I Heart Cool Stuff

The first time I’d encountered Dacosta Bayley’s work was when the Mr. and I noticed his GID “ball” in MPH. I liked the look of it, the Mr. liked that it glowed in the dark and the DCTO ended up coming home with us. It wasn’t until we got home that I sat down and traced every detail of the packaging. Every word of the background story was read. Every image on the box was given full attention and I caressed each curve of the physical object I came to know as the DCTO: Dreams Come True Object. Though it was the Mr. who bought it, I was in love with every aspect of the figure– the background story was captivating and to this day it has not escaped my mind. The drawings were “super fresh” and clean. I was impressed.

When Dacosta made his way to NYCC ‘07, he and I became close fairly quickly. I’d already been in contact with him through email and it was a pleasure meeting the man behind the toy that gave me some inspiration. Which is why, now, I follow his every move (whether it be voluntarily or not– I’m sounding like such a stalker right now). Fresh off the press blog entry, Dacosta drops news of his upcoming Dreams to Dreams show opening December 6th at the Japanese American National Museum in LA. To get more details about the show and the amazing cast of contributing artist, check out Dacosta’s blog.

Perils

KAWS Exhibition at the Gering & López Gallery
Hours: Tuesday - Saturday | 10:00 am - 6:00 pm
730 Fifth Avenue
Between 56th and 57th Streets
New York, NY 10019

The artist himself will be here tomorrow and I will most likely not be there. Someone, please attend and share your photos with me so I could share with the world. I have a meeting until 5:45 and an appointment with a trainer who won’t take no for an answer at 6pm. If we stick to an hour, I might just make it up there in time, but I highly doubt it. Thanks to John W. for reminding me– now I’ll head on over to a corner and cry.

[Photo: Stephen Voss]

This entry is going to be a little different than usual. It’ll serve more as a self-reflection on the outcome of this year’s election. Please continue at  your own will. (more…)

Next week, November 5th, I plan on attending a lecture that hosts Paul Budnitz (KidRobot) and Mark Graham (ILoveDust). The lecture will focus on character design, animation and toy design. I think it’ll be great to learn about both the toy maker’s perspective and the artist’s perspective. I fell that many times whenever we interview people, we clearly only get one side of the story and I’m curious to hear about their “horrors” in the business. I hope to take some good notes and pictures– I also hope to score a sketch from ILoveDust since KidRobot wouldn’t let me bring my black book when he was in town earlier in the year. =) Funny.

During the custom Bumrush show at ToyToykyo, I finally had the distinct pleasure of meeting the Sucklord. I’ve been a semi-fan of his works for a while– I don’t base the “semi” on him but rather my love/hate for Star Wars– I’m sorry!! Anyway, one thing is for sure, I’ve been aware of his works and can recognize it quite easily whenever it’s in front of me. The man was actually a bit odd, and in a weird way, exactly what I imagined the Sucklord would be like.

It seems that the Sucklord is going to have a group show at Munky King. Who does it feature? His Suckadelic figure transformed by a plethora of artists. Above is Amanda Visell’s contribution taken straight from her blog. I’ve got to say it: I want!! I wonder how much it’ll be? I know KidRobot’s version is $500 buckaroos.

My Plastic Heart

210 Forsyth Street

It’s official, kaNO’s second coming has arrived and has been crunched down to a 6″ figure better known as: Bodega. For those who didn’t grow up in a primarily Latino “hood”, Bodega/s refer to your nickle and dime shops where you could score your 25 cent juices and 20 swedish fish for a buck. I can still score those swedish fishies, but that “quarter juice” doesn’t exist in my neighborhood anymore. I’m not too worried though, kaNO’s newest release will help settle some of those nostalgic moments as he’s a spitting image of those very quarter juices I had to sneak into my home because my mom wouldn’t let me drink them.

If you want to pick one up yourself, you should make your way to MPH on Friday November 7th from 6-9pm, for the release party (with DJ Kula). There will be 30 pieces on sale, limited to a total run of 300 and produced by Bic Plasics. Each figure will set you back $45 and come accessorized with a “shank” and brass knuckles.

Does the above title confuse you? Well, I’ll try to make this long story very short. I went away to Florida the last week of what was left of my 2 month vacation– thought I should enjoy the last of my “freedom” before becoming a Dean in a NYC jr high/high school. Well, I fell behind on “work” because things piled up really quick when I got back. Toyqube celebrated their 4th Year Anniversary in August and not only introduced their new Artist Proof clothing line, but also held a custom Sharky show.

If you didn’t know it before, Sharky’s are Keith Poon’s creation, aka, the owner of ToyQube. It is my honest opinion that sharks have never looked so good than that of Keith’s vinyl. =) Or, if you’re reading Keith, never looked so manly. >___< ?!! Anyway… I wasn’t around to celebrate with the TQ crew, but the Mr. had attended the party/celebration and took shots of the event specifically to share with you all. I’m sure you’ve seen photos somewhere else, and you also saw them a lot sooner, but I’m still sharing, deal with it. Want to take a look at some more photos, follow this link.

Gallery Hanahou, NYC, is going to be hosting a show titled Spread the Lead on October 16th, 2008. It seems that the show, very similar to Black Maria Gallery’s show: Get the Lead Out, challenges artists to create a piece [s] with a single tool, a pencil. I was very interested BMG’s show, but clearly I don’t live on the West Coast so I only got to see images from the show. I’m curious to see what the Hanahou participating artists come up with and maybe see if any of them really had a difficult task creating art with a pencil (graphic artists maybe?).

It seems Gallery 1988 (seriously, when is it not them? They need to move to NY, they’re always having a show of some sort) is having a show titled: Monster Art Rally. You can tell from the name that monsters will be involved and they’ll come in vinyl and plushy form, woohoo! Pictured above is kaNO!’s entry for the event. A custom 10″ MadL in the very grim form of CHUCKY. Eek. Chucky used to scare the shit out of me when I was younger and like kaNO! mentions on his blog he chose to stay away from the typical Dracula and Frankenstein choices as those would obviously make an appearance.

I definitely concur with the decision and to be quite honest I expect kaNO to always stride away from the obvious choices. Whenever I’m in kaNOs prescence, the old school conversations always come up and Chucky is definitely one scary mofo from my generation and those older than myself. If you’re in SF, check it out. It opens Friday, October 10th.

I’m in a real dilemma. It seems 3 shows are opening the same night, and I don’t know which 2 to attend. I’m pushing it by planning to attend 2 openings, but I know I’m definitely not missing Kathie Olivas’ Uninvited Guests show at MPH– but she’s also going to have some works in Opera Gallery’s Young Blood show.

Young Blood will open October 17th at NYC’s Opera Gallery and it will host 15 talented artists– both national and international artists. Some of my very favorites will include; Kathie Olivas, Brandt Peters and Camilla d’Errico!! I’m trying to attend this during the VIP night, but I have no sources at the Opera Gallery and I highly doubt I’ll be able to score an entry. So– shall I go meet Camilla who’s finally coming in from Vancouver? Or should I go to the Obama show right after Kathie’s Uninvited Guests show? Help! If you’d like to see the preview, click here.

*Correction: I have yet to confirm whether Camilla will be at the event or not, I misinterpreted something on her blog and assumed she would be. Sorry about that. >__<*