8 days. 6 art fairs. 8 museums. 6 panels. 1 studio visit.

Touted as the most important art week of the year in New York, collectors, curators, and artists descended upon Manhattan for Armory Arts Week and the city did not disappoint. With a plethora of satellites, fairs boasting more galleries and more square footage than ever before, and the ADAA Art Show scheduled to coincide with the Armory, this was a big test for the art market and, at least anecdotally, it seems to have passed with flying colors. The aisles were filled with the who’s who of the art world: the Mugrabis, Margulies, Carolyn Christov Bargiev, Beatrix Ruf, Don and Mera Rubell, Jerry Saltz, etc. The walls at all the fairs, but particularly the Armory, declared that painting is alive and quite well: Yayoi Kusama and John Korner at Victoria Miro, Mel Bochner at Two Palms, Hernan Bas and Angel Otero at Lehmann Maupin, and at White Cube painting reigned supreme with Gary Hume, Gabriel Orozco, Georg Baselitz, and one of the much-hyped Damien Hirst blue paintings. Sculptures with glitz or reflective surfaces—often best sellers in Miami—made appearances at Jack Shainman (Nick Cave and El Anatsui), Hauser & Wirth (Isa Genzken), Lehmann Maupin (Nari Ward), Lisson (Anish Kapoor), Toby Webster Ltd. (Jim Lambie) and 303 (Jeppe Hein).

As you’d expect, each fair had a few stand out pieces that transcended the rest of the visual noise:

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It’s easy to get jealous in Los Angeles.  Most everyone came here from somewhere, even if it was here, to try and create art of some sort, to go behind the curtain of media-making in an attempt to toss in a pinch of their own individual ingredients.  The result is an endless stream of Facebook invitations, familiar postcards on coffee shop pin-boards, and a daunting sense that others’ ingredients—some friends, some enemies, some people who just got to town—are taking over the stew.

But if there’s anything I learned in college—a smaller, but similar stew—it’s that the work of my peers, in analysis or collaboration, is often the best teacher out there.  And it’s precisely because you are jealous, because you can view their creative process as a mirror of your own.  You can say, “Huh, this person is no genius, they’re practically an idiot, but they made this choice.  I never thought about doing that.  Maybe I too can make that choice, only better.”  It’s creative capitalism, but the only way it works is when you’re actively supporting one another.

This seems to be motto of the Los Angeles-based art collective, This Is What We Imagine (TIWWI, or Teewee), a group of young video, film, photography, and design makers—many of whom I went to school with—that are exhibiting their latest projects tonight, Saturday night, at the Echo Park Rec Center.  Beginning at 9:00 PM, the program, called “Show and Tell,” boasts the premiere of two recent collaborative efforts: “Weekend of Wonderment 6” and “Remember When.”  If you haven’t heard of the first five installments of the “Weekend of Wonderment” campaign, it’s comprised of about four or five projects, all made within the time-span of two days and with the help of anybody and everybody available.  “Remember When,” also the product of many (as opposed to few), is a new comic web-series about a group of friends who try to recreate the lost memories of their amnesia-begotten buddy.

TIWWI’s “Show and Tell” begins tonight, Saturday, 9:00 PM, at the Echo Park Rec Center, located at 1161 Logan Street in Echo Park. For more information, please visit www.tiwwi.com.

There are some pairings in film that conjure eye rolls and looks of confusion.  There are still others that are so perfectly crafted, they practically create a new era of film in and of themselves.  Cue Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. That their first film together, Flying Down to Rio (1933), was a Hollywood-style happy accident was more fortuitous than producers and audiences could imagine.  From that film onwards, they delighted audiences with their charm, chemistry, and dancing style.

Astaire, 12 years her senior, offered Rogers a cigarette in The Gay Divorcee (1935) with his sly smile and a song in mind, “Night and Day.”  Dance numbers between the two range from vivacious, Vegas-style spectaculars to intimate, two-on-two turns on an impromptu dance floor.  Their costumes ranged from gowns and coattails to slacks and blazers just as their styles ran the gamut from sweet and silly dancing to dramatic sweeps across the floor.

