It's been 10 years since Giant Robot editors Erik Nakamura and Martin Wong photocopied and stapled their first 'zine, a vehicle for their personal interests that sought to explore Asian and underground cultures.
Now the quarterly publication has spawned bustling commercial ventures while establishing itself as a bridge between Asian and pop cultures.
"Over 10 years, [Nakamura and Wong] have nurtured a voice of a generation without knowing it," says Wing Ko, a local filmmaker who has documented the boarding culture. "They've outlasted trends -- 'zine culture, dot-com boom, glossy Asian-centric magazines, all while doing it on their own terms."
That connection to culture will be celebrated with an exhibition of artists who have helped shape the magazine's identity. The show begins Saturday at GR2, the second of two Giant Robot spaces on Sawtelle Boulevard, where a crop of mostly Japanese-owned businesses has taken root in L.A.'s Westside. That a third outlet, GRSF in San Francisco, has opened and that plans are in the works for a restaurant on Sawtelle speak to the editors' abilities to transform ideas into enterprise.
All have grown from a publication whose content has included in-depth stories on the Sriracha hot sauce factory in Rosemead, Korean cinema and Asian mass murderers, as well as pieces on Snoopy in Japan, Balinese cockfighting and life behind bars in a Tokyo jail cell.
"I think a lot of us at GR grew up on the outskirts of Asian American culture, and I think GR is a response to that," Nakamura says. "I think there are more people like us."
Giant Robot seems to speak to a generation raised on equal parts Bruce Lee, Mad magazine, ramen and Hello Kitty.
"GR has become a direct byproduct of the multicultural shabu-shabu bowl here in Los Angeles," says reader Gregory Han, a Silver Lake-based graphic designer. "The same city where Morrissey's fan base is comprised of predominantly Mexican rockabilly kids, where Korean clubs are the biggest nighttime draw in the city. I don't think Giant Robot could have started anywhere else but Los Angeles."
Still, when GR sought more space for its growing e-commerce business in 2001, Nakamura and Wong weren't exactly welcomed into Sawtelle's established enclave of sushi joints, noodle bars, grocers and Japanese nurseries.
