I will admit the initial take on this blog post won’t seem to fit in with my art and photography posts that I make here. The obvious tie in is I took photographs of the store to document what I saw. But as I authored this, I found other more interesting photography aspects to highlight.
When I was a kid, I loved going to toy stores and the “five and dime” stores with my mother. It was an adventure, discovering the different toys and books on the shelfs, I looked forward to the special occasions when we would go, and I could get a new toy. I still can visual a couple of the long gone stores we would go to in Pasadena where I grew up. When I moved to Newport Beach in 1994 a dime store named Gilbert’s was still there. It had everything you could need, it was a throwback to the America I grew up in, but it didn’t make it into this century.
When I went to Atlanta for the opening at the Atlanta Photography Group I discovered Richard’s Variety Store in the same center at the gallery. Going through Richard’s was like going back in to the past. Shelves of board game, toy trucks, Barbies, toy animals, books, Whamo Frisbees, and a host of other things. The thing I loved was the fact all these toys needed a child with an imagination for them to come to life. Someone had to play with them and pretend, think, and dream. I am so tired of seeing young kids (older kids & adults) fixated on iPhones and tablets to have their entertainment delivered to them. Richard’s had an atmosphere of innocence about it (if you ignored some of the gag adult humor items). I even overheard a young girl point out a specific Barbie to her grandfather and tell him that was the Barbie she wanted for Hanukkah and I thought about how many times a child had a made a toy request like that for the holidays. I recognized the hope the child had and the fact I am lucky enough to live in a country were so many children are lucky enough to actually get something for the holidays.
Preparing this post, I searched several on-line sources about Richard’s. Their Yelp review ratings was average, some people complained about price or an employee interaction years ago. I didn’t pay much attention to the prices because I was in awe that a store like this still existed and had such a huge inventory. The staff I talked to were nice so who knows what happened in the past. What I found very interesting was their Instagram page. They encourage patrons to photograph their purchases and post them to their page. What I found in amongst the posted images was an interesting portfolio of portraits, the toys we gravitate towards tells a lot about us, at any age. Not that I have time to do this but if someone were to curate and edit these images, they would make a good book or exhibition. Richard’s Facebook and Twitter pages also have similar great content.
With my photography I document my era, being in Richard’s Variety Store allowed me to go back in my past to see something long gone at home, I guess that motivated me to photograph in the store to capture those memories from when life was simpler and more innocent; perhaps there is some self-portrait element here too. I was thankful a store like this still exists and that I was able to experience it again.
