Rubik's Toy Icon

2nd July 2014: Remember those days when you had hours to puzzle over completing the second layer of a Rubik's cube? Or if you were lucky enough to complete the task in full, we commend you! Considering that a Rubik's cube can be twisted in 43,252,003,274,489,856,000 different ways, it's no mean feat. Especially when you look at the facts, out of these different ways 43,252,003,274,489, 855, 999 of them are wrong.

Maddeningly frustating as it is, these mathematical truths haven't stopped us falling in love with this 3-D visual challenge. Invented in 1974, by Erno Rubik, the cube was the absolute must-have toy of the early 1980's. Although popularity faded relatively quickly, and in 1986 the New York Times said the cube had been 'retired to the attic, the garbage heap and, with a bow to its elegance and ingeniousness, to the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art', lately it has undergone a resurrection including a $5 million exhibition at the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City.

What is it that holds our fascination with this toy? Is it the magic of unfathomanable numbers or the Mondrian-esque boldness of flat colour, twisted into a myriad of rainbows in eye-popping colours? Is it pure nostalgia for days gone by? Some objects become iconic and represent a generation, the Rubik's cube is one.

Honouring the Rubik's cube is Sean Sims' image 'Gorillas in the Mist from his new Happy Folk collection'. Our featured Artist of the Month for July, Sean Sims is an artist hugely inspired by the iconic toys of the 1980's. ....(continues below)

The inspiration behind Sean Sim's image came whilst watching the famous David Attenborough's encounter with mountain gorillas. Capturing the gentle & inquisitive side of these giant creatures as they gently searched with their finger-tips through Attenborough's hair has gone down as a special piece of TV history. This co-incided with a news-item at the time about the Rubik's cube being 40 years old, and thereby was born a winning idea. A lot of people identify with Sean's image, especially those of us old enough to grow up with those little cubes of frustration...

Experts have calculated that a cube can be solved in as few as 20 moves but even a champion 'speed-cuber' averages completing the toy in 50 moves, in as little as 6.94 seconds. Needless to say, being competitive and with time on their side, it's teenagers who are buying the cube now - or maybe it's just to remind their parents how old they are!

Send us your stories and memories of your favourite 1980's toys or even the odd drawing or two...