Today we’d like to introduce you to Bradley Kahabka
Hi Bradley, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
When I first decided to go to college, I chose to study mechanical engineering at Binghamton University in New York where I am originally from. I studied for about two years and at that time began studying music as well, and at that point decided that engineering wasn’t the path I wanted to follow. Although I enjoy mechanical processes and the inner workings of machines, restoring cars and motorcycles which I still do, at the time my creative desires weren’t being satisfied with what I was doing. I decided to leave NY and come to California with just my bags packed and enrolled in Musician’s Institute in Hollywood for Guitar Performance. It was a year and a half of pure immersive guitar performance in the heart of Hollywood and I learned a lot about music and myself. I had played in a few bands before and after the school, and then the recession hit so I moved back home to regroup. After some time I decided to come back to California again, missing the atmosphere I had when I was in school here, but really had no direction. I had tried to get into a school in Costa Mesa but the financial aid didn’t work out, I had an apartment I couldn’t afford and a job that was terrible, so I joined the Army. I went back to my mechanical roots as a vehicle mechanic and shipped off to South Carolina for training. The training overall was very useful, helped develop discipline, purpose and pride, and gave me a sense of belonging to something larger than myself. During my youth I became an eagle scout and used to teach at boy scout camps so the army in reality wasn’t a far cry off from that, just with bigger equipment and more weaponry. After some time and coming back I was figuring out next steps, deciding on school again and getting a degree but unsure of what I wanted to do. I tried some CAD programming and engineering stuff again, I just couldn’t imagine designing parts for machines I would never see over and over again, but I ended up taking a drawing class just for fun, and that is what really stuck. I ended up going into the art program at Long Beach City college, taking drawing and sculpting classes mostly, and found peace and fulfillment in making things. At the time I was doing a lot of found object sculptures and really developing my skills in life drawing and oil painting.
The degree was specifically to transfer into Cal State Long Beach, which is what happened after 2 years at the city college. My degree is a BFA in drawing and painting with a minor in sculpture. CSULB has such an amazing art program that is pretty well recognized, I got really lucky I just managed to end up there. It’s a funny story actually that after I was coming back from the Army I had nowhere to live. I had lived in Hollywood and Costa Mesa briefly, and wanted to live somewhere near the ocean, so I kind of just looked a map and picked long beach, without having been to the city even once. It seemed easily accessible to LA, was right on the water, and easy to get to Orange County as well. Also, it ended up being more affordable relatively. During this time I bought an old motorcycle, fixed it up and started going to school. In some crazy way, I ended up in one of the best art programs around. CSULB has an actual foundry which I got to take many classes in, and a lot of the teachers were very technically knowledgeable and well renown, some of the ones at the city college too were fantastic. I learned such a tremendous amount, acquired a wide array of skill sets, and really got to improve on my drawing and painting skills which I had never done before attending school.
My last semester of CSULB was the beginning of the pandemic. I had a huge studio in the school that I was forced to give up, was doing very large-scale paintings that I couldn’t do any more and wasn’t able to really complete any of my sculptural work at all. I did what I could to graduate, but it was a tough time for everyone involved and just completely unheard of. During my time at school, I was working part time at a music company doing instrument setups. I had worked in music stores before and have a music background, so it was an easy job and worked well with my school schedule. My boss had always wanted a custom shop to make instruments in house and make really one-of-a-kind pieces, so when the pandemic hit, I asked him if it was time to build a shop, and it turned out it was. I had a conversation with him that since I had just gotten my degree I really needed to be doing something in the creative field.
So this is where all of the skills I’ve acquired really started to pull themselves together. I was able to get all of the equipment to fully build a custom wood shop and spent the first year really learning how to design and build instruments. There was no formal training, only reverse engineering, lots of YouTube videos and experimentation. I would say the two biggest hurdles were woodworking, which I had zero experience in, and learning 3d modeling and CAM operations for CNC work. I had begun an individual studies class at CSULB on the manual milling machine during my last semester but that got cut short. I spend so much time learning fusion 360 the first year but it paid off in the end. I was able to make necks and fretboards among other things, and began to make the tools and jigs I needed to make the actual instruments. Side benders, molds, painting apparatus, jigs for the machines, and new machines themselves, it really opened the door of possibilities to make anything for me. So the engineering and mechanical background definitely came in handy, as well as all of the sculptural techniques I learned as well. I do all of the design work and fabrication, and even the paint work at the end to create the finished, functional work. The drawing has helped with my intricate inlay work tremendously, just understanding form and spatial awareness.
