(bright music) - [Ben] On this episode of "Postcards."

(gentle music) - I mean, I didn't plan on this.

I never expected to be building cars for art collectors and actors and things like this.

- It's pretty cool.

I'm very fond of being Sticker Guy.

- I got started with art as a little girl, and I just fell in love with painting.

And that, it was like one of those things where I just knew right away it was something that I loved.

(energetic music) - [Ben] "Postcards" is made possible by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

Additional support provided by, Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies.

Mark and Margaret Yackel-Juleen on behalf of Shalom Hill Farms, a retreat and conference center in a prairie setting near Wyndham, Minnesota.

On the web at shalomhillfarm.org.

Alexandria, Minnesota, a year-round destination with hundreds of lakes, trails, and attractions for memorable vacations and events.

More information at explorealex.com.

A better future starts now.

West Central Initiative empowers communities with resources, funding, and support for a thriving region.

More at wcif.org.

(slow-paced music) - I didn't really fit into the mold of your typical public school system, and I definitely learned differently than sitting in a classroom with books in front of me.

But I could apply all of those same things, Math, English, all those things, if I was hands-on building and creating.

(car engine roaring) That's the thing people don't, they're like, he builds homes?

What's a coach?

You know, they think it's something to do with building homes.

A coach builder, traditionally, a well to do person, would go to a coach builder and they would say, I want this car built.

I want these materials, I want this style, I want this engine.

And a coach builder would bring that to life.

(soft music) (car engine roaring) As a teenager, I would buy cars, fix 'em up, typically, Volkswagens, and Porsches, and BMWs, and then resell them.

And if I made a little bit of money, I'd put it towards another one.

When it really got outta hand, was when I found a bunch of tools at a barn in South Dakota.

I was going there to pick up an old Porsche, and this gentleman had hand-built an aluminum-bodied car.

Growing up, I knew about these cars.

I kind of had a little bit of, I guess, an infatuation for them.

One thing led to another, I bought all the tools and laid out a plan to build my first car from scratch.

(soft music continues) My inspiration, most of it comes from bygone eras.

The old photos and the history books on European postwar racing.

The concept of aerodynamics, I think the Germans really started playing with it in the 1930s.

And what they thought was aerodynamic, this teardrop beautiful shape that we emulate in our work, unfortunately, true aerodynamic cars are ugly.

So, (chuckles) we kind of strike a balance between modern understanding of aerodynamics, top speed of our cars, and keeping them beautiful.

(car engine roaring) (grinder roaring) This is a very, very quick version of what takes several hours to do.

But most shops, at this point, this would be suitable for painting.

But what we would do, is sand this, taking it down really smooth, and then do a final polish with it.

(upbeat music) So, my son has taken an interest in this.

He's always kind of been in the garage with me.

But in the last few years, especially since driving age, of course, when he turned 16, he really took an interest in the cars and started working on his own projects, and then now helps me in here.

- My title here?

- Mm-mm.

- Executive manager?

No... (laughing) I build the Tube Bucks.

I'm just the kid who builds the Tube Bucks for right now.

So, now we're going over here.

Yeah, so what I'm gonna do, is cut a length of tube to make this shape out of, and I'm gonna just go back and forth between that and these radiuses here, and just basically get it to fit that shape.

(upbeat music continues) - He has his own vision and his own interpretation of the designs, and that's really fun to see.

- The reason I like working with my dad, is 'cause he kind of lets me sort of innovate the process, I guess, where if you're at a normal job, you might be kind of stuck into doing it how they want you to do it, you know?

(bright music) So, I do like the old more flowy cars too.

But as far as like production cars, I like those boxier BMWs.

I like to drive them.

But even more than driving them, I like to have a car that like is completely undrivable, and restore it and make it look all pretty, and then be able to go drive it.

That's what makes it a lot more fun.

(bright music continues) (car engine roaring) - I grew up on a hobby farm in rural Minnesota just outside of Alexandria.

And the environment was having parents who always pushed us to just dream.

So, I started snowboarding at Andes, and that turned into actually a career for me.

I snowboarded at a professional level for seven years.

