Robert Race

I aim to provide an exciting range of artefacts and materials, and to focus on design as an essentially playful process of problem solving.

Students will learn to experiment with materials, and to use simple mechanisms to produce movement, bringing their own ideas to life in amusing and intriguing toy-like objects.

I use a collection of moving toys from around the world as an inspiration, and like students to work with wood and a wide range of materials such as bamboo, wire, string, plastic, etc., using basic tools, but trying to exploit the properties of the materials as imaginatively as possible.

I try to make things that move in simple but interesting ways. Traditional moving toys have been a strong influence on my work, and I have travelled in Europe, Indonesia, Mexico, India and Japan in search of them. At their best they achieve a vigorous imagery and make ingenious use of really simple mechanisms. The makers of these toys have also been constantly inventive in their use of materials: They have cleverly exploited the properties of whatever natural, re-used and recycled materials were readily available to them. I try to do the same and at present particularly like using driftwood because collecting it gives me a good excuse for going to the seaside.

I contribute widely to exhibitions of contemporary crafts, toys and automata. Current and forthcoming shows are listed on my website.

1965 Graduated from the University of Cambridge ( Natural Sciences). 1966/67 U. of London, Sch. of Education : Postgrad. Certificate in Education 1967 Taught Science in Secondary Schools 1970 Warden of Trowbridge Teachers’ Centre. 1974 Diploma in Education, University of Bristol 1978 Became a full time toymaker. As a craftsman I am self-taught.

Before making toys I taught Science in a Secondary School and was the Warden of a Teachers’ Centre. Drawing on this experience I still occasionally work with both adults and children, using my own work and a collection of moving toys from around the world as a resource for education

Museum of Childhood, Bethnal Green, London Japan Museum of Contemporary Toy, Okayama, Japan Arima Toys and Automata Museum, Hyogo, Japan. Arts Council (South East) Craft Collection

See: Peppé, Rodney Automata and Mechanical Toys The Crowood Press, Ramsbury 2002 ISBN 1-86126-510-7 Exempla 2002 – Welt des Holzes Bayerischer Handwerkstag e. V., Muenchen 2002 ISBN 3-933363-13-6

Since 1991 I have been an active member of the British Toymakers Guild, and was Chairman from 2003 to 2006.