Publisher of 'The Book of Tiki' on CBS Sunday Morning - General Tiki

B bigbrotiki Tiki Socialite Tiki Island, above the Silverlake Joined: Mar 25, 2002 Posts: 11621	B bigbrotiki Posted posted on Mon, Mar 21, 2011 1:45 PM On 2011-03-21 12:14, Okolehao wrote: Sven, was it a hard sell to get him to publish you?.... What was implied was that Taschen is the creme de la creme of publishers. Yup, he is the Creme de la visual arts publishers to me. The best thing and what I respect about him is that he is daring, in his subjects and formats, but not stupid. He has very edgy, eclectic taste on one hand, but he also has the commercial sense to brutally say no to any subject that will not bring its money back. He has no fear, unlike all the American publishers that turned down my book proposal for 7 Years (this is were I always whip out my Chronicle Books rejection letter) : (funny thing is that when I sent them the proposal again in the late 90s, they rejected it saying "Ah, Tiki...well that trend has already come and gone." :) ) To hook up with Benedikt Taschen essentially was the old "right place at the right time" thing (after 7 years, finally!): 1.) In 1998, he was just beginning to expand his distribution from Europe to the American market. 2.) My friend Pete Moruzzi, being the L.A. Modcom chair at the time, knew the Swiss architect Frank Escher who Taschen had hired to renovate his Chemosphere, because Escher had written THE book on the Chemosphere's architect John Lautner http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1568981422/ref=s9_simh_bw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-3&pf_rd_r=12FKWDV2FPFCZP84Y499&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1287771322&pf_rd_i=283155 At the end of 1998 they were still working on the place, and Pete gave a copy of my proposal to Escher, who gave it to Taschen, who came by my place on January 1st 1999, and after viewing every slide and shred of paper in my archive, gave the project a thumbs up. 3.) What might have helped was that I had been best friends with painter Albert Oehlen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Oehlen in my Berlin/Hamburg years of the mid- to late 70s, and that now Taschen was a big collector and patron of Oehlen. In any case, I am glad that I held out and did not go with small underground publishers that were interested. After years of writing for Tiki News I felt that for Tiki to emerge from a subculture and really come back, it needed a high gloss/ all color platform. All my knowledge and material would have gone only so far had Taschen not done it justice. The other cool thing was that, as I was making the book, nobody at Taschen knew anything about Tiki, so they couldn't meddle with it and I got to do it the way I wanted. :) All in all an ideal deal! [ Edited by: bigbrotiki 2011-03-21 15:28 ]

On 2011-03-21 12:14, Okolehao wrote:
Sven, was it a hard sell to get him to publish you?.... What was implied was that Taschen is the creme de la creme of publishers.

Yup, he is the Creme de la visual arts publishers to me. The best thing and what I respect about him is that he is daring, in his subjects and formats, but not stupid. He has very edgy, eclectic taste on one hand, but he also has the commercial sense to brutally say no to any subject that will not bring its money back. He has no fear, unlike all the American publishers that turned down my book proposal for 7 Years (this is were I always whip out my Chronicle Books rejection letter) :

(funny thing is that when I sent them the proposal again in the late 90s, they rejected it saying "Ah, Tiki...well that trend has already come and gone." :) )

To hook up with Benedikt Taschen essentially was the old "right place at the right time" thing (after 7 years, finally!):

1.) In 1998, he was just beginning to expand his distribution from Europe to the American market.

2.) My friend Pete Moruzzi, being the L.A. Modcom chair at the time, knew the Swiss architect Frank Escher who Taschen had hired to renovate his Chemosphere, because Escher had written THE book on the Chemosphere's architect John Lautner http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1568981422/ref=s9_simh_bw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-3&pf_rd_r=12FKWDV2FPFCZP84Y499&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1287771322&pf_rd_i=283155

At the end of 1998 they were still working on the place, and Pete gave a copy of my proposal to Escher, who gave it to Taschen, who came by my place on January 1st 1999, and after viewing every slide and shred of paper in my archive, gave the project a thumbs up.

3.) What might have helped was that I had been best friends with painter Albert Oehlen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Oehlen in my Berlin/Hamburg years of the mid- to late 70s, and that now Taschen was a big collector and patron of Oehlen.

In any case, I am glad that I held out and did not go with small underground publishers that were interested. After years of writing for Tiki News I felt that for Tiki to emerge from a subculture and really come back, it needed a high gloss/ all color platform. All my knowledge and material would have gone only so far had Taschen not done it justice.

The other cool thing was that, as I was making the book, nobody at Taschen knew anything about Tiki, so they couldn't meddle with it and I got to do it the way I wanted. :) All in all an ideal deal!

[ Edited by: bigbrotiki 2011-03-21 15:28 ]

Post #581147 by bigbrotiki on Mon, Mar 21, 2011 1:45 PM