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| Oceanic
Arts owners Robert Van Oosting & LeRoy Schmaltz |
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| "Mahalo
for surfing our site!" |
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| Watch
some fun Videos
- featuring OA and the "Tiki Culture"
scene... |
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| 12414
Whittier Boulevard, Whittier, California |
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From
our modest beginning in 1956, Oceanic Arts
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supplied the Tropical Décor Trade |
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with Unique and Authentic Polynesian Arts and
building materials for 65 Years. |
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| Tiki
Carving at OA in the early 1960's. |
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| Moai
outside Oceanic Arts' current Whittier Boulevard
Entrance. |
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| Hotel
Taharaa, Papeete, Tahiti - OA Tiki. |
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| Oceanic
Arts has worked with Buyers
and Associates in Hong Kong, Taiwan, the Philippines,
Mexico, and China, always on the alert for Fine Indigenous
Arts, new Mattings, and Structural Materials. |
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| (
left ) A Customer explores a small portion
of |
| OA's
Showroom / Warehouse, when it was once open to the
public. |
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| In
1960 we made " The Big
Trip* " to the
South Pacific, and traveled over 33,000 miles in search
of new items, seeking to learn more about the Indigenous
Native Arts, and to set up buying Contacts. |
For
many years, our Warehouse / Showroom was
open to the public, where guests could
listen to authentic South Seas Island
music while they perused our displays
of Primitive Arts from South Pacific.
Among the items that were on display were
vintage Stone Axes, Spears, Shields, Kava
Bowls, Masks, and a 27-foot Double Outrigger
Canoe from the Palawan Islands, plus many
other rare Polynesian and Tropical Arts
and Crafts.
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| Watch
some entertaining Videos,
featuring Oceanic Arts and the "Tiki Culture"
phenomenon... |
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Video
Favorites |
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Just a few of the many videos showcasing OA's amazing auction and
the fantastic "Godfathers of Tiki" collectible book... |
Have a look at the trailer for this fun documentary about Tiki Culture,
"Plastic Paradise: A Swinging Trip Through America's Polynesian
Obsession", now being shown on some PBS stations (Oceanic Arts
is featured!). |
Another
fun "documentary" about Tiki Culture, "The Air-Conditioned
Eden" (and look for LeRoy and Bob at around 13:05). |
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| ~
A Brief History of Oceanic Arts ~ |
| CARVIN’
& TUBIN’ IN WHITTIER, ‘56 |
| (
above ) Oceanic Arts owners |
| LeRoy
Schmaltz & Robert Van Oosting, |
| late
1950's. |
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“The
World’s Largest Supplier of Tropical and
Polynesian Décor” started in
Whittier, California, in 1956, when Robert Van
Oosting and LeRoy Schmaltz met in college, where
LeRoy was carving Palm Frond Masks for an art
project. They decided to work together, and would
often take the fronds down to the Rio Hondo River
to carve them, and to “tube down the river”
in sbetween making Masks. (They eventually sold
thousands of a modified version of the Palm Frond
Masks, at 500-per-order, to the Builder’s
Emporium home improvement chain. Their wives would
even help stain and paint the Masks.) |
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| (
above ) LeRoy carving our First Tiki, in 1956, |
| in
the San Gabrial River bed. |
A
year or so later, LeRoy and Bob met Robert Carter, who
was importing Tapa Cloth, Canoes, and Tikis from the
South Pacific, and selling them to Donn Beach and Victor
Bergeron. Eventually Bob and LeRoy did a lot of carving
for Carter, concentrating on items like New Guinea and
New Caledonia Tales (pronounced "tall-eez"),
and Taboo Panels made of 2” thick Sugar Pine slabs.
Their other carvings included the Tahitian Support Posts
for Trader Vic’s, and Don-the-Beachcomber’s.
