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C: Do you think everyone could use more color in their lives?

P: In terms of soundbites—sure. Yes. But it’s such a back and forth history. A lot of it has to do with the way colors are produced, and with what people can stand. There are two  aspects: one is production, one is maintenance, or living with. Pigments like white and creme are comprised of dirt. They’re easy to produce, so they’re everywhere.

The thing that astounds me is the way people dress [in muted colors]. Maybe it’s a part of Puritanism. But Italians, who are predominately Catholic, do the same. It may have originated with the way dyes are produced. But it also has to do with how we live and interact with the color of things. I haven’t evolved enough in my thinking to understand.

But that’s what MEMPHIS was.

I feel one of the contributions I made maybe had something to do with California and color. Coming out of the 70s and into the 80s, a whole group of people that I knew were doing what now is called POSTMODERNISM, which is about the gathering and amalgamation of existing information as a way of making something new.

The thing that I did—of course, I made all kinds of ideas and reactions, but, basically—I wanted everything to be bright. I just had to do it. I was trying to make all these colors vibrate and come together, and that’s what I brought to these Italian guys and gals in Memphis. Their stuff is tamer than mine, and I laugh because when Memphis was over, they went back to their natural good taste!

Traditionally, paintings are mostly neutral, with a few accents. I was reversing that for some reason; I was making everything high majors, with neutrals being the accents.

C: Does color bring more happiness?

P: Would people be happier with color? A lot people don’t want to stand out. The neutral color thing has a lot to do with our ability to live with it. It’s a comfort thing, whatever your preference is. George Bernard Shaw’s way of saying it was something to the effect of, “He who desires a lifetime of complete happiness desires to enjoy the taste of wine by keeping it your mouth indefinitely to savor the taste.”

Most people can’t stand the high color. It doesn’t mean that neutral or understated colors or design can’t be beautiful.

I remember this particular department store in Sapporo. There was an attic, and it had all these used kimonos. The striking thing is that there weren’t any bright colors. There were the most unusual colors. Purple beiges, beige purples. Beige with a spot of purple. Blue grey, green grey, dove grey. Hundreds and hundreds of nuanced colors, and they were all so beautiful. It wasn’t like shopping at Old Navy!

The point is, the question isn’t, “Should people have color in their life,” as my idea of their perfect happiness. What they should have—should being a difficult word—is an idea of proportion and aesthetics that are really beautiful and that light things up.

And it isn’t for their perfect happiness, it’s for mine because I have to look at them! (laughs)

P: Always hoped. Probably had a lot to do with being part of a certain era—I was very aware of all the… aspects. I did go to school here in Westlake Park (now MacArthur Park) at Chouinard, which later, through a series of events, became Cal Arts. But at that time it was an urban, soulful art school of a different model than CalArts. As a child, art was clearly where most of my skills lay. You’ve gotta see a house from all angles. There’s an aspect to cooking rice, where you don’t want to take the lid off… Art was something I had to keep close.

I didn’t tell everyone, “I’m going to be an artist!” I was a big fan of Mose Allison, a jazz pianist. He had a song called “IT DIDN’T TURN OUT THAT WAY.” Sometimes you don’t want to declare these things. In part not to let the pressure off, and partly not to be subject to ridicule. In other words… simply by talking about wanting to be something, you create a different reality where you’re not necessarily pursuing it.

Here’s a story about one of the places that [pursuing art] came from. One summer I worked with the county of LA. I was talking with one of the guys in the hallway and he kept talking about this girl. “Look at that gal over there, she looks great.” And then he turned on his heel and said to me, “I’m gonna go talk to her. If I keep talking about it, I’m not going to do it.” That lesson stuck with me. The difference between saying it and doing it. The saying it can divert you from doing it.

P: Memphis is two things. It’s a mythology, and it’s a “brand,” as they call it now.

What does that mean, a brand? It means the name itself carries meaning, rather than the meaning carrying the name. It was something that came out of a moment.

Everybody says, “Artists are the harbingers, or weathervanes, of cultural change and they’re 20 or 30 years ahead.” But it’s actually the reverse: we’re actually 20 years behind—40 years ahead of everyone else.

These things, these moments like Memphis, are really generated by technology. What constitutes technology has changed over time. in the Middle Ages, it was moving from hunter-gatherer to agrarian society.

In the Renaissance, the great technology was banking, trade, and imports. Traveling, in a sense. And so forth: these technological shifts generate major changes. Memphis hit a moment where technology had changed and was changing. 

For me, the touchstone was changing from strictly industrial technology to digital or computer technology. IBM was getting going in the 50s. In the 80s, PCs were starting to become more commonplace.

And ideas around how a computer could influence production, the making of objects, were starting to gain traction. So there was this fantastic cross of industrialism, handmade culture, and computer attitudes.

Many people had said “You should meet this guy, Sottsass.” Then he showed up here in California. We went to lunch, we were getting along. I was working up my courage to say, “What do you think about my coming to Italy?” when he turns to me and says, “When will you be in Italy?”

I said, “How about August?” He said “No don’t come then, everyone will be on vacation.”

I said, “Okay, I’ll come in September. Should I try to learn Italian?”

He said, “Don’t bother, anyone you’ll want to talk with already speaks English.”

So I went, we hung out, we did all kinds of stuff. I was supposed to work with STUDIO ALCHIMIA, the predecessor of Memphis, so I went to this ceramics factory… a few months later BARBARA [RADICE] called me and said “We’ve left Alchimia, we’re going to start a new group. Will you come with us?” I said, “Sure.” And the rest followed.

There’s a lot to say about it. And it’s a very important part of my now-history. Something that at that time I was simply doing and going through and was fun, and it meant a lot. I knew it meant a lot, but I had no idea.

And other things have meant a lot too, but Memphis ultimately changed the world and became the high-end signifier of an era; an important design movement, if you will. And I was part of it, God bless my little heart!

When you’re talking about having a defining moment, or a career high.. there’s a story of the rock-n-roll singers, the ones who have one or two hits. When they’re asked, “Don’t you get tired of singing that song?” they say, “Thank God for that song.”