Early hoaxes and lessons

- So I went to a Ball State. - Yeah. - 'Cause it was in state and in state tuition was like ridiculously cheap and so it was Ball State, IU, or Purdue. And my sister had gone to Purdue and I don't know. I picked, oh, I know why I picked Ball State, because before I took that arts class, we had applied the summer between my junior and senior year. So I had applied for elementary education, 'cause I didn't really know what I wanted to do. - Yeah. - And that was a great school for that. - Okay. - But by taking that class throughout the year, I got more and more excited about art design and so we actually called the school and by the end of my senior year, I was admitted into the arts program. - That's awesome. - Yeah. - Very cool. - So yeah, I studied graphic design, because yeah, my parents were very, very supportive, but my dad said you got to make sure you get a degree and you get a job then. - Yeah. - But yeah, so I mean, basically, I just kind of just worked my tail off the whole time doing all sorts. I think a lot of the shows and things that I did were somewhere between art design and pranks. - Oh, pranks. - Yeah. (laughs loudly) - Tell me more about pranks. What do you mean pranks? Like sarcasm, commentary, or? - Well, so there was a lot of... There wasn't a lot of excitement about the arts and at the school and other students in general that were outside of the arts program, so we did different things like where you go to a football game and you paint the letters on your chest. So we, three of us painted art on our chest. (laughs loudly) And we told the president at university that we needed to talk to him about something. I don't remember what our excuse was, but we got in his office with him. And we're videoing the whole time and then we ripped off our shirts and like chanted art. (laughs loudly) And-- - That's awesome. - Yeah, and then he did let us get a picture before he kicked us out. (laughs) - So, at least he had a sense of humor-- - Yeah, yeah. - And just different things like that. I was putting on a show, it was a group show and no one was... I had talked to a lot of people and I'm like, you guys come to this, and like, oh, I got a class, or oh, I got this thing here, I don't know. And so, there is no excitement and no one's going to come to this show. So I created a bunch of controversy about it, and then wrote to the school paper. - Oh, and yeah, and get up that easy. What kind of controversy did you create? - Well, I don't know. Yeah. (laughs loudly) I might preferred... Yeah, I don't remember. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - But basically, I created a bunch of controversy and then wrote to the paper a letter to the editor, saying like, oh, we're going to boycott this show, and we hate this and stuff and so they printed it. - Oh, fantastic. - And then it was on the news, not the city news, but the school news. - Yeah. - And it was the biggest attended show ever. (laughs loudly) I mean, the Dean came. - That's fantastic. - Everybody came. - What was the show's theme, What was it about? - It was just a sculpture show. And that's the thing that in the end, there was nothing really... - Controversial? - Yeah, and then there was a bunch of discussion about it afterwards and then in everybody's classes, but the thing is once they found out that it was all an elaborate hoax, everyone got let down and very angry with me. (laughs loudly) And so I feel like in college, I did learn a lot of different things about that. - Yeah. - I did another show where I felt like it wasn't that interesting for me to just make work. So I made all this work and said that it was made by this old person who made this work in the '70s. And created this whole, like made it very official and gallery asked and printed big boards and artist statements and facts about this stuff and everyone thought that some other art group had brought the show in. And, I met someone who said it was the most inspiring show they'd ever seen. And I was like, oh, you know, what's funny is I did that. (laughs loudly) And you can just see, just it all, like everything drain. - To settle that down? - Yeah, and they're like that completely ruined that for me. (laughs loudly) And so I had some hard lessons and I feel like I learned that. - Sorry, I'm laughing at your-- - No, no, no, yeah, It was funny. It's funny. - You trust we've move on from that now. - Yeah. - Well, what I realized is you have to... I thought I was helping. I had no evil intentions. - Right. - But the outcome was sort of, and that what I realized is everyone needs to be in on it, and it needs to help. And so everything I've done since then it's almost like you've learned lessons the hard way to then never repeat. So everything I kind of done since has been about building everybody up. And I'll still find ways to bring people like the caution tape itself. - Yeah, yeah. - But it's not... It takes it to a different way.