Soon LeRoy and Bob had carved a good number of authentically-styled
South Sea Island Paddles, Shields, and Mask Patterns,
which they then reproduced in smaller quantities in
hardwoods and sold to many Polynesian & Tropical-themed
Restaurants, as well as to Carter for his projects. |
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"The
Big Trip" |
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In
1960, Bob and LeRoy both set out on “The Big Trip”,
traveling to the South Pacific to meet the people and
explore the cultures there, and study their Arts and
Crafts. |
Starting
from Hawaii, LeRoy and Bob went on to Tahiti (and its
outer islands), before continuing west on a journey
that would take them across western Polynesia and ultimately
to New Guinea at its farthest point. |
While
they were staying in Tahiti, Bob and LeRoy took a boat
trip to the French Polynesian Island of Huahine, attempting
to locate some of the old Whale Blubber Pots. They rented
a small motor boat, and hired a young Chinese man who
spoke Tahitian and knew the island. When they landed,
half-way around the island they visited a school --
where some of the five-year-olds started crying! Scared
by the first White people they had ever seen, in a time
long before the instant-media of today. |
Later,
they had raw fish at The Chief’s Place, where
The Chief even had a refrigerator – though there
wasn’t any electricity. |
To
get back to the Tahitian island of Raiatea, LeRoy and
Bob had to charter a fishing boat – which got
lost in a violent squall that the boat’s
navigator led them into, when he failed to properly
figure deviation on the compass! The storm was so terrible
that they found native families anxiously waiting on
the docks for their return, amazed they made it back
alive. |
| FLIGHT
TO FIJI, "A La Flambeau"... |
Waiting
for the arrival of what would be, in 1960, the first
commercial flight for Fiji to leave the New Fa’a
Aerodrome in Papeete, Tahiti, Bob and LeRoy spent a
good part of the day sitting under Coconut trees on
the tarmac (choosing the Coconut trees without
coconuts – as falling coconuts are a problem).
They watched the local festivities until it grew dark,
when finally the plane, a T.A.I. DC-6, arrived –
with one of its engines on fire and spurting sparks...!
They eventually took off again, rising past gallon-cans
of kerosene lit on fire to serve as “runway lights”,
into the night on a heading toward the Fijian Islands.
Some time later the crew awakened them during their
flight, to let them know the port engine was on fire
again… |
Fortunately,
the two young Oceanic Arts founders landed safely in
Fiji, next stop in a journey that would take them on
to New Caledonia, to the Australian Outback, and from
there to exotic New Guinea (“From one end to the
other!”). |
| BUMPY
FLIGHT OVER NEW GUINEA |
On
the flight from Port Moresby, New Guinea, north and
west to Wewak, LeRoy and Bob found themselves locked
inside the cabin of a DC-3 with several Kanakas (Natives)
with leprosy, all of them mostly naked. |
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The
two sets of travelers sat on wooden crates, staring
at each other, as the tropical storm
they were flying into grew more vicious by the
hour. No doubt everyone aboard was saying their
prayers while the plane was tossed around by the
turbulent wind and rain! |
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The
people at the aerodrome were concerned, unable to make
radio contact with the DC-3, and thought the plane had
gone down in the storm. They ran out to the plane as
it landed, hugging the Pilot and Co-Pilot upon
their safe arrival… We were in Wewak. |
In
the Eastern Highlands of New Guinea, Bob and LeRoy stayed
in a small “hotel” in Goroka, amongst the
jungle trees. There was a white Cockatoo in a nearby
tree which had eaten all of the tree’s leaves
off. The bird would sit on a bare limb staring at the
two young American guests, and as soon as they would
get up to leave, he would flip upside-down and scream,
“Help! Help!” (Bob says it was
hard not to love that bird.) |
The
photo above is from our 1960 South Pacific trip, taken
in Chimbu Village, near Goroka, Territory of Papua,
New Guinea. On the left is Mr. Robert Van Oosting, and
on the right is Mr. LeRoy Schmaltz, partners of Oceanic
Arts. |
OA’s
founders flew back to Australia, and while in Darwin
they stayed at the Victoria Hotel (owned by Victoria
Bitters Brewing, Ltd.), where, at around 7:00 p.m.,
a lady of about 80 years sat down at a piano in the
Grand Hall eating area. The more she played, the more
she drank, and the more she drank, the more she played…
It was announced that dinner that evening would be “a
surprise”, and when it finally arrived, Bob and
LeRoy discovered what the “surprise” was.
