Robert Ortiz Studios Blog

It’s Sunday September 26 as I am writing this and this afternoon I will “play” John Wesley Dobbs one last time in the world premier of Robert Earl Price’s “All Blues.”  I found that the process of creating Mr. Dobbs was not dissimilar to making a piece of furniture.  The playwright handed me the blueprints or design, if you will,  in the words that he gave me to speak, the actions that my character was to perform.  The challenge for the actor is to bring those words to life, not just to say them but to convey the underlying emotion, feeling and reason for the words being spoken.  I had an “aha” moment as I was trying to learn this and what it meant.  It was furniture making that showed me the way.

I have designed a line of furniture of about 40 pieces and, while I have made repeat versions of individual pieces, none of them is ever the same.  Sure the dimensions are the same, they may have similar joinery but the essence of the “painting” of the object, the grain and texture of the wood is always different.  For one client it may be a quiet Sofia Entry Table, for another it may be that the selection of wood for the top is bolder and thus it’s a dramatic Sofia Entry Table, one that calls more attention to itself.   So, though I may make 20 Sofia Entry Tables or Daniel Coffee Tables, they are each a different piece, a different painting if I take care to be true to my process.

So in my “aha” moment as John Wesley Dobbs I came to realize that my obligation as an artist and an actor was to, each night, take what I had learned from the previous night’s performance and my studying during the day and continue to refine my John Wesley Dobbs.  My words were the same, but the texture and awareness of my character needed to be refined  if he were to remain a vital character.  I wish that I could “play” him for a long time, there is more that I think I could discover.  There is also, I think, a better actor in me that I might be able to become but there’s also work to be done back at the shop, furniture to be made and I am anxious to find out how this experience of being a “temporary actor” will inform my furniture making. I am convinced that it will, I’m just not sure how yet…stay tuned.

These are all unrefined thoughts  so I would certainly welcome any thoughts and comments you might have.  For those of you who might follow this blog, I hope to have more information on finishing posted soon.

I am here in Atlanta, Georgia for a week acting in the premier of Robert Earl Price’s play “All Blues.”  You may correctly ask what this has to do with woodworking, but as I have taken on the role of an apprentice in this new craft, I can’t help but be struck by the many similarities in both disciplines.  This is a one shot deal – I have no illusions that I am going to become an actor, but having been offered the opportunity and believing in the theme of the play, I hoped that it would be fun.  I’ve been working on this just about every day for the past 4 months.  It’s been a lot of work, at times utterly terrifying, sometimes  frustrating but finally very satisfying and fun also.  Over the next few days that I will be here, I hope to be able to reflect on what I have learned.  My hope is that perhaps you might find some useful ideas that you can apply to your own discipline.

The hardest part of this endeavor, for me, has been taking on the role of an apprentice.  I thought I left that behind a long time ago.  In my studio my errors are usually made privately and at best I even get to incorporate them into a piece.  On stage everyone sees your errors…there’s no place to hide.    I have been well aware that the first shortcoming that all apprentices have is “no peripheral vision.”  That is, they only see what is right in front of their nose.  The novice at the table saw sees only the cut to be made.  He or she may lose sight of how the piece relates to the rest of the project or how the grain of the piece they have chosen may actually distract from the whole.  Only with experience does the apprentice learn to have a longer view of the project “in their head”.  Thus they can see, not only what is right in front of them, but also the road ahead.

I had a sense that it would be the same with acting, but much to my dismay I seemed incapable of avoiding the same lack of peripheral vision on stage.  If I remember my lines (what’s right in front of my nose) I forget to project, or neglect to stand still…and let’s not even get into a discussion of – can I find the right emotion to convey to the audience what I’m trying to project?   It reminds me of the guy who used to spin plates on the old Ed Sullivan variety show of the 60′s.  He’d be spinning ten plates, turn his attention to one, and four others would start to fall.   I am now that guy.

I suspect that most apprenticeships would follow the same arc regardless of the discipline, be it craft, art, music, athletics and dare I say it, business.  One other thing that I have found to be very curious is how my brain seems to have responded to all of this.  When I was in school – many years ago – I was very good at languages.  Over the years, it has seemed to me that I lost that ability to retain words or phrases heard in another tongue and much to my dismay even in English and Spanish.  Needless to say, I was worried about my ability to learn my lines and several longer monologues.  Much to my horror, it took me about 4 weeks to learn the first long one, but I worked at it every day and to my surprise, the second one – just as long – took 2 weeks.  By the time I got to the last one, I had it in 4 days.  I guess the brain is like a muscle…you have to work it.

If I have learned anything in my years of making furniture and running a business, it is this:   suit up every morning, turn the lights on , stay focused and get to work.  It does not guarantee success but you won’t succeed unless you do that.  The knowledge  and “the method” I have developed and learned as a wood worker, as an artist  has served me well and shown me a way forward as an actor.

…I’m off to an afternoon rehearsal…the Atlanta premier of “All Blues” is tomorrow evening.

After several months and many meetings the new Ortiz Studios web site has gone “live” this morning.  First of all, thank you to my friends Michael Wootton of Chesapeake Bay Internet Associates and to Karen Ashley for their thoughtful and patient  work on my behalf.
Karen and Michael had some ideas about how to present the furniture and the work here at the “shop.”  The new web site is the realization of that vision. The basic idea was to get away from the “website as catalog” and be more graphically oriented – to show more photos of furniture.  I also thought it was time to say less and let the newsletter and blog pick up that function.   So…take a look around the site, let me know your thoughts and please remember that if you’d like to see more photos, you can always contact me directly or view previous posts on this blog.   As always, you are always welcome to visit.
The photo below is a version of the coffee table that is on the home page of the new website.   It incorporates some new variations on the Sofia design…floating shelf, more complex leg.  The top and shelf are made of African curly bubinga; the base is wenge.  On the home page of the web site, the top and shelf are made of Hawaiian Koa.