A Daytime Culver Crawl

My day job has been frustrating of late. The economy sucks and there isn't enough staff to do what needs to be done. Everybody is stressed out. I needed a couple days off before I acted on the fantasy of putting my foot through the CPU. So, I chilled out and did mostly nothing for a couple days except take a fun trip to the Culver City galleries. I had missed all the current show's openings due to intense busyness in my life so, some of what I'm going to write about won't be available to view much longer but, I thought it worthwhile to highlight the outstanding work I saw.

At Walter Maciel there was a fine group show called Valley of the Dolls. A diverse assortment to be sure. My favorite was Andy Diaz Hope's strange and meticulous works which were sort of photographic mosaics using dark and moody subject matter. What started as a large photographic print was cut up into hundreds of tiny pieces. Each piece was then put into clear gelcaps which were glued onto a perfect grid in correct order, reconstructing the picture. Talk about yer OCD! Beautiful stuff. There was actually another artist who did a similar piece in the show, Beverly Rayner, who used gelcaps but put a photograph behind them instead of inside (far right).



At Angles Gallery was a fascinating kinetic piece by Joseph Kohnke called launch. As you entered the installtion room a motion detector activated a series of antique lunch boxes to come alive. The boxes slowly open at different intervals creating a creaking, whirring din. Each box had inside a thermos that would rise and aim, then descend back into it's silo. The artist was inspired by North Korea's bleak reality of not being able to feed it's populace but at the same time building a massive army.



I was pretty tired and ready to split the scene until I walked into Honor Fraser and saw Israeli artist Shiri Mordechay's bizarro mixed media installation. This totally took my breath away. It's just one of those indescribable explosions of expression. A sculptural collage-maze set before me. A vomit of grotesque bodies painted on paper and shaped into some crazy floating and creepy world. Contorted erotica and mythological creatures caught in a spider's nest of string and scraps. A Bosch-esque parade of fuck-sexy vagina-cock corpses. All of it painted on paper, cardboard, and fabric. Glued, wired and sewn together hanging from the ceiling, and standing on the floor. I don't even want to read the press release, I'd rather go back to see if I could figure out what's going on. A must see. Go see it before it's gone. Quick!





http://www.honorfraser.com
http://www.waltermacielgallery.com
http://andydiazhope.com
http://www.josephkohnke.com
http://www.anglesgallery.com

Perform Now! in Chinatown!

I caught some groovy Performance Art at the Chinatown Galleries Perform Now! event last week. I'm glad they are holding this event yearly now. Also, last year I believe it was just one day but this time it was a three and a half days, Thursday night through Sunday. I didn't see as much as I wanted as I was all over the place during the weekend. But, I did catch a few interesting gems.

I've always liked Tiffany Trenda's work. It's well planned, thoughtful and compelling. She employs video projections, video cameras, bizarre costumes, and usually an interactive element. She was performing her piece Terrarium which included all of the above. Trenda was wearing a white body suit with an LCD and camera headdress. She crept around in slow motion on lucite heels reaching out to audience members behind a rope barrier mimicking their slow movements but never touching. All the while various futuristic city and environmental scenes were projected on top.



I've always liked Lucas Murgida's work as well. In his piece The Oracle he cuts out the wise sage middle man who is normally called upon to form riddles for you to figure out and thus find your path. In this version you are your own sage. The viewer is invited to enter a phone booth-sized box with two way mirrors. Inside, all your questions are answered. Lucas stands outside like a barker, the truth is his con to entice people inside.



Perform Now! is really a fun event. The Chinatown Gallery area is perfect for it as it has a nice inner courtyard and a large secluded cul de sac. Be sure to take the time to check it out next year.

http://performnow.tumblr.com
http://www.tiffanytrenda.com/home.html
http://lucasmurgida.com/

NYC Exploits Part 2

After the Chelsea death march on Friday what I really needed and was hoping for was a crazy night at some bar in Williamsburg. Luckily, Justin was spinning at a bar down the street from where I was staying. He used to have 80+ Prince singles but, I don't remember hearing him play any during his set. Actually, I didn't remember much after the 4 1/2 margavesas and a whiskey shot. But, I checked my Facebook status in the morning and apparently I had a lousy milkshake at Kellogg's diner for a nightcap.