As they dug into the meat, they discovered roundish
bones – the "surprise entrée"
was Goanna snake! |
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The
weather in Darwin was well over 100 degrees with humidity
to match, and a walk outdoors soaked one’s singlet
in a matter of minutes. One day, LeRoy discovered a
large pond on the outskirts of town. Native boys who
had Aboriginal mothers and Australian fathers were swimming
and playing there, and it reminded the young travelers
of their childhood days skinnydipping in the Whittier
rivers back home. The boys there were 10-to-12 year
olds, having great fun, and so friendly and happy-go-lucky
that the next day Bob and LeRoy went back with their
swimming trunks. |
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It
didn’t bother the locals at all that the newcomers
wore trunks while they swam around naked, and they shared
stores about how, when the monsoon arrives the saltwater
Crocodiles get washed up from the ocean, into the streets,
and ponds… Later that day, when LeRoy and Bob
were swimming about half-way across the pond, they both
felt “bites” on their hindquarters. Suddenly
the local boys nearby behind them began yelling, “CROCODILE!”
and hastily swimming away. Bob and LeRoy are sure they
set the Unofficial World Swimming Record making it to
shore. When they got there, the native boys stood there
laughing and pointing at them. They had swum up behind
the two newcomers, pretending to “bite”
them with their fingers, pinching their behinds. |
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A
good joke, but sometime later in the same area, while
LeRoy was walking down a jungle path he noticed a very
real Crocodile – one that looked to be
over 8’ long! And, apparently this big fellow
had indeed come from the same pond he and Bob had
been swimming in earlier. Needless to say, LeRoy
reports high-tailing it out of the vicinity, post-haste… |
| NEW
ZEALAND, AND HOME AGAIN |
Finally
the last stop on “The Big Trip” was New
Zealand, and from there LeRoy and Bob were on their
way back to California. After 3 1/2 months and 37,000
miles, by Air, Boat, Motor-Scooter, Jeep, and Hiking-by-Foot,
Bob Van Oosting and LeRoy Schmaltz were headed home
with literally only $1.50 in their pockets. But
what a Trip it was! An unforgettable adventure
filled with a lifetime of wonderful memories…;
it would help to lay the foundation for OA’s Import
/ Export business in the coming years. |
In
addition to the months LeRoy and Bob spent immersing
themselves in the Arts and Crafts of various indigenous
Polynesian cultures, the business purpose of The Big
Trip was to set up Buying Contacts. While they were
in New Guinea, LeRoy and Bob established Contacts to
ship Primitive Arts back to them in Whittier, California,
and back in Fiji, they also found a casket-maker who
made them wooden shipping crates for the many artifacts
they had acquired. |
Subsequently
many crated prime artifacts arrived, addressed to: “Dr.s
Schmaltz & Van Oosting, Under Her Majesty’s
Service”. They even received a human
skull in one of the crates – with an
arrow hole in it (which can now be found at the
legendary Mai Kai Polynesian restaurant, in Ft. Lauderdale,
Florida). |
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Back
Home, to "The Green Barn" |
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| "THE
GREEN BARN" - UNTIL '64 |
| (
above ) Our first shop, "The Green Barn"
in Whittier, California, |
| It
was an old walnut-packing building. Here from 1956 to
1964. |
Back
home in the early 60’s (after Carter moved to
Westwood), Bob and LeRoy continued to base their business
in Whittier, California, renting a huge tin walnut-packing
building left over from the 1920’s that they affectionately
called “The Green Barn”, where they would
have many great experiences and build upon their lifetime
of fond memories. It was a place and a time when they
could leave Tikis and Giant Clam Shells on their old
wooden dock and they knew no one would steal them. (Of
course, the Clam Shells were selling for only $1.25-per-inch
of width in those days…) |
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Not
all their experiences were great, however,
as when they tore up The Green Barn’s former stable-area
floor planks and, after repeatedly washing the scent
of 30 years of horse urine away (or so they thought),
carved New Guinea Abelam Heads and Figures on them,
and sold the carved panels to a Polynesian Restaurant
in Hollywood. They went to visit the job before the
restaurant opened – to find that the eau-de-stable
was still there, and being circulated by the air conditioners.
