Tupac Martir: “From La Loteria to the Cosmos Within Us”

Justine: Hello and welcome. It is our first ever inaugural, which is the first ever, Cannes XR, which is also the first ever Cannes XR we are at a podcast. And my very first guest is Tupac Martir who is the creative director with Satore Studios, which is what London based, Paris based?

Tupac: Mexico City and New York.

Justine: Wow. That’s quite a lot.

Tupac: it’s a lot of rent to pay

Justine: And frequent flyer miles and you’re earning there. So Tupac, tell us, give us a little hint in what you’re doing besides exciting. I know a lot of fashion. What other kinds of interesting technology based cool stuff do you guys do?

Tupac: So the company is actually the way we call in three spaces. We have the live entertainment side of things, which does fashion, ballet, opera, theater installation work, art work, that kind of thing. Then we have another side of it, which does architectural lighting, yes. For buildings and all those sorts of things that take a long, long time to make. And then we actually opened last year, Satore Tech, which is a sister company. And they do in there is to create our own IP to investigate how technology can be implemented into architecture, into live entertainment, but also into AR, XR, and trying to understand how to best maneuver these new ways and creating new workflows for people to use and new techniques to tell stories.

Justine: So tell us what you, what you have been working on most recently or anything that you want to say about Satore studios. What’s exciting working there?

Tupac: So I think the nicest part about the studio is actually a big, big family. I know a lot of people say this and it’s a cliche, but we have, I think kind of day to day 14 different nationalities, which

Justine: very UN of you,

Tupac: You can have maybe a very pro Europe of me too. but I think it’s a really nice way of, of how to solve problems based on everyone’s culture.

Justine: Okay.

Tupac: And so the way that certain problems get approached and how they get solved allow us to have quite a different view on it. You know, we have people from India, Iceland, mainline Europe. we have an American, we have a Colombian, there’s a few Mexicans. You know, it, it’s, it’s a nice little combination of people into what we’re trying to do. And also that creates really interesting avenues of what we want to make.

Justine: Can you tell me, do the nationalities bring with them certain kinds of sensibilities or have you seen kind of commonalities within the nationality?

Tupac: There’s commonalities. It’s almost impossible not to have just because of the Internet and the way that we see things. But at the same time, it’s quite interesting how certain problems get solved in the Icelandic why or how things get solved in the Latin American way. And you know Raj, one of our Indian guys who just kind of goes and creates his own little code and find different it’s like everyone finds different avenues to how to solve it. And some of them you go, we wouldn’t do it that way, but I actually, I can see how that relates to this other way of doing it. And so it, it’s quite, it’s actually quite fun in that sense that you just sit there and I sit at lunch because we have lunch together every single day. And I make them, I make them have lunch together to they don’t have to talk about work and to actually meet each other and talk about the lives and actually create relationships rather than just 24/7.

Justine: So that kind of explains a little of the family vibe that you’re talking about. So, yeah,

Tupac: I, I really enjoy the fact that that that’s, that’s who we are. We spend a lot of time and, and go into, when we go to the movies, we go to the ball. We go and hang out at each other’s. We’d know nowadays with with the whole game of Thrones thing. Tuesdays have now become Tuesday. Lunch is game of Thrones. And so everyone sits down and watches Games of Thrones, it’s which you kind of go, that’s great. Yeah. It’s, it allows to create a sense of community.

Justine: Okay. Well then how does that sense of community work when you’re making cool new stuff or creativity? How does that, what’s the impact there?

Tupac: The biggest reason that it and the way that, the reason what we do where this way and why it works is because then you realize that nothing that you say is personal. When you’re in the middle of a job, when you’re in the middle of creativity, you’re not challenging that person for who they are personally, but you’re challenging who they are, what they’re thinking about creatively. And so you’re, there’s, there’s a point in which you can easily say, this is our relationship outside of work. This is our relationship in this project. I see. And so then that creates that sense of everyone’s trying to do the best for the project that we’re doing. but if I hurt you, I don’t mean in a personal way? I just mean it in a way to try and make this project better. And that being able to create that massive difference. That allows for a whole lot of problems to go away

Justine: I think that’s very helpful because what’s hard about being a creative is hearing feedback that you don’t want to hear a criticism. So I went to a battery, but it’s painful.

