The mask man

Tom Banwell has been a working artist for most of his life, parlaying his self-taught leather-working and resin-casting skills into a living by making hats and trophies since the 1970s. But it wasn’t until 2008, at the age of 60, that he found true creative success and recognition in an unexpected place—the retro-futuristic fantasy world of steampunk.

Steampunk is an emerging aesthetic rooted in late 19th-century science fiction of the Jules Verne/H.G. Wells variety, complete with its own subculture known for elaborate costumes and homemade machinations, mixing Victorian and Old West-era fashion with a touch of post-apocalyptic devolution. Banwell, known mainly for his elaborate masks, is currently one of its brightest stars, with his work featured in numerous television shows (Smallville, Once Upon Time, Wonderland to name a few), films (indie feature After the Fall), more than half a dozen books on the genre, and international art shows. Though his name is now associated with steampunk, Banwell wasn’t even aware it existed until six years ago.

“I bought a laser engraver for the trophy business, and during a slow time I started wondering if I could use it to cut leather,” Banwell said in a recent phone interview from his home in Nevada County’s Penn Valley. “It worked well, so I went online to see how other people were using that technique, and saw many artists were using it to make masks.”

Banwell decided to try his hand at mask-making, and fashioned a leather mask of a bulldog’s face that he posted on the Internet, with encouraging results: “It was the first thing I’d put online that people actually liked,” he said. “So I thought, ‘Well, I better make some more masks.’”

While looking at the work of other mask-makers, he noticed one artist who used the word “steampunk” to describe her work and, unfamiliar with the term, Googled it.

“I thought, ‘Wow, man, this is something that works for me,’” Banwell recalled. “It involves history, costumes, mechanics and of course the whole fantasy element, all things that I love, so I thought this might be a great genre for me to work in.”

Soon after, Banwell stumbled across a World War II gas mask, and decided to take a shot at the genre, casting components based on the mask’s respirators and goggles, adding bits of metal, and tying it all together into stitched-leather head gear straight from a land of nightmares. He now makes gas masks in various designs, some resembling animals like elephants and aardvarks, and his signature, bird-billed “plague doctor” masks. He also makes filigreed, lacy-looking leather-cut masquerade face coverings that are as feminine and elegant as his darker works are terrifying.

Banwell started selling his masks through his online Etsy store, and business remains brisk—his creations ranging from about $40 for the masquerade-style pieces up to around $400 for gas masks. Critical acclaim also came fast, and less than a year into mask-making, his creations were featured in the first European steampunk art show, at England’s Oxford University, in 2009. Another recent show in which his work appeared—in Seoul, South Korea—was the first steampunk-themed display in Asia, and was so well-received it is now engaged to move to Beijing soon.

Because decades of Banwell’s career were focused more on commercial ventures, and success came late and fast, he missed a few major pit stops along the way, one of which he’ll be achieving with his upcoming local showing at Idea Fabrication Labs—his first solo gallery opening.

Though Banwell said he communicates with other artists in the genre, he rarely attends conventions or other public steampunk-themed gatherings. “I’m 66 now and kind of slowing down, so to me traveling is not that much fun anymore,” he said. “But what I really enjoy is making the stuff and having other people appreciate it, so the more time I spend in my shop, the happier I am.”

Banwell admits it’s been strange to find a following and “be discovered” at the age of 60, and credits his late success largely to the Internet.

“If I’d been born 20 years later, maybe I’d have been this successful 20 years earlier,” Banwell mused. “I kind of wish it happened earlier, but life is good now.”