything fits. So when I look at this bookcase and I say, that book fits perfectly in that shelf, it makes me happy in a way that I cannot justify that. I don't know why that is. There's other books and they look fine and they don't match. But there's something about the fact that that book fits perfectly with about a centimeter above it where I'm just like, yes, there's good in the world. 

Speaker 4 (35:08):
Well, I think that's a point that I bring up a lot with people in looking at art, is trying to remind people that a person made this and a person made choices about this. So when you talk about those things that look like just accidents or imperceptible things that sell a sort of reality, and this probably is more apt for paintings than necessarily furniture, but I just am always fascinated by those details that just go unnoticed or those were an intentional, somebody did. And it's almost like the more you work at it, the more it disappears and you don't even notice it. 

Speaker 2 (35:46):
And I also will say, and this is not a knock to painters, but I have worked in carpentry before, so I have a little bit of insight into it. It's also very, I think sculpture in general, but also wood carving, so physical that it's like, I'm going to make a choice. And if you get, and maybe this is true of paintings too, but if you get 90% of the way done and you screw up and the piece of wood you're carving breaks, okay, well that's done. Okay, that fell apart. But it's also, if you make a choice that makes a carving more intricate, it requires more physical labor from you. So it's not just an artistic choice. It is an investment of time and labor of, I could just leave this, I could put two flowers in this instead of three, 

Speaker 2 (36:34):
But I think it will look better in three, and I'm willing to put in the extra 12 hours to carve that flower because I don't want it to just have two. And it's not just like, well, I'll paint it and oh man, and now this sounds like I'm really knocking paint. But just the idea of I'm going to possibly, especially when you're dealing with carving utensils, hurt myself, but also I'm going to sweat. I'm going to labor to carve a third flower. You know what I mean? Those kinds of choices to me, they just resonate because it's that idea of like, Hey, why did you do that? I was like, I just thought it would be better. I just liked it more. 

Speaker 4 (37:16):
And in this gallery, nobody stopped at three flowers. Oh 

Speaker 2 (37:18):
No, there's so many flowers and birds. This one, the bed frame, okay, obviously I can't lay down on the bed, but what I do like about this, 

Speaker 4 (37:30):
We did have a guard kind of go, come and eyeball us too earlier. So I think they're watching as they might. 

Speaker 2 (37:34):
I would, I'm the person that if I'm in a home good store in their beds, I'll lay down on them. But what I love about this is that the hard thing arcs up over. So if you're laying down in the bed and you look up, it's all one that the headboard itself is three-dimensional, but also there is a piece above you that as you look up, you see, so it's not just a piece to be observed from the outside, but that also from inside the bed, you get a view that you don't get just looking at it from outside. 

Speaker 4 (38:08):
So 

Speaker 2 (38:09):
It is designed not just for the viewer, but for the user, which I really like when it comes to practical furniture art of like, yes, this is, the desk is designed for somebody to actually sit at and use. And the view that you get inside of the desk, you don't get from standing over it. 

Speaker 4 (38:28):
I wonder if even how three dimensional the birds and flowers are above the bed too, on that headboard. That's probably a big consideration too, that as somebody who's laying there, they would get a different view of those birds. 

Speaker 2 (38:42):
And 

Speaker 4 (38:42):
If it was more of just like a straight relief, you wouldn't have that as much. Whereas there, they actually maybe have that sense of these birds flying over them. So there was actually another reason I wanted to come in here, and this bed is one of those, is that this is a piece that was worked on by a family together. So Ben Pittman was the designer and his wife was the carver. 

Speaker 2 (39:06):
Excellent. 

