“This Is Not A Toy” in Red Bulletin
At some point over the last few years I ended up on the Red Bulletin magazine (Amazon.com search*) mailing list. The issues show up, I flip through them a little, and then off to the trash they go.
It’s not at all a bad magazine, but most of what they cover is stuff I either have no interest in or read about online, so the magazine survives at most an hour before it is gone.
Not so with the latest issue, because while reading through their Pharrel Williams coverage I ran across this page that pushed my buttons and made me remember my time visiting the NYC Kidrobot store five years ago. The “these are art, not toys” attitude of the store staff disgusted me, and this article triggered the exact same response.
Now toy coverage in a mainstream magazine — as well as books like I Am Plastic* and Dot Dot Dash* — should bring me joy. After all, these give the “common folk” a chance to discover something new, but when the approach is to suggest “do not play, this is art” then it kills me.
They’re toys, people! Some are pricey. Some are custom. Some are fragile (my least favorite). But they are toys!
I think I’ll go grab one of my more expensive designer toys now and play the hell out of that thing. That’ll learn ’em!
Related articles
- Pharrell Williams – Master Collaborator (pllatform.com)
- Exclusive Red Bulletin Cover Story: Pharrell Williams (hiphopondeck.com)
I despise toy snobbery. What irks me the most is the false sense of superiority from folks who collect indie toy lines. Like somehow the rest of us “plebs” who buy mass retail products from Hasbro/Mattel are inferior.
I have only one response to that, “EFF YOU!”.
But they’re not really toys, not in any but the broadest sense of the word. Comparing designer toys to the 5 POA figures on the shelves at Wal-mart is like comparing an oversize coloring picture to one of those low-run Mondo posters: Sure, it’s all ink on paper but they’re not really the same thing at all. No doubt a lot (most?) of the indie guys are snobbish jerks, but that’s true of a lot of collectors when they’re dealing with something outside of their interests. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say there are varying levels of artistry (or craftsmanship, or whatever term you want to use) among toys and some are meant to be on display rather than played with.
I collect both vinyl toys and action figures. I like both, but I like action figures like the stuff the Four Horsemen put out the best, because they manage to be both “Art” and “Toys” without the pretentious hype goes along with some of the vinyl stuff so that suckers end up paying insane amounts of $$$ for glorified chunks of painted plastic. 😉