The Social Scene

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!

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.

The Academy Awards are upon us.  Like St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland or Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Oscar weekend takes over the city of Los Angeles in a joyous display of self-congratulations.  Don’t get me wrong, being from Los Angeles makes it actually required (I believe it’s legally binding) that I watch and enjoy all that the Oscars have to offer each year.  Going into the final stretch before the big show, I feel an annual commitment to seeing all, or most, of the nominated films so that when yelling at the TV, I will be doing so with educated qualms.  The American Cinematheque at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood seems to have similar obligations, which must be why they are setting all of us up this week with a number of programs to get us good and ready for Sunday evening’s broadcast.

Before taking a look at this week’s programs, let’s just be clear – there are ten films up for Best Picture this year.  See whichever ones you feel drawn to; ten is a lot.  If, for example, you feel like you’ve seen District 9 once you finish the trailer, save your $10 or go see The Hurt Locker again.  Don’t be hard on yourself if you haven’t seen them all, I’d bet that there really are only 5 contenders anyway.

Over at the Egyptian Theatre, though, your pre-Oscar education can get underway with Fridat evenings show of Oscar-Nominated Short Films – Animated and Live Action.  You’ll get a chance to see shorts like “The Lady and the Reaper,” “A Matter of Loaf and Death,” “French Roast,” “Instead of Abracadabra,” and my personal favorite “The New Tenants.”

Head back into Hollywood on Saturday morning at 10am (no whining, this is Oscar weekend – we’ve got to get you in shape!) for their Invisible Art, Visible Artists panel with the Oscar-Nominated editors of Avatar, District 9, The Hurt Locker, Inglorious Basterds, and Precious.  Stop off for lunch somewhere nearby, but don’t stray too far.  The panel with Oscar-Nominated Art Directors begins at 2:30pm and will give you the chance to discuss your ideas for set design with those creative minds behind The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, Avatar, Nine, Sherlock Holmes, and The Young Victoria.

You’re all set and squared away.  You should feel very capable of making some educated bets – not that we encourage gambling… much.  Here’s to the Oscars – LA’s version of a national holiday.  (Good luck making a reservation just about anywhere in town this week, too.)

Click here to check out the Egyptian Theatre’s full calendar of events.

Kimberly Brooks had a great idea recently.  The local, Venice-based painter decided to look into the art that plays a role in our everyday lives and the people holding the cards behind it.  She looked beyond museum shows, beyond advertisements, and into the world of fashion that is so often considered less of an art form and more of a necessity.  The men and women working behind the scenes to make our world a touch more glamorous are artists who recognize that the necessity of fashion can be one of the more creative enterprises in our lives and it can be one that makes (or doesn’t make) the right impression.

In her latest series of paintings, called “The Stylist Project”, Kimberly Brooks scoured the world of stylists, costume designers, and Creative Directors to delve deeper into the minds of who exactly is dressing our most photographed celebrities and our most watched characters in TV and film.  She painted Vogue’s Creative Director Grace Coddington and Mad Men costume designer Janie Bryant in their most comfortable settings (albeit in their most fabulous clothes).  She painted Elizabeth Stewart, a stylist for the New York Times Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar, with a gorgeous and colorful palette and she captured the nervy and frazzled essence that is Rachel Zoe.

We got a chance to sit down with Brooks to discuss just what went into “The Stylist Project” and the upcoming show at Taylor de Cordoba gallery in Culver City.  We learned very quickly that stylist is a pretty loose term to us amateurs, but in the business, a stylist can be anyone who fashions a photo shoot (often-times called a Creative Director) to someone who styles a celebrity for a red carpet event.  Brooks’ colors and masterful way with a paintbrush allows us into this inner sanctum of fashion via the world of art – it’s almost as if we know them just by looking at these paintings.

Check out our video interview and go say hi to your new friends (the stylists, of course) at the opening reception at Taylor de Cordoba gallery on Saturday evening (February 27).  The show runs through April 3, 2010.  For more information, please click here or call (310) 559-9156.