In celebration of the romantic duo’s 75th Anniversary, the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood will host a double feature of two of their most memorable turns on the silver screen – Top Hat (1935) and Roberta (1935).  The first is a comic look at what happens when, simply put, Astaire tries to impress Rogers with his good looks and dance moves during a show they’re both working on in London.  The latter sees them tapping their toes in Paris where Astaire, leader of a band in need of a gig, gets help from his old girlfriend, Rogers.

The rumor that mulls around American musical lovers is that Ginger Rogers really wasn’t a great dancer in her own right.  It’s that Astaire was such a professional, he made her look like queen of the dance floor.  (I mean, he has danced with a coat rack.)  No one really knows if that’s true, but if you think about it, it’s a sweet rumor – they were more together than they were alone.  Swoon.

The double feature of Top Hat and Roberta at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood is on view this Sunday, March 14 from 7:30pm.  For more information, please call (323) 466-3456 or click here.

What is Mindulful Awareness?  And how do you do it?

Right now my brain is thinking of a way to describe this new-age, medical concept while sending signals to the muscles in my fingers in order to type out, letter by letter, the words and eventual sentences to communicate this notion to an imagined, future audience.  Oh, and I’m hungry.  That’s Mindful Awareness: the “moment-by-moment process of actively and openly observing one’s physical, mental and emotional experiences.”

To hear more specific information about the proven health benefits of such exercises, as well as how to do them, head to the Hammer Museum at 12:30 PM this Thursday for their free weekly “drop in” session.  Leading the discussion is the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center’s Director of Mindfulness Education, Diana Winston, alongside Dr. Marvin Belzer, an expert practitioner of Mindful Awareness.

What is Gesamtkunstwerk?  And how do you sing it?

Well, Gesamtkunstwerk, pronounced ‘guess-amt-kunst-verk,’ is a term made famous by German composer, conductor, director, anti-Semite, and writer Wilhelm Richard Wagner, and it’s usually translated to mean “total artwork.”  Wagner, in all his “Ride of the Valkyries” gusto, had a vision of a kind of ‘future art,’  in which the end-result would be a synthesis for every art-form known to man (i.e. music, performance, drama, architecture, poetry, etc.).  It’s debatable whether or not Wagner actually achieved a true Gesamtkunstwerk in his work, but his deep influence and brilliance as a composer/writer of opera is hard to match, let alone perform.

At 7:00 PM on Thursday night at the Hammer Museum, Wagnerian singers Linda Watson and John Treleavan of the on-going Ring Festival LA (an enormous cultural compilation of lectures, exhibitions, shows, and conferences revolving around the first-ever Los Angeles performance of Wagner’s four-opera masterpiece, The Ring of the Nibelung) will discuss the intricacies of belting out complex tonal and chromatic changes, while still remaining a simple piece of the overall Gesamtkunstwerk.

What is the connection?  And why would you attend both lectures?

Besides the obvious similarity in setting, there does seem to be a thematic crossover between these two programs.  Both attempt to explain the whole in terms of its parts, and those parts in terms of their smaller parts, and so on.  This mode of thinking assumes there’s a greater organism at work, spinning wheels inside wheels, and what better way to get lost inside these rotations than to spend a day at the Hammer?  Either that, or write an opera.

“Mindful Awareness” starts at 12:30 PM on Thursday, March 11.  “Ring Festival: The Challenges of Singing Wagner” begins at 7:00 PM.  Both programs are free of admission, and take place at The Hammer Museum, located at 10899 Wilshire Blvd.  For more information, please call (310) 433-7000, or visit hammer.ucla.edu.

The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens and LACMA are both about to come into a little bit of an inheritance.  The private collection of Sidney and Frances Lasker Brody, which is filled to the brim with enviable works, will go up for auction at Christie’s in May.  According to the LA Times’ Culture Monster, The Huntington is set to get a share of the upcoming sale, while LACMA will be the lucky recipient of a 12-by-11-foot mural that the Brody’s commissioned from Matisse.  Go back. Read that again.  They commissioned a mural, called “La Garde,” from Matisse.

