Category:Scott Powel

The two words which best describe Scott Powel are gearhead and artist.

Scott comes from a family of creative mathematicians and scientists. As a young man, he spent countless hours in his father's garage building fine furniture, model airplanes, remote controlled sailboats, landsailers, surfboards, skateboards, musical instruments, jewelry boxes, and speakers. The garage also served as the family's automobile repair and restoration facility, so Scott learned to be quite adept at turning a wrench. In their spare time, he and his father built televisions, high fidelity audio systems, and computers on the dining room table. (To this day, Scott's dining room table is strewn with electronics, and has only been used for food on rare occasion.)

Scott and his father built a home computer before there really was such a thing. At age 16 he built and sold a contact management database for real estate investment banking, and at age 17 he was working as a SYSOP for a mortgage encapsulation service. He attended California State University, Long Beach, where he studied mathematics.

Eager to put his math education to use, Scott landed a job in the art department of a high-volume silk screen company called Screen Scene. There he quickly distinguished himself by absorbing the technical manuals for the cameras and film processing units in the darkroom, then performing maintenance and calibration routines on each. The improvements he made were so dramatic he was given 'ownership' of the darkroom. From there, his role continued to expand until it covered all aspects of the business, and he was soon promoted to the position of Art Director, although Art Director at Large would have been more accurate.

He introduced computers to the business to manage client, job, invoice, vendor and employee data, and most importantly, to create digital art. As Scott became more familiar with the production equipment and processes, he was able to improve performance in those areas as well. He devised techniques which allowed the sophisticated fourteen color press (that no one before Scott understood properly) to set up a complete job in minutes, instead of the hour or more it had taken before. These improvements allowed the company to cut pre-press production costs, improve job quality and repeatability, and reduce turn-around time.

Scott's friend Richard Jones also worked as an artist at Screen Scene. Backed by the vast resources (and with the complete blessing) of the company, they experimented relentlessly with unorthodox screen printing techniques and materials, creating unique, vibrant works of art. The synergy of the two was undeniable, so Scott (with the support and guidance of his older sister, Mary Ann) decided to start a company to serve as the foundation for their artistic endeavors. Ever humble, they called this new entity (and themselves) Gods of Creation - GOC for short.

In the art business, artists are 'legitimized' by having art on display (and usually for sale) in a gallery setting. Competition for display locations is therefore intense, with access to prime spots limited to established and well connected artists. Since the GOC were neither established nor well connected at this point, Scott and Richard decided (after a few beers) the best way to immediately place their art in a gallery would be to open their own. If they could also carve a workspace out of such a place, that would be sweet too. Someplace where they could make noise at all hours of the day and night (they often used power tools and played loud electronic music to keep themselves moving while the rest of the world slept). Their objectives now clearly defined, the two began searching for a site. The one they found surpassed their wildest hopes.

Paradox, they called it. Art studio by day. Art gallery by night. Not quite believing their incredible luck, they set to work breathing life into their plan. They worked around the clock, and yes, it was very noisy indeed. Soon Paradox was filled with their art. They also equipped it with a huge deejay booth, a kicking sound system (with subwoofers installed in pits built into the hardwood dance floor), a thirty foot bar, and their own custom lighting and visual effects.

As Paradox took form, the GOC refined their business plan. The gallery would be open to the public on an invite only basis every other Saturday night. This would allow them to make each opening a spectacle, showcasing new works of art integrated into powerful and varied themes. By combining the best elements of an art gallery, a night club, and perhaps a circus, the Paradox would give their art excellent exposure. It would give them the notoriety to hit the ground running as professional artists, they hoped. Besides, they reasoned, showing their art every other Saturday night to five hundred or so hand picked guests, with an open bar and fresh dance music sounded like it was going to be ridiculously fun!

One missing element from their plan, at this point, was a proper deejay. As if on cue, they were introduced through a mutual friend to Aldo Bender, who was managing Club Post Nuclear at the time. Aldo found their enthusiasm for the Paradox project intriguing, and stopped by one evening to see it for himself. It far exceeded his expectations, and he immediately decided to join forces with the GOC, volunteering to deejay for the gallery's grand opening. It was a wildly successful event, by all standards, and it bonded Scott, Richard and Aldo into a close partnership that lasted many years and though many many events.

That year Scott reserved a booth to display his art in Art Expo '89, which was held at the Los Angeles Convention Center. He used the momentum he had gained building the Paradox to make his Art Expo exhibit a reality. His booth was essentially a slice of the Paradox taken on the road. It brought a slice of night to the event, and used effect lighting, music, and fog to accentuate the art he had on display. Although it wasn't exactly a financial success, Scott never expected it to be. It did provide him with tremendous exposure and it gave him valuable experience performing an installation of his art at a major event. Mission accomplished.

Back on the home front, the Paradox continued to be wildly successful. So much so the police department advised them that it was not in a zone which permitted such large crowds. They could open that night, but it would have to be the last, they were told. This began a period of venue hopping for their art gallery/night club events. During this time they continued to use the Paradox as their massive studio, preparing art for use in installations elsewhere. After a string of sports bars and Mexican restaurants, Scott and his partners secured a spot at a brand new multimillion dollar club in Newport Beach called NYC. Soon they were doing installations there three nights a week, and the line to get in usually stretched down the block.

The GOC were contracted for all types of special events, including record release parties for Network Records, parties for Ocean Pacific following their annual OP Pro surf contests, and for a Cystic Fibrosis fundraiser (where Scott performed as a robotic alien on stage in front of over six hundred Sigma Alpha Chi sorority alumni), to name a few. Scott also worked closely with Peter Schroff designing and building elaborate trade show booths for Gotcha. Sadly, Screen Scene closed so the owners could relocate, and to make ends meet Scott took on work remodeling houses with his friend Joseph, a general contractor.

Joseph introduced Scott to Jack, who owned a special event equipment rental company. Jack was in the process of preparing a proposal to provide sound, stage, lighting, power distribution and a system to broadcast eight different languages via FM for simultaneous multilingual translations. The event was Pope Jean Paul II's Youth Day celebration, to be held at Hughes Stadium in Colorado. With Scott's help, they devised a complete, innovative plan of action and were awarded the contract. Fearing they may have committed themselves to entirely too big a project, Scott and Jack immediately got to work.

They built two forty foot trailers which linked together to form the core of the Pope's eighty by forty eight foot main stage. Once linked together, steps folded out along the front edge of the trailers, and a giant erector-set like structure folded out the back. This structure was then covered with decking which was also transported atop the trailers. Lighting towers were crafted to hoist powerful flood lights above the stadium's top level, to be connected to diesel generators by the robust power distribution system they devised. They modified high-end FM tuners to form their translation system, tweaking them to transmit instead of merely receive. They were careful to observe all FCC guidelines, of course. Lastly, they assembled a huge sound system, big enough to be heard clearly by all of the 30,000 projected event attendees.

Amazingly, they were able to fit all this gear into two trucks, distributed carefully so that the vehicles retained enough capacity to tow the trailer/stage units from California to Colorado. They dedicated themselves to the task, and took each obstacle the project dealt them in stride. Their thorough preparations, relentless determination and stubborn pride all combined to somehow enable them to successfully deliver everything they were contracted to do, and the event was a complete success.

Scott's computer skills came back into focus at this point. After completing a side job building a contact management system for an adult entertainment business called the Caliber Group, he was asked to come to work for them as their 'IT Guy'. He accepted their offer, and soon set them up with new business and accounting software. He eventually went on to build a database driven e-commerce web site for them. Written in PERL and TCL, the site was years ahead of its time. Scott used the system as a springboard toward a career as an application developer, and, much as the Paradox had served to establish him as an artist, it was very effective at opening doors for him.

For reasons still not completely clear, Scott's partner Richard moved out of Southern California on short notice, and the GOC were effectively disbanded. Scott and Aldo, still close friends, moved to a deluxe house perched high in a canyon in central Los Angeles. Scott continued to pursue employment as a contracted application developer, working for a company called BDM Technologies. BDM recognized his skills, and assigned Scott to write custom software for customers such as ARCO and the Capital Group. Following the conclusion of one of his major corporate contracts, BDM placed Scott with Web Service Company to build an intranet for them. As usual, Scott soon found himself working on all aspects of the business, and his six month contract wound up lasting almost five years, ending only because Web hired him to a permanent position. Scott still works for Web, and currently holds a title there of Senior Application Developer.

Scott found that not working as a professional artist ends up giving him more time, resources and enthusiasm to devote to his personal art projects. Working with databases by day, creating new works of art and making music by night, Scott's interests stimulate and challenge him, forming a balance in his life and allowing him to fully express the logical as well as the artistic sides of his nature. His love of electronic dance music is as strong today as it ever was, and he continues working to refine his mixing skills at every opportunity. Recently he entered the realm of music production, and is starting to make his own fresh beats. Check his web site (antilockbreaks dot com) to preview his latest musical creations, download full length mixed sets, and see examples of his art.

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