Downtown

Late July and we’re knee-deep in festival season. You’ve likely hit a few events from the Slamdance, the LA Film Fest, the Fringe Fest, Outfest, Comic-Con, the Middle Eastern Comedy Fest, Lilith Fair…the list goes on and on. The urge to see it all keeps us coming back, but I know, festival fatigue is strong. Hang in there, though—we’re at the home stretch. The REDCAT’s NOW Festival, which kicked off this weekend, should bring festival season to a spectacular end.

The New Original Works Festival features new dance, theater, music, and multimedia performance works by artists who are known for their often radical and unconventional approaches. While Week One (with work from Maureen Huskey and Killsonic) may have past us by, there’s still time to catch Weeks Two and Three, beginning this Thursday, July 29th.

Three artists make up Week Two of NOW: Christine Marie & Ensemble, in the expressionist theater piece “Ground to Cloud,” uses projections, electric light and shadowplay to unfold a multidimensional mythology of nature and human intervention. Systems of Us, from choreographer Rae Shao-Lan Blum & composer Tashi Wada, explores the disruption and transformation of relationships in a dance collaboration that may call to mind those early experiments of Cage and Cunningham. Finally, master of Breaking and hip-hop dance innovater Raphael Xavier’s “Black Canvas” explores the body of the Breaker in relation to the stage and life.

Week Three, beginning August 5th, features theater, dance, and animation. Alexandro Segade’s “Replicant vs. Separatist” depicts Segade himself calling the shots on a live sci-fi film shoot in which two male couples navigate the murky waters of state-mandated marriage. Hana van der Kolk’s “Once More, Again, One (Solo)” uses familiar pop music as the background for her solo dance adaptation of a work originally conceived for four dancers. To close, animator Miwa Matreyek (of Cloud Eye Control) uses animation with live projection to explore fantastical worlds in “Myth and Infrastructure.”

- By Helen Kearns

Each “week” of NOW is really only a Thurs/Fri/Sat, so budget your time accordingly. If you only attend one more festival this summer, consider the power of NOW. For more information, please visit www.redcat.org, or call 213-237-2800.

I’m about to move neighborhoods in Los Angeles. I realize this information is of interest to very few people, and even then, of very little interest. But for the past two years, I’ve lived in the USC area, about two blocks away from the historic Union Theatre—also known at the Velaslavasay Panorama—and I’ve never once stepped inside. I’ve tried. When I first moved in and took my inaugral expedition around the hood, I couldn’t help but gravitate toward the building. It’s vastly out-of-place, an artifact from another era dropped in-between a bodega and some low-rent housing (and in fact, it is from another era: it was built sometime in the 1910’s and operated for many years as a venue of multiple uses, including a playhouse, a silent-film theatre, and a meeting hall for the Tile Layers Union Local #18). When I tried to enter beneath the grand, old-fashioned marquee, however, it was closed. Ever since, it’s just been that mysterious buidling (sometimes aglow) that I drive by nearly every day, and have yet to go in—either because it’s closed or I have no reason. And now I’m about to move.

Fortunately, I have one last chance. This weekend, starting on Friday, but running on Saturdays as well, for five weeks only, the Velaslavasay Panorama opens its doors at 8:00 PM to present the unique and aptly located live performance of The Grand Moving Mirror of California. What is it? Good question. It’s a series of moving painted scenes, which encircle the theatre like a long scroll being rolled out around the audience, and depict the journeys of early American settlers attempting to reach California during the Gold Rush of 1849. Using live narration taken from an actual 19^th century script, along with musical accompaniment and radio-play sound-effects, the show celebrates and revives a 130-year-old mode of entertainment that simply shouldn’t be missed.

Not bad for my last weekend in the neighborhood.

- By Joshua Morrison

For more information about the Union Theatre, the Panorama, or panoramas in general, please visit www.panoramaonview.org, or call 213-746-2166.