Speaker 4 (39:07):
And then her sister Elizabeth nurse, who's kind of one of Cincinnati's most celebrated painters, did the details on the headboard there, the paintings. And it's the same team that worked on the dresser right there with the paintings as well. So I just like that idea of this collaborative affair that a family worked on together. Oh, 

Speaker 2 (39:28):
Are you referencing that? I do a lot of my shows with my family. Exactly. Yeah. I have shows that I do with friends, but most of my shows are with my family. And there was a certain amount of, and there's a couple reasons. One, when you do something, at least not for everybody, but for me, I really like my family and I like spending time with them. And for me, family is very important. So when I look back at something that's created by family, it's not just an investment of art, but it's something that we as a unit completed. But it is also, I think in collaboration with family, you're just able to be a little bit more direct and a little bit more blunt, but also not have to say some things which just like for example, my brothers and I, we've worked on the show together for a long time. 

Speaker 2 (40:18):
At this point, I trust their judgment in any kind of negotiation or working on anything. Or if they're like, Hey, I think we should cut this. I'm like, okay, because I trust them and I trust their judgment and I trust their creative visions and artistic thing in a way that someone who maybe I've only known for two months, I definitely wouldn't feel that way with. So yes, I do appreciate working with family, and I think you get a better end result. Maybe that's not true. As I said with my family, it's we've always kind of collaborated on stuff and we've worked on different projects together all our lives, and so you just end up with a stronger collaboration that's said. I also love the shows that I do with my friends, so maybe it's a really good collaborator. You're just 

Speaker 4 (41:08):
So great at working with people. 

Speaker 2 (41:10):
No, I just bring in really great people and then just grab their coattails and ride them forever. 

Speaker 4 (41:15):
Well, another thing to kind of note about a lot of the furniture in this room that I think maybe would surprise some people today, I don't know, 

Speaker 2 (41:23):
It's all fake. 

Speaker 4 (41:24):
It's 

Speaker 2 (41:25):
All native cardboard. 

Speaker 4 (41:26):
Yep. Surprise. That's the big trick. No, that I think of wood carving as this very macho act and pretty much everything in here was carved by women. 

Speaker 2 (41:39):
Here's the thing. Here's the thing, y'all, when I worked at the theater, if I needed a detail piece done, my wife came in and dah, dah, because mom, here's the thing. I won't speak in gender normative terms because I don't know. I have found in my working with my wife in our specific, me and her relationship, I like getting things done. And the way I look at it, it's like, okay, I want to mark stuff off the list. I want to finishing things, and she likes getting things. And so she like, this is the dumb, oh, man, I was done, listen to this the other day. We were picking out a high chair for our baby, and she spent two and a half hours researching and picking the right high chair. As I was sitting next to her losing my mind, just buy one, she said, hi, chair, it's fine. It's fine. Just buy one. And she wanted to get the right one. And I think that that is, if I were building a carved bed with my wife, I would let her do most of the actual, most of the actual art. Megan, I'm perfectly fine building a thing, but if I want it to look good when it's done, I let my wife finish it. 

Speaker 4 (42:54):
Well, that's actually, I'm pretty sure it was this beardie gentleman on the wall over here. I think it was either him or his son who basically said the exact same thing that, and again, sorry to be all men are from Mars, women are from Venus here, but that they felt at the time that women had better attention to detail and that they were better at carving these kind of detailed things than men were. So that was sort of their view on it from the 19th century. 

Speaker 2 (43:23):
I'm willing to bet that there's something less inherent about that and more just the stuff that we expect from the different genders throughout, blah, blah, blah. 

Speaker 4 (43:33):
Totally. 

Speaker 2 (43:35):
And God, there's so much to say about that that I'm not going to, but this idea of the expectation of, well, men, we're going to teach you how to swing an axe, and ladies, we're going to teach you how to season a dish. Listen. Hi, this is Travis McElroy. I'm not endorsing that at 

Speaker 4 (43:51):
All. 

Speaker 2 (43:52):
I'm saying that that is unfortunately societally so much more than like, Hey, what do you want to do? Great, let's do it. I think that there is a lot of stuff like that where it's like you're just trained differently from birth to worry about different things. 

Speaker 4 (44:06):
Even the fact that they were carving these things isn't necessarily a sign of true progression in a way of like, oh, look at this. But it also had a lot to do with that. Anything basically seen as domestic 

Speaker 2 (44:18):
Was 

Speaker 4 (44:19):
Seen as women's works, even if it came down to carving furniture. That was sort of the realm of what women did. So there's also that it was seen as more domestic. 

