Spectrum Hawaii; 021; 022

The following program is a production of key HGT in Honolulu Hawaii Public Television. The following program was funded in part by the Hawaii State foundation on culture and the arts. Day on spectrum. We will visit two distinguished artists you should sit down with an award winning animator with the National Film Board of Canada and Leona Mitchell is one of the needy and ready for family generation. Opera has long and established musical tradition as an eminent Soprano of today's opera Leona Mitchell often with life to

aspiring young. Actresses. Today. Animators are employing new types of materials in that issue but now a native of India has made numerous technical advances in the art of animation here. Hawaii Public Television is now sunniness interview packing. Issue. Most people are familiar with this type of animation called cell animation when you draw and paint hundreds and hundreds sometimes thousands of pictures to get what they were looking for when you're not involved with this technique. You can explain to us what methods you've. OK well the kind of traditional cell technique which Disney did in these little films that isn't really getting really expensive because you have to have so many people to work on it. And so when one has to use to paint in piles and piles of

drawing it gets very very expensive. If it's a half an hour in one hour from you can imagine how many times it need. So people have been developing different kind of things over the years. And one of the very simple one is the cut out gone where you don't have to draw the same drawing over and over again. Instead you have a drawing made of two different bars different sections and then you can use the hands and the legs and. Eyes and a mouth and a nose and different pieces separately and then manipulate it in the camera. I'll give get a very simple example of. For example let's say this is a square here. If you had to do with a traditional method the same square in the square is moving from this position to this position like that on a screen that's clearly be drawn several time. That means descript has to be drawn over and over again the painted color. And so whereas with kind of techniques you can put the same square here and then most likely take one frame most likely take one frame most likely me take one frame and then eventually the square which is.

So that means your one piece of square which you just manipulate under the camera frame by frame. You must also remember that animation can show a single frame at a time you can never have to run the gamut continuously. And it's a very sophisticated machine is often used in the schools and colleges often they use cameras with single frames so you can duplicate it like that. Now that's a simple. You can use complex one life character has a lot of character. He's a little boy and there's a show here. And his legs and everything. So you can get in one of those. We haven't had all the parts here separately but can have this separate unit separately and you practically make him walk make him do things what you want to do. So that's one aspect. Then there are various other things people use. And actually I

have used in one of my film the beach and you can see here some of the song to be seen with your a little girl or younger and that this is all of it. And the Indians and song used for their decorations on their throats and so on. So these kind of material you could use it and it all just shows you just need to be on the loose like that. So now you can form any shape you want so that you can shape it like that in one frame and you can shape it slightly more like that. And that's something very simple but you can also Line them up with a little brush like that. And if you if you line them up one by one at a time like this you have made a drawing out of the beads actually. You start off doing everything or this line by line. It's just a flexible line.

Let's see this is the line here right now that this line is turr twisting like that. All you have to do is to frame by frame change the position of the light something you can use that you object to for drawing a line like that or like that curved them like that slightly and so forth and so on very fine images can be done by the brush. Now this is just a simple one but you can you can just draw any animal or human Feaver you lined them up in that form and that would make it look like an animal. And then you change it frame by frame what actually supposed to do. So these are all the things people use people of use sand under the camera and you shift them into different shapes and everything else depends on your imagination how you do it. Your technique seems to be an individual technique where you

alone control everything. Whereas this technique involve many many people doing many many different things and find this as far as expression of art. This is more personal. Well this is this kind of extra new medium also gives you a different visual quality on the screen first. Secondly it also gives you the freedom to try some different subject which you cannot do with cartoons or any machine which most people are familiar with. So having different materials having cut outs or sand or things like that scene or something we go for this kind of new ideas which then gives you possibilities to go into a different kind of subject. Something very serious. Often people associate cartoon or funny joke to that man with a big nose and feel bang bang bang. Whereas this one you can go into the very serious subject matter. So it is it has a personal expression.