In the underrated classic Los Angeles film L.A. Story, Steve Martin fails to get a reservation at L’Idiot, a fictional hot L.A. restaurant with a line out the door, ticker tape reading the income level and importance of each dinner guest, and paparazzi at entry and exit. As Martin and his dinner guest leave, paparazzi back away, screaming, “Never mind! They’re nobodies!”

At the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA, the opening of “Dennis Hopper: Double Standard” felt more like a cinematic tribute to Los Angeles stereotypes than a serious exhibition. Before passing away at the age of 74 due to complications from prostate cancer, Dennis Hopper had an uneven career in art, mostly dedicated to imitating his slightly older artist friends. But at the opening, it didn’t seem to matter.

The opening was much more exciting than the show itself. Curated by Julian Schnabel, the exhibition drew an eclectic crowd from all corners of the city, everyone obsessed with the scene moreso than with Hopper’s art. Wearing gowns of peacock feathers and skintight high-waisted bandage shorts, guests took pictures of people outside, pictures of themselves, and pictures inside the gallery. Waiting by the bar, a woman wearing six-inch red high heels whispered to me, “Just to let you know, Diane Keaton and Liv Tyler and the lady who used to be married to Charlie Sheen are inside. Diane Keaton! I almost peed my pants!”

Inside, Diane Keaton was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps she was obscured by the giant fiberglass sculpture of a Mexican waiter looming in the entrance, which might have been a cultural symbol of fear, or stereotypes, or something. Either way, it rang hollow. Hopper began his artistic career with painting in the 1950’s. Some early abstract pieces on small canvases show promise, or at least, the promise of promise, which fades later on. Equally unsuccessful works use found objects and graffiti, including an early drawing of a woman with a mustache scribbled above her upper lip. As commentary on femininity and pop culture, it falls flat and graceless.

Hopper was most renowned as a photographer though, and the black-and-white photographs from the 1960’s are the best part of the exhibition. In one of the loveliest pictures, a young, golden Jane Fonda wears a bikini and aims a bow and arrow into the distance, full of promise. Other subjects include Robert Rauschenberg, Andy Warhol, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Ike and Tina Turner cheerfully posing with a giant inflatable Coke bottle.

After the year 2000, however, Hopper reproduced some of these earlier photographs to billboard size, with garish results. “I kind of hate this,” said one woman, standing next to a giant black and white reproduction of Andy Warhol, who is holding a droopy iris flower and oozing self-importance. The piece seems preoccupied with itself, more like a painting in a Hollywood comedy about the L.A. art scene rather than actual art.

And after looking at the umpteenth photo of Warhol, the title of the show begins to make sense. One wonders, did Hopper’s creativity lead to his fame, or was his fame a result of his access to renowned artists and celebrities? Are the two qualities really inseparable from one another? Was Dennis Hopper’s artistic fame a double standard? After all, Hopper starred in everything from Easy Rider and Blue Velvet to “classics” like Speed and Super Mario Bros., and dabbled in all types of art, equally embraced for his creative eccentricity as he was exiled for his drug use. But Hopper’s cinematic career was more interesting than his artistic one, and as a big survey exhibition, the show sells Los Angeles short. The art scene in the city is much more complicated and intriguing than this exhibition gives it credit for, and MOCA must have access to many more talented artists.

But as the night wore on, no one at the opening seemed to care. The guests stood at tables outside, drinking from clear plastic cups, and everyone watched one woman yelling and dancing to DJ tunes by herself. A plump MOCA photographer leaned against the wall, waiting to capture the L.A. moment.

- By Cassandra McGrath

“Dennis Hopper: Double Standard” is on view at the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA until September 26. For more information, please visit www.moca.org, or call 213-626-6222.