After a hazy morning my mates and I went down to the Whitney. There was a Charles Burchfield painting show there. I totally loved this stuff. It reminded me a lot of William Blake's work for some reason. My favorite works were the watercolors in which he seemed to render energy emanating from trees and other flora. He portrayed nature's invisible biorhythms in a sort of spiritual way with glowing yellow and white light. Very psychedelic and visionary. I'd have more pics but... No Bigture No Bigture! I had to pull these from the interwebs.



Later, it was a distressing afternoon for the members of Violent Bullshit. We missed the set but not the aftermath. Apparently, a string had broken, and their 11 minute set was lacking in focus and energy. I tried to console the bassist but I just made it worse. The guitarist was surprisingly upbeat though, ready to get on with his new life without his girlfriend who just dumped him and without his band who he was dumping. Only a crazyman named Sam Tobin could resuscitate this gloomy ex-pool supply store.



On Sunday Scotty RV and I took a ferry to historic Governor's Island. It was free except for the 2 bills we lost playing blackjack in the casino on the lower deck. On this barren outpost the lonely soldiers stationed here would put on elaborate shows to liven their dreary and desperate lives. Some times it was dinner theater featuring saucy vignettes while other times it was a musical with costumes. They would often fight each other to play the female rolls. One of the goals of my trip was to visit a bar in Manhattan called Max Fish where we used to hang out during the band years. Never got there but, I did get to see the t-shirt at the Meatopia festival on Governor's.



After meeting Justin & Stacy later in the afternoon for the end of the World Cup match at a bar in Greenpoint I went to a local recording studio to see what Turing Machine was putting together. Gerry Fuchs, their drummer had passed away late last year and Scott and Justin were trying to cobble something together from various demo recordings to put out a third album. Andrew, their producer played me a couple of things, one of which was a fantastic improvised jam recorded at Scott's upstate NY home. Very exciting driving Turing Machine style stuff. Can't wait to hear what they come up with. But, it will take some time.



While in the studio I took a couple hours out to meet an NYC performance artist, Shaun El C. Leoardo at a bar called the Pencil Factory down the street. I had seen one of Shaun's performances that he did at LACMA in LA awhile back called Bull in the Ring. My cinematographer friend Brad Cooper was filming it for him. It featured Shaun leading football drills and then being pummeled by 10 burly linebackers. It was pretty intense. Shaun's performance work involves personifying masculine role models in order to "truly experience the psychology and pain involved with representing the hero figure". In another performance called Battle Royal he got in a cage match with several blindfolded professional wrestlers for 3 hours! I had a great conversation with him and his artist friend. Hopefully I'll catch one of his upcoming projects when I visit NYC again. Go to his website to read about his interesting work.



Whitney Museum of American Art
http://whitney.org

Turing Machine
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYReXckG7Ys

Shaun El C. Leoardo
http://www.elcleonardo.com

Bull in the Ring
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FioYRo77sd8&feature=related

Battle Royal
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pdFkcMW9fE

Endless Arts in Chelsea

Being "based" in LA (whatever the hell that means) I write about LA arts here at TTINLA blog. But, last weekend I had a bit of an NYC art trip so I thought I'd write about it. I was mainly out east to see my mates who I was in a band with in the 90s (pitchblende). But, I had enough time to go arting too.

I had never visited the Chelsea gallery area in Manhattan's lower west side so I took an afternoon to peruse it. Vast! I had no idea. In about an 8 square block area it seemed like almost every building was a gallery, or a building full of galleries. It took me 4 hours and I was passing up probably two thirds of the spaces. My head was spinning and my feet were aching. 100 degree temperatures accompanied me.



I can't begin to start writing a review of this, it's just too much. So, I just picked some things out that seemed interesting to me. At the Carolina Nitsch Project Room was a fantastic show of strange artworks. Richard Dupont had some bizarre and compelling figurative sculptures. Honestly, this shit just kind of freaks me out. Little naked and bald men on a table all contorted in slightly different ways. I would assume in a 3D program and then somehow cast in polyurethane resin. Want to try some DMT? No need, just check this stuff out.



My favorite show in Chelsea ironically, featured an LA "based" (there it is again) artist, Tim Hawkinson. I've always loved his inventive and complicated work. He's a true mad scientist. The Pace Gallery was displaying Tim's "One Man Band" series. These are works that are musical in nature and have scores sort of like old player pianos. But, the scores are on plastic film, a row of beads, or screws in an old thermos. When the pieces are activated by a motion detector they spring to life and start making "music". It's mostly dissonant patters as far as I could tell. Fantastic!



At Slag gallery were some bold and slaggish busts by Kristian Kozul. They were sort of emulating classical busts of Roman generals and politicians but they had a modern twist looking like they were dripping in crude oil and featuring contemporary clothing. One called Guardian of Prosperity appeared to be a cop in riot gear including a gas mask. I thought these were brilliant.

Ok, I think I got a couple more episodes for this trip so stay tuned for parts 2 & 3.

Slag Gallery
http://slaggallery.com/home

The Pace Gallery
http://thepacegallery.com

Carolina Nitsch Project Space
534 W. 22nd St. New York, NY 10011

Walk west, Drive north

I had a nice walk through Beverly Hills last Saturday. No, I didn't stop at Dior for a $5000 black satin leather jacket. A super lady (Micol Hebron) was talking a super walk in her silver superstar outfit all the way to the ocean from downtown via Wilshire. Friends were driving and biking by to give their farewells on her journey. One cohort was walking the entire 16 miles with beachball in hand. This was Micol's final "act" in Los Angeles as she is off to...Paris? No, Utah to pursue other artistic endeavors such as being the Senior Curator at the Salt Lake Art Center. I hope she doesn't forget about us here in LaLa Land. Once she realizes she has to join a private club to drink a Coca Cola maybe she'll spend her weekends here.



Later that day I went to a great photography show at Cella Gallery in North Hollywood. Disambiguations featured the work of Sinan Revell. There were actually 3 separate bodies of work being shown all from the last few years. In the doppelgANGER series Sinan plays chameleon by posing as every character in her photo montages. Sinan appears as glamourous LA trophy wife and gardener, busy business woman and homeless person, police brutality victim and policeman, as well as many other pairings that represent social and class opposites.

All the work was of the highest quality in execution. The various characters are seamlessly composed in the environments. All the characters looked surprisingly natural and legitimate especially considering that they are all the same person. Very fine work indeed!



Also present were Homeland Security Blankets featuring some of the crime-orented photographic images made into tapestries, and Sinan's Color Blind series. A really amazing display of work which I've seen parts of in past shows but having it all together was really very impactful. Brad Cooper was at the opening as well, Sinan's collaborator.



So, take a trip up to North Hollywood's Cella Gallery and view this fantastic show up through July 26th. It's actually the only art gallery in North Hollywood's "Art District" according to the young and attractive interns.

Cella Gallery
5229 Lankershim Blvd.
North Hollwood
http://www.cellagallery.com

Sinan Revell
http://www.sinanrevell.com

Avant-Garde Music Night delayed by Lakers Game Result

Now that's a headline I thought I would never write. Yes, even some members of the commie-pinko alternative music community in LA cannot help but show their local pride in mass-market athletics. As the final game of the NBA championship was winding down the ResBox show was pushed back, until curator Hans stepped in and restored order and sanity.

ResBox is "A monthly event featuring the world's best experimental music, curated by musician and filmmaker Hans Fjellestad." It happens the 3rd Thursday of every month at the Steve Allen Theater at Center For Inquiry West (CFI) in Los Feliz. I've been to ResBox a couple times now and it's a great night if you love avant-garde music, Musique concrète, improvisational jazz, performance art, or live electronics. The musicianship is really pretty impressive and tonight was no exception.

The lineup included the SCOTT HEUSTIS GROUP featuring Breeze Smith + Jeff Schwartz + Robert Leng + Scott Heustis, a quartet of sorts including ANNA HOMLER + TED BYRNES + JORGE MARTIN + STEUART LIEBIG, and the FPR TRIO featuring Frank Gratkowski + Phillip Greenlief + Jon Raskin. I know, a lot of names and if you're not into this scene it wouldn't mean much to you probably. But, it was good stuff I tells you. There were three very distinct sets.



First a lively set from a quartet of electric guitar, drums, saxophone and standup bass featuring dynamic, improvised jazz in front of clips from old silent films. It was out there but still probably the most standard and identifiable music of the night.



Next was a free form weirdness. Anna Homler was in da house with a table full of noise-making toys. Robot rayguns, pull string dolls, and various other beeping, crying, and clicking plastic devices were held up to the microphone and then further manipulated with an array of pedals and effects. This set also featured the first 6 string bass sighting of the night, and somebody torturing a drum kit while crumbling up aluminum cans. Pretty nutty.



The 3rd set featured a fantastic saxophone trio. Apparently deciding their music was not quite bizarre enough, they all decided to play separate compositions simultaneously overlapping them. But, somehow it worked, though I probably wouldn't have known if it didn't.

STEVE ALLEN THEATER

at the Center For Inquiry
West
4773 Hollywood Blvd
http://www.steveallentheater.com

ResBox Facebook Page

The Relentless Ride On The Zebra

Going to clubs that usually have a velvet rope outside the door is not high on my list of priorities but, I was assured from the invite that Robert Vargas' Red Zebra at the Crocker Club (Kojak reference?) would be FREE to the public. Why th' hell not? And that indeed was the case, I wasn't even padded down at the door.



Inside were beautiful people of all sorts dressing to impress for the most part. In the "Ghost Room" (legend has it that someone was shot and killed there) was a comedy show MCeed by Rick Izquieta. There was some really funny stuff! Some of the comics had actual jokes too. The hilarity could not even be dampened by the relentless heckling from the front row. The intrepid and scrawny comics held their ground during the onslaught. Also, kudos to the organizers for having the balls to combine a comedy show and avant-garde fashion show in the same event. A dangerous combination to be sure.



A little later, the Makers revved up their various jazzy instruments. They just kept playing and no one wanted them to stop. No one wanted the sexy dancers to stop writhing around on the table either and to capture the moment just about everything that resembled a camera in the joint was flashing away. Warning, epileptics need not apply! Probably best for you to stay at home the first Thursday of the month. Vargas even brought out his charcoal and started a portrait on stage during the set and still there was no pause in the sound. Relentless they were. Makers play 7th & Grand on Tuesday nights. Did I get that right? I'll see you there.
http://themakers.bandcamp.com

Rick Mendoza was in da house sporting some serious looking camera equipment. He wasn't kidding around and was snapping some impressive portraits. The event featured a good assortment of his photography work including some collage-esque pieces, a few portraits and some downtown alley scapes. Nice stuff.
http://www.rickmendoza.com



The avant garde fashion show by Omega Collektiv (it's intentionally spelled that way you sap!) was bizarre and interesting. Flanked by a pair of fantastic hooded and laser-weilding gargoyle-men, out from the vault marched a parade of unisex spadex glam creations. Vargas would occasionally pull one of the models out for an impromptu portrait or some punk style body painting. The irony was absolutely not lost on the audience when a model holding a thought bubble sign that read "Boycott BP" walked out in a full spadex fish scales body suit and was sloshed with black latex paint. It was dramatic I tells ya.



Well, I know where I'm going to be the first Thursday of every month. Great event and $10 for a Jack & Coke isn't that expensive.

Red Zebra at the Crocker Club
www.vargaspresents.com