And your material is actually helping to interpret I'm sure the material follows the material it gives you the kind of action Jesus style. He also gives it a style of concepts and ideas. So this is just one of the two which is also slightly cheaper in terms of one man show one person who controls everything he can. Auditioners the idea that he makes it he doesn't have to draw anything because the material is there and you go under the camera and work for several weeks and months and keep shooting. When I find something else I usually just blast the scene in some cases I use. And this is the plasticine kids used for making models. Now there is also in any mission same way you make two dimensional models and you you move the hands and the legs and the face and everything and you have single frame. People are familiar with this stuff. This stuff it kind of fanned by French culture. But I've also tried something else which is you backlight plasticine. I love the camera and you do all your character in that. And

when the light shines through the plasticine then you change every frame you change like you're drawing. It's like sculpturing under the camera. What do you think computer graphics will do to animators like you and me. Well I think it's getting late here are what the computer will do. Our is planning a film and I discovered that it's very very costly to use the machines first of all it's in a very early stage. There's a lot of technical gadgets and all

hardware and software. There are various companies are making various kind of effect animation and there is no coordination between industry among the industry. So what happens is that you've got you've got to you can do something here. This particular system. Something else you have to go in California. Some other kind of effects you have to go to Denver and this kind of system is been laid down by the people in the Guardian very seriously. So when I go and when I'm making a film when I go to one particular system they tell me that there is a distinction here you can only do this but for this year to go somewhere else. And so when I go somewhere so they know one particular system exists where the artist doesn't have to worry about any issues and it's very very costly. So I don't know where it's going to go. Maybe the cost will come down a bit and it'll be used but it is. Also my impression and people who are working in Mission very impression is that it will never take

over to be again one more to from set in motion to cut outs to plasticine to stand to beat it so we can prove that it has a certain slick look and you can only do so much with that kind of look really reflects what we're doing now. Spectrum's executive producer Nino Jane Martin enjoys a conversation with Leona Mitchell. She discusses her career as an opera singer and then sings a few of her favorite selections. Newnam What ever made you get into this crazy business. That's what I asked myself when I first was as you know didn't I want to sing opera. I was very afraid to try it because no one around. I had no examples of people that had gone into it and. I was thinking really you know I don't know how one gets into opera. What do you do and what it was like opera. Oh no no no I think there you are.

Yes. And all involved. But no I maybe heard my first opera recording when I was 17 that late and it was two recordings of one was Maria Colace and one was Lanting price doing it either. And I was just blown away I just thought it was so gorgeous and I wanted to emulate them. And I studied them as an opera singer. I must say this chorus teacher of course to me into doing these parts for my on the school program and I studied a little bit with her. She said it wasn't that difficult because I had had three AS's French in three years in Spanish are reading through my high school and junior high. So to learn the language was not so difficult for me but it was just the technique of singing and she would teach me everyday before school. These lessons in opera but other than that I've had no contact with it. First of all like yourself when you hear that applause out there what does it mean to you. Especially now having gone through what I call being a grown up singer

versus somebody green going into it. It is so worth all the pain that one has. As you go along in life it's applause is worth everything. Can you sense the depth of sincerity in the audience. Yes because actually opera audiences are very vocal and demonstrative. I mean it's terrible that they boo when they don't like you are they polite applause you know they half like you and tremendous applause so yes. You feel it as a matter of fact during a performance I think you can feel it. The public is really with you when. You get a sense of feeling if anything happened to you on stage. You know you could hear these stories about things that happened sets for the most embarrassing moments. How long is it in your hands. I love that one. Well just recently I just did. Daymond which Americans called Desdemona Othello and I had you know they

I'll tell it had already strangled me and I had I had to call. So I was just getting over a cold and I was thinking I said What am I going to do when I'm dead. I can't call. But I had to I had to really do it. And I kept asking my husband and God did you see me or after I have expired you know. That was embarrassing to me because I mean as an actress I just couldn't conceive of them. I wasn't all that opera but I don't think that people noticed that much. I tried to suppress that. Also another time in Santa Fe I was playing the Countess from the marriage of Figaro a very dignified and you know a royalty and all. And indeed this was a dress rehearsal and they had pinned my wig my curls. Not well so they fell on the floor. And now to be dignified and pick up your curls and all of that. That was quite a time. It was very very comfortable and very a voice does it really well when you know the vocal chords are very tiny little

things and opera singers sing without microphones you know that's the one good thing the pop singers having their favorite mikes. I think you could maybe keep your voice a little bit longer but we have to sing over these big orchestras and with no mikes and the voice only last for so long. But if you take care of it I think it can last a little bit longer than some of them have. But you're in your early 30s. You have a long way to go. I do. Again I know Carlos and Sovaldi were at their peak of my age and like they were finished by 38. So sorry about that. No because I've done it differently than they have. I didn't start out singing quite the dramatics repertoire that they did. They were 21 into thinking and I waited until 31 too. So I hope that my span of singing will go differently I would want to sing until I'm 60 I mean latein and Joso in their 50s 67 now and they're still going strong.

