JOCKO T-shirts available online...almost

We finally have something for you to buy in our museum store! A very cool Jocko t-shirt is available... or sort of. We posted it for sale last week and sold two before Paypal and our server conspired to send people on a wild web chase. But we are working out the bugs and beg you to be patient. Believe me, we want to sell these shirts!

One thing you should know, if you have tried to become members and got fed up with the Paypal system, Paypal has changed their policy and if you want to just get on with it and buy something without becoming a member of Paypal, you can! It is as easy as buying from any other secure site and it enables us to sell on our web site without having to expend capital to become a full-fledged capitalist organization (meaning many monthly fees and sales minimums).

Not to bore you, but I recently attended a Museum Store Association (MSA) meeting where they discussed the importance of the museum store as a revenue stream for funding museum programming (not to mention paying salaries and the electric bill), and there was a presentation about UBIT (unrelated business income tax) laws. For non-profit institutions, income from museum store enterprises are non-taxable by the IRS, EXCEPT for certain types of merchandise. In the past, logo merchandise like t-shirts, shot glasses, mouse pads and mugs were considered taxable since they didn't relate directly to the institution's mission statement or permanent collection. But now the IRS has amended this to say that if the item serves as a viable marketing tool , i.e. a 'walking billboard' for the organization, that it could be considered as tax exempt.

Our t-shirts not only serve as billboards, but could even be considered 'amusements' since they are so entertaining! The web site address and the proper pronunciation of the acronym "LATDA", appear clearly on the shirt (along with an attractive portrait of our mascot). They are also verrry comfortable. And when you buy one, you are saying that you support us and want to see us produce more exhibitions!

Hey, if you don't want to buy online, send us a check (LATDA Museum, P.O.Box 41011, Los Angeles, CA 90041) and we will send you your shirt via priority mail. Just check out the prices ($18 for members; $20 for non-members; $5.00 for shipping and handling) and make out your check accordingly. If you sign up as a Shiny Red Fire Truck member, we will send you a shirt for free! (Just let us know what size)

Remember, the holidays are coming up and these shirts would make great gifts! Give a gift that supports a good cause!

Dr. Toy and WIT

Fulfilled a longtime aspiration this evening to meet Dr. Stevanne Auerbach, aka Dr. Toy . Ever since hearing that she had a toy museum in San Francisco, I have wanted to pick her brain and also ask her why she closed her museum after only three years. That I never saw nor heard of her museum while it was in existence from 1986-1989 was no mystery - I was a new bewildered mother and didn't get out much for the first few years. The Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989 was the reason Dr. Toy's museum was closed.

Dr. Toy was a speaker at the Women in Toys meeting this evening. Her topic was Smart Play, Smart Toys. I felt like a student trying to suck up to a respected teacher because every time she asked a question like who has heard of ___? Or how many of you have ever attended a Toy Fair? My hand kept shooting up like a rabid third-grader. When she opened her Power Point presentation with the statement, "A toy is a child's first experience of art", I sat up at attention. It was all I could do to not stand up and testify and try and start a dialogue.

For the most part what I heard was a reinforcement of the mission and vision of LATDA. But there were times I wanted her to go farther. That toys can teach motor and cognitive skills is undeniable. But I think that we learn desire and love from our first toys too. Both 'bad' love (covetousness and unbridled desire) and 'good' love (protective and nostalgic). We also learn how to be delighted and astonished through our experience with toys. Perhaps the latter states of emotion are fleeting and temporal, but love and desire are substantial and complex.

The other topic I longed to broach was the idea that toys are not just for children. That what we consider as positive developmental tools for children are also reflected in toys that are being created by adults, for adults. And I'm not talking about marital aids...

There is a rapidly growing movement of artists creating limited editions of vinyl toys aimed solely at collectors who are old enough to have disposable income. These collectors fall somewhere in between art collector/connoisseurs and toy-mint-in-box collectors. My personal opinion is that what makes these collectors different is that they maintain the same innocent sensibility as a kid who simply WANTS a particular toy. This is fodder for a future LATDA exhibition...

