Maine news, sports, weather from Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram, Portland, Maine

The imaginarium of Randy Regier

— WATERVILE — Randy Regier would do just about anything for the chance to walk up to his exhibition without any prior knowledge and just gaze at it, dumbfounded and slack-jawed.

click image to enlarge

click image to enlarge

Additional Photos Below

Select images available for purchase in the
Maine Today Photo Store

But Regier can't do that. He created this work, and he knows what it's all about -- or what it's supposed to be about, in his mind anyway.

''I would love to have the experience of seeing it and not knowing it,'' he says ruefully.

Regier's NuPenny Toy Store installation -- located in an empty glassed-in vestibule at the old Hathaway Mill at 8 Water St. -- is about as good as it gets. A Portland sculptor with a streak of genius, Regier has created a store full of fantasy and wonder.

He has filled the shelves with rockets, robots, boats and cars. These are functional and fantastic playthings, the stuff that 10-year-olds dream of having.

He built them in his basement, assembling everything from 20th-century industrial, scientific and household items such as paper towel racks, kitchen implements and various other pieces of discarded chrome. None of his creations are or were toys at any time, nor did Regier make any of them made with existing toy parts.

Everything is a product of Regier's active imagination. He outfitted each toy in metallic gray, giving the store the blinding feel of ''The Twilight Zone.''

Folks are not welcome to walk inside Regier's store. It's closed for business, for now and evermore. The door is always locked in an attempt to keep it within our reach but out of our grasp.

If Regier opened the door and allowed people in to touch the toys, the dream would be over. The fantasy would be broken.

The locked door represents that moment between when our dreams feel real and when we wake up and feel them vanish.

''It would become reality,'' Regier says. ''And that's not something I'm interested in right now.''

And so visitors must do what I did on a chilly afternoon two weeks ago. They must walk up to the storefront, push their faces up close to the glass, peer inside with wonder.

Regier, 45, has lived in Portland since 2005. He and his family moved east from Oregon so he could study at Maine College of Art.

He placed this installation in Waterville because he received a grant from the Harry Faust Art Fund, which is managed by the Maine Arts Commission. Faust was a community leader in Waterville and a big supporter of the arts.

It seemed fitting to Regier that his NuPenny Toy Store should open in Waterville. It will be on view into April before moving on to another Maine city to be determined.

Every piece in the store means something to Regier, though he chooses not to explain the origin. If he did, he might deny the viewer the opportunity to interpret the exhibition independently.

There are labels on each piece, but the labels are written in teletype. You can figure out the words if you want, but it requires effort and patience.

''If I put anything in that space that says, 'This is artwork,' it lets people off the hook to think for themselves. I would rather have people wonder, 'Is it art? Is it a toy store?' I just feel it's not my place to tell people what it is or what to think about it.' ''

In an interview at his Portland home, Regier reveals a few secrets.

He's using the toys as a medium for his dreams, and because his dreams feel tactile to him, he feels able to recreate them in these toy forms.

The toys also reflect literal and cultural references. Conceptually, each toy is his interpretation of a song lyric, poem or literary work that has affected him in some way. The influence of William Stafford, Charles Bukowski, Pablo Neruda, Rage Against the Machine and Aimee Mann are all over these pieces.

The only other thing he'll say about the NuPenny Toy Store is that he thinks it may be best viewed after hours. The nighttime aura adds to a sense of otherwordly mystery.

''I prefer it after dark,'' he says. ''It's the difference between being in the movie theater with the lights on and the lights off.''

Staff Writer Bob Keyes can be contacted at 791-6457 or at:

bkeyes@pressherald.com