I would like to do the same thing. I would imagine that whenever you're singing opera you certainly have to know the language. You just learn it by rote or do you actually understand the words that a lot Americans learn by rote because where we don't hear Italian we don't hear French you may learn it in school. But the actual use of it you don't do in America which is a shame you know really it is because we have all kinds of people in America and it is a shame that we don't hear some of these languages more often. But a lot of Americans have to learn by rote. In that case. Which is a sort of a hindrance because you don't have the total scope of a language inside of you the flavor of it but that's all we have exactly the nuances in this you know. But I think we do well in spite of that. And I think that's why a lot of singers go and live in these countries so that they can become fluent. I haven't had the opportunity though to live in the countries I've been. Six weeks here eight weeks there to give a little flavor. But I would love to spend a lot of time in songs places but I've been so busy

just you know jumping from Paris with places that I haven't had a chance to do. Why do you speak. Well I have. A work man's knowledge of French and Italian a little bit German I feel like I'm in squalor. For many Italians all in Julliard I've had teachers and all throughout California. And ask you the inevitable. I'm sure that you've been asked to do this at every interview ever done in your life. Could you sing a song for you. Of course. I think I'd like to think about being Ocado from Johnny squeakiest Puccini. OK. Now why don't we hear that. I know. Omeo Bambino Katoh from gyse Kiki. Glorious. Glorious.

So beautiful. Ok and now you have other types of music certainly you are the daughter of a Pentecostal minister in Oklahoma and certainly you must have been influenced by that. Oh I was I was required to read and I did a lot of gospel music. I suppose ever since I was 10 years old up until about 18 until I went into opera I did gospel music. Well I had to kind of put gospel aside because it's a slightly different technique of singing. There's a difference between gospel and spiritual. Yes it is spirituals for gospel and spiritual naturally have the same text the religious text but the spirituals are generally done with more of an operatic type of style of thinking. So what you're doing and we're going to do. Yes yes. And this is going to be a true spirit of verses.

OK thank God not anymore. Because it is really a very different technique. So what would you say your sweet little Jesus boy is a very favorite of mine and my mother's was her favorite and was early on as much as. The. Sweet little Jesus boy. By Soprano Leona Mitchell. And we're

talking with her today here on spectrum. But just before we leave I'd like to ask you a couple of other questions. One is how do you feel. How do you assess your career and being so successful at such a tender age. I had a lot of good things happen to me and good people that surround me and. I've had a lot of good advice. And I think that I have always said from the very beginning of my career I tried to keep within a framework of a plan that I've had and I'm going just as I plan I'm doing the repertoire that I want to do where I want to be. If you were to give some advice to young people who are coming up one of the operatic stars or singers or whatever any particular piece if I like to give them. Yes I yes because I really would like to maybe at some point in my career do college circuit and talk to a lot of young sing.

I'm a little concerned about a vocal teacher that's my pet peeve in kids putting their trust in some of these seats. Of course if it's a good teacher then that's where you put your trust in them. But if it's so many young people that are led astray that lose their voices before they even begin a career. And I would say to them that they have to trust a certain something in themselves to know if somebody is kind of leading them astray and not just go blindly. I mean if you can't sing a note that you sang you know six six months ago obviously something is not working properly. So I would say you know be aware that there are people out there that don't know how to teach well but there are some that do. Obviously someone got a hold of you and touch you will be doing very well. Our very special guest today is Leona Mitchell here on spectrum soprano and thank you so much for being with us and sharing some of your thoughts and ideas and spirit. Thank you. Thank you. My pleasure. Michael Douglas thank you. Practicing an art form helps us to more fully appreciate its demands on

our skill. Listening to the comments of established Asha's serves to heighten our awareness of the needs and the problems that face any creator. Whether laboring alone to protect a form or acting in cooperation with other members of the art community. The talent of the artist is a gift that may be shared by all. Join us again on our next spectrum. Spectrum was funded in part by the Hawaii State foundation

on culture and the arts. The following program is a production of HGT in Honolulu Hawaii

