It was back in 1968 when Andy Warhol first published the phrase “in the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes”, though photographer Nat Finkelstein has claimed that he gave the concept to Warhol two years earlier. These words have become quite ubiquitous ever since, cropping up regularly in popular culture and literature. They have come to have several shades of meaning but generally involve the idea that brief (and fleeting) fame is within everyone’s grasp, even if not necessarily on a global level. It is intriguing that the expression was coined well before the advent of the Internet which now makes this concept seem, at least theoretically, more feasible than it might have been back in the 1960s.
Against this backdrop I reflected recently on a fun journey which my wife Diane and I participated in last March with a close acquaintance of ours who achieved his moment of fame. This acquaintance was Oscar the Octopus, who Diane had conceived and created during 2014-15. He is an 82 pound shell sculpture octopus who lives with us and sits serenely in our lanai most days. Each of his eight tentacles is over four feet long when extended though they wrap gracefully around a driftwood base when he is at rest. His 10,000 shells were all collected at local beaches, mainly on Manasota and Gasparilla Keys, and were lovingly attached to an underlying epoxy clay sculpture crafted by Diane.
While attending the March 2018 Sanibel Shell Fair and Show I showed a photo of Oscar to one of the co-Chairs who was instantly fascinated by him. She explained that he would not qualify for any of the competition categories in the show, which are limited to 30 inch by 30 inch creations, but wondered if we would be interested in bringing him to the 2019 show if they created a special non-competition exhibition category just for him. Diane agreed and over the following six months we corresponded periodically with the show leadership culminating in a request for a photo for marketing purposes. We assumed this would be used in an exhibition brochure or some other similar publication highlighting the show entries. We were therefore quite surprised when we discovered that Oscar’s story and image were being used as the show’s primary advertising message in a host of newspaper and online promotional articles.
We attended the opening reception and were very gratified to see large crowds continuously surrounding Oscar who sat on the rotating base I had built for him. Diane was asked to come in on the Friday morning of the show with the prospect that she might be interviewed by a local TV station. We arrived bright and early and Diane and Oscar were rewarded with a two minute live morning show appearance at 8:15 am on Fox 4, Fort Myers. Oscar’s week of fame may only have extended to our little corner of Southwest Florida, but it did seem to put a big smile on his face.
To see the Fox 4 interview visit http://seggerstudio.com/oscar-is-a-celebrity/ and to learn more about how he was built visit http://seggerstudio.com/oscar-the-octopus/. Note that Diane is proudly wearing her BSGAC golf shirt in the interview. Oscar welcomes anyone who would like to visit him and his fellow sculptures and paintings at 1001 Romano Key Circle.
The Sanibel-Captiva Shell Club was formed to exchange information in the field of conchology and malacology, to foster public education and intelligent conservation, and to encourage and support studies and research activities in those fields. The Sanibel Shell Show, now in its 83rd year, is one of the world’s premier shell shows drawing exhibitors from around the globe. The 2020 show will run March 5, 6 & 7 at the Sanibel Community House, 2173 Periwinkle Way. Their website is https://sanibelshellclub.com/. The Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum on Sanibel is also well worth a visit – https://www.shellmuseum.org/. It is currently closed while a new aquarium is being constructed but should open again later in 2020.
This article was published in the January 2020 issue of the BSM Beacon.
