As he turns 100, Viktor Schreckengost looks back on an art-design-teaching career that spanned more than 70 years and pushed the boundaries of design, visual art and functional art far into the 21 st century. Along the way, he also changed the way we live. One day, while he was out driving, he counted 32 items—from bicycles to street lamps to lawn mowers—that he'd had a hand in designing. Always, he says, his creations were a blend of art and utility. “I don't think there is any way to separate the two,” he said in an afternoon interview at his Cleveland Heights home.

Where were you born and raised?

Sebring , Ohio . Everything was pottery there. There were five pottery plants. I had two brothers [both of whom became designers] and three sisters. Only one sister did not go into pottery in some way … clay was in the blood.

[Laughs] I could hardly wait to get out of Sebring. I wanted see something bigger, and I didn't want to be a potter when I went up to Cleveland to go to art school, I wanted to do cartoons.

When Guy Cowan [head of Lakewood-based Cowan Pottery] saw me, in my sophomore year, he said, ‘Of course you are going to specialize in pottery,' and I said, ‘No way.'

He did convince me to get a minor in it. But it wasn't until my senior year [1929], when there was a show on European pottery at the Cleveland Museum of Art, that I decided to continue with it. That show had pieces that were sculptural and big and wonderful.

You have done so much work in such different areas – in theater design, in automotive design, in furniture design, in toy design, in bicycle design, in education. A lot of people call you a Renaissance man. Do you think of yourself that way?

In some ways, I was curious about all those things you named. That's the reason that I got into them. Those people [those labeled Renaissance men] are curious and they are always searching for solutions to problems. I searched for solutions to art problems. I searched for solutions to engineering problems. I searched for solutions to anatomy problems.

I've always been interested in anything that indicated a new direction. I'd grab it right away and see how far I could go with it.

When I was in art school, I took a course in anatomy with Wyngate Todd, who'd taught anatomy [to art students] at the Royal Academy in London . He told us to bring a corncob pipe to class and cut the stem off so that the bowl would be close to our nose to cover the smell. I took that class for three years. That was my introduction to how people's body's work, how the joints work.

Have you ever been compared to the ultimate Renaissance man, Leonardo DaVinci?

Well…yes, but that kind of comparison, it isn't something that I think about.

On June 26 th , you turned 100. To what do you attribute your long and productive life?

I don't know. I'm in pretty good health right now. I've always been curious. That's kept me going [mentally].

I've never overdone things—in terms of eating or reading or sleeping or exercising—and I think that makes a big difference. I don't have a “diet.” I've always eaten what I wanted. And I've never been especially careful about exercise, but I was always been active. Always ready to go: Not physically, like an athlete, but on the go. And I've always been like that. When there have been problems, it's always been something mechanical: I've had back surgery, shoulder surgery, cataract surgery.

Academically, artistically, commercially, you have been an innovator. Why were you so innovative, especially in the commercial sector?

I really don't know the why of it, except that my father would always encourage all of us [six] children to listen and look and learn…and go a bit further in whatever it was we were doing. He always encouraged us to search for something beyond the norm, and to always look for more than one solution. The more choices you have, the better.

You talk a lot about your parents. How did they influence you?

My father was head of the firing of the bisque ware [at French China in Sebring , Ohio ] and he'd bring clay home for us to model. We did our own toys and he'd fire them. We melted crayons and used the paraffin to color them. My mother could take a piece of cloth and cut it and make anything. [Laughs] I think I inherited a strong art gene from them.

Of all the things you have done – your artwork, your teaching, your design – what do you want to be remembered for?

I think it's teaching [from 1931-1993]. I could work with a young person and get them to develop a concept that was their own, not as part of a class, but as an individual. Being able to pull what was already there out of them … getting them to see what they already knew, that was what I liked. When they got it, you could see it on their face. It was a whole new world for them.

Anything else?

The functional design that I did—I started doing some commercial design work in the ‘30s—for the things that people would use. The fact that I could create a functional chair [points to Beverly Hills lawn chair he designed in 1941], that means an awful lot to me, more than a painting that hangs on the wall.

Design that touched the lives of many, that has always been important to me. There were hundreds of thousands of those chairs made, and the function of that chair may be more important than having a picture I've done – which will only be seen by a few – hanging in someone's house.

My art or my commercial design: I can't tell you which one is the most important to me. My personal art has always been important, but it's always had the last place in what I was doing because the other things always came first. I'd always find a way to do the artistic things, but they were never the first things that I did.

But…I don't think there is any way to separate my art from my design work. I can't do it. [Picking up a teacup he designed in the late ‘40s] Is this ornamental, or sculptural, or functional?

Who was the biggest influence on you and the direction your art took when you came up to Cleveland to attend art school?

Julius Mihalik, the head of the design department at the Cleveland School of Art [today's Cleveland Institute of Art]. He grabbed me right away and led me into things. When I graduated from the school [in 1929], he arranged for me to go to Vienna to study at the Kunstgewerbeschule, where' he'd taught.

He was a wonderful teacher. The most important thing I learned from him was the adaptation of art to function. He taught me that art had to do something, produce something, be functional as well as attractive.

You mentioned before that when you came up to Cleveland to go to art school, you wanted to be a cartoonist. What were you planning on doing with a degree in cartooning?

I was going to be a cartoonist and make fun of things. And I wanted a skill where I knew I could make a living.

You started teaching at CIA in 1930. When did you retire?

Retire? I don't think I have, though the last official paycheck I got was in 2003.

You taught for 73 years. How did you manage to stay so fresh and creative and innovative as you taught and mentored all those years?

I was always working with each student, not a class, but a student. And I wasn't teaching theory, I was always teaching them how to solve problems. I'd start where their weaknesses were, and develop things from there…but I was just giving them a direction. They'd carry on from there.

And I'd involve everyone in the class in the education process. I always used the most advanced students to assist me. They were almost as big a help as the other instructors.

[To stay current] I looked at all the stuff I could. I read. I'd go to design meetings. I traveled – a lot – to Europe, Russia and Finland , North Africa , Indonesia . And I always took photographs, wherever I went. A lot of what I've done is based on my photographs.

I was always looking for a new direction, new insight, and new directions when I traveled, things that would open me up to new ideas.

Where is the most unusual place you ever got an idea or inspiration for something?

In a factory, where I was seeing something being made. I'd look at what was happening and I'd start thinking, “How is this item being made and why is it being made that way and how can it be made differently or better?”

But, I can't really give one answer for that, because I was always looking at things.

You served in the Navy during WWII. What did you do?

I served in the Naval Air Corps. I was the head of the unit for special devices. We made things, but I never just told anyone what to do, I was always working with them. And I worked on everything—from how to use radar blips to do aerial mapping and identify targets to designing prosthetics for the men who were coming back from the war with lost limbs.

How did your experience in WWII change you, impact you as an artist or designer?

Well, I can't put it in words, but it gave me a different way of seeing things. Completely different. When I came back to Cleveland , I knew that I wanted to have an impact on more people than just those who were going to see my art works.

You are probably better known for the products – the toys, the teapots, the trucks, etc. – you have designed, rather than your works of art. Does that bother you?

No. To me, the articles and products that I've designed and helped create or make better, were very important to me because they are more important to more people than a piece of art. People who have never gone to a gallery or an art show, they are still experiencing my work because they are using it every day. I have always thought that was more important to help many than to entertain few.

What would you do now if you were just starting out?

I would look for new subjects to work on and technologies to work in. I might not be doing painting or sculpture today; I might be working with digital or electronic art.

What I wouldn't do? I wouldn't keep on doing what I was doing.