This past Saturday, June 19^th, three different art shows opened at 510 Bernard Street in Chinatown, a sure-fire sign of a gallery space—and beyond that, a part of town—that’s gaining more and more recognition in the Los Angeles art world. The small corridor that opens up onto the tucked-away cul-de-sac off the 110 Freeway was packed with visitors, many of the bearded and bespectacled genus commonly referred to as hipsters. They walked in triangular traffic patterns, making their way from the video art of Human Resources Gallery, to the depictions of economic distress in the Francois Ghebaly Gallery, and finally to Adam Janes’s John Carpenter-influenced installation in the WPA Gallery.

But was Chinatown always like this? The short answer is no. In the early half of the 20^th century, Old Chinatown (which was then located in the Union Station area), fell into economic and cultural despondency due to widespread anti-Chinese sentiment, arson, lack of political presence, and inter-cultural warfare. The little that was left of the community was about to be completely annihilated with the creation of Union Station in the 1930’s (a bitterly ironic twist, given that many of the first Chinese immigrants had worked on the earliest railroads). Luckily, a determined group of Chinese Americans led by Peter SooHoo Sr. struck a deal to buy a portion of Downtown land, soon to be known as New Chinatown—the first Chinese community in America to be completely planned and owned by Chinese Americans. With the help of some sympathetic developers and architects, New Chinatown opned up shops, built around 62 units in a one-square-block radius, and erected the famous Chinatown gates straddling Gin Ling Way and Broadway. On the East Gate, there are four characters of poetry, which translate in English to “Cooperate to Achieve.”

And on Saturday, the formerly abandoned building of 510 Bernard Street, now housing three different galleries, with the new Dan Graham Gallery directly next-door, was doing exactly that. The actual art on view was by no means breath-taking (my favorite was Margie Schnibbe’s set of stream-of-consciousness doodlings, seeming to point at the mundane, existential stress of bad economic news). But that almost wasn’t the point. There were three shows going on at once, and a sense of respect for one another and one’s community was tangible.

Before the show, I stopped for a cup of coffee at the Via Café in the central square between Hill and Broadway, and watched Chinese-American fathers buy their sons packets of those miniature exploding pellets. I gazed at a couple of old men manning their shop beneath the strings of Chinese paper lamps. Yes, Chinatown may very well be the next neighborhood to fall victim to the claws of gentrification, but for now there’s just cooperation. Let’s hope it stays that way.

“Mystic Circle” at Human Resources is on view until July 27^th. “Carpenter’s carpenter (plan your escape)” is on view at WPA Gallery until July 4^th. And “Bourgeois Pig” at the Francois Ghebaly Gallery is up until July 24^th.  For more information, please visit www.humanresoucesla.com, www.ghebaly.com, or www.wpala.com.

I wrote about the Los Angeles Film Fest last year, and made a day-by-day list of the movies and events I was looking forward to go see (as evidenced by this link). And while I would love to do the same thing again this year, there’s a problem. A lot more films on schedule are films I had no idea even existed. Maybe with the Festival’s move from UCLA to Downtown, and with the supposed scale-back of this year’s Sundance, the LAFF also got more “indie?” Or more likely, the marketing budget for independent features went way down this year. Regardless, and out of a resounding sense of selflessness, here’s a list of movies playing at the Los Angeles Film Fest that seem interesting to me:

Down Terrace: Bristish writer-director Ben Wheatley first got noticed with a ten-second viral video he made called “Cunning Stunt.” It’s short, one shot, surprising, and insanely realistic. Wheatley borrows this same attitude, storytelling prowess, and predilection for genre-molds to his first feature, Down Terrace, which he shot in only eight days. It tells the tale of a father-son ex-con team who decide to go after the man they think snitched them out. But when a hit-man, his 3-year-old child, and a bossy matron get involved, what could be a simple, maybe humorous crime farce turns ugly, gritty, and extremely dark. Wheatley is the latest figure in the the long-standing “kitchen sink” tradition of British filmmaking, where much like in “Cunning Stunt,” the mundane and passingly familiar transcend into deeper realms.

