A Celebration of Monsters, Superheroes, and Villains in traveling museum exhibitions!
SuperMonster市City! traveling exhibits are derived from co-founder David Barnhill’s private collection of an estimated 200,000 toys, posters, games, books, films, and more. Co-founder Stephen Rueff curates the objects in social and political contexts through reflective and informative texts, artist profiles, and commentary. Barnhill and Rueff bring new insights to America’s iconic mythical figures from America’s Golden Age of toys.
2024 Exhibition Dates:
Spies and Space: Toys of the Cold War Era is an exhibition reflects on how the drama and intrigue of real-world espionage, and the fascination with outer space, seeped into American and Russian popular culture during the Cold War Era. Follow the links below for more info!
Sheboygan County History Musuem
February – April 2024
Dacotah Prairie Musuem
May – September 2024
Castle Museum of Saginaw County Musuem
September 2024 – January 2025
2024 Exhibition Dates:
This exhibition explores how American monsters, superheroes, and villains impacted American culture from the 1960s to the 1990s and became iconic characters reflecting America’s changing values and social tensions. Through this unique display of hundreds of toys, posters, media, and text panels, this exhibition has been enjoyed by thousands of people in cultural institutions across the U.S. Follow the links below for more information!
Science Central
June – September 2024
Sacramento History Museum
September 2024 – January 2025
Recommendation:
The St. Louis Public Library Director of Marketing and Events
Cathy Heimberger wrote the following recommendation.
“As the director of marketing for the St. Louis Public Library I am tasked with bringing exhibits to our Central Library that are unique and have a broad appeal. I met David and Stephen while attending an American Association of Museums conference and I knew immediately that I wanted to work with them and bring this one of a kind experience to St. Louis. They didn’t disappoint.
“Our exhibit consisted of more than 500 items from David’s personal collection and attracted visitors of all ages and backgrounds. The exhibit was a natural fit for the library as monsters and villains have lived on the shelves of public libraries from our earliest days. We saw a spike in our graphic novel checkouts during the four month run of the exhibit. I highly recommend bringing this exhibit to your organization.”
Check out these pictures from the St. Louis Public Library
Exhibited October 2022 – January 2023
Video Testimonials!
Goldstein Museum of Design Director
Lin Nelson-Mayson interview and exhibition images
Historic Duluth Depot Program Director
Briana Johnson interview and exhibition images
Video: Attendees share their thoughts on our exhibitions
Click this LINK for interviews and installation images (if asked, password is SMC)
SuperMonster市City! exhibits strive to be carbon neutral!
As a proud member of TerraPass, we offset 100% of CO2 emissions from shipping and related travel.
We inform host institutions of the amount of CO2 emissions upon request for use in their sustainability reports.
For more on SuperMonster市City!
Contact email: Stephen@SuperMonsterCity.com
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Toy photos above by Steve Zerby
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SuperMonster市City
SuperMonsterCity! celebrates monsters, superheroes and villains in traveling exhibitions and more!
The legend of the Creature from the Black Lagoon according to the Aurora monster model instructions. Let’s take a listen to the 1963 biography of the Creature. It is not exactly the perfect storyline according to the movie, but to my five-year-old brain it was truly exciting. Enjoy. #monstertoys #vintagetoys #supermonstercity #creaturefromtheblacklagoon #MONSTERMODELS
Watch as the crazed collector opens up some retrofitted newly created by high-end technology toys from his past. These two Jaymar Tricky Walkers are cloned from my original toys that I got 1 million years ago. Let’s see if they work or work as I remember they did, see what happens!!!???
Happy Easter from all of us at SuperMonsterCity... May you find lots of fun and create lasting memories.
Wow, here are some SPOOK STORIES cards from 1961. Leaf brand company put them out and as a kid I just loved them, on the other side are monster jokes, maybe someday we’ll post those too. Who remembers SPOOK STORIES ? 
Wow! Here’s another incredible game or playset that I don’t understand. I bought this box of imagination way back in the early 90s when I lived in Tokyo. I know that it is featuring Yokai characters. Yokai are Japanese supernatural beings. Please tell me what’s going on with this box and these characters, I’d appreciate it, thank you.  #supermonstercity #yokai #japanesetoys #anime #
Hey everybody, let’s take a look at playing cards and decks of cards with characters that are full of memories. Here are a bunch of playing cards and card decks that I played with back when I was a little kid and I thought you might get a kick out of the artwork, the characters and the memories. What playing card decks do you remember and what games did you play? Thanks. #supermonstercity #cardgames #nostalgia #popculture
Below are the logos to some of the cultural institutions that have hosted our exhibitions
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