Tupac: I went to art school, my dignity is buried in a, in a sand lot, somewhere in Omaha, Nebraska. Really, really, really deep down. I think that as being someone that has been creating since the age of 15 you know, and being in front of the public and having to put exhibitions and having to do pieces and do insurance for a hundred thousands of people and knowing that you’re gonna get scrutinized at some point, that kind of just goes away and just kind of accept it. And you know, I, I tend to go back and see a show or see a piece two or three years after and see it with the eyes of someone that did not make it, but rather as a, as an as an as an outsider completely right. And then I give myself comments and I gave comments to everybody else and nobody else had a lot of comments. It’s, it’s allowed us to be able to showcase things to people and understand that no one’s giving you feedback for the sake of making you feel bad, but actually for the sake of trying to make it, make the piece feel better and be better. And you know, if that’s, that’s part of the DNA that we have is you, you, you put it up there, you better be ready to get scrutinized.

Justine: Well, both out, but it’s stuck. I said, but it’s never a personal thing, isn’t it? Great. No, you’re absolutely right. I mean, I, I did the same thing in school when we had to submit our written work and it did feel like you needed an ambulance outside the door when your classmates have 12. I’ll go through your piece and you know, edit. But in some ways I’m kind of thinking about in a field of emerging technologies in Vr or Xr, wherever we’re going, whatever fields, it’s, it’s such a new technology relatively. And yet we, so the iterations are quite fast and you know, trying to make waves and the room for feedback there doesn’t seem a lot of feedback built in. It’s very expensive. You can’t make mistakes. So I wonder how criticism works in a, in an emerging.

Tupac: Partly you have to remember is because it is such an emerging technology, no one has the right answers and therefore you’re able to, to do things and tried to experiment with things quite freely, which doesn’t happen in, in many, many ways. You know, if you, you look at film and you know, it be the, the the back catalog that everyone has of film is so big that they’re able to relate to tell you which shot someone else, they’re better withthere’s a whole, whereas in, in, in this part that we’re in, we were all trying to find new ways of telling the story and new combinations of of elements and, and how stories needs to be developed. HowI mean, it wasn’t long ago, long ago that someone said, you can only make a VRP that is five minutes cause no one can stand longer than that. You know, and now we’re looking at 25, 30 minutes and that’s, that’s normal. So no, the, the cost, there are no set rules. you’re able to experiment so much and therefore the feedback that you might get might be something that people just don’t get at the beginning. That happened to us in 2012 completely outside of Xr, just doing a, a theater piece. And you know, I wrote my first stop press slash ballet and a lot of people didn’t understand it and I had to live with the idea that you guys don’t get it right now, but in three, four years’ time, you’re going to start understanding what it did in this piece. And literally it was three, four years later that people started out going back to the piece and go in. Well, yeah, there’s, there’s, there’s nothing. Yeah, I did that in 2012 yeah, yeah, I did that in two and 12 yeah, yeah, yeah. I did that in 2012 and all of a sudden we start going, wait a second, that, that, that, that they all have this five, six different things. I did it in 2012 and people didn’t get them at the time.

Justine: So there’s also then the argument is sometimes you’re going to get feedback or criticism that’s premature. Yes. Especially in this field,

Tupac: Especially in this field, especially in the way that you’re trying to, to create something out of scratch. And you know, today, whatever the engines are doing are going to be completely different to what it’s going to be available in two years time. And so you can’t look back at some pieces and go, Oh, you I would’ve done is like, yeah, but back then there was no, no way of doing it. I think this is the reason why certain pieces like notes on blindness have carried on so well because it’s just, there was so well made.

Justine: Yeah. That’s craftsmanship and storytelling or are an art form and, and we can get it right. It’s timeless. SoI think it’s that’s important bit. Oh, that’s right. No, it’s an interesting conversation. Of course. Discuss, give us a little bit of an out as, as a, as an artist to say, yeah, fuck, you just didn’t understand it because you’re before your time. So that givesyou really do have to be true to yourself, don’t you think? And being able to take the right criticism, because if it’s premature, it’s premature, but we can’t fall on excuses.

Tupac: Correct we had it. and I always say that, yes, I am the creative director of the, of the company. but at the same time I’m one of the, I’m one of the guysI’m, I’m one more and I think nothing can put it simply when I was pushing for customers to be done in a specific engine in this specific way. And at some point my entire team sat me down and one’s right, Tupac, here’s the deal. If we do it the way that you want to do it, this is how far we can push it. There’s are the limitations. And these are the advantages. If we do it in the way that 90% of your team wants to do it, these are the timings, these are the pros. And these are the cons. what do you decide to do? And we will go with you with whichever you pick, but we need you to make a decision and be conscious on that decision. And, and, and funnily enough, I looked at it and I went right. Step away from, from your ego, step away from your, from what you envision at some point in and understand what the limitations that this guys are telling you. Go into the story. Because at that point, the most important thing is can I tell the story the right way? I think it took me about five minutes and I turn around and I said, guys, yeah, I’ve been in this position before and a lot of my friends have been in this position before and I’ve told my friends many times, why don’t you look the right instead of looking to the left, I understand that you want to a trailblazer on the stand. You want to be the first guy to do it, but right now you’re too early to make it the way that you want to do it. And I had to be honest with myself and I went, yes, the tool that I want to use is great, but it’s got limitations that won’t allow me to tell the story that was supposed to be. And so you guys are correct. We’re going to move the entire workflow to this new engine that you guys are talking about and that’s the way we’re going to do the piece, you know? And, and that’s when you’re in that. I think that for them also allow them to realize that they were such a big part of the piece and they were able to take decisions and give me options on how things are being done and for me to then make a decision on A or B, but with a conscious idea of what is entailed by either one of those sites. That gave them a lot of strength to themselves to then really push me and say, well, we think this is the correct way of doing it. You know? and sometimes yes, sometimes I go, no, no, no, we’re gonna stick to that because I know that that’s the correct way of doing it. And sometimes I have to turn around and go, no, you guys are correct. Let’s go with what you’re saying. You know?

Justine: Well, that’s, that’s the leadership and wisdom that come, come together. I told you when my stuff got sand buried, then my dignity’s down there. Well, let’s have in, in a kind of cinematic way. Let’s have a flashback right now. Flashback scene and tell me your beginning and how you got started. And

Tupac: So I was born in Reading in England, Two Mexican parents. Two very bright Mexican parents. My Mom and my dad was studying masters and PhDs. my dad’s indigenous. He’s, which oil is from the southwest of Mexico. And you know, I have pictures of my dad where all of them are wearing sandals and is likethird street and. Like that kind of thing. Yeah. But yeah, so they’re really, really, really bright economist and they got scholarships to study and during their scholarship in England, I was born and we went back to Mexico at the age of five. Lived until the age of 15 in Mexico, in Mexico City. Move with my mom to Italy at the age of 15 to Milan because she was a diplomat. I’m stay with her until the age of 17. Went to school in the states outside of Baltimore in a place called Columbia, Maryland.

Justine: Then I’m an American and I’ve never heard a thing. Just to let you know,

Tupac: To be fair, there’s so many Colombians and like all around the US. and then I went school in Omaha, Nebraska for college, which is something I would go old town. I Love Omaha, love Omaha. hey.

Justine: So how did Farm Land USA help you as an artist? I

Tupac: went to a Jesuit school, which I went to Creighton, which had a very interesting program. They were about to open a brand new building for the arts. and it’s unheard of to go to a school and work with a national geographic photographer.

Justine: Yeah. That is pretty unusual.