Mahler on the Couch: It may be the year for ‘famous-figure-meets-other-famous-figure’ biopics. First there’s Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky, and then from Germany, there’s Mahler on the Couch, the meeting of composer Gustav Mahler and father of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud. In this richly stylized interpretation of actual events, writer-director Percy Adlon—who also made Bagdad Café and Sugarbaby—relates the story of the complex, doomed marriage between Mahler (a supposed manic-depressive) and his wife, as seen through the oddly comic psychotherapy sessions with the most influential figure in 20^th century art and thought.

Marwencol: It’s important to see at least one documentary in any film festival, because frankly, they’re usually the best. The 2010 LA Film Fest is certainly not lacking in good-looking docs, either. But Marcenwol is by far the most curious. It’s the story of Mark Hogencamp, who suffered acute brain trauma after being attacked by a group of local teenagers. The damage left him a near-amnesiac, and he was forced to re-construct a new life for himself. This led to Marwencol, a 1/6 scale model of an imaginary, WWII-era Belgian village that Hogencamp took four years to build in his back-yard. He infused intricate storylines for his action-hero and barbie-doll villagers, many of whom stand in for characters in Mark’s real life. And just as anyone who saw Exit Through the Gift Shop can testify, every good story ends with a visit from the imperial art-world.

Café Noir: Even if you don’t speak Korean (which I do not), I recommend watching the trailer to this feature-debut from former South Korean film-critic Jung Sung-Il. The dialogue and action are deliberate and sparse, the photography is beautiful, and the editing destroys any American-borne notion that the more frantic the preview, the better the movie. In this story of unrequited love, Jung Sung-Il instead takes a page from the Godard school of filmmaking, folds it up into an airplane, and flies it over Russia into South Korea. Along the way, he references Bollywood, Goethe, Dostoyevsky, Christianity, politics, and the entire history of South Korean cinema. This is a movie that foreign-film buffs, nostaligic French New Wavers, and eager dilettantes like myself shouldn’t miss.

Tiny Furniture: This, in my opinion, is probably going to be the smash-hit of the festival. It’s the semi-autobiographical story of 23-year-old, writer-director-star Lena Dunham, a film-studies post-graudate in search of herself. It co-stars Alex Karpovsky (the lovable romantic lead in my favorite movie of last-year, Beeswax), as well as Dunham’s own sister playing, well, Dunham’s sister. I’ll admit, the bitterness in me arouses suspicions of cliché about this movie, but at the same time, I’m looking forward to a young female-helmed movie that shows off young females in a more realistic light than Juno. Who knows?  It may turn out to be my generation’s The Graduate, or (and what I hope), it will turn out to be something more specific, something personal and true, something a fellow-former film/writing major can watch and say, “that’s interesting.”

The 2010 Los Angeles Film Fest runs until June 27^th. For tickets, times, and more information, please call (310) 432-1240, or visit www.lafilmfest.com.

On June 11^th, 2010, there will be two big premieres coming out of South Africa. One is the much anticipated 19^th FIFA World Cup, the first time the continent of Africa will play  host to the world’s most popular sports tournament. The other is the U.S. premiere of the film Gangster’s Paradise: Jerusalema.

Clearly, the World Cup is a tad more significant than a movie opening, but both are representative of a larger global shift: the emergence of South Africa as an international cultural force—especially when it comes to cinema. From the success of a great film like District 9, to the obligatory Hollywood initiation of a Clint Eastwood-helmed drama (Invictus), it’s clear that the South Africa is tossing its hat in with the Western-dominated entertainment industry.

Is it any wonder, then, that their films are reflective of this cultural transcendence? District 9, for example, is not a provincial movie; it’s in direct conversation with the great alien invasions of Hollywood, from Orson Welles’s War of the Worlds to Independence Day. It pays its homage to tradition, while using the alien genre for its own purposes at the same time. And this is not simply a Tarantino-esque play of mash-ups; it’s a way to communicate.

