Why do we classify mugs from Chinese restaurants as Tiki? - Collecting Tiki

B bigbrotiki Tiki Socialite Tiki Island, above the Silverlake Joined: Mar 25, 2002 Posts: 11621	B bigbrotiki Posted posted on Tue, Dec 18, 2012 6:43 PM Why do people always think that when I am discussing the parameters of the art form that I am trying to take away their fun? Is it some kind of authority hang-up that produces an anti-intellectual knee-jerk reaction of "You can't tell me what I am free to like!!!" ??? I have no intention to do so. But I have defined the genre, and a LOT of people liked the way I did it. But please, everybody is free to do what they want with THEIR definition of it. Just don't expect me to call it it Tiki if I don't see it as such. But luckily you should not care what I think then, right? OK Eric, I thought you knew, but back to square one: Don The Beachcomber and Trader Vic were NOT "Tiki" initially, they are the founders of Polynesian Pop. Don's places never really went fully Tiki, but Trader Vic did so majorly beginning in the mid-50s. Their Polynesian Pop concepts formed the backdrop and set the stage for Tiki to star in his own South Seas movie fantasy. Without them, there would be no Tiki, but without Tiki, their environs would have been only half as interesting. All the jetsam and flotsam they brought together came from the Seven Seas and beyond, yes, and it worked like a complex mosaic to create the illusion of a bohemian harbor hideaway. As one element for example, they introduced those green Chinese ceramic tiles as room dividers - a classic! But that was ONE element - not the whole place. It is all a matter of balance and degree, and yes, that balance can vary to the individual taste of the proprietor. But there is a line where a place leaves the realm of Tiki Bar and becomes something else. Or not?

Why do people always think that when I am discussing the parameters of the art form that I am trying to take away their fun? Is it some kind of authority hang-up that produces an anti-intellectual knee-jerk reaction of "You can't tell me what I am free to like!!!" ???

I have no intention to do so. But I have defined the genre, and a LOT of people liked the way I did it. But please, everybody is free to do what they want with THEIR definition of it. Just don't expect me to call it it Tiki if I don't see it as such. But luckily you should not care what I think then, right?

OK Eric, I thought you knew, but back to square one:
Don The Beachcomber and Trader Vic were NOT "Tiki" initially, they are the founders of Polynesian Pop. Don's places never really went fully Tiki, but Trader Vic did so majorly beginning in the mid-50s. Their Polynesian Pop concepts formed the backdrop and set the stage for Tiki to star in his own South Seas movie fantasy. Without them, there would be no Tiki, but without Tiki, their environs would have been only half as interesting.

All the jetsam and flotsam they brought together came from the Seven Seas and beyond, yes, and it worked like a complex mosaic to create the illusion of a bohemian harbor hideaway. As one element for example, they introduced those green Chinese ceramic tiles as room dividers - a classic! But that was ONE element - not the whole place. It is all a matter of balance and degree, and yes, that balance can vary to the individual taste of the proprietor. But there is a line where a place leaves the realm of Tiki Bar and becomes something else. Or not?

Post #661899 by bigbrotiki on Tue, Dec 18, 2012 6:43 PM