Public Television. The following program was funded in part by the Hawaii State foundation on culture and the arts. Today on spectrum you have to read the works of what is most eminent stained glass artist. And discover an unusual art exhibit. The participation is well. Then we've observed a photographer composing images why he explains is the sense of touch is the opposite of a special exhibit by contributing

contemporary art. It's no Academy of Arts and exhibit that invites the viewer to use his hands as well as his eyes. The art of photography selects images which arrests our attention. Images which we might otherwise ignore. Today we'll find out what images photographers stand to make a choose. And why. But first. Spectrum advances into a world made of glass. That we know is a stained glass artist internationally renowned. Born and bred in Germany a few years ago Eric apprenticed in Boston during the early 1950s. He has lived and worked around the world choosing Hawaii as his most recent film. Spectrum looks in on Ericka's Moreno Valley home where she is completing a work in progress as a gift to her husband today. Erika Carter when I glances back and discusses several of her more memorable stained glass window

conditions. What is exciting. Oh everything. Everything. Because first of all the colors can get you started. But. Of course you have to have ideas what you want to do without an idea or you really can design can. You. Think. So satisfying the colors of satisfied. That even without any subject to just putting colors together. It's. Fun. It's exciting you know. I still like to just put rectangles. Can be lots of fun. My recent challenge of course was the ceiling at the woman who did this to. Me. This was really up for. Something I've done many

many vertical windows but this is a horizontal thing and totally different from chiefly because of its weight and the height of the ceiling. It's about 64 feet from the ground which made a great difference. OK. The subject has to be abstract because if you had a realistic thing with figures you would have to train your neck all the time and it would be very difficult to seem to enjoy. Although most of those stained glass commissioned from churches Komando building presented with a new shot. At St. Andrews Priory chapel. I had a real problem

as there was a structural problem the architect had to have a column right in the very center of the window which Sister Evelyn one did that I often have structure problems but that one wasn't really real. Actually there are two windows one window two narrow strips tall and there was. But she wanted it made to look like one window. And you have to be almost imitation to achieve to make it look like one window and decide she wanted to take that it's also very difficult. She went into a tree. She had seen the famous just yet shot and she really loved the idea of the shark of course has figures it's a figurative window and yeah I was working with very crude blocks of wood of

grass and no painting no figures in the way I saw that. I use the column to appear like the center of the trunk of the tree and I design branches out from this column and on each branch I place a crown representing the kings of Juda and each crown a different. And they're done in a very very small scale. Very true. Like at the top with a conventional tree it would have a figure of either Christ or the Virgin the child. I have a burst of light representing I. The say. That. Everyone has stained glass project with.

I'm drawing a sketch in her long experience a thorough knowledge of glass and a wide variety of colors textures and thickness has been gained. Now and then straighten this out a little. This is the costume to. The new I'm making no and when residents first come to design design. Then they cut to an actual size. And then I make my patterns to look. For. Patterns. That are already designated and are numbered and. The colors are also possible. The colors are. Marked. However I'm having difficulty with the colors. I never seem

to have the right color so I mull over that a long time. That's what makes the process so slow. Oh I use all kinds of class. I like your European allies. I love French antique like French antique and I like the English class English which is very difficult to get a very very. German Belgian. There is some domestic flights to from Virginia but generally speaking like what's known as there and it's made to look and appear very much like the live show. When you do more detailed work you do figures faces painted for instance. Usually I don't consider good taste to paint on the stick glass. It's the nature of the thick

glass so totally different it's a crude ceria and should be handled that. That's the beauty of it and the other one you can paint it still you wish you can do all kinds of things. The turtle and originally of course that's how stained glass started and the old windows and friends in the truck for 11th 12th century they were to. See things rises. Church windows. Rescreen about my jobs saying Friend liveing is my enemy

the Windows ME and the architects wanted to put a light right over the window looks like a flat like it's a no no. Inside the brain and. In fact looking at stained glass from the outside it's like looking at the back of a picture. Very many people don't realize that they really don't. I've never been. It's very very difficult. I think everybody in the congregation comes the same idea. No really the church because first of all I know the way. And. It's

true. And luckily they let the. Subject matter. To me in time. The window is quite tall. I think it's seven. Feet wide in the title of it is the crooks gem which means the Jew a cross. Finally. The success of a Windows total effect. Is largely due to the amount of light behind it. Coming up on spectrum the motives and methods of photographer Stan Tomita

