As you know I have a rather extensive collection of wind-up toys. I love the cheap and colorful toys that are aimed at children (or at their parents, as parents have more money). But I found these ones recently, and I think they fall into the category of ‘art toys’. I don’t remember encountering such things before, and it is always good to have new experiences at my advanced age.
This one wobbles along and has a mechanism to make sparks as the center platter rotates. Not exactly the sort of thing one might give a child, it would be broken in mere moments of use. It is not the only sparky wind-up in my collection, I also have a sparky King Kong and a sparky Godzilla.
This one is called ‘the pea’, presumably because it is small. It has a rotating walking mechanism.
This one is a tall, skinny walker. In the background is my knitting basket, perched atop some of the new books that have come into my house (I know that I say I am trying to cut back on books, but I’m not too successful).
This one is sort of as described, but it’s more of a fluttering heart. And why do I describe these as ‘art toys’? Well they were about twice as expensive as ordinary wind-ups, and probably twice as fragile. And I bought the first two at an art supply store, and the last two at our local art museum. I really have no sales resistance to this sort of thing.