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As you walk towards the Rube Goldberg exhibit, this greeting in the stairwell reminds you of the man’s cultural importance.
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Here’s what I’m talking about: an unnecessarily complicated device used to apply a simple hand stamp.
Sam Machkovech
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Unfortunately this is the nothing but full-scale Rube Goldberg device at the exhibit.
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In keeping with the exhibit’s namesake, the instruction boards are a bit obtuse.
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Another shot on small feet.
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Place hand here, accept hammer blow (and small sticker).
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A play table for children to make their own constructions.
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Lots of Goldberg merchandise was on display…
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…but it was all stuck under glass. Why don’t you break open these boxes and assemble these little kits, MoPOP?
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Video walls showcased Rube Goldberg devices in pop culture, like this series from The Great Adventure of Pee-Wee.
SEATTLE – When most Americans think of the dawn of the tech age, they probably think less of specific devices or factories and more of one pop culture icon obsessed with it: Rube Goldberg.
While his name is synonymous with intricate constructs used to facilitate simple tasks, the early 20th-century cartoonist never actually built one of his world famous ‘Rube Goldberg machines’. This irony is explored in depth in a new museum exhibition called The Art of Rube Goldberg. Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture (formerly the EMP) took a first look at the collection’s world premiere. The exhibits tell a story fans of OK Go music videos and Pee-Wee Herman movie sequences may not know: the work of a sports-obsessed cartoonist who struck pop culture gold with a different kind of sketch.
The Art of Rube Goldberg is largely about cartoons and cartoons. As such, it chronicles Goldberg’s career in both elaborate, full-page comic strips (which never quite reached the level of Krazy Kat or Little Nemo) and political cartoons (whose clunky, overwritten treatments certainly read like an engineer’s stuff). Goldberg’s breakthrough came when he started drawing crazy machines – attaching them to characters like Professor Butts to help them perform humorously simple tasks, like reminding him to write a letter to his wife or fix his eyes on a golf ball. during a swing. The public ate these wacky sequences, and Goldberg turned to work on merchandise and artwork for advertisements (all of which are featured in the Seattle exhibit).
Unfortunately, this world premiere exhibition is very lacking in reality machines to play with; there is only one major piece of equipment at hand (pictured above) along with play tables that kids can use to build their own simple doodads. But as a combination of an old sketch store (many of which are captured in the gallery below) and sociological examination of Goldberg’s career, the exhibit is nonetheless fascinating.
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Goldberg was a cartoonist, not an inventor or engineer. The exhibition succeeds as a sociological and historical look at how it came to be. (This gallery is pretty much all made up of his original artwork.)
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Doesn’t hurt that one tons of his old, original sketches.
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It’s a far cry from “Alexa, set a reminder.”
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All original sketch lines and white markings can be seen on the sketches in this exhibition.
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Static device.
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Focus on the ball!
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A concept sketch…
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…for this finished cartoon.
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If you’re a serious cartoon nerd, you’ll recognize this: the Eisner Award design.
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The exhibition also includes a series of advertisements drawn by Goldberg.
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Giant reproductions of wall art look great in the exhibit.
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More giant wall art.
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Goldberg’s early work as a full-page cartoonist. It’s amazing how well these original pages held up.
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A zoom on one of those funny pages.
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Goldberg signed this on the day he proposed to his wife. It’s cool that this is in the exhibition.
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Before Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions, there was Goldberg’s popular take on the concept.
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A zoom on stupid questions.
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The selection of political cartoons was a reminder that Goldberg certainly had plans everything he did like an engineer – and in the case of his jokes, that sometimes meant a tendency to explain too much.
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People apparently really loved Goldberg themed buttons back in the day.
The Seattle exhibit is underway. No closing date has been set.
List image by Sam Machkovech