Tupac: So at the door who was a professor at Creighton is or was a photographer for National Geographic. So I got to work with him. I also got to work with very close to, to my mentor with John Thein who is an amazing artist and just truly took me from just being a drawer or a painter to actually be an artist. You know, like the, the training and the every day you need to read this, you need to look at that. You need to work on this technique, you need to work on that technique. You need to, and every single day there was a conversation to be had with him and, and he really pushed me to those limits where I, up until this day, I still claim I am a painter on the route and everything that I ever do comes from the vision of a painter. And whenever I need to strip back something to understand it, I always go back to how do I understand this as painting? And by understand that it’s painting or can start understanding of what the technique should break it down, what things need to come before we need to come after, you know. And that, that really is what Creighton gave me. I mean, I had the opportunity to work with three professors who will walk into my studio every other Friday and criticize my work to make me better artists. I was able to go to the art historians and say, I’m working on a piece in this idea and the art history professors will puttwo or three carvers cells of slides from each take to my studio and see that what was going on. And so you don’t get usually that in other universities you don’t get that,

Justine: but just wait, did you hear that? Children slide carousels. That’s a relic from the past slide carousels, all art historians had to go through these lines. Yes. Slides all and on it took a long time and upside down and proper sequence. Yes, we didn’t have this thing called a computer, but it was and nothing in it.

Tupac: The sheer fact of that gave me a very good understanding of what it meant to be an artist and the sacrifices you need to do in the time that you need to spend in there.

Justine: Well, this sounds like to be a creative director. I mean, you really did your homework, so to speak. I’ve been, Jesuits are known for their tradition of hard work and deep thought and, and recurs training. So I’m not surprised that you had that kind of experience. but you come into a new field and you bring a tradition with you.

Tupac: Yeah. I was very lucky. Oh, was climate. when I went back to Mexico I did I got asked to to work at the, at the Opera House in Mexico City and I was working under a, an artist who works with paper. So I learn a lot of techniques about how to dye paper. Wow. It’s a tinted how to maneuver it, how to create skirts and costume and an entire set.

Justine: Can we let’s talk about Mexico for a second, because Mexico is, is I feel sometimes overlooked for, they’re a fantastic and deep and broad cultural and artistic heritage. and I mean, everyone thinks Diego Rivera, they think of Frida Kahlo, but that’s just the tip of,

Tupac: of the iceberg. For me, it’s, I mean, now I’m cold sack religious because me cicadas is a better, it’s a better painter as a better muralist and the things that you did and the way he worked with proportion and the way he worked with color. AndI, I think the, it’s a, it’s, it’s quite of a tricky one, isn’t it? Because we’re seeing, especially in America, we’re seen as a labor force. we’re not sending US second, we’re not seen as a creative and environment. We’re not seen as, as, as this visionaries of, of, right, exactly. And and I mean, and I, funnily enough, we did we designed the main stage at Coachella in 2011. And you know, I was the only Mexican in the design team or the other Mexicans were either cleaning or digging or being labor. And I’ll never forget something happened on stage and I had to turn around to my crew chief and I was like, no, we’re going to do it this way. We’re going to do that and you’re going to pay attention and this is what you’re gonna do. And I remember the entire crew just turning around, he doesn’t mean like, that’s right. Black boy, the Mexican just told you bow to your sensei. You know, it was like there was that sense of pride, of course, of someone coming in and just being like above the one that always Kinda, and they never did have that. They hate him, but you know, he was that kind of Nice thing of, yeah, look at that. There’s, there’s one, there’s a Mexican above them. And, and I think that always say, I mean, we have, I have a lot of Mexicans in my studio. I work with a lot of Mexicans. I think that we are a country that has an incredible culture, incredible. The statics

Justine: I was just thinking that the murals and howan important facet they are, but in a way that transcribes very easily and to like VR space very well at this larger than life. You know, even though it static, how it just seems easier to come to life.

Tupac: But I mean if you think about it, the three best directors in the world are Mexicans.

Justine: I haven’t forgotten.

Tupac: And the best European, the world is Mexican

Justine: that does say something, doesn’t it show

Tupac: When you look at in that sense, we are a country of artisans that has this imagery that can tell stories. You know, I, I remember I did a piece in 2012 for the Cultural Olympiad and it was about a retrospective of Mexican cinema, a hundred years. And the way that it was made is in Mexico we have the lottery, which is the like Bingo. But except for our luxury visual, it’s there. And so for me there’s just this whole chronic, there’s like two iconic iconic, but if you think about it, call young, wrote an entire book about how Tara cars are the archetypes of the people that would meet in our lives. Oh, and

Justine: Which archetype are you? The Magician?