Charles Welch a very special Auto-ID resents touch sensory art exhibit at the Academy of Arts Academy docent Jean Culbertson leads a group of curious children through yonge fiber and string. All right I'm going on the left do. You. Come over here. And be sure to feel both top on the bottom here. What do you think these things look like. What do you think there's going to be. OK that's a good thing. You know what the artist. She says. Groschens. Do. You think. She. Said. All. This. Stuff. Is so

supposing you were going to take one and paint a picture frame a picture would you. Paint this exhibit is a touch show a hands on experience for both visually impaired blind and sighted people. We're trying to get people to look at art in a different way will actually feel art in a different way to look at their senses and their perception of art. Through touch instead of just visual aesthetics. Now what does that feel like compared to the other things you are. It's smoother. It's more like a glass. What. Does it feel like. Why is a nonprofit organization we are interested in making the arts performing arts and visual arts more

accessible for disabled people in the community. Another great thing on this show is different because we're taking into consideration participation it's really participatory experience for everyone. This is a new experience I think for the Arctic cademy it's also a new experience however for many museums in the United States of very few programs have really been accessible to disabled people up until the last few years. So hopefully it will just be a beginning for the art Arta cademy and many other museums to open up their doors to lots of people. And I do want to warn you a little bit last time I set me up and Jolene you can have some surprises and you are going to be some noises. You said you wanted the noise well you. Want the envelope. Oh it's.

My. Dreams. You just say as we'll. Well then what does that feel like to get something to eat. Something that you never have a hard. Time. Right. And one important point I think is that oftentimes when we've approached artists to work with disabled people they are hesitant at first because they think that they're not we're sort of apprehensive or scared about working with disabled people they think they're different. But this gave the artist for at least an opportunity to explore the possibility of making a creative experience for disabled people and to take in the special needs of these

people and maybe give them a new way of looking at creating something other than just a visual experience. I find myself feeling like peace if I work on it a lot more and that I've become more aware of how it feels and even just sanding and grinding and things like that where you look at it and it looks smooth and then you touch it and it doesn't anymore. And for a person that couldn't see it they would get a whole different idea of a piece. And what I would have by just looking at it. In the gallery on location or in his studio. The photographer is ever alert to the impact of images. Photographer Stan Tomita explores this phenomenon and reveals his personal approach. When he brought the image to order it finally came

up for air. I hope I mean I'm still reprinting what I'm having trouble with the final word. You mean you don't have anything yet. You know I've been looking at the image that I'm looking for should have specs so what I've been concerned with in photography for the last 15 years and because it's the last image of the exhibition should be both an ending and a beginning. Bring it in when you pile. I'd like to see it. OK. I got to go back to you. OK. See you later. Bye bye. I. Got it.

Ray. Why did you pick. The foundations for this image released in the early years. Walking the street talking to people doing their portraits even having conversations with walls and surfaces of incomprehensible textures much time was spent looking watching trying to focus in on something I photographed with no preconceptions itinerary no for me know my hands move on their own accord. And it is all improvised at the moment of exposure exploration discovery and inner dialogue as are the prime motivators of my work. I am trying to be receptive

to all I do not know. My images are primarily autobiographical in nature. They expose aspects of myself. Oh I think oh I feel where I've been where I am and maybe even where I am to go. During a one year stands up. I walked around almost every day and somehow photography and commitment were crystallized. Japan was a time for quiet conversations and thoughts laughter food and q always being exposed to everyday living and ways of life and your aesthetics. Like what you saw me you again I was also introduced to Tom the way I thought

that predates him. But targer then became a language of symbols and metaphors images about images images and covering images. I was given this word to think about MA Bordeaux. She describes a feeling state in response to an experience. The thing can be of itself and simultaneously a symbol of something completely unrelated. Sometimes it can be so real so intense you can taste it and being so mesmerized. Images float by behind your eyes and the series leading to the last image where the exhibition depicts the

three dimensions that I've been concerned with the surface of both the surface and behind the surface symbolic equivalences are past present future. The fourth dimension is time for timelessness the Fusion and union of all three dimensions to one moment which is the No. My work is a process of an underlayer. When the artist Pioneer's a new path of perception can we be far behind. If we are exposed to new views of the common place in a fresh form or an intriguing path and doesn't it invigorate

and Renu us. Join us again on our. Next. Two.

Spectrum was funded in part by the Hawaii State foundation on culture and the arts.