ToyCyte: Toy Culture Collected

This weekend, Project:Gallery moves and relaunches as the Cerasoli:LeBassse Gallery in Culver City, CA. Just across the street from their original venue, the new gallery is much larger and provides a more beautiful space. Tomorrow night from 7-10PM, they launch Blender, a group show featuring several emerging Asian painters including Melissa Haslam, Vincent Hui, Mari Inukai, Ryuichi Ogino and Deth P Sun. Toy fans will recognize the work of Ryuichi Ogino, aka Ogi, who was born in Tokyo, educated in the Bay Area and is now back in Japan. The Daily Du Jour art blog has photos of Ogi installing his art for Blender and mentions that it is informed by Takshi Murakami’s superflat movement. The sculptures look like vinyl, but are actually hand-painted Japanese polymer clay and model kits. Ogi’s figures range from about $25 to $300 and will be available at the show. You can check out a Flickr preview here. And if you need a further endorsement, Huck Gee posted the following on Kidrobot’s thread about this show: “Ogi is hands down one of my favorite artists ever. He’s brilliant. His designs are gorgeous. Hard to believe no toy company has swooped him up yet.” Very very cool.