And then started another business with my father where we developed a technology used in the petroleum industry, and that allowed me to do more car stuff.

I think that people, they definitely identify with their passions, with their professions.

And I learned, thankfully, about midway through my snowboarding career, not to wrap my identity up in it.

That was very temporary, 'cause I saw a lot of other people who, not only did they like crash in the literal sense, but in the kind of lifestyle sense.

And so, I was well aware of that.

And so, even with this, it's a blast and I love it.

But it's an extension of my passion and who I am, but it's not me, even though it's very close to my heart.

(chuckles) I have designs in here all the way from when I was a teenager, even back in the '90s, of cars.

And this is one that I have actually built, FF 007.

I take these sketches after I get 'em to a point where I'm happy with them, and I send them to a friend out in California, Alberto Hernandez.

And then he renders them into a more realistic view and quarter views of the car that allow me to bill off of.

And the reason these are so filthy, is 'cause these are what I used when I actually built this car.

I had these in the shop the whole time.

I mean, I didn't plan on this, I never expected to be building cars for art collectors and actors and things like this.

That was not my intention.

My intention was just to go out and experience what it was like, that sense of freedom.

So, it's almost surreal when you start out in the barn, you know, hammering away on aluminum, and people are like, is he okay?

(chuckles) And then five years later, people are like knocking on the door, hey, I wanna see what you're building.

You know, it's a really interesting dynamic.

(car engine roaring) Plenty of leg room!

Yeah.

So, there's the success that you see from the outside where I've been able to take my work and share it with Jay Leno and a very broad audience.

But the successes that I think I find a lot of pride in, are within the work itself, and coming up with new ways to tune the car, suspension settings, power to weight ratios, balancing the cars, and when I get to go out and drive that car and feel like, okay, this is my best one yet, that's where I find success.

(car engine roaring) (bright upbeat music) (gentle music) - I got the name "The Daily Lunch" from starting out as a food blog.

And I would pretty much draw pictures for the wait staff, or take a picture of my lunch every day.

That's how it actually started, I was taking a picture of my lunch every day and it was the same lunch every day.

So, it was just the same picture every day.

So, then I started drawing pictures for waitstaff.

And then from there, I started making stickers.

(gentle music continues) A lot of people call me Sticker Guy, my best friend calls me Sticker Guy.

I've never been able to shake the Sticker-Guy thing.

And I think it's kind of endearing.

So, yeah, it's fun.

(gentle music continues) I have over 150 sticker designs.

Each one has either meaning or some sort of emotions linked to it.

They're just memories for me.

Each one conveys a different time of my life.

(bright music) I would say out of all the stickers, the best ones have jokes behind them.

So, I always found humor to be the best way to convey thoughts.

(bright music continues) Out of all my sticker designs, my favorite of all time though, would have to be probably the most recent.

Because I'm always improving, and getting new skills, and I'm biased.

(laughing) (bright music continues) Typically, in a day, I'll wake up, go to a coffee shop like Main-Stay.

I'll sit down and just interact with community.

One of my favorite things to do, is just talk to random people.

I'm not really an extrovert, but it's how I interact with people.

Oh, hey.

- How are you?

(all laughing) - Pretty good, you want a sticker?

- Sure.

- Or.

- Yeah, let's see what you got.

Oh wow, can we pick any of these?

- Yeah, of course, of course.

- Wow.

- What's this one mean?

- It's a step up from a grab it, which is just a rabbit with a hand for a head.

- Gotcha.

- [Josh] Yeah, some of 'em are really weird, some of 'em are just interesting.

- [Customer 1] Yeah.

- [Customer 2] Absolutely.

- I like working in Main-Stay because it's just a cozy place.

I think it's probably one of the more comfortable cafes in Marshall.

They don't mind it if I hand out a sticker here or there.

I don't sell 'em here, but it's nice to be able to talk to people and just meet new people.

When I first moved to Marshall, this was the first coffee shop that I wanted to go to.

I don't know why, it just drew me in, and I've been coming here ever since.

I have a serious coffee problem.

(laughing) I feel like a studio is kind of a trap.

You get in there, but it doesn't get you any exposure as an artist.

It's interacting with community that gets you any sort of traction in your town.

I'm not big on social media.

I like to focus on the people around me rather than the people that aren't.

Would you like a sticker?

- Sure.

- I always appreciate the conversations, so- - Yeah, these are all really good, which ones are- - I prefer in-person experiences over virtual reaction.

Likes mean nothing to me.

- I love Mr. Bean.

- Mr. Bean's one of my favorite.

- Yeah.

(chuckles) - Rowan Atkinson.

- He's the best.

- I love when people come up and ask about anything I'm doing.

I love that opportunity to converse with people.

I'm always a little distracted when people ask me something.

Like, I'll partially be in my work, and partially try to have a conversation.

And sometimes, I get a little drawn into the drawing a little bit more.

But usually, I'm open for a conversation.

So, it's fun.

I would say I chose stickers as a medium, because I used to do other forms and they just didn't stick with me like stickers do.

A little bit of a pun there, but it wasn't really intended.

I just can't get rid of them.

Since starting stickers, I've just been able to socialize with people more, and that's what my art's about.

So, I enjoy seeing them just strewn across the world, I guess.

(chuckles) I have some in Missouri, I have some in Alaska.

I have stickers in places I haven't even been.

And that's phenomenal to me.

One of my favorite things about the medium of stickers, is just the versatility of it.

You can get 'em done professionally.

I don't do that professionally, I make 'em all myself, I like the DIY experience.

So, that's something I would suggest to people, is before you go to a company and have somebody do something for you, do it yourself.

Find out how to do something like that yourself.

Just experiment with art, it's a big part of the process.

It's just created so many opportunities and so many just relationships in my life.

It's pretty cool, I'm very fond of being Sticker Guy.

(bright music) - I got started with art as a little girl, and I just fell in love with painting.

And that, it was like one of those things where I just knew right away it was something that I loved.

(bright music continues) About two years ago, my sister gave me a gift card for Christmas to an art store.

And it had been like 15 years since I'd really been practicing my art.

And I just thought to myself like, I wanna give this more of a effort, more of a go.

And so, I just decided, every week, I'm gonna have a date for two hours with my art.

And it doesn't matter if I make something good, or if it's just like a total flop, I'm gonna do this.

And I felt really nervous about it, but I started just the practice of making art again.

And within a few weeks, it was crazy.

I just like re-fell in love with it, I started sharing it more, and it's just been absolutely awesome.

So, that's how I kind of restarted doing my watercolor practice.

The thing about watercolor, is it can flow, but it also, you can control it and have hard lines.

So, it's about how much water you add to it.

And for some artists, I have artist friends who hate watercolor because it flows and they feel like they can't control it.

But I feel like that's where the magic is.

Because if you put water down and then you add color to it, it will do what it wants to do, and it'll move around.

And so, that's one of the things that I love, see how it just bleeds?

And I'm gonna totally geek out over this, but I just love this so much.

(gentle music) You know, it sounds kind of rudimentary, but just in the beginning saying, I want to do this practice of making art again.

And when I started looking at it that way, and looking at it more as like an adventure, and I'm gonna work this into my life and into my schedule, it was amazing to me how all of a sudden, my life had this space for the art again.

And it was really healing for me.

(gentle music continues) I remember one day, one of my daughters coming home from school and I was painting at the dining-room table.

I don't have a fancy studio right now, it's just, how can I work it into my life?

And she came in from school and just kind of watched me painting.

And then she said, mom, I'm really glad that you're making art again.

And it was like just kind of this confirmation in me that when we're doing those things that are in us, you know, it could be baking bread.

For me, it's painting watercolors, it could be landscaping.

We all have these things in us that I think we're meant to do creatively.

And when we do them and we share them with others, it like, they notice.

We want all of the time we do, we spend on the things we do, to matter.

So, we don't wanna feel like we've wasted time.

But I try to look at it as I'm investing in developing as an artist.

So, this watercolor, I'm really pleased with, but I have a ton in my portfolio that I would never sell.

I'm also not gonna rip them up.