Speaker 2 (44:29):
Now tell me about who carved this Samsung TV here? This 

Speaker 4 (44:31):
Samsung TV was carved by Emma ler, and 

Speaker 2 (44:36):
She did a great job. It looks just like a Samsung tv, and she died in 1947, how she designed the modern day flat screen tv. No, I assume that's some kind of display. 

Speaker 4 (44:45):
Yeah. Yeah. I didn't turn it on, so we wouldn't have a racket uhoh you. No, 

Speaker 2 (44:49):
I got caught on a chair. I would like to look at this table. I've been eyeballing it the whole time. 

Speaker 4 (44:53):
Yes, especially when you kind of want to get up close to 

Speaker 2 (44:56):
Oh, yes, I was You inlay as close 

Speaker 4 (44:58):
As you're allowed to be, I should say. 

Speaker 2 (45:00):
I love inlay. 

Speaker 4 (45:01):
Yeah, that green in there is so intense. 

Speaker 2 (45:06):
Here's the thing, once again, I love subtle things that complete a thing where it's like, I think that that's what makes a lot of artists so much smarter or better. What's the difference between something I could draw if I worked really hard versus somebody who was born to do it? And the difference is I could work really hard and I could draw, well, if I trained really hard, I think I could draw something reasonable where you'd be like, I know exactly what that is. That looks exactly like the thing, but the difference is somebody who's born to do it is it needs this. It's like only now Doro. So that green ring really stands out and it's so beautiful. I wouldn't have thought to put that out. 

Speaker 4 (45:47):
Yeah, it's like that kind of little anomaly that just sort of adds that special little sparkle to it. 

Speaker 2 (45:54):
It's stuff that just jumps out. I mean, that's how I feel. I feel that way whenever I hear a really great musical or music where I'm just like, okay, maybe if I trained to do the thing is I think a lot of people will have this thought of, well, yeah, if I worked all my life to learn to, if I had trained to play cello forever, I could have done that too. And it's like, could you do a facsimile of that? But you wouldn't have the thing where it's like, okay, but could you have thought to do that thing different that they did? And it's like, well, no, I could play it. The thing is, Lin Manu Miranda is not Lin Manu Miranda because he trained really hard at it and learned by, it's because he has thought processes that make him think differently about the things. And it's the same. There's just so many skills. There are lots of skills you can teach, but you can't really teach creativity in that way. And so I look at this stuff and it's like, I could design a bookcase. I could design a bed. I could make a bed that looks like a bed. 

Speaker 2 (47:04):
Would I sit there and be like, it needs eight birds. If it's seven birds, it's going to look incomplete. And maybe I'd make a bed with seven birds. And I'm like, this is fine. And everyone's like, yeah, this is fine. But if I had had that eighth bird on there, and that sounds silly, and I'm saying it out loud and it sounds like I'm making a joke, but if I'd had that eighth bird on there that it was the thing that makes people step back and this makes me feel good. Look, it feels complete. It feels done. You did it 

Speaker 4 (47:30):
Well, it's also, it's like we were talking about the eighth Bird or the Green Circle, or even Lin Manuel Miranda. I'm thinking of those things that pop out 

Speaker 2 (47:40):
That 

Speaker 4 (47:40):
Are out sort of a little bit unexpected, and that's what sort of makes them special. So for me, when I'm just thinking about Hamilton, it's in the Skyler Sisters the Way, and Peggy is slightly offbeat that just makes it pop for me and makes me think like, oh, that's so funny. It's like she's extra. She doesn't matter in this song, and it's making a big joke of it, but it's that doing something just a little bit wrong. 

