Post #586177 by bigbrotiki on Sat, Apr 23, 2011 9:36 AM

On 2011-04-22 23:51, tikibars wrote:
I have yet to meet many people who were actually Tiki bar fanatics - Tiki fanboys so to speak - in 1961 or so, or people who can talk of Tiki from an enthusiastic customer's , opposed to being a bar or restaurant owner or a decor creator. Was anyone in the 1950s or 1960s actually more enthused about Tiki then than the average bored urbanist is about Thai or Indian dining now? Have any of you seen evidence? Maybe there's a thread about this, I've be out of the loop lately...
I think the fanboy/meme aspect of Tiki may not have existed (outside of a small SoCal enclave) until the early 1990s, when Otto started Tiki News, Sven started his seminars, and I started Tiki Bar Review Pages.

I totally dig the concept of Tiki as its own imaginary isle, maybe someone can make a Polynesian triangle map with it in it, something like this:

One thing is for sure: In its own heyday, Tiki style was not named "Tiki", this term for the genre was created in the 90s. In the 50s and 60s, people did not have the "abstand" to the phenomenon. "Abstand" is German for "distance","separation", and "perspective". In the mid-century, Americans were like children in a candy shop, taking advantage of the horn of plenty of the post-war boom, they didn't stop and THINK about what they were enjoying.

So, Tiki was not recognized as a style in its own day, and consequently did not have a name. The only terms I have heard uttered by contemporaries of the style to refer to it was "Polynesian" and - in rare instances - KON Tiki style.

Your question about people in the day being into "it" like we are now brings to mind what I call the "Polynesiac" of the period, an individual who was a fan of all things Hawaiian/Tahitian/South Seas, beyond the average Tiki bar customer. These people had the most elaborate rumpus rooms and backyard Polynesias, and freely mixed collecting authentic artifacts with tourist art and Polynesian pop items. For some of them, it was the pre-stage to trying their luck at opening their own Tiki restaurant.

On 2011-04-22 23:51, tikibars wrote:
But where did "Tiki" as a meme or pop phenomenon truly originate?

In spite of all of the so-called pre-tiki or tropical junk that existed, I personally peg the seed of it all it at Don the Beachcomber in Los Angeles, in 1934... and then it spread and grew and changed...

Regarding this statement, I respectfully have to point out again that Don did not use Tikis as logos, as decor, as mugs or even the name in his restaurants. Yes, he was the main originator of many of the ACCOUTREMENTS and CONCEPTS of the style - but without the participation of the actual Tiki image. This is what I called Polynesian Pop in the Pre-Tiki stage:

(I have to amend this chart by saying the decades would have been better spaced in mid-decade, i.e. that the main Tiki period happened between 1955 and 1965, with its peak being in the early 60s)

All this brings up the question of WHEN the name of the style was coined. The 80s underground artists like Jeffrey Vallance played with the Tiki image, yes, but they did not name it so, their focus was mostly on EXOTICA as a genre. I came up with the title for my first book in 1992, Otto started Tiki News in 1994. I believe that what lead me, and Otto and many of us to choose Tiki as the moniker for our passion was what has inspired many archeologists: A piece of pottery. The finding and subsequent collecting of Tiki mugs, with restaurant names and locations on them, lead me to look for THAT image and name in other forms.