Whew! Tripping the Lite fantastic

LATDA's first meet and greet took place at the Museum of Neon Art last night where we unveiled our (ahem) mini exhibit and maxi window to a large crowd of MONA's members and LATDA's loyal following. All our Board was in attendance, having traveled from as far as Pittsburgh, PA, just for the momentous occasion. Jocko t-shirts were displayed and sold with pride (even to people who didn't know who we were) and a good time was had by all.

Many thanks to all who helped make this a reality, including Kim Koga, executive director of MONA; Gary van der Steur our curatorial/marketing guru (he refers to himself as 'the graphics guy' but he is oh-so-much-more than that - a man of many talents); Barbara Kwong, the Cookie Goddess, who baked 30 dozen of the most delectable cookies for the opening (they didn't last long); Jane-Ellen Dawkins, Blue Gehres and Bev Smith who provided the supportive base upon which this exhibition was built (not to mention great moral support); David Hoffman, who provided some great flashes of Lite-Brite inspiration; Neal Yamamoto, who gave up time from his own creative projects to help paint our window; Matt Koga (not related to Kim) who helped us get our t-shirts printed in time; Clement Hanami who loaned us his production extpertise and materials; and Derek Billings at Posterprintshop.com, whose guidance and patience helped us to produce the window graphics. And of course, thanks go out to our many members and friends who have put their money and their unflagging votes of confidence behind LATDA for these formative years. On to the next show!!!!

It was a pretty heady evening for us all - chatting with people about LATDA and Lite-Brite non-stop and greeting old friends made the time pass quickly and somewhat chaotically. But early in the evening, we met with an actual toy designer who happens to be on the board of MONA. We were able to get a great story from Jay Simmons, the inventor of PixelBlocks, a new construction toy that is on the market after twenty years of patient vision.

Jay Simmons was very eager and open about sharing his experience with toy design, so all we did was ask one question, 'What made you want to design this toy?' and stood back as he transported us with his PixelBlocks story. The short answer to the question was that Jay was looking for a new artistic medium. He said that learning disabilities hindered him from creating art in traditional media like painting and drawing. He credits his work as a television engineer and the viewing of a textile exhibition at the Los Angeles County Art Museum as being the inspiration for PixelBlocks. A quote that summed up the toy nicely was on the PixelBlocks web site.

All the limitations and possibilities we discovered in our pursuit of the history of Lite-Brite were explored and solved with this new building toy. Instead of Lite-Brite's 8 colors, PixelBlocks come in 20 colors (and if Jay has his way, they will eventually be available in 256 colors). Instead of relying on a two-dimensional screen placed over a single light source, PixelBlocks are designed to accommodate fiberoptics that can be threaded through 3-dimensional structures. Jay donated a few sets of the toy to LATDA for research purposes...can't wait to play.

One of the thoughts I came away with last night was how much a toy museum needs to be a physical place and not just a virtual site. We observed the looks on people's faces when they walked through the door and saw our case of Lite-Brites. The ones who recognized the toys came up with a flood of instant memories about their Lite-Brite days. One woman said she still had hers and would never give it up. Those who were not familiar with Lite-Brite carefully read the information about them and a smile would spread across their faces as they looked at Ray Fournier's Mona Lisa in Lite-Brite and thought about the juxtaposition of toy and art. These kinds of visceral reactions reminded us of why we think that toys are the first objects that inspire us with desire and other strong emotions. And how the physical objects can help us recall these hidden and creative parts of ourselves in a way that mere secondhand images cannot. Jay Simmons' PixelBlocks are a perfect illustration of an urge to make physical something that exists as an image on a screen.

Now, go to MONA!

Collecting passion

As we barrel onward towards our first public appearance (it’s not really an exhibition per se – although it will feature artifacts and history) we are experiencing a whole range of self-doubt and re-examination of our mission. What do we want to accomplish by establishing a toy museum? Is there an audience out there who thinks that Southern California needs another museum, let alone one that deals with toys, dolls, and amusements?

We think the answer is YES. We are still looking for a home and have been approached with the idea of going underground (literally) to join a consortium of museums. We are also attracting some very interesting members whose work we’d like to share with you. These are the kinds of people who think a toy museum is worthy of support, and they are interested in a wide variety of amusements.

Gianna Maizler of F.G. & Company is a collector of antique ephemera and games, which she and her partner Darren Calkins have been reproducing in their original playable formats as well as creating wrapping paper and decorative signs. A visit to their booth at the gift show is to be transported to another time. They have recently reproduced a card game called (believe it or not) La Tee Dah. Gianna says of the two other decks she knows of, one belongs to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.

Another of our members is Harvey Jordan who has a very interesting collection of original paintings for amusement park rides. My favorite is the "Corn Ride". I think this could be part of a future LATDA exhibition…

Mitch W. collects children’s phonograph records (remember these?) and phonographs. We are hoping that in the future Mitch will share his passion with us and allow us to exhibit some of his pieces.

Borrowing artifacts is one way that museums can mount a wide range of exhibits without incurring the expense of purchasing and housing a permanent collection. Not all museums actively solicit artifacts, but many museums begin when someone is searching for a home for a particular collection. LATDA has a small, growing collection, however our strategy is to gather objects that we feel may fit an exhibition idea we have for the future. We were recently asked whether or not we had a Teddy Ruxpin or Tickle Me Elmo. Frankly, it didn’t ever occur to us that we should – but maybe that is because we haven’t started thinking about an exhibition that would include those items.

What do you collect? How did you get started collecting? LATDA wants to know!

Bookmark this page!

And get ready for more regular entries. We finally have our blog fixed and you can now access past entries through the list on the left. No longer will you get the frustrating "page not found" message. The archiving frequency has been changed to monthly, however it may change back to weekly as action starts to heat up. This should be the place you check for news. Updating the main site is a much more time-consuming enterprise, since we want to only present you with the most entertaining of graphics and stories. (But do look for a Museum Store soon!)

First and foremost in the news: OUR FIRST EXHIBIT WILL OPEN IN OCTOBER 2004! This will be the first in a series of mini exhibitions called "Inspired by Toys". The series will appear in various venues as we partner with other museums, libraries and galleries to highlight their programming through toy exhibits! We hope that these mini-exhibitions will give you a taste of all that we plan to bring you in the future in a dedicated environment.

For now, here are the facts:
"The Play of Light" will open in October 2004 at the Museum of Neon Art, 501 West Olympic Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90015. Times and specific dates will be forthcoming, and if you would like to be on our mailing list (members are already on the list!) email us your address. MONA has been incredibly generous in allowing us to launch this first exhibition. It’s just another example of how innovative and creative this museum continues to be. MONA will also be opening not one but three exhibits at the same time! One of vintage beer signs will be just in time for Oktoberfest!

If you are a member of LATDA, you will be able to see all the shows for free!

In the mean time, stay tuned for more recent news. I promise to be more diligent about reporting our progress. (Your humble electro-scribe has just spent a crazed few months preparing to push her only child out of the nest and into the wilds of Rhode Island). And there are many things simmering in our creative soup!

Farewell to the Forest

Yes, it has been a long time since I've made an entry here. One would think that I had a child who is a senior in high school who needed to be whisked around the country in search of a college or something... April was indeed a lost month.

I am sorry that the event that finally compels me to sit down and write is the loss of another New York toy institution; the Enchanted Forest in Soho. After twenty years (can it really be that long?) they have closed their doors, and I am sad to have missed the farewell party held today in New York.

David Wallace, the king of the forest, is a dear friend of mine from college. When he started the Forest, I was a bearmaker. But we had followed very different paths to our destinies in toys. The only toy connection we had was in the form of a rubber ducky that he says I gave him for Christmas his freshman year. That was the year that I snuck into all the rooms of my boyfriend's dorm (dorms being gender segregated in those days)to steal a single sock. One upper classman in the dorm (who grew up to be a famous producer) didn't have a single clean sock in his drawers and I had to substitute one of my boyfriend's socks to carry out my plan. On the day before we were all leaving for Christmas vacation, I filled about 20 socks with nuts, oranges, chocolate and a single toy. When I thought everyone was asleep (around 3 AM) I crept out of bed to arrange all the socks under a makeshift Christmas tree we had set up in the dorm.

Mind you, we were the only dorm to have our own Christmas tree. We went up into the mountains behind the college and chopped a scraggly pinon down with a hand axe. Unfortunately, there wasn't much of a trunk to anchor it to a stand, so we hung it from a wire attached to the ceiling. Anyway, when I arrived at the tree, there were two freshman from another dorm lying in the hallway and gazing at our tree. At first I suspected that some combination of drugs and alcohol led them to take refuge in the wrong dorm, but it seemed that they had just heard about our tree and had come to capture a wistful holiday moment. I enlisted them as my fellow elves and we set to placing the socks in a radial pattern around the base of the tree.

The memory of a bunch of groggy-headed, neo-adult males being delighted by the surprise in the morning brings me almost as much warmth and pleasure as my own child's early Christmas mornings...when she was old enough to have that heady anticipation. I have a photo of a lanky Texan in his underwear playing with a yo-yo, while others search around the base of the tree searching for familiar socks.

David says that his sock held a rubber duck that squeaked, and that when he opened his toy store, he searched all over to find the same duck to carry in the Forest.

I visited the Forest last year during the great blizzard of '03 - but didn't get to see David because he was busy organizing the peace rally being held that weekend. It sounded as if his life had taken him into many new directions, although he didn't indicate that he would be closing the Forest at the time. It was only my third visit, but it felt comforting and full of treasures - some familiar and some completely new. I'm glad that I was able to visit, but am sad that I didn't get to say good-bye.

(If any of you remember the Forest and have stories to share about it, please email them to latda@latdamuseum.org)

Box art

The latest piece to arrive for our “Playing with the Box” exhibition comes from artist turned toy maker, Mitch Mitchell. His piece is entitled “The Monkey King and Queen” and is comprised of a mini puppet theater depicting a jungle paradise, complete with a pair of royal monkeys. It reminds me of the dioramas we used to make as kids, or a Pollock’s paper theater. (We will have to start putting images of some of our box art on this blog – but you will have to write in and beg us to do it, so we will have motivation to learn yet another computer task!)

Mr. Mitchell has many interesting and amusing facts in his CV, not the least of which is the fact that he went to the Ringling School of Art and Design. Now that sounds entertaining. He has worked as an animation artist and an illustrator, but his current profession is one that we find especially near and dear. Mitch makes SOCK MONKEYS. He has a wonderful web site with interactives that we wish we had thought of. Check out the Incredible Sock. This will need to be a future accession for LATDA.

We hope to work with Mitch to create a Super Sock Monkey exhibition in the future.

We passed!

We just filed our Support Schedule for Advance Ruling Period...this is lRS-ese for "proof that people really will support a toy museum by actually giving it money". In order to show that we are not just deluding ourselves by plowing our own money into a dream, we needed to show that other people were willing to become supporters (members) of our museum. Our gross receipts were not mammoth, but they were in such a proportion as is required by the statutes of the law. Meaning that you (you, wonderful members, you) sent in money that correctly balanced against the money we have shelled out of our own pockets.

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!

And to those of you who have not yet become members, we need to continually prove that we are a publicly-supported institution, so your help is still needed! Join us now!