REBLOGGED from Solais100.com - Ok so Urban Vinyl is kinda over but...

"Next thing you know Japanese Toy companies, Western Graffiti artists, Music Label owners and Streetwear hustlers all embrace in one sweaty geek group hug and birth a new category of nerdy collectable that references all the stuff that makes street culture cool and taps directly into the Star Wars shaped hole left from selling all those childhood toys: Urban Vinyl aka Designer Toys!"

Read the whole blog post here. Trust me, it's worth a click and 5 minutes!

Galerie F x Urban Vinyl Daily 'For The Love of Toys'

Galerie F and Urban Vinyl Daily are pleased to present a toy fueled exhibition titled 'For the Love of Toys!' All styles, materials, and characters are welcome in this two week exhibition celebrating playful three-dimensional art. Each artist will contribute anywhere from three to six new custom toys and accompanying 2D works on paper, canvas, or found material. If we can hang it, you can view it. The show will be on display until May 1st and includes works from the following 9 artists.....

Jc Rivera, Jeremiah Ketner, JFury, The JCW, FEDZ, Jenn & Tonybot, 64 Colors, Rocketboy Customs, and Leecifer

The opening reception will take place on Friday April 10th from 6-10pm and is free and open to the public.  They will as have Adult beverages for adult attendees at the event sponsored by Revolution Brewing. If you are in the area make sure to stop in and check out all the great pieces! To RSVP for the event please follow the link HERE.

Guest Blogger Lawrence on Urban Vinyl and the Amnesty International Freedom Candles

Hello Friends,

    Some of you know about my Penchant for "Urban Vinyl", some of you don't.
  
Urban Vinyl is a kind of Art Movement; born from out of the time when Graffiti became art, Urban Vinyl has become what has been a perfect marriage between Street Art and Progress.
    This art form finds only as many facets as the Imagination will allow.
  
My personal Favorite piece is the "Dumb Luck" Bunny, by Gary Baseman (to the left). It is the first piece I ever bought. As my collection waxes and wanes, it will also be the last piece I ever
let go of.

It looks like a Toy, doesn't it? Well, that's the Raw Fun of Urban Vinyl, ART in the form of a toy.
Produced in limited numbers and often in several 'Colorways' they are collectible and somewhat rare.
And look at this piece, look how proudly this Bunny shows off his 'Lucky Rabbit's Foot' despite
the peg leg he has acquired to procure this 'magical implement'. Dumb Luck indeed.

    Another group making history with these toys is called COARSE TOYS. The figures are angular
and bring to mind an appreciation for the Cubist Movement.

Artist Mark Landwehr's vision is often obscure and his subject matter leaves many details about what any particular piece is saying up to the viewer.

    And as you see here to the right, another Rabbit. Teddy Bears, Rabbits and other traditional toy subjects
have been reinterpreted by these different artists in many different ways. In Landwehr's work, where the human subject is actually in conflict with these childhood characters, there seems to be some suggestion in tow about the nature of growing up and developing the courage to question the status quo.

    The movement has taken many directions and has been interpreted by Artists of many genre's.
It has also been a driving force at times in addressing Social Issues.

    Here I am bringing to your attention the work of both Mark Landwehr and Sven Waschk. They have
created for Amnesty International three different candles, each burns down to reveal a Bronze Statue and
these candles, they are currently on auction on eBay. There are 10 of each piece.
  
Please click on the video below and watch the short by Amnesty International
and please, take the time today . . .   to do something for someone else in the world.

    Thank You,
    Lawrence

Nathan Hamill x Urban Vinyl Daily Curiosity 'MudHoney' Ed Resin

Urban Vinyl has teamed up with Nathan Hamill to release an all new painted colorway of his 'Curiosity' resins. The 'Mudhoney Ed.' of this 5" figure features an allover bronze paint job with drips of 'honey' randomly on the body. This limited edition release of 5 figures were cast by Oni Creations, will be signed/numbered, and sold blind. You will be able to get yours for just $70 each in the Urban Vinyl Daily store starting May 14th at 12pm EDT.

Q-Bert Custom for Blow Me Show x Jeff Beck

Brand new from Jeff Beck at Menace Inc. Studios comes this custom resin Q-Bert figure for the Urban Vinyl "Blow Me Show". It comes with a painted Q-Bert cube base and is available for $90.00 now at Urban Vinyl's site. 

~Mr.N.Visible

Blindsided: a 5-part essay on blind-box toys by Jeremy Brautman

I must have a bad case of HUTA, since I missed this last week:

Each day last week, ToyCyte's Jeremy Brautman released a piece of his essay series about blind-box toys. He managed to interview scores of artists, retailers and manufacturers during his research. It's a veritable Who's Who of movers and shakers in the toy business. 

I must say that this is one of the most thorough, well-thought-out pieces of expository writing I have ever read within our designer toy industry. Kudos, Jeremy!

Blindsided: a ToyCyte Investigation

Part 1: Toy Companies

Part 2: Toy Fans

Part 3: Toy Stores

Part 4: Toy Artists

Part 5: Toy Bloggers

Upcoming stuff from Toy2R

We just met with Toy2R at the Toy Fair and placed orders for a bunch of new stuff. Here are some pics of some interesting 2009 offerings from Toy2R:

Molly Series 1 Qees are sold out. Here is a case of the Molly Series 2 blind box Qees. Crown doubles as a chair for the figures.

This is a resurrected Doink Qee pillow that they initally made in very low quantities but they will be remaking to be sold for $30 apiece. Pictured next to an 8" Doink Qee and a Toyer Pillow.

This figure is the David Horvath 5" Crocadoca figure, the next figure in the series after Bossy Bear & Turtle.

These are the David Horvath Turtle figures: 3.5" Turtle, 7.5" Turtle, and the GID Flocked 3.5" Turtles, one of which will be our Tenacious Toys Exclusive colorway. We may get Pink or Blue as our exclusive, not sure yet. Apparently people loved them the other day at Yoyamart where they were revealed. They will be made in limited quantities of 100 to 200 per colorway. Each color will be an exclusive for a different shop.

Of course everyone knows Bossy Bear! The little ones are the 5" Bossy Bears that will come in an assortment pack that we may pick up. In the back is the big 8" Bossy. See that cool looking Bossy in the back that looks like wood? There will be a whole series of smaller Qees with the wood-color paint effects!

Other items we ordered: Sun Min Spider Boom vinyl mini figures, Jeff Soto 8" Egg Qee Minnesota colorway, Kozik 1.5" Mini Bombs, Dalek Space Monkey Qee assortment. Also possibly Voltaire's Deady Qee Assortment.

First post...

...we are working out little butts off over here at Tenacious Toys, trying to get our new & improved website up & running. One aspect of the new Tenacious Toys site is this blog, which we will link to from our new homepage.

The purpose of this blog is to keep you informed about what's going on in our store, without having to shoot off newsletter emails every day. We will be posting up info about upcoming toys, artists, pics and info about anything else related to our shop.

We have been talking about switching hosts and putting up a new website for a while now, and we finally got the time to get that big project done without the help of outside designers or programmers. Okay, almost done. We will most likely end up launching the new website this upcoming week. It's a lot of work, especially with our old website still up & running, orders to fill and 3 trade shows in NY this month. Whew!

Benny is off the Toy Fair today to scope out new toys and meet with vendors. In particular we are going to finally meet in person the distributor that is handling the fulfillment of our orders from Toy2R USA! So in the upcoming months, expect more Toy2R products at Tenacious Toys.

And with that, we're off!