Speaker 2 (48:04):
Well, that's the thing in the opening number of Hamilton, Hey, let's talk about Hamilton for another 

Speaker 4 (48:08):
Two hours 

Speaker 2 (48:08):
In the opening number, 

Speaker 4 (48:09):
I'll mention, I'll hashtag Hamilton, and this will have the most listens I've ever had 

Speaker 2 (48:14):
When in the opening number, the line, take your time. And it hits this really interesting kind of chord thing. My wife, who was a musical theater major, I listened to that 10 times and finally I looked at her and I was like, Hey, why do I like that? Why does that sound good? And she was like, oh, well, it's this resolution. It's this thing. And it was like she gave me a great explanation two years ago and now I can't remember, but it was like, oh, it's because it's this and this and this. But all I knew was when that progression of notes hit, I like it 

Speaker 4 (48:44):
And 

Speaker 2 (48:44):
I enjoy it. 

Speaker 4 (48:45):
And that's how I kind of feel about music too, is I'm kind happy to sort of not totally understand it. It still is a little bit magic, but it is fun when somebody can explain that to you, oh, here's what this is how this works. 

Speaker 2 (48:59):
Yes, I agree with thought. That's also what I like about it. One of my favorite things too, and I just love that with really well polished, well stained wood when you can't tell the difference between the metal fixtures and the wood makes me really happy and I don't know why. 

Speaker 4 (49:19):
And you're kind of looking at the corner cupboard here when you're saying that. Yeah, 

Speaker 2 (49:24):
It's like if you told me it's all wood, I would believe you, but I'm looking at screws and hinges and stuff where I'm like, that's metal, but 

Speaker 4 (49:33):
It's like seamless 

Speaker 2 (49:35):
All of a piece, but then it compare that to the fixtures on this dresser over here. Wear vanity where the fixtures are like bright gold. I also like that, 

Speaker 4 (49:46):
But again, there's almost like a functional reason too. You want people to see that the part that they grab and pull, so it's practical as well that here, those hinges and things, you don't really need anyone to grab it, so you don't need them to see it. This cupboard is a little mysterious how you actually would open it in general, but 

Speaker 2 (50:04):
I'm also looking at the table, the green circle table. If you told me that was iron, I'd believe you. 

Speaker 4 (50:10):
Yeah. 

Speaker 2 (50:10):
You know what I mean? It's got, but it says it's ebonized white oak. Okay, cool. Sounds great. 

Speaker 4 (50:20):
Yeah. I'm guessing now that I keep looking at this cupboard now that I guess it's one of those things that just opens by the key. You have to turn it and then that opens. There's no real handles or anything to open it. 

Speaker 2 (50:32):
Well, this is also fun. I can't tell which door overlaps the other one. 

Speaker 4 (50:36):
Yeah, yeah. That's center bar. You can't really see which side it's a part of. 

Speaker 2 (50:41):
Well, here's the thing. I also think anybody who as a kid read the lion, the witch in the wardrobe or Indian in the cupboard or anything that had to do with magical furniture pieces. You see stuff like this and you're like, I just want to get in there. I want to get, I'm looking at this and all I want to do is get inside of it. 

Speaker 4 (50:59):
Well, 

Speaker 2 (51:00):
And I'm pretty sure I'm not allowed to. 

Speaker 4 (51:01):
No, no. That is frowned upon. 

Speaker 2 (51:03):
Yes. 

Speaker 4 (51:03):
Fair 

Speaker 2 (51:03):
Enough. 

Speaker 4 (51:05):
On the cover or the cover, the doors here, you have Freya and Thor, and so I think that also adds to that kind of narnia feeling of like, I'm going to go into a magical land where Nors Gods live, just have to go through this cupboard. 

Speaker 2 (51:19):
I appreciate all of these artworks. I also, it has a roof. You know what I mean? It's kind of like a slanted roof that it absolutely, positively does not need to be a finished piece, except it's better than it does. 

Speaker 4 (51:31):
Yeah. Any other pieces you want to talk about in here? Anything else? Catch your fancy, kind of hit almost everything, didn't we? 