At the moment I am getting back into my painting practice, I ended up taking a break to learn instrument making and the 3D modeling, it just took up so much of my time. I’ve got about 6 paintings in the works right now and plan to get into some shows this coming year and develop my own website. I have got a scuba/shipwreck series started and plan to do a neon series soon. As for the Ukuleles, I’ve got models in Germany, Japan, Australia, England, and of course scattered throughout the U.S. I’ve also made and am in the process of designing right now custom models for a few of the artists associated with the company which will travel the world with them and be available to their fans to place orders with as well. It is quite liberating to have total creative control and freedom to really design what I want to and to push the boundaries of what has been done in the past. When I’m not working on projects I’m usually taking trips on the motorcycles, kitesurfing or paddleboarding in the canals, or figuring out where my next scuba trip will be.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I think most of us are under the impression at a young age that life will be kind of a straight line. Go to school, get the degree, get the job, get the family and the house, and live happily ever after. I think I’ve always fought with myself and still do over this idea of practicality over creativity. That I could have become and engineer and made a lot and had a stable career possibly, but would have stayed unfulfilled creatively, and vise versa. All I knew when I first went to college was that it wasn’t right, and just up and leaving everything on my own was tough. All I really had when I moved to Hollywood were the clothes on my back and a desire to do things differently than I was, something more creative. Luckily, I’ve never been a person for comfort or material things really, most of the things I own have a purpose to do and are just tools for my work. At a time in my life when I really needed some direction and re-booting, the Army served me very well. That was another time I just got up and left with nothing, got on a plane and just started a new life. I was a bit older so it wasn’t as much of a shock to me at that time, but being thrust into such a different environment with all these new challenges thrown at you can be tough. Not to mention the seriousness of it all and the expectation that you may be required to use all of this training they are giving you can be a hard concept to really accept the gravity of. I mean they really do strip you down of your individuality, train you in a new way of thinking, and it’s just an environment that is so drastically different from the civilian world it’s hard to relate to most people. Then finding a place to live when I got back in a city I had never been to on my own was challenging. It seems like since I left high school I have just been bouncing around on my own around the country, never really putting roots down anywhere and just always searching for something.
Being alone and putting your work out there, being creatively vulnerable can be a tough thing to be. I moved a lot, lost a lot, had to wear a lot of different hats as a person, was really struggling with who I was and my identity, and it was an extremely mentally challenging portion of my life. At one point life just got overwhelming, and when I started Long Beach City College I was getting things back together and living in a halfway house at the time. Most of the people were nice, we had something to bond over and some rules to follow, but it is also a very unstable environment for a variety of reasons. It was tough going to school and then not really having a place of your own to call home to come back to. I also barely owned anything besides clothes and school supplies which was liberating but also frustrating, so I ended up spending a lot of time at school which ended up being a good thing. When I got to CSULB I had my own apartment finally and was able to just throw myself into the work. My days were typically from 8am until 10 pm in classes and the studio at school, working part time whenever I could. I don’t have what I would call a natural talent for drawing so I spent quite a lot of time focusing on improving in that area which helped my painting practice grow tremendously. It was tough time though, working a job part time while being tasked with all of these studio classes was the biggest workload of any schooling I’ve done so far. That more difficult the journey the rewarding the outcome is though, so I think of the tough times as a chance to build resiliency and character.
I think a lot of artists struggle also with the feelings of inadequacy, perfectionism, self doubt, a sense of purpose, and many other conflicting emotions, all while trying to improve upon their craft at the same time. It’s very hard to just relax, there is always this compelling feeling in the background telling me to create the next thing, think of the next idea and get started on this mountain of work that will never end. I have gotten better at taking a breath and enjoying life around me, and I continue the work in hopes that it will lead to bigger and brighter horizons.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
My personal work is primarily Oil paintings. Light source is a primary driving force in my works, really emphasizing contrast and also texture. I do primarily portraiture and landscape or a combination of the two, mostly based in realism. The landscapes typically contain a human element, often times something abandoned or forgotten that has outlived its usefulness, a solitary reminder of the impermanence of mankind. In school we were given the choice to work in either oil or acrylic, and I chose oil. I think there is something there about my personality as well, somewhat old school and deep about the material itself, the depth of color you can achieve, the tradition behind it and its timelessness. I’ve always been fascinated by the ocean and marine environments, so that tends to find its way into my pieces as well. I grew up in the transitional period between not having technology and the explosion of it taking over our lives, so my thought process is a blend of traditional and modern. I think that’s also why I’m drawn to old, outdated things. I grew up watching the latest technologies rise and fall, and despite the decline of all of these different things I still see their value. I’ve always worked with my hands, and even though digital art is everywhere right now, I prefer the old manual way of doing things. There’s something so tactile about having a physical media to work with and an actual thing once you finish that I find extremely rewarding. Just creating something from nothing but an image in your mind and letting it physically live in the world.