Tupac: No, no, no. I’m the fool. but I said, why is it not possible that for Mexicans, luxury cars are the archetypes of the people that we think about when we’re creating stories. And if you, if you think about it, we don’t, you never say La Sirena, you Aunt Mary and I was like, ah, the pretty one, the mermaid, uncle Johnny, the drunk. It’s called singing the loteria. And so you are creating this images in your head all the time. And so we started discovering 24 cards and as the court discovery itself, so the musician as a turn around, we went and did retrospective about how musicians were portrayed and Mexican cinema across a hundred years. And then how death was portrayed and how the rose and you know, the, the drunk and the gentleman and the mermaid. And, and we went through Mexican cinema finding this iconography that had been creative for the past hundred years, I can imagine. And it was, it was in, I mean, it was an amazing study, but it was also a lot of work. But it was great because you, you’re seeing how this single element it’s told in so many different ways.

Justine: So listeners, I really encourage you, if you’re wondering what [inaudible] lottery is, if you don’t know to actually look at these. it’s loteria.

Tupac: correct.

Justine: And just they’re just cards. They’re brilliantly colored and a simple design, but it’s very simple.

Tupac: The backgrounds are always very monotone yellows and blues and reds.

Justine: But it might be the moon and it, but it’s just beautifully done in a single style. Yes. And I think they’re very graphic, very graphic,

Tupac: We played it as a little kid? And, and for me that’s when we’re talking about this kinds of things is when we startedI started working at the Opera House and then I got to do every single job in the Opera house assisting everybody.

Justine: So you were in the moon and the sun and the heart, a walking Loteria.

Tupac: There was, there was a moment where I found my, so on my knees applying makeup to the insight part of the leg of a male dancer and a realize I had taken a wrong turn. But it gave me a basis on how productions need to be made in, it gave me an understanding of how my craft as a painter, as an artist could be used in set in costume and video and lighting in in makeup, in hair so I could understand how all these elements can be put together in order to create a piece. You know? And that’s, that’s pretty much the basis of where, how we started developing everything that we do because we’re always trying to find how do these pieces come together. You know, everyone working for the other, that various anesthesia type of working and understanding that at one moment you will have, you will be the star of the show, but then as soon as that happens, you’re finished. And then you become part of supporting cast to make sure that my water bottle is now the star and then is the chair. And then everybody has their moment in the sun and the rest of the time you’re always supporting the concept that goes behind it. And, and that, that allows us to say, no, actually in this one, we want to make this the important bit of the piece. Okay. So let’s drive that. So yeah, it, it’s given me a very good understanding of an overall piece, which I still think that, you know performance. I always have a choke with cinematographers when I go. I’ve been designing them 360 since I was 20 years old.

Justine: No, that was just yesterday was it?

Tupac: But only because it when you’re creating a space, you have to think about everyone sitting in that space, in the angle that they’re looking at.

Justine: Right.

Tupac: And, and what they’re going to pay attention to and what’s going to be important to them. And you know, if all of a sudden, 90% of the people that were looking at the, at the main actress, but 10 people are looking at all the other things that are happening, around the stage, those things just, people can not just be sitting there doing nothing. They need to, they need to act, a design that goes with it. Yeah. So that’s why we always have a joke that we’ve been designing 360 long, long time.

Justine: Well, let me ask you, and now we’re gonna fast forward in the, in the movie, in our hands we are going to go, what have you been doing? I think it was with DevLab recently.

Tupac: Yes. So we got chosen for DevLab in last November.

Justine: And to be clear, this is a Kaleidoscope, Riot, Oculus getting together, being a team together and putting together some, a cool kind of fund support mechanism for emerging talent.

Tupac: Correct. I tell you what the coolest part about it is actually. and I, and I see this also at Venice during the, the Bienalle college cinema. It’s, it’s amazing. Did you, to get all these creators in one single space and sharing what they’re doing and how you’re doing it and what did they think is the future of this bit of storytelling? And he said they’re trying to use, because once again, it’s such a new territory that the exploration everybody else on the benefits that the rest of the community and that I think that was, that was amazing. I met incredible people a lot of, most of my friends and you know, and we’re all cheering for each other to get our projects funded.