The Brody’s served on both museum boards and their collection and their house are both points of pride for art and architecture lovers in Los Angeles.  Christie’s has estimated that the sale will garner $150 million especially considering that they’ll be auctioning off works by Picasso, Giacometti, Braque, and Degas.

Click here, or here, to read more about it.  Wonder if we can afford anything up for auction!

In an obvious turn of events, considering the children are the future, youth orchestras in Los Angeles have a chance to give the LA Philharmonic a run for their money own their own home court.  This Saturday at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, three youth orchestras have been invited to participate in the LA Phil’s Youth Orchestra Festival Day.  The Renaissance Arts Academy Orchestra, Korean American Youth Symphony, and the Santa Monica High School Orchestra will all take the stage to perform Mozart, Bizet, Tchaikosvky, Dvorak, and Bernstein in concerts set to last all day.

The Youth Orchestra Partners Program has six total participants that are presented with free concert tickets, master classes with LA Phil musicians, and this kind of opportunity to perform on stage at Disney Hall during their two year run in the program.  It is the Philharmonic’s way of making sure, six schools at a time, that classical music programs and youth orchestras are nurtured as they should be and are made to feel like valued parts of our local arts community.

Saturdays performances are set to provide us all with a marvelous perspective on what high school students are capable of when they have the right instruments in their hands.  From 1 – 1:45pm, the Renaissance Academy will delight with compositions by Holst, Bizet, Mozart, Adamis, and Orff.  Run off, have a snack at the café on the Music Center campus across the street.  Come back from 2:30pm – 3:15pm for the Korean American Youth Symphony’s take on works by Suppe, Saint-Saens, and Dvorak – a very enticing combination, if you think about it.

Run off again for a coffee, and jet back to your seats to finish off your day of discovering classical music with the Santa Monica High School Orchestra’s performance of works by Bernstein, Tchaikovsky, and Saint-Saens from 4 – 4:45pm.

You’ll discover that children are, indeed, the future and so is classical music.

The Youth Orchestra Festival Day performances will be held on Saturday, March 13 from 1pm – 4:45pm at Walt Disney Concert Hall. Click here or call (213) 972-3454 for more information.

With “See the Music, Hear the Dance,” an evening of three challenging choreographies by George Balanchine at UCLA’s Freud Playhouse, the Los Angeles Ballet has reaffirmed its ascendance as the ballet company for which Los Angeles has waited decades.

Chosen from the vast catalogue of works from Balanchine’s prodigiously long career, the LAB premieres of “Kammermusik No. 2” and “Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2,” and reprise of “Serenade” from Season 1, give audiences a glimpse into the limitless creativity of the greatest of 20th century choreographers.

As usual, Co-Artistic Directors Colleen Neary and Thordal Christensen greeted the packed auditorium. After a brief description of the dances and a couple of anecdotes about Neary’s work with Balanchine, the curtain rose on “Serenade” – the first of Balanchine’s creations after arriving in America in 1933. The perfection of the pale blue tableau of the women in the corps de ballet elicited spontaneous applause from the audience. With its kaleidoscope patterns of razor-straight lines melting into liquid curves, the piece showcases what has been perceived as LABs greatest strength – the flawless precision of their women’s ensemble.

With “Kammermusik No. 2,” the company has takes another huge step forward. The dance features two couples backed by an eight-man ensemble. In last year’s Prodigal Son, though the men’s corps showed their technical proficiency and strength, they had not quite homogenized their collective ears to Prokofiev’s score, such that they could dance together with absolute precision. But what a difference a year has made. The Hindemith piano/chamber ensemble opus is very difficult – but the group’s solid, cohesive musicianship allowed them to move as one through the avant garde combinations.
Unleashing powerful, lightning-fast athleticism coupled with uncanny fluidity, Melissa Barak commands the stage. There is, apparently, nothing she can’t do. She is squarely in her element in this piece. Her partner, the long-limbed and majestic Andrew Brader, is a perfect foil for Barak’s abandon. His stunning lifts break laws of gravity. Shadowing Barak is exuberant gamin Grace McLoughlin, who danced an endearing Effie in last year’s “La Sylphide.” Her diminutive size belies a large personality, and she expertly “works the room” for laughs during a series of Charleston-on-steroids maneuvers. Rounding out the quartet of soloists, Drew Grant’s guides his compact frame through the blazing pace with confidence and discipline.

The final work, “Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2,” is Balanchine’s 1973 revision of his “Ballet Imperial” from 1941, and utilizes every resource available to dazzle and astonish.  Monica Pelfrey shines in this very classical Balanchine homage to Petipa. Grand breadth of gesture and superb balance distinguish her dancing. New to LAB, one is confident that she will adapt her ‘English Royal Ballet’ style as she relaxes into this very American company. Also new to the company, Zheng Hua Li is a pleasant surprise as the romantic cavalier.  His beautiful, expressive face is no small asset, and his feet are about as perfect as feet get. The audience rewarded his clean execution of double tours-en-l’air and big, floating jetee’s with enthusiastic applause. As were the prolonged standing ovations that required multiple curtain calls.

By Penny Orloff

“Balanchine – ‘See the Music, Hear the Dance,’” has one last performance… Tonight! Head to the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center for the 7:30pm performance. Click here or call (310) 998-7782 for more information.

Have you ever wondered what a fight for equal rights looks like through our contemporary artistic minds?  Forget what it looks like when Anderson Cooper discusses the issue and interviews the experts on CNN.  Nevermind what it looks like when thousands of angry protesters come together on the street waving signs telling passing cars to honk if they agree with the cause.  What does the fight for an equal rights issue look like through a painter’s eyes, a photographers eyes, and what does it sound like when a DJ spins a soundtrack to it all?

If you’ve recently wondered just what a group of the most talented and relevant artists in our time think when it comes to the issue of equal marriage rights, now is the time to make your way to 1341 Vine St. in Hollywood – The Manifest Equality Gallery.  To be frank, the collection of artwork is not an abstract, nor a complex look at the issue so much as it is a blunt and to-the-point reflection of what’s wrong with the fact that equal marriage rights are still not availed to any and all that want them.  Artists represented in the big, warehouse-like group show, set up in the former Big Lots! space include Shepard Fairey, Gary Baseman, Robbie Conal, and Bary McGee.  Their work is an amalgam of mediums, focal points, and aesthetic styles that all fit under the umbrella issue of once and for all supporting equal marriage rights for gay couples.

A DJ spins accompanying tunes during the day as locals, tourists, and curious passersby wander through the space taking a look at pieces of art and memorabilia that speaks to this no longer just grassroots movement.  The gallery will be open through this Sunday, March 7 at 10pm and it’s really worth shifting some plans around to make even a quick run through of the space.

The Manifest Equality Gallery is located at 1341 Vine St in Hollywood and will be open through March 7 at 10pm.  It’s open from 10am – 10pm through then – Hollywood, here you come! Click here for more information.

A while ago, we posted an article asking what you, dear readers, thought about the distinction between art and vandalism.  Skating the line, with a very charged political message, is British street artist D*Face who has installed two enormous and menacing Oscar statues atop two iconic LA locations: Runyon Canyon and Mel’s Drive-In in Hollywood.  Both statues have skeleton-like figures with bits of flesh missing from their arms and legs exposing Oscar’s blood and bones.  The one that sat at Runyon had a placard that read “Beauty Is One Snip Away,” while the other at Mel’s Drive-In said “Beauty Is Skin Deep.” They’ve both been removed since they were spotted yesterday morning, but the whole incident begs a whole host of questions, not least of which is: really? Mel’s Drive-In? We get Runyon Canyon, but that’s a strange choice.

More importantly, what do you think of all this? The two most basic sides must be: applause to D*Face for exposing a vanity-obsessed culture at a time when it’s at its most self-congratulatory vs. how petulant of this artist to criticize a sector of popular culture that he need not participate in if he finds it so disheartening.