(chuckles) But they taught me something.

So, there might be one thing in a watercolor I didn't like where I'm like, wow, I learned how that blue bleeds into that, and I love how it plays off of that.

And I learned something, so I'm gonna take that into the next one.

So, I think that helps to alleviate some of the pressure.

It's great as an artist to be able to sell your work, but more than anything, it's the joy for me in being able to start with just a blank piece of white paper, and just sketch something by hand.

And then just like get in that zone, where it's like this is something that I'm making and I'm meant to do it, and then that somebody else would want that in their home, or wanna come and look at it in an exhibit, is just like so exciting for me.

(gentle music) When I sit down and I create, I feel like I'm doing something that is productive, and it's adding value to life.

It's not ruminating, or being stagnant, or just kind of getting stuck.

And so, I think that the thing about art, is that it adds, it reminds us that there's beauty in life.

I could say there's tons of great watercolor artists in the world, and like, why should I try?

And like, there's so much of that.

But there's no other Anna Spickelmier who wants to make, you know, like, I'm the only me.

You're the only one who's going to express yourself the way that you express yourself.

It doesn't matter if other people are, you know what I mean?

There's room, and go for it.

Like, don't worry about how many people have done that.

(gentle music continues) I am not a like a fighter in your face kind of person, but it's a way that I fight back by saying, this is what I'm gonna do.

I'm gonna add something to life with my art, add something to life by creating, add something to life by being involved with other artists in Madison and in my community.

And so, that's been a huge part of it for me.

So, I'm currently exhibiting art at the Madison Mercantile with a friend of mine who's also an artist.

His name's Dallas Nyflot, and he's from Madison, Minnesota as well, and he's a photographer.

And this project has been really fun because it's called "Interpretations."

And what it is, is it's a collection of his photographs with my watercolor interpretation next to it.

So, we worked on this project for about nine months.

And what it's trying to encourage people to do, is to look at two art mediums and to think about, as you look at art, what are you interpreting?

So, this is Dallas and I interpreting what we saw, but we wanna invite people to look at it and start to think about the fact that we're always interpreting what we see and the art that we see.

So, it's been really, really exciting.

And I loved working from Dallas' photography as an inspiration for my painting.

Here's another one I did that I really feel like it shows what watercolor can do with how it bleeds, and it can be so flowy in such a mood, but then you can get hyper-focused and hyper-realistic with it.

And some people don't realize that about watercolor.

They think that it just flows and it can't be controlled, but it can.

Art has taken me on a really interesting journey.

I think a lot about the quote that someone said, do what you love to do before anybody rewarded you, or applauded you, or paid you.

And for me, that's been art ever since I was a little girl, and now as an artist who I'm really grateful people are supporting my work.

But even if that wasn't happening, this is what I love to do, and I just feel like I come alive when I'm in the studio working.

I really feel like what I'm advocating for, is appreciating the beauty in life.

Because I feel like life can really suck the life out at you sometimes.

And it can just, there's a lot of things that weigh us down.

So, I want people to look at my art and just say, to see something that's beautiful to remind them to see that.

And something that's really important to me, is for other people to know whatever it is that you have in you, that's a creative thing that you can do, that it's important and that it matters.

And so, for me, when I restarted doing my art a couple years ago, it was like I was telling myself again, I am an artist, and I can do this.

Whatever it is that is like a creative passion for people, even if it's only two hours a week, find the time to do that, 'cause it matters for you, it matters for me, and it matters for us to like share that with each other.

It's important.

(chuckles) (energetic music) - [Ben] "Postcards" is made possible by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

Additional support provided by, Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies.

Mark and Margaret Yackel-Juleen on behalf of Shalom Hill Farms, a retreat and conference center in a prairie setting near Wyndham, Minnesota.

On the web at shalomhillfarm.org.

Alexandria Minnesota, a year-round destination with hundreds of lakes, trails and attractions for memorable vacations and events.

More information at explorealex.com.

A better future starts now.

West Central Initiative empowers communities with resources, funding, and support for a thriving region.

More at wcif.org.

(energetic music continues)