My professional art right now is instruments, specifically ukuleles. When making these I find myself relying on my sculptural background and really thinking about the material involved in the construction. I make every component of the instrument except for the tuners really, and it’s actually fascinating to learn about how different each species of wood is, it’s building characteristics and even how it smells. I build again with a combination of old and new school techniques. Alot of new technology, CNC machining and laser cutting and engraving, but everything is put together and finished by hand. I’ve designed somewhat modern shapes and dimensions for the instruments, but also use a type of painterly realism for my inlay work. I draw everything out, keeping in mind the flow and form of the work, much the same as I would do for a painting, so the end result is a kind of flowing landscape that almost has a story to tell. There are certain things about instruments that must be precise and correct for them to work, but they are what I would consider functional art, and I get a lot of creative freedom to make changes or improvements and to be innovative. When you look at the way old things were made, tools, furniture, buildings, and so on, besides being aware of the functionality of the object they were making there was also a conscious choice to be as artistic as humanly possible. It’s just something I keep in mind when I’m building.
Most of my work is about the things around me, the ocean and where I live or have been, and also of things that often feel like distant memories or memories I feel like I should have if that makes sense. The thing I’m most proud of is that for both of these, the paintings and the Ukuleles, I had no prior experience going into either of these ventures. It wasn’t like I grew up as an artist or had artist parents. The first time I really painted or drew anything was when I was in school for it, and my first time really wood working was making instruments and just experimenting with inlay. I just wanted to do these things, so I figured out how to make it happen. I also feel like there is a signature look to the work that I make. I like to show the material that these things are made out of, whether that be paintings or instruments, the materiality of the object seems to be important to me. I just have this mechanical/engineering mindset yet the creative ability to mold these objects into what I want them to be. Many artists I feel are at heart problem solvers, and working with many different mediums allows one to sort of transfer theses skills in between materials and think in unconventional ways to achieve a goal. I feel that knowing all of these things does set me apart in a way, just having such a vast array of skills in my toolbox, yet there is a certain aesthetic to work I make that makes it authentically mine.
What were you like growing up?
Growing up I was a pretty quiet kid, shy at first until I got to know you and I suppose I am still the same way now. Not really introverted I would say but more reserved. I did play some sports and got to try a lot of different things but when I got to middle school I started playing saxaphone and really got into music all the way through high school, went onto jazz band and some music competitions and that sort of thing. I grew up in upstate New York with the adirondacks right there, ended up joining boy scouts and got really involved with that. I had a really good troop where we would do some incredible camping trips. Really learned about self sufficiency, being respectful to the environment, and surviving on close to nothing but having fun doing it. Ended up getting my eagle scout rank which actually ended up helping me out in the Army as well. I taught wilderness survival at a scout camp in my teens for a few summers which was a great experience and a lot of fun. My father was an environmental engineer but had to commute pretty far to work so he would buy wrecked cars and fix them every few years and then move onto the next one. For years when I would go to my grandparents house up in Buffalo they had a volkswagen bus on cinder blocks in their yard and when I was old enough it was passed down to me. I believe it was a 1974, which I restored completely with my dad. It was my first car, drove it all through high school, learned a lot about rebuilding and mechanics, and that’s where my love of old machinery and forgotten things comes from. Later on in high school I started playing electric guitar, got really into the bands that were a part of the Warped Tour which I would take some road trips in the van to go see for a few summers until I finally went off to college. Actually took the van to college as well but decided to sell it the help fund the move to California. I was always fixing things or trying to make something, I just always saw the value of being able to understand how things work and figuring out how to repair rather than just buy new. I think it was always just really rewarding for me to bring things back to life that would have otherwise been thrown away. Those two things, mechanics and music have really been a part of my life for as long as I can remember.
Pricing:
- 5000 for Scuba
- 2500 for the tree and lights
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/Kahabkart