The Artists report making a hasty retreat before the
Owners got to the door first…
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The
Green Barn’s view was fantastic – they could
see all of Los Angeles in those days, and there in the
yard, under the old Eucalyptus tree, it was great place
to carve -- until a Right-of-Way Agent notified Bob
and LeRoy that they were in the fast-lane of the new
605 Freeway, and had two weeks to vacate the
premises (a complete surprise, as their then-landlord
failed to tell them anything about it)! |
| "UPTOWN
ABALONE" - '64 - '74 |
| (
above ) "Tikiizing" the front landscape of our
second shop -- "The Abalone Shell Block Building". |
| It
was inlaid with crushed Abalone shells. OA remained at
this 1,500 square foot location from 1964 to 1974. |
So
in 1964, in a week’s time, Bob and LeRoy moved
out of The Green Barn, and into a 1,500 square foot
concrete block building (embedded with Abalone shell)
that they found near uptown Whittier. Their 1,500 square
feet was supplemented by a garage, and some out-buildings
they added to store bamboo poles and thatch, and they
thrived there for ten years, until their business outgrew
the property. |
| (
above ) Our third shop in Whittier, from 1974 to 1990.
New offices were built in this 300' long building, |
| which
had a railroad siding that was used a few times. We used
to ride our Dirt Bikes inside. |
Bob
and LeRoy again moved Oceanic Arts in 1974, electing
to stay in Whittier, where they bought a 15,000 square
foot building on one acre of land leased from the Southern
Pacific Railroad. They even had their own railroad spur,
which they used to ship Rattan to Mexico City. On clear
days they could see Los Angeles, and even Catalina Island…
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They
did a lot of carving there, including a 24’ long
Mahogany Outrigger Canoe for the Las Vegas Tropicana,
and a 32’ long by 10’ high carved wooden
sign for the Getty Corporation’s Mammoth Mountain
Inn. They also designed and carved a 4” thick
by 18' wide by 18' high Tympanum for the front of Marriott’s
World Headquarters Building in Washington, D.C. |
During
this time, Oceanic Arts supplied all of the décor
for Disney World’s Polynesian Village Resort Hotel,
including over 100 signs (one of them being the 9’
by 9’ Entrance Sign). A huge project in itself,
which included the fabrication of large Bronze Escutcheon
Plates inlaid with Capiz Shell, Ash Urns, many Tikis
and carved artifacts, such as carved Tifa Drum Lamps
(and many other décor items), Oceanic Arts also
supplied many items for Disney World / EPCOT Center’s
Norway, France, and Canada areas, including a 5’
diameter, 35’ tall authentically-designed Totem
Pole. |
| (
below) Overview of Disney World's Polynesian
Village Resort Hotel |
| OA
supplied all of the décor, including the
9' x 9' Entrance Sign. |
| (
right ) Marquesan Ceremonial Bowl, Carved from
Jellutong wood. |
| Polynesian
Village Resort Hotel, Disney World, Orlando, Florida |
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| (
left ) Maori Canoe Prow, |
| Carved
Mahogany |
| 11'
long x 5' tall x 6" deep |
| Inlaid
with polished Pahua Shell, |
|
it took three of our carvers |
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three weeks to carve. |
| Polynesian
Village Resort Hotel, |
| Disney
World, Orlando, Florida |
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The
Disney World Polynesian Village Hotel was a fantastic
job to supply, and among Bob and LeRoy’s most
pleasurable memories was working with Walt Disney’s
personal staff. |
About
this same time Oceanic Arts opened a Decorator Showroom
in Oahu, Hawaii, working with Vince Buono to supply
and install tropical décor to many Hotels and
Restaurants for Inter-Island Resorts and AmFac Resorts.
