Bobble Funk

You don't hear much about the art of bobblehead transmogrification. There's no course work available at the Kansas City Art Institute. There are no exhibitions at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Don't bother looking for a First Friday retrospective on the early days of the form.

That may be because it doesn't exist yet. But when we at the Department of Burnt Ends saw this photographic evidence of Pitch contributor Josh Ziegler's work, we knew he was on to a Jackson Pollock-style art revolution.

Ziegler says he spent about 12 hours working on a bobblehead he got free at Kauffman Stadium of legendary Royals first baseman John Mayberry. He used a tiny Black & Decker electric saw to carve down the facial features. Then he sculpted clay onto the figure. The result: what we believe is the world’s first bobblehead of Kansas City, Missouri, Mayor Mark Funkhouser. For Funkhouser’s accompaniments, Ziegler says he tried a metal street plate but found it “too large and unwieldy.” Attempts to put a light-rail train in his left hand “looked too phallic.” Instead we have the puppy that Funkhouser carried on campaign stops and a framed photo of his now infamous wife, Gloria Squitiro.

What did Ziegler learn from the whole experience? He says he discovered that there may be “an African-American first baseman and designated hitter with a lifetime batting average of .253 underneath us all.”

Click on the photo for a slide show of Ziegler's work.

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