A summer exhibition in the School of Art, Art History & Design’s Eisentrager-Howard Gallery will feature original artwork from popular films, animated television series, comics and trading cards from a local collector.
“Building a Narrative: Production Art and Pop Culture” will be on display June 3-Oct. 7 in the gallery, which is located on the first floor of Richards Hall on the University of Nebraska–Lincoln’s city campus. As part of the Lincoln Collects series, the exhibition is comprised of selected works from the private collection of alumnus Trent Claus (B.F.A. 2006), who is a visual effects supervisor for Lola VFX.
Lincoln Collects is an ongoing series hosted by the school to showcase works belonging to notable art collectors in the Lincoln area.
“We are extremely excited to show Trent’s extraordinary collection of production artwork including concept art, storyboards and visual effects from popular culture spanning TV and film,” said School of Art, Art History & Design Director Francisco Souto. “This exhibition will be the first of its kind to be shown in Lincoln and will represent the second edition of the exhibition series Lincoln Collects. Trent’s concept art collection will give the community a rare glance of the impact of storytelling has on popular culture and how it has shaped our own personal narratives.”
Claus has been collecting this art for 25 years.
“What everything shares in common is that it’s a piece of art that was generated on the way to the final product,” Claus said. “So a lot of the pieces don’t get seen a lot by the general public, and a lot of the artists aren’t known by the general public. It’s exciting to shed a spotlight on them and their work and see all of the artistry and collaboration that goes on behind the scenes of the things we all know.”
Claus said the centerpiece of the exhibit will be his animation collection.
“It will be arranged in a giant grid so that there’s one piece per show, and there’s 90 different television shows represented,” he said. “And what really sets it apart is not only the huge volume of shows. But most of the time, when you see animation cells either on display or for sale, what you’re seeing is the cel, and then there’s a reproduction background because there may be hundreds of cels for every one background. Every single one of the 90 cels in the show has the original hand-painted background, which is a huge rarity.”
The wall will include cels from “The Flintstones” (the first primetime animated show), “The Smurfs,” “Transformers,” “G.I. Joe,” “The Simpson’s,” “Rugrats,” “Ren and Stimpy,” and more.
“The Simpson’s one is a big, important one in the collection because it’s from the first season. It’s from the fourth episode that was produced, and it’s exceptionally rare because it has full-body images of all five family members, and I’m the second owner. It was owned by Sam Simon, the co-creator of the show, and it hung on his office wall until the time of his death. Then, I bought it from his estate. So it was handpicked by him to hang on his wall for 30 years before it came to this wall,” Claus said.
The entire exhibition represents just a portion of his entire collection.
“The process of paring it down for the show was kind of painful because I watched some pieces go that I really wanted to have seen, but that’s how it works.”
The exhibition will include highlights from everything from “Star Wars,” including a concept piece from “Return of the Jedi” by artist Ralph McQuarrie to “Star Trek,” “The Goonies,” “Labyrinth,” “Ghostbusters,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “Cinderella,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “Dances with Wolves,” and much more. There are also original comic art and paintings from the Garbage Pail Kids trading cards.
Claus began his collection with comic book art that he purchased when he worked at Cosmic Comics in Lincoln as a teenager.
“I was very familiar with comics and the artists, characters and all that sort of thing,” Claus said. “But basically when eBay started, that was my first access to it I got a couple of pieces from that, was hooked and then it just ballooned from there.”
His collection of concept art, matte paintings and film production art began when he moved to Los Angeles to begin his career in visual effects.
“Ongoing employment allowed me to have some spending money, but then also just access. There’s a lot more available in Los Angeles than there is in Nebraska,” he said.
A large portion of his collection just stems from his own nostalgia.
“Things that I grew up with or things that maybe before I had the chance to grow up with, but I’ve come to appreciate a lot as I’ve gotten into film,” he said. “And then with the matte paintings, in particular, my first job in the industry was as a matte painter, so I have a connection to those.”
He also remembers seeing books featuring “Star Wars” art when he was growing up.
“I used to look at art books, specifically from ‘Star Wars’ when I was a kid that had big, full-color pages devoted to matte paintings that were in the films,” he said. “And it just blew me away as a kid, seeing that you can fool the audience into believing this is a real environment when it’s really just a painting. That was so cool. I’ve just been fascinated with them ever since.”
Claus hopes the exhibition attracts a wider audience for the gallery.
“I hope that it’s something that might draw the public in to view the art that wouldn’t normally find themselves in an art gallery,” he said. “Because there’s a lot of pieces here that can strike a nostalgic chord with people that have a general interest because it is so much a part of pop culture, that I hope people will bring the family in. I do think there’s something there for just about everybody.”
He also hopes university and high school students have a chance to visit the exhibition.
“This is the sort of work that inspired me when I was a kid, and ultimately had a result on my career and my life,” he said. “Maybe there’s another one or two out there that it will have the same effect on. And even if it doesn’t change their path, it may open up their eyes to the sheer volume of collaborators that are going on in these films and things that they love. I think it’s both exciting and fascinating to see so many thousands of artists that go into making a film, some of whom have never been on a film set, but they’re a part of TV and filmmaking.”
After graduating from UNL with a studio art degree, Claus begin his career as a matte painter with work on films such as “Iron Man,” “The Love Guru” and “Jumper.” He then transitioned into compositing, working on such films as “Blade Runner (The Final Cut),” “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” and “The Social Network.” Now, as a visual effects supervisor with Lola VFX, Claus is known for his work on the Marvel Cinematic Universe, having contributed to 21 of their films, including “Avengers: Infinity War,” “Captain America: The First Avenger” and “Ant-Man.”
He was recently featured in an episode of “Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian” on Disney+ to discuss his work on the series “The Mandalorian,” where he helped bring Luke Skywalker back to the “Star Wars” franchise.
“It is amazing to see how Trent’s career has blossomed,” Souto said. “His success is no accident. It is his hard work, his perseverance, and most of all, his love for what he does what set him apart. We are so very proud of his accomplishments and accolades. He is certainly and role model and an inspiration for all our students.”
For Claus, part of his inspiration for collecting this artwork is also to preserve its history.
“A lot of animation cels would get dipped in a solution, and it would strip the acetate of all the paint, and they would just re-use them,” he said. “That’s why in ‘Roger Rabbit,’ the villain is threatening Roger Rabbit with dip. It was used to strip all the paint away. Or they would just incinerate the cels. A couple of years after Disneyland opened, they would occasionally hand out cels at the exit just because they were thought of as worthless. And that’s the same with a lot of the other pieces. The concept drawings and concept paintings a lot of times would just get thrown away. So collecting them is not only a way to see and view them, but a way to preserve them and archive them.”
Claus, who recently moved back to Lincoln, said this exhibition is a milestone for his collection.
“This will be the first time many of them have ever been hung, and it’s the first time that any of them have been shown publicly,” he said. “So it’s a big moment for the collection.”
He encourages people to come see his collection.
“There’s definitely something here from something they’ve seen,” he said. “I think there’s something to be said for seeing art in person, and this is no exception.”