Justine: Right.

Tupac: You know, because that’s the only way that people are going to see. I see the pieces, if we actually get the funds.

Justine: Probably the hardest part between that and distribution.

Tupac: But yeah, I think, I think we’re, we’re, we’re learning in the really, I’m going to say harsh way, but it’s my first time doing this, the circuit in terms of raising, raising money. So going through markets and we were in Rotterdam we were at SXSW Now we’re here and it’s just like, it’s weird, but you know, it’s doing very well. the best part, we we have just been, we have coproduction money. Okay. From the Luxembourg film fund. I didn’t know they had one, but thank you. Okay. And amazing.

Justine: What is your project that you’re working on or raising for?

Tupac: We, of course, of course. I mean, it’s, you know there’s, there’s, there’s a couple, there’s a coke cans at anything else. Exactly. No, it’s weird. We’re creating a piece called cosmos within us. Cosmos within us is story that comes out of the idea of loss. And I wanted to start writing and I start running this piece almost 24 months ago where I wanted to understand how it felt and how can I explain everybody else, daddy of loss. Cause we’ve all suffered it. And it could be the, the loss of a friend, the loss of a loved one, the loss of innocence, the loss of love and the loss of a toy.

Justine: We’re all losing. So basically we’re all losing.

Tupac: And as we’re working around it, we realized that we needed to define a, a threat for it that was easily understandable. And so the more that we played with it, we realized that the hardest thing is, is the loss of memory. Because that takes into consideration all the other things. And so our, our, our character is Aiken, who is a 60 year old man who is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. And when we first entered the story, we find ourselves in, in our old house trying to grasp and try to remember the last bits of memory before all they fade away. And that basically took us into an entire journey of it in parallel. And this is where it gets really, really weird. our story developer was looking for things and found this story about a woman, a scientist who had lost her father and they cremated him. But her being a scientist wanted to know what was in those ashes. So she went and stole a little bit of ashes from her dad and put them and put them under a microscope. Now you, I almost everybody would think that if you put ashes into a microscope, chances are you’re going to see grey. And everybody in her lab, when she looked into the ashes, there was an entire cosmos. And that started creating say, well then that means there’s, there’s something of us that becomes this beautiful matter. Three months later, I’m getting picked up by a car at 4:30 in the morning to go to the airport. And as I’m in the car, I’m just kind of going through Facebook and I see that this friend of mine just posted my new website have a look and I go to see it and it’s turns out that she’s a scientist that has put ashes of her father in a microscope and has this discovered an entire cosmos. So I send it to the store developer and I go, is this, is this the same person? He goes, yes, that’s her. And I was like, I’ve known her for 15 years. Her brother and sister are really good friends of mine. Then you start thinking how many people it, cause it’s not like I forgot her cause she’s there, but we just just never paid attention to her that moment, you know? And I went out to how many people in this world, know of me, but don’t think about me until something happens. And then they remember me. And so then that just started taking us into this kind of weird thing. And we started coming in and joined too. You know, as I say it, the piece is not about saying, hey, you have zombies, everything’s gonna be okay. No, it’s, it’s about trying to give them peace in knowing that even when they cease to exist, even when they cease to have those memories, other people’s work, other people will have the same memories and therefore that memory is still alive and there was still be living through the memories of others. And that’s the kind of what we’re taking this piece, we want to, we’re reaching out to the Alzheimer’s Society. We want to get people involved that can come in and see the peas, maybe to understand what the parents or grandparents or partners are going through and to allow them to, to, to get a little bit of that empathy about how it feels to be in those shoes.

Justine: Well that’s quite beautiful and profound and Tupac. I just want to thank you for coming by and sharing that with us. I mean, we’re going to be a little still in thought for, for a moment, but best of luck and I’m so happy to hear that you’re actually making this.

Tupac: Thank you very much. It’s been a pleasure. Cheers, bye.