Speaker 2 (51:42):
One little thing. I like that this is asymmetrical both in 

Speaker 4 (51:47):
The 

Speaker 2 (51:47):
Shells and the drawers, but also the carvings on the doors in the top. Centerpiece is asymmetrical. I like it 

Speaker 4 (51:56):
On the top one too. I like how the one that's a little fuller has the emptier side, so it's sort of a sense of balance. You have this one that's a little less complete, but then it's balanced out by the three drawers on the side. 

Speaker 2 (52:09):
But not only that, okay, now I'm looking at all the asymmetry. There's a knob on the top front there, not there. 

Speaker 4 (52:17):
Oh yeah. 

Speaker 2 (52:17):
There's spiral carved in the air where it's more of a leaf lattice carved into that side. Even the bottom ones are different pieces with different flowers and different arrangements of them. The top piece is asymmetrical as the vine is growing and just look the top, the insignia there has one cross piece of wheat or a thistle or something like that instead of two crossed pieces. So it's just, it's asymmetrical kind of start to finish in a way that you don't normally see in carved furniture. I'm looking around the room trying to see if there's anything else that jumps out at me. I mean, unless it's a piece like the birds, but most of it is very balanced, one side or the other. But on this one, it's much more of like, no, I wanted nature and nature is not balanced, so that's what I did. And I just love that as artistic choices of like, no, I'm building a piece. I don't want someone to be able to recreate it. Anyways, that just jumped out. I like the asymmetry in it. It's very balanced too. It doesn't feel weird, but it's also like, okay, this is little, but this shelf 

Speaker 2 (53:32):
Is centimeter half an inch higher than the other side, so it's not a straight line across. And that shelf, the taller shelf is thinner and the lower shelf is thicker, and so it feels balanced even though it's asymmetrical. So it's like balanced asymmetry is just very, I like that as a design choice. It makes it more interesting while still feeling of a piece and feeling like it all makes sense. 

Speaker 4 (54:00):
I agree. Yeah. You're noticing stuff I've never noticed. 

Speaker 2 (54:03):
Well, like I said, I like woodwork. I like carpentry, I like furniture. So I just get to take one of these home with me now, or How's that 

Speaker 4 (54:11):
Work? That's the rules. That's how the game works. Yeah. 

Speaker 2 (54:12):
Okay, cool. I'm going to take the Thor cabinet done. 

Speaker 4 (54:15):
Alright, well we'll have our boys pack it up for you. Okay, great. 

Speaker 2 (54:17):
Thank you. 

Speaker 4 (54:18):
Just pick it up in the loading dock. Terrific. Perfect. 

Speaker 2 (54:20):
Roll your car around. Fit, blow, fit in my hatchback. 

Speaker 1 (54:22):
Yeah, I think 

Speaker 2 (54:23):
So. Awesome. 

Speaker 4 (54:23):
I mean, they could probably tie it to the roof, if not. 

Speaker 2 (54:25):
Excellent, excellent. Maybe a tarp or something, but maybe it's a Nice day. 

Speaker 4 (54:30):
Alright, well thank you. Thank you so much, Travis, for looking at some art with me. 

Speaker 2 (54:34):
Well, thank you for having me. Sure. 

Speaker 1 (54:42):
Thank you for listening to Art Palace. We hope you'll come visit the Cincinnati Art Museum and have conversations about the art yourself. General admission to the museum is always free, and we also offer free parking Special exhibitions on view right now are William KenRidge. More Sweetly Play the Dance Tiffany Glass painting with color and light, the poetry of place. William Cliff, Linda Connor, and Michael Kenna. And it's the final days to see dressed to kill Japanese arms and armor and transcending reality. The wood cuts of Kosaka ga May 7th is their final day. And if you want to come celebrate Japanese culture with your family, visit us on May 6th from 12 to 4:00 PM for Family First Saturday. We'll have special art projects, performances, and more at this free museum wide event. For program reservations and more information, visit cincinnati art museum.org. You can follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat. Our theme song is Efron Al by Balal. And as always, be sure to rate and review us on iTunes. Maybe this is one of your first episodes and you liked it, let others know. I'm Russell Iig and this has been Art Palace produced by the Cincinnati Art Museum.