Vending Machine Chronicles, part 2
More adventures in the (mostly) cash economy
The first time I realized vending machines could dispense something other than a Coke or a Snickers bar, I was a junior in high school on a summer exchange program to Japan. My host sister and I had taken the train from Nara to Hiroshima, and before being completely devastated by the Peace Memorial park and museum, I was gobsmacked by a run-of-the-mill-looking vending machine selling canned cocktails to anyone with the proper change. We had drive-through liquor stores in New Mexico, but this was next-level. (1988 Japan was very on-trend for 2024 American drink culture.)
We weren’t in the market for those cans, but I think a seed was planted in me, and a fascination with less-mundane vending machine offerings has grown.
In addition to the previously discussed Art-o-mat, please enjoy a few of the other coin-op dispensaries I’ve loved before …
1. Anastasia Inciardi’s Mini Print Vending Machines
Confession time: I wasn’t completely upfront with you all about my visit to the Whitney in January. Yes, I truly wanted to see the Ruth Asawa drawings exhibit, but the initial draw (hahaha) was the gift shop and the fact that it now plays host to one of artist Anastasia Inciardi’s vending machines.
Inspired in part by the Art-o-mat, as well as temporary tattoo vending machines around her Brooklyn neighborhood growing up, the Portland, Maine-based printmaker says she first dreamed up the idea to repurpose a temporary tattoo vending machine to sell little prints as a means to collect quarters for laundry money.
I discovered her machines around the same time I started madly carving eraser stamps and was overcome with feelings of “Why didn’t I think of that?” (Maybe because the whole sticker/temporary tattoo vending phenomenon is something that neatly skirted my particular age group, like Hannah Montana and SnapChat?)
Inciardi has since customized a few of these adorable dispensers and installed them in shops from Brunswick, Maine, to Los Angeles. She even created a special set of prints to vend at the final season premiere for Curb Your Enthusiasm:
Back at the Whitney, $1 in quarters will get you one of ten tiny prints inspired by iconic NYC things (to-go coffee cups, park benches, the High Line, a slice of thin crust ’za, etc.). My daughter and I *may* have purchased an entire roll of quarters to see how many of the designs we could pick up as gifts and souvenirs. Behold our first go:
Check out Inciardi’s beautiful food-related prints and find out where else you might visit her vending machines at inciardiprints.com
2. The Magic Fortune Telling Pencil Machine at Ephemera, Des Moines, IA
We’ve established that I love pencils and I love vending machines, so it stands to reason that these would be two great tastes that taste great together. If you happen to be in Des Moines, Iowa, for any reason, you can have your fortune told Magic 8 Ball-style, and take home a useful writing implement in the process, thanks to the creative souls who run a delightful independent stationery shop here.
And if you don’t believe that to be a source of pixie dust in this universe, then I submit the following goofball video into evidence. (Yes, another one. Please excuse the sound quality, we were working with an old iPhone and I got a little breathless there in my excitement.)
3. Photo Booths
Ok, the truth is that most photo booths now take credit cards and therefore feel a little less a part of the funky analog vending world. But you still have to squeeze into a cramped little box with half a curtain, a tiny stool, and a hard-to-predict timer, then go with the flow and the emotional momentum for a series of freeze-frames that are awkwardly or giddily or nakedly charming. And the physical printout is the sole record. (As far as I know.)
I have no complaints about the convenience of documenting events with the handheld computer in my pocket, but I will never pass up a Photo Booth as a more immediate and time capsule-like way to capture a particular moment in a particular place with a particular set of people. (Plus those strips make excellent bookmarks.)
Please tell us about your own fun vending machine discoveries in the comments!
You are all BABIES in those pics!
I love the Whitney gift shop, how did I not know about the Inciardi vending machine?!! Luckily, I have lots of quarters!