Our CREATOR
Eric Ward
Founder & Chief Creative Officer
Eric’s life as an artist/entrepreneur really started with creating ‘paper toys’ when, at six years old, was exposed to Origami (the Asian art of paper-folding), via a thin book as a gift from his insightful mother Joyce “Jo” Ward, who saw ‘idle hands’ needed an outlet. Her own example was of a keen intellect expressed with creativity making a quality family life out of ‘scant’ resources. Eric’s mom connected her child with an immediate resource… paper.
The self-taught ‘past time’ of origami, following illustrative instructions with how to fold paper and its ‘applied geometry’ quickly evolved into self-guided experimentations with other passions for automotive designs, architecture and objects using the most available and ubiquitous material – paper. Key, in this early phase of this person’s intellect, were parents allowing time and space for ‘things to develop,’ intermixed with a disciplined environment and moments ‘to play’. Adolescence rolled in and the artist-as-you-adult was building scale model paper cars ‘engineered’ to incorporate working suspensions, operating doors, and in some cases…tissue paper folding convertible tops.
Parallel to this junior creative explorer’s paper ‘art-ventures’, life was filled with learning classical music through performance of the violin; another of his intuitive choices exposing him to his first mentor-of-disciplined-practice, master violinist Chris Kuzzell. Other formal studies, from middle school through city college classes in technical/industrial/architectural drafting, drawing, design, mathematics and sciences, imbued Eric’s intense intuitional process with methodology, discipline and broader access to the world outside for a young person’s fertile imagination.
Young Eric’s imagination and education were further enhanced by inquisitive and adventurous parents taking the working-class family on summer-long travels by car and vacation trailer across North America, the expanses of Canada, the United States and Southern extremities of Mexico; experienced, were the sights, people and artistic cultures through intimate interaction with local folk arts and renowned museums.
Further informal, yet profound ‘rounding out’ of this young person’s knowledge-base was through this father Jack Dennis Ward, a professional teacher and practitioner of B&W fine art photography. Additionally, the father’s friendships and association with other renowned 20th century artists such as Ansel Adams, Wynn Bullock, Imogen Cunningham, Brett Weston, Herbert Bayer (Bauhaus School), and many others pointed the way. Poignant was being in their homes/studios and experiencing how these artists lived and talked about their own creativity. Established lives around their own imagination…profound, was this exposure.
A creative life ready to meet the next mentor, Joseph “Joe” Buzelli, who was both boss and eventual friend on an early graphic design job with Martin Merrieta (now Lockheed) Space Shuttle Program (SDI oriented) at Vandenburg AFB. The mentor quickly identified the artist needing to be in a much bigger and richer environment other than the Central Coast of California. So after three letters of introduction to the owners and principals of display marketing agencies in Los Angeles, Eric’s life took a dramatic turn with three job offers and a launched professional design career in point-of-sale displays, packaging, pop-ups and products for the major entertainment, automotive, cosmetic industries, as well as, celebrity-based charity organizations and events. A 30+ year career working with and, competing with the best and brightest in the great international cities of Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, London, Hong Kong.
Now with new stories, as character/architectural build system, “The World of IMAGO” a company is launched, providing critical-thinking development moments for fellow humans by this artist/entrepreneur - PAGO, Inc., PAGO Toy Build System, and a group of companies are based on this founder’s vision who, years ago, started ‘playing with paper…