Giant Robot Store and GR2 News

Wendy and I flew into Portland, had dinner with my old college friend and his family, and then rolled up to the Land Gallery where we immediately ran into even more friends: artists transplanted from Los Angeles Souther Salazar and Monica Choy, musicians from Brooklyn Aaron Hartman and Alicia Jo Rabins. Portland may be a small town but I guess the world has become even smaller…

Like me they traveled to Portland’s Mississippi district to attend the opening night of Tae Won Yu’s art show, REMAKE: The World in Paper. As fans of his album cover art for Built To Spill and Versus might guess, Tae’s paper constructions are as whimsical as they are meticulously crafted. Wendy and I couldn’t not buy a print.


The art was amazing but the other reason we flew up from Los Angeles was to see Tae play in his new duo, Poses, with fresh drummer Victoria Salvador. As Paul Weller went from the harder-rocking Jam to the more soulful Style Council before finding middle ground in his solo career, Tae has gone from the art-punk Kicking Giant to the R&B-tinged KG to something in the middle with Poses. Fans will not be disappointed and, yes, he is still a rock ‘n’ roll animal. And who is that setting up in the top right photo?

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We got a little more information on the Trading Tortoise. We’ve been asked many times, “what’s going on?” So I asked Souther a few questions. Here’s more info: GR: Does it really stick to 50 trades? SS: We can only do about 50 trades max, because of the time/space constraints of the project. We have short conversations with each person about their item, so that’s about the most we can do.  If more people show up with trades then we can get to, we encourage trading outside of the tortoise too.  When we are approaching cut off time (5pm), if there is still a line, we will just need to cut the line off at somebody. GR: What do people need to do? SS: We have printed tags for people to fill out about their item, before they sit down to trade with us. GR: What are people getting or trading for? SS: We are trading the things that people have brought to trade with us in all the cities we’ve been so far…everything from handmade objects, found artifacts, art, zines, prints, secondhand store finds, sentimental trinkets, childhood toys, homemade jams, mix cds, stories, etc ,etc.  It depends on what we got from the last few stops usually.  There are guidelines on the site, but the main things we can’t accept are things that are too big or too fragile for us to travel with.  We only ask that people bring something they think is special.
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  1. Bring us something special that you’re willing to trade.  2. Fill out a tag (we will have them out near the Tortoise) with your name, location, and as much info about your trade as possible (leave the number blank). 3. Sit down and trade with us!  Tell us about your object you brought: where did you find it? did you make it? what’s the story behind it? We will present a few different options for you to choose from. We will do our best to connect you with something we think you might appreciate.  (If you decide you would rather keep the item you brought, that is always totally OK too) 4. Track your trade online. We will assign a number to your item that will allow you to see where it eventually finds its new home. What is OK to trade:  Anything that you think is special and carries some story or meaning along with it. It could be a found object, a childhood possession, a handmade creation, a story, a drawing, etc. What is not OK:  Anything living Anything perishable Anything extremely fragile without a container Anything extremely large or bulky (shoebox size or smaller is preferable, our storage space is limited!) Garbage from the bottom of your purse or backpack. Extra Notes:  We can only accommodate up to 50 trades per stop, so come early! You are welcome to bring more items to barter with others, but please only 1 trade per person with the Trading Tortoise.
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Giant Robot 2 Opening saturday night. It's getting nuts in LA, tons of art show openings all over the place. You name it, there's probably an art show there. People are having art shows in spots where there's no space for an art show. It's just getting nuts. What can we do, but hopefully provide a decent space for a person? Maybe our reputation complete with a magazine, and being one of the first...
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