If you’re like me and already dreading the mere idea of Valentine’s Day (and this dread may or may not have anything to do with your relationship status on Facebook), then it’s best to stop ignoring the inevitable, hunker down, and fight back!  Bill O’Reilly once coined the phrase “war on Christmas.”  Well I’m declaring a war on Valentine’s Day, and in the spirit of modern, American warfare, it’s going to be a preemptive attack.

Thursday, February 11th – 2000 Military Time – Largo at the Coronet:

One of Valentine’s Day’s strongest and most enduring weapons is music.  It could be Bryan Adams, it could be Ryan Adams; either way, there’s nothing more debilitating than hearing that one song on the radio at 2:00 AM, and having to pull over the car to wipe away the tears.  Fortunately, Richard Thompson never plays those kinds of songs.  His eerie and oft-imitated guitar noodling, along with the deep, British hymn-like vocals can definitely be depressing, but depressing in the kind of way that a dark, full glass of Guinness is depressing.  So head down to the Largo this Thursday at 8:00 PM for a special performance from Thompson and his band, order a glass of something thick, and drink in the wounds English-pub-style with one of the true greats of folk-rock music.

Friday, February 12th – 2000 Military Time – Upright Citizen’s Brigade Theatre:

Earlier this year, actress/comedienne/song-and-dance-woman Charlyne Yi made a romantic quasi-documentary with her ex-boyfriend Michael Cera called Paper Heart.  I hate this film, and for no other reason than it’s the one I took my ex to see on our first date (the Valentine’s Day WMD: Women’s Movie Date).  But 8:00 PM this Friday at the Upright Citizen’s Brigade Theatre, Charlyne smashes those bitter memories to the stage with her live show, World of Pain (a Very Masculine Play), co-written by Yi and the hilarious, unknown Allan McLeod.  Choc-full of videos, comedians, and silly music, this Valentine’s weekend installment of her monthly UCB gigs might just be the scissors to Charlyne’s paper…heart.

Saturday, February 13th – 0000 Military Time – New Beverly Cinema:

Did you know Quentin Tarantino owns The New Beverly Cinema?  Explains a lot about their choice of films, and why it may just be the destination for a perfect Valentine’s Day Eve destruction.  They’re showing The Last American Virgin, the 1982 teen sex-comedy that puts American Pie, Knocked Up, and Juno to shame, if only for being more shocking than all three put together, and at least two decades ahead. After the ending of this movie rolls to credits…well, let’s just say ‘mission accomplished.’

Come Sunday, if Valentine’s Day isn’t buried as far into the ground as Saint Valentine himself was on this day back in the year 270 AD, then we may have been defeated once again.  There’s always next year.  That is, unless you meet someone special on one these preemptive outings, and per chance switch sides on the whole matter.  In which case… well, good luck.

For more information on venues, please visit www.largo-la.com, www.ucbtheatre.com, or www.newbevcinema.com.

All photos can be sent as e-cards from this genius website.  Send them to someone special… or not.

There’s that old rule of thumb that you shouldn’t worry too much about little things – will you even remember what you were worried about 6 months from now? What about a year from now?  Well… what about ten years ago – do you remember?  This video does.  It’s a great time capsule of magazine covers published over the last ten years that chronicle all we’ve been through.  We think Kanye West’s “Stronger” would have been more appropriate for background music, but… anyway, enjoy!

It was only a little earlier today that the Los Angeles City Council voted down the proposition to eliminate the Transient Occupancy Tax (the TOT), the sole source of governmental funding behind of the Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA).  This action, had it been carried through, would have effectively shut down 18 cultural centers—including the Barnsdall Arts Center in Hollywood and the Center for the Arts in Eagle Rock, host to the Sony Pictures Media Arts Program for middle school youth—as well as five professional theatre facilities, and an array of classes, programs, and cultural events.

Such a worthwhile institution as the DCA might seem like an easy stronghold in such a creatively centered city as Los Angeles, but it was largely due to incredible advocacy organizations like Arts for LA that the proposition was shot down.  They, along with other activist groups and privately-funded museums such as the Hammer, urged their supporters to write letters to their councilmen, and voice their opinions at the City Council public hearing this Wednesday.  Some handed out stickers with the phrase “Arts Fuel LA,” others toted hand-made signs, and one woