Clayburn Moore: No. Actually, the person who hired me had seen my bronzes in a show in Los Angeles. So they called and said, "Do you want to do this project for Harris as sort of a sub-contract? And I said, "Sure." So I did it.

That piece had a lot of success and was really noticed. So I just put a game plan together. I thought, "Well, gosh, these people are making a lot of money off of my work." So I decided that I would do work for all the major companies, which at that time were DC, Marvel, Kitchen Sink, Image and others. And that's exactly what I did. I thought I would build up my reputation by working for the major companies, and then I would start to do my own licensing.

Once I became the sculptor that each of the companies knew, there was no reason for them to go through another company as a middleman. And I thought, "Why not start my own company?" So I did.

I know a lot of artists are a little bit intimidated by the business aspect of it. I think that nothing in life is just jumping into a sea of change. It doesn't happen that often like that. I think that it's like stepping-stones. Things happen on a gradual basis. So even if it's over a period of months, you can begin to change your way of thinking to sort of a business approach, then you can start to handle business problems.

Teresa Patterson: As a business, you have to deal not only with sculpting the piece, but also finding a way to manufacture, package, promote and distribute it. That seems like a very complicated process.

Clayburn Moore: To a certain extent it is, you're right.

Teresa Patterson: So how did you manage it?

Clayburn Moore: I took two of my clients and said: "Look, if you will finance a trip for me to China, I'll find a factory that can manufacture the pieces. I'll put in part and you put in part, and then we will pay everyone back out of the profits. We'll save that money right there, and then some, by going direct to the factory in China." So that's what I did.

I flew to Hong Kong. I set up some appointments prior to that. Then I set up some more appointments when I got there. I went into China and looked at the factories. It took a while to get used to the whole overseas production idea. But I had lived in Europe, so I was used to traveling on my own. I wasn't intimidated by being in a different country where I didn't speak the language. You have to keep in mind the fact that they are there to do business with you, so they are going to find a way to communicate with you.

I highly recommend any artist doing that, whether you're doing sculpture or prints. I know that Chinese printing is more affordable as well.

So, that's what I did. A lot of it was good luck, and a lot of it was common sense, combined with sticking to something your good at, which in my case is sculpture.

Fathom

When I say I have a diversified portfolio it means that I do different work, and different kinds of things, but at the same time there is a single purpose, a single goal in mind, and that is to become, eventually, largely independent of the licensing realm. To become a company that is known for both original and licensed work. It's still a case where I really do still enjoy doing licensed pieces and working with other artists.

Teresa Patterson: Like the piece you did with Frank Frazetta.

Clayburn Moore: Exactly. To be able to meet Mr. Frazetta, to go to Frank Frazetta's house, to be able to hold his paintings in hand and to talk over those paintings with Mr. Frazetta, to meet his wife Ellie and have dinner with them and spend time with them was just a dream come true. If you had said ten or fifteen years ago that I would be meeting Frazetta and spending time at the Frazetta house and holding those incredible paintings, or watching Frank Frazetta work -- I never would have believed it. To me, that alone has been worth everything. Personally, I do consider him one of the great artists of the twentieth century.

To a certain extent, meeting any of the artists whose work I admire -- after growing up on comics and science fiction/fantasy, getting to work with someone whose work I admire is very rewarding. Mark Shultz for example. Mark and I have become good friends -- he and his wife Denise. He's one of the greats of the industry, just an absolutely remarkable talent. He does some of the best brushwork I've ever seen. That's just such a plus in this industry.

I don't always work with somebody because I'm going to make a fortune. I can also work with them because its mutually beneficial, business-wise, to do it, or because I admire their work and I know that if I do it, and it's of their work, I'm going to have nice solid core sales. I'm not going to make a fortune, but I'll have something that I'm very, very proud of. So what I try to do is to work with people who I really admire, whose work I would like to do -- like Terry Moore of Strangers in Paradise, David Mack of Kabuki, Mark Schultz with his various properties. Then also to do the Witchblades and the Fathoms, and possibly the Marvel stuff -- things like that.