The last time the Dirty Projectors played in Los Angeles was on Halloween at the Jensen Recreation Center in Echo Park, where frontman David Longstreth wore a ten-gallon foam cowboy hat and his upside-down guitar with the confidence of a newly minted visionary. Fans of the Projectors’ odd, brilliant, shimmering music had been waiting for the band to play at Disney Hall since November, anticipating their breakout hit, 2009’s Bitte Orca, amplified by a lush string section.

But on Saturday night, Longstreth looked small and befuddled on the Disney Hall stage, fiddling with the tuning of his guitars for a half an hour during intermission. Longstreth is 28, with the refractory brain of a brilliant twelve-year-old with attention deficit disorder and the composing abilities of Mozart on mushrooms in Africa. After Saturday night, the audience learned his musical influences include Ligeti, Wagner, Ravel, and Don Henley.

Don Henley might seem like an odd choice. The program notes include an earnest letter Longstreth sent Henley in 2005, accompanying a free copy of The Getty Address, Longstreth’s 2005 opera about materialism, the homogenization of FM radio, and Sacagewea, or something like that. “I have included a copy of it here for you,” Longstreth wrote to Henley. “The album examines the question of what is wilderness in a world completely circumscribed by highways, once Manifest Destiny has no place to go- but in the end it is a love story.” Clearly, this makes sense to only one person: Longstreth himself.

The program was divided into three parts: the Philharmonic playing alone, the Projectors playing The Getty Address along with the ensemble Alarm Will Sound, and the Projectors playing alone. The program began with selections Longstreth hand-picked for the Philharmonic. Highlights included Ligeti’s Etude No. 13, played by gray-haired John Orge, who lingered on the piano keys after the last high notes for a long, indulgent silence, and Ravel’s beautifully orchestrated Mother Goose Suite. After a long intermission, the Projectors emerged, wearing color-coordinated hooded jackets, to play The Getty Address in its entirety. And here is where the problems began.

Truthfully, the opera is an indulgent college project from a very, very talented student, with glimpses of the Projectors’ current, much more successful musical incarnation nestled in like raisins studded into a very wobbly gray oatmeal. In the first song (er, movement), “I Sit on the Ridge at Dusk,” the beat kicked in, and the Projectorettes (Amber Coffman, Haley Dekle, and Angel Deradoorian) wailed “got a world of trouble on my mind,” in an indistinct language, moving very slightly from side to side, like shy sirens. But momentum was lost on the second song, and the album is so complex, the time signatures so twisted, it seemed that no amount of practice could have nailed it down. It didn’t help that Alarm Will Sound had some spotty synchronicity and tuning moments. The long, drifting passages on “But in the Headlights” and “Gilt Gold Scabs” sounded misguided and naked, as though a player were missing. Some members played on wine bottles, and a base flute was involved, as well as lots of gratuitous hand-clapping, which sounded messy at times, perhaps on purpose. Many in the audience began to get restless, but the ensemble soldiered on to no avail.

After the opera finally ended, the Projectors (minus their drummer) took the stage for three songs: a very slow cover of Dylan’s “I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine,” as well as their own “Temecula Sunrise” and “Cannibal Resource” from Bitte Orca. They sounded good, and Longstreth’s singing sounded much more comfortable, but the band would have sounded much better with a whole orchestra backing them up. None of the women got to sing lead on any song, though Angel Deradoorian singing “Two Doves” would have sounded lovely in this acoustic setting.

All in all, the event demonstrated what the Projectors are capable of musically. It also showed that some misguided musical experiments are better laid to rest, no matter how brilliant their 23-year-old composer may be. As the Eagles said, “And I don’t want to hear any more/ No, no, baby/ I don’t want to hear any more.” Here’s hoping the Projectors stick to Bitte Orca from now on.

By Cassandra McGrath of CWG Magazine

The Walt Disney Concert Hall is located at 111 South Grand Avenue in Downtown Los Angeles.  For more information on upcoming shows, please call (213) 972-7211, or visit www.laphil.com.