Ralph Ziman’s Gangster’s Paradise: Jerusalema, which I got a chance to see this Friday at the USC Albert and Dana Broccoli Theatre, is no different (except maybe in budget and heaviness of hand, which I’ll get to later). Based loosely on a true story, it’s about the rise of slumlord Lucky Kunene, who starts off stealing cars in the small South African village of Soweto, but eventually moves to Johannesburg, where he enacts a brilliant plan to take over a series of high-rise buildings in the ghetto of the city, providing a deadly though lucrative buffer between the properties’ white landlords and black tenants. Along the way, he develops a relationship with a white woman from the suburbs, picks a fight with a drug kingpin, and becomes a kind-of slumlord Robin Hood.

The film’s South-meets-West dialectic is evident even in the title. When it was released in South Africa two years ago, it was just called Jerusalema, a reference to a well-known regional hymnal. The producers of the movie, however, felt the title needed an extra kick to be able to sell in America. So they added the preamble of “Gangster’s Paradise,” an obvious allusion to the 1995 Coolio song (though in actuality, may refer to the change in the Johannesburg motor license plate prefix post-Apartheid to “GP,” which stands for Gaunteng Province). Director Ralph Ziman, in a Q&A session after the screening, said he was okay with the change in title if it meant more people would see the film. And to my eye, this same cultural compromise was central to his entire cinematic creation.

Narrative-wise, for instance, the movie was yet another re-telling of the all-to-familiar gangster story—the rise and fall of a sympathetic crime boss. But the details of this particular tale are entirely fresh. The character of Kunene is someone you want to get to know better and better (especially in the hands of the actors Jafta Mamabolo and Rapulana Seiphemo, who respectively play the young and old versions of him), and the politics of how he takes over the high-rises are fascinating. Visually, too, it was photogrpahed in the overused documentary style made popular with films like City of God, and even District 9. Yet the gritty realism of the setting (they shot in one of the world’s most dangerous slums) was undeniable. And musically, the composer (who was present at the screening) certainly borrowed from the rhythm-heavy soundtracks of modern-day thrillers, while still seamlessly inserting never-before-heard, African chants and beats into the background of the mix.

According to actor Jafta Mamabolo—also present at the screening and Q&A— these cultural interweavings in Jerusalema have helped it to become a genuine, South African cult hit. Whether or not this proves to be true for American audiences, however, is another issue. Because while such narrative and aethetic borrowings may help to bridge gap between worlds, there is such a thing as overdoing it. Cheesy voice-over dialogue like “In the beginning…,” unnecessary chase scenes, predictable book-ends, and romantic sub-plots within the movie often cross the border into cliché. And I found myself, after the highly informative Q&A, wishing Ziman had let go of some of these Hollywood trappings, and stuck more closely to the real events that inspired him in the first place.

Regardless, the film is most definitely worth seeing, if for no other reason than to witness yet another step in the maturation process of a fast-growing industry. If you see it on opening night though, just make sure to not to miss the first game of the World Cup: South Africa vs. Mexico. My bet’s on the underdog.

Gangster’s Paradise: Jerusalema opens in select theaters on June 11th. For more information, please visit www.gangstersparadisejerusalema.com.

When I heard about choreographer Lionel Popkin’s There’s an Elephant in This Dance happening at the REDCAT this past weekend, complete with interpretive dance and elephant costumes, my imagination went wild. Dancing elephants! Sign me up! Being the enthusiastic fan of the extravagantly bizarre that I am, I was of course expecting something outrageous—chorus lines of elephants adorned in gold and green, roller-skating through arbitrarily-floating sheer fabrics of rose and yellow, a bazaar-like carnival of gleaming lights and clamorous music and pinwheels and ice sculptures and bubbles, lots of bubbles!—but of course, as I should’ve learned by now, anything that I attend at the REDCAT is nothing like what I expect. Usually, it’s better.