Of course, when you work with a corporation, it's never going to be the same as working with an individual. Luckily, Top Cow, which does Witchblade, is in between, and it's a real pleasure to work with them. The little compromises aside -- compromises are always going to happen -- it's a good company to work with, and the characters are very popular. And the success frees me up to start to do some more original work again.

Teresa Patterson: Of all the different pieces and types of pieces that you have done, what are your favorites?

Clayburn Moore: Well everything you do in commercial art has a series of headaches or lost battles, whether it is the hand position or the torso proportions. Licensing is a compromise. You accept that or you don’t get into it. There’s a trade off -- commercial success against those compromises that you have to make to bring your vision and theirs together.

That said, one of my favorite current pieces is Witchblade. That was a piece that it was pretty much a case of them looking at my design and saying, "This looks great! We love it! Go after it!" That's the kind of response you want. The best moments in your career are where a company wants to work with you because they want you to do it your way, show your vision of the character.

The Pitt sculpture is another of my favorites. The character was created by a very popular artist, Dale Keown. He pretty much said, "Do the piece how you envision him." And that's what I did, and I think that it's a much better sculpture for it. So, when I look back on it, I see The Pitt as one of my more successful pieces.

Clayburn Moore: That would have to be the Frazetta pieces: Conan the Barbarian, and The Princess. Frazetta is incredibly talented and could pull what he wanted out of his mind and make it work. My challenge was to make it sure that his paintings were brought to life in a way that worked from the back as well as the front, so that he would be happy and his fans would be happy. Taking most of his painting, The Barbarian -- the interaction of the two figures -- and doing it in 3D was a tremendous challenge. One of the changes that he made was to lengthen the Conan figure. I had made the figure too short. In retrospect I look back and wonder, "How could I have done that?" Because, I now see it in the photos. But when you are involved in a piece, you get caught up and do the best work you can at the moment.

But he was right. It was about a quarter-inch too short. So, we cut the figure, and I raised it. But then I had to stretch out the whole torso -- in a very miniscule step-by-step way. When I look back on it, it made me a better sculptor.

It was proof that not all changes are compromises. Sometimes they actually improve you. As an artist, you have to keep an open mind. But when you know something's right and it shouldn't be changed, I say, stick to your guns and make the argument. Ultimately, if it's a licensed piece, it's their choice. But you should still make the argument. On the other hand, you want to keep an open mind and realize that you've got something to learn from just about everybody out there. Certainly from someone like Frazetta, but also from just about anybody that you work with. You should admire their work enough and admire them as an artist enough to realize that you've got something to learn from them.

The Pitt

Teresa Patterson: So how do you turn a comic or TV character into a three-dimensional sculpture or action figure?

Clayburn Moore: First, like any writer or musician -- you sit down and tune your instrument -- you start to read over the material. You start to gather your thoughts. It's a similar process with art. For me, it even becomes almost a little kindergarten game, where I cut out pictures of the figures, and I laminate them and I think about setting it up, and I think about the character in my mind. It's not a big esoteric thing. I just familiarize myself with the character. Everything is about characterization to me. When I do a character, I try to remember that.

The process of choosing a pose can really run the gamut. An artist can say, "Refer to this drawing and base it on that." And I may say, "but we need to make changes in it, because I think that pose doesn't work as a three-dimensional piece. I think it will work better like this." And sometimes, as I said before, an artist will say, "Take the ball and run with it."

The Fathom sculpture was based on a very tiny -- almost thumbnail -- panel in the comic that I just thought was fantastic! Sometimes I think the best work you can see by an artist will just be a thumbnail or a pencil sketch. This becomes the spark, which I take and run with. Sometimes the genesis will be straight out of my mind, using their character based usually on a composite of their panels and things.

So if it's a commercial assignment, I may do five or six ideas, and either take pictures or a video of it, and send it to them so they can pick. That's how Lady Death was done. We had six ideas. That's how the original Savage Dragon was done.

Teresa Patterson: There seems to be a lot of passion in all your work -- even the action figures. Is that what makes you pieces different? The passion?

Clayburn Moore - Continued