Comments on: Sharpen your pencils!

Sharpen your pencils!

greenie2600 — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:24:02 -0800

Mark Kistler has spent over two decades inspiring kids to pick up their pencils and draw. If you're a child of the 80s, you'll remember him as Commander Mark, host of The Secret City Adventures on PBS—some episodes of which are conveniently archived on YouTube for your nostalgic viewing pleasure.

The Secret City left the airwaves in the early 90s, but Kistler has certainly kept himself busy. He's created a series of classroom instructional videos, another PBS series, and a whole slew of instructional books and DVDs. He leads summer art camps, presents over a hundred school assemblies a year, and offers scores of online instructional videos (which he also posts to the 'Tube). (Incidentally, I once emailed him to tell him how much I loved The Secret City as a kid. He wrote me back, and he seems like a genuinely gracious guy.)

By: erpava

erpava — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 20:03:01 -0800

What a great guy. Every once in a while I draw the little sketch of his brother lying in a 3D tube with his feet sticking out. On Imagination Station he always had nice things to say about the crappy drawings kids sent to his show.

By: troy

troy — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 20:31:13 -0800

By: sarahnade

sarahnade — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 20:41:43 -0800

Dude, I loved me some unibears. Also this was produced for Maryland Public Television, my home state! Does anyone remember there were 6 things you had to draw to become a member of the secret city? I think one was the box/tower thing, one was a pig, but I can't remember the rest.

By: greenie2600

greenie2600 — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 20:50:07 -0800

I'm originally from Maryland, too. I had a shitty black-and-white TV that got three stations: NBC, MPT, and some weird UHF station that played low-budget soap operas, infomercials, and nutty religious programming. I suspect that my early exposure to MPT is partly responsible for my current NPR addiction.

By: Nedroid

Nedroid — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 21:04:58 -0800

I love Mark Kistler! I remember the joy I felt when I discovered Mark Kister's Imagination Station on PBS one summer when I was young. He always seemed like he was having a genuinely great time drawing rockets and twinkies.

By: jewzilla

jewzilla — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 21:28:26 -0800

Thank you! I remember trying to draw parts of the secret city mural as a kid. I vividly remember the trees with the stream and the floating island with stalactites. I completely didn't remember all the creatures like the little fuzzy things or the dragon. This was great! Thought I'd never see it again.

By: drezdn

drezdn — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 21:43:07 -0800

Commander Mark taught me all I know about drawing. Granted, it's not a lot, but I can draw rings of smoke around jet trails.

By: brundlefly

brundlefly — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 22:11:40 -0800

God, I loved Mark Kistler. I can draw rings of smoke around jet trails. LOL! Hell, yes! I still draw this myself!

By: P.o.B.

P.o.B. — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 00:02:16 -0800

Gabe from Penny Arcade has interesting story about meeting Commander Mark.

By: JHarris

JHarris — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 02:47:19 -0800

For those of you who didn't see this show (and I only caught it a couple of times): Every day on the show, they'd go to the huge section of wall that had the Secret City Mural on it and add another bit to it. It was just an amazing amalgam of miscellaneous awesomeness that they filled in over the course of the season, with monsters, tunnels, spaceships, robots, waterfalls and more. Like Ghostwriter which came up last week, it's one of those kinds of shows that seems to have vanished from the airwaves. What on earth awesome thing could kids TV have now to replace ol' Commander Mark?

By: DU

DU — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 04:28:59 -0800

...they'd go to the huge section of wall that had the Secret City Mural on it and add another bit to it... I saw this section of the show a single time when I was in around 6th grade. I've remembered it ever since. It taught me to draw UFOs and caves-on-cliffs.

By: threeturtles

threeturtles — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 05:40:16 -0800

I still have drawing pads filled with sketches I made while watching this show. I swear, after years of art classes, this show was the only thing that actually helped my drawing ability.

By: furtive

furtive — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 06:42:37 -0800

There's a great account on Penny Aracde of how Gabe met Commander Mark, was served up a harsh dose of reality but also the skills that helped maked Penny Arcade what it is.

By: rlk

rlk — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 07:02:55 -0800

Ayup I spent years drawing UFOs and aliens due to this guy. I had ten feet of Christmas wrapping paper taped blank-side-out on the wall of my bedroom so I could have my own mural. I even joined the fan club and got the book and colored markers.

By: lampoil

lampoil — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 12:16:46 -0800

I even joined the fan club and got the book and colored markers. Yeah I did too but I never got the stuff! Now I'm grown up and I can get as many free coloring books as I want, and guess who won't be getting any from me? Yeah that's right, Mark Kistler, that's who. I seem to remember my little sister's Picture Pages workbook arriving safe and sound, though. But it did NOT come with a Mortimer Ichabod marker. So, no free coloring book for you either, Bill Cosby. Sorry.