OA also supplied most of the décor to Vince Buono
for the many creative projects he did for the Coco Palms
Hotels. |
Other
noteworthy Oceanic Arts projects included the design
and painting of old-time canvas signs for Hilton Hotel,
and furnishing décor for the newly-styled Don
the Beachcomber’s Restaurants, for their multiple
locations in Santa Rosa, Marina Del Rey, Dallas, and
Houston locations. |
Many
new carvings, tropical lights, and various other items
evolved from these jobs, and Oceanic Arts’ work
for these renowned clients led to supply & installation
engagements for hotel chains like the Mariott’s
Kona Kai Restaurant, the Kon Tiki Ports, and many others.
In some cases, Oceanic Arts designed the interiors of
certain restaurants, as well as installing the décor.
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Oceanic
Arts was asked to supply and install their Polynesian
Décor for many different kinds of projects, which
also multiplied to include most major apartment buildings
on Lakewood and Rosemead Boulevards – spanning
Bellflower to Pasadena. At one time OA ran a crew who
helped install their décor in many Polynesian-themed
restaurants around the country, from Colorado, to the
Tur Mai Kai, in Kalamazoo, Michigan. |
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PanAm
Airlines engaged Oceanic Arts to create the décor
for the InterContinental Taharaa Hotel
in Papeete, Tahiti. OA did so, but declined to
do the installation, as at that point Bob and
LeRoy had decided to close down their installation
operations and concentrate their time on importing
and wholesaleing décor. |
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When
the Décor Trade slowed in the late 1980’s,
a supplier called “Sea and Jungle” closed
their doors, selling Oceanic Arts two truckloads of
various décor for $600. They even gave Bob and
LeRoy their office chairs, source-books, and –
their Customer List. This last item helped to get Oceanic
Arts started in the Movie Supply and Rental business.
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Ultimately,
the two young tiki-carving entrepreneurs from Whittier,
California were supplying the tropical décor
for installations around the world, from displays of
thousands of Pink Murex Shells for the Pago Pago Intercontinental
Hotel in American Samoa, to Outrigger Canoes for the
King of Bahrain. |
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Oceanic
Arts Today |
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OA
remained at the Southern Pacific Railroad property location
until 1990 -- when the city of Whittier condemned the
entire area for a new shopping center. They moved to
their present 10,000 square foot Warehouse location
on Whittier Boulevard, purchasing it a few years later,
and also lease an additional 7,000 square foot warehouse
nearby. |
| (
above ) Oceanic Arts' present Warehouse
in Whittier, California. |
| Loading
Dock and Main Office Entrance. |
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( Entrance Moai carved by Guy Wilson. ) |
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From
Oceanic Arts’ modest beginning in the mid-1950’s,
when Bob Van Oosting and LeRoy Schmaltz started working
out of a family-owned garage, to their current combined
17,000 square feet of Showroom and Warehouse operations
of today, it’s been an ongoing whirlwind of almost
constant activity, with LeRoy and Bob working six days
a week. |
But
they will quickly add that they’ve been having
so much fun that it seems incredible they’ve been
going for over 60 years now, all made possible they
say by a great Employee Team, and the Best Customers
in the world (and when they say "the world",
they really do mean “the World”).
Mr. Van Oosting and Mr. Schmaltz say they’ve truly
been blessed. |
| "Mahalo
for surfing our site!" |
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Visitor
Photo Gallery |
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| (
left, above, and below ) |
| Photos
© J. Hirschfeld |
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| (
above, below, and right ) |
| Photos
by Johnny Curtis |
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