The dance opened with a woman, Peggy Piacenza, on a dark, empty stage, matter-of-factly putting on the pieces of a chintzy, worn-out elephant suit. She jiggled the headpiece into place, and bing! Elephant! The now-elephant contemplated her newfound existence for a moment before beginning a series of delightful, childlike dances, at moments hesitant and at others exuberant, until collapsing exhausted on the floor.

I was quickly learning that the elephants in my own mind rest in a much different place than the ones in Popkin’s. Popkin, raised in a split Hindu/Jewish home, grew up surrounded by images of Ganesh, the Hindu deity esteemed as the Remover of Obstacles and Lord of Beginnings. Popkin used his own connection to the iconography of Ganesh to explore the themes of cultural identity and self-actualization in There’s an Elephant.

Following the opening, the dance centered on the character played by Lionel Popkin himself. The wistful, plucky music of composer Robert Een’s live score accompanied by a black-and-white video of the furry dancing elephant by Cari Ann Shim Sham and Kyle Ruddick served as a backdrop for Popkin’s more serious self-exploration. Hands in pockets, Popkin planted himself center-stage and looked around inquisitively. Slowly, he began to sway, his spine swiveling at his hips just like the trunk of a curious pachyderm, whipping and contorting with increasing ferocity. Popkin was soon joined by the dance’s other players, including long-time collaborator Carolyn Hall and modern dance veteran Ishmael Houston-Jones.

Hall and Popkin took the lead in a terrific duet, wherein Hall commanded Popkin about the stage with her index finger, leading him by the mouth like a mule to a carrot. The innocent buoyancy of the dance dissolved quickly as the power struggle between the two dancers grew. Caught between resistance and longing, both dancers struggled to assert their individuality while simultaneously remaining clearly co-dependent. A beautiful play of domination, desire, and will emerged as Popkin’s character scuffled with the ever-more-clingy Hall. Finally, in a brilliant reversal of roles, it was no longer Hall’s character who led Popkin’s on her finger, but he who carried her, limp with exhaustion, into darkness.

What was so great about this dance was its capacity to mimic human capriciousness—at one moment somber and pensive, the dancers entwined in this petulant power-struggle, and at another playful and blithe. Being prone to emotional volatility myself (only sometimes, y’all) I found myself laughing out loud and then immediately sinking back with the dancers into their pining.

In the concluding act, Popkin’s character reached the final stage in his quest for self-actualization. Alone again, he encountered the elephant suit, which had maintained an eerie side-stage presence for much of the dance (aside from a charming interlude in which Piacenza romped excitedly around stage while attempting to put the thing on). Watching Popkin explore the dimensions of the suit, dressing and disrobing, at times rolling on the floor trailing the head by its trunk, gave strange feelings of awe and unease. With the last moments of the dance Popkin seemed to find peace, but only after many fits full of grace and existential yearning (I said it! Existential yearning!).

I was left not only wanting to sign up for an agro-yoga class, but feeling almost like I’d already taken one myself. That feeling you get after a not-to-strenuous bike ride on a sunny day. So what if I saw “dance” and “elephant” and I didn’t read any further—I’m glad I didn’t. There’s an Elephant in This Dance was the most pleasant surprise a trunk-lovin’ girl could’ve asked for.

For more information on REDCAT and their upcoming events, please call 213-237-2800, or visit www.redcat.org.

http://www.vimeo.com/10734020

New Wave LA marks the 4th time I have seen the Los Angeles Ballet (LAB) perform. I was lucky enough to see their debut performance four years ago when they performed The Nutcracker. They were so new on the scene they had guest dancers perform most of the important roles. This past December, I saw LAB perform The Nutcracker once again and I’m happy to report that their formative years are almost behind them. So when I saw that choreographers from the show So You Think You Can Dance—of which I am a huge fan—were also choreographing for a live show to be performed by LAB, I was delightfully surprised, and bought tickets right away.

The first number, choreographed by SYTYCD favorite Mandy Moore, was entitled “Wink.” Okay, internet dating has now infiltrated all art forms, even dance. It was very clever and sweet and did not remind me at all of the few internet dates I myself have been on. Too bad, maybe they know something I don’t. The piece opened with the dancers in a line on the lip of the stage, and each was spotted with a voiceover of their dating profile: their astrological sign, a few facts about them, etc. (to which we all got a good laugh). We then followed the different couples as they met, got to know each other, got to like or hate each other, became intimate (which is always just so pretty when interpreted by dancers as opposed to real life…), and found true love. It really was very enjoyable to watch.

The second piece was choreographed by the only non SYTYCD choreographer, Josie Walsh. Hers was entitled “Transmutation” and she described it as “the male and female energies as they provocatively interact until total integration occurs manifesting into a heightened state of balance and harmony.” Okay I’ll just say it. This piece was  phenomenal. From the moment it started, the music (Paul Rivera Jr.) completely captured me and Walsh’s brilliant choreography made me want this dance to never end. It was very tribal and caveman/woman-like, but with a splash of gothic. Six dancers—three women on pointe in skin-tight red short body-suits and three men in gray matching outfits—they alternated between dancing by gender and by couple. Fast jumps and turns paired with slow and languid movements; I was at the edge of my seat. Right before it ended, the women balanced their backs on the men’s and held their legs in splits while both sets of arms moved up and down Swan Lake-style. The lighting was such (designed by Ben Pilat) that it looked ethereal. As soon as the music stopped, I immediately wanted to see it again. It was so strong and solid, and so powerful and impressive that even the old man in front of me (who was sighing loudly for the first dance) gave it a standing ovation.

The third piece was choreographed by SYTYCD former contestant, Travis Wall. When he was on the show’s second season—which he should have won but placed runner up—he was known for his contemporary dances, which were always rich with emotion (as were the ones he choreographed for the new dancers in his return in 2008). But what he does that most of the choreographers on the hit show do not do, is invent new ways of getting from point A to point B. Sometimes they are awkward and sometimes they flow, but they are always interesting. His piece in this show was entitled “Reflect. Affect. Carry On…” Eight Dancers remained on stage the entire time, all at a party, and each had a label. “The Oblivious” “The Greedy” “The Heartbreaker” “The Invisible” and so on. It was innovative but maybe had too much going on at once for me. I definitely felt the emotion there, and what each was going through. It was very interesting to watch, but I was distracted by the constant movement and wanted a focus for myself. When the piece ended I turned to my friend and said “That was so Travis.” Then I heard that sentence repeated back to me in my head. Are there such things as SYTYCD nerds?

Finally, “The Back and Forth” by SYTYCD eccentric, Sonya Tayeh. I usually like her dances on the show because they are so different, but this particular effort more traditional. Again, like in Walsh’s, it was three couples with the women on pointe. The dancers were great and the dance teetered on tango at times, but the emotion wasn’t there. It was enjoyable to watch and if it had been the second dance, I would have liked it better. But the set-up was too similar and the execution was not as powerful. It was, I suppose, not the “Sonya” I thought I knew.

As far as the talent of the dancers was concerned, LAB has an impressive company, no doubt. But unlike most ballet companies of their stature, they have not been around for decades and are not world renowned. So the crème de la crème don’t necessarily flock to LAB in the “ballet draft.” Not yet anyway. I was trying to explain this to my non-dancer friends after The Nutcracker and again tonight. In numbers where there are three sets of couples doing the same thing, almost always one couple is just a beat behind. And usually one dancer stands out as being the best instead of all being equally good. Also, sometimes their balances are shaky and they adjust the foot they are balancing on. In the opening number I even saw an arabesque held for about five seconds and the dancer didn’t bother to point her foot. It’s just these little things that make me feel like I shouldn’t be paying the same price for a ticket as I would for ABT, SF Ballet, or The Joffrey.

In its entirety, New Wave LA was a great night for dance. It’s exciting that LA finally has their own dance company and I look forward to seeing many more LAB performances. But something about their shows is just not top notch yet.

- By Deidre Moore

New Wave LA runs next weekend as well at The Broad Stage in Santa Monica. For more information, please call 310.477.7411, or visit www.losangelesballet.org.

Generally, creative innovation in any field is thought to have a kind of narrative. When young, the pull toward radical exploration and experiment is bright, vigorous, and hardly noticed by the establishment; that is until a little bit later when these once controversial methods start to become accepted by the mainstream, tauted as revolutionary, and before you know it, the avant-garde becomes the old guard—wisdom and tradition taking precedence over innovation.

But what if this narrative is in itself a kind of trap? What if the possibility for newness, for regeneration never peters out, even in death?

For the late master, avant-garde choreographer and dancer Merce Cunningham, this was essential. From his early 1950’s collaborations with such ground-breaking artists as Robert Rauschenberg and John Cage, up until his death at age 90, Cunningham was constantly striving for the future. As late as last year, he could be found hosting a weekly webcast series called “Mondays with Merce,” where he invited the world to see the inner-workings of his 57-year-old, world-renowned company, the Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC).

And after his death in July of 2009, his innovation lives on. He, himself, arranged for a post-humous outline for his company called the “Legacy Plan”—a way for his work to continue to grow for future generations. As a part of it, the MCDC has embarked on its final, two-year-long international tour, where they will premiere brand new pieces by Cunningham for the very last time.

This is where FineArtsLA comes in. We have managed to score two tickets to see the Saturday, June 5^th performance of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, where they will be premiering to the world the reconstructed Roaratorio, featuring music by John Cage. And yes, we’re giving them away to you, our loyal followers. This is literally beyond a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: all you have to do is enter your first name, last name, and e-mail address into the form below, and you will be eligible to receive two free tickets to see the 7:30 PM world-premiere performance of Merce Cunningham’s Roaratorio, as performed at the Walt Disney Concert Hall by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company on Saturday, June 5^th. Not only that, but you will be automatically entered into the running for our next three ticket giveaways.

Cunningham liked to leave his work up to chance, but if you just want guaranteed tickets, you can buy them here.

A sense of community is one of the many reasons people frequent gallery openings.  When everyone’s milling around on a Saturday night, Grolsch or Tecate in hand, discussing the work of some emerging artist hung on the stark white walls of a Culver City gallery and deciding where to imbibe next, there’s a sneaking sense of belonging.  Once you find a gallery with the same taste as yours, it’s only a matter of time until that’s your local spot where everyone knows your name.

With all this in mind, Edgar Varela Fine Arts has got the right idea.  At their previous location, a number of openings featuring various artists were held giving regulars and newcomers the idea that it was as much about doing something interesting and new as it was about experiencing new artist’s work.  The new location strives to continue driving the point home.  The grand opening of this new space, on W. 5th Street in downtown LA, will be held on Wednesday night and will highlight the feminine work of artist Ashley Gibbons in an exhibition called “Coquettish Modernisms.” She utilizes quilting, lingerie, and other fabric-based materials to create images that reflect women and the female form in a modern way.  Gibbons puts hardware to good use as well, stretching lingerie across a canvas with screws and nails.  Her show at Edgar Varela Fine Arts runs from Wednesday (May 12) through June 26, 2010.

Edgar Varela is an independent art collector and dealer with a panache for throwing art-related events that Angelenos actually want to attend.  If you like what you see, make sure you keep coming back – you’ll want to be known as a regular.

Ashley Gibbon’s “Coquettish Modernisms” opens Wednesday, May 12 from 5 – 9pm at Edgar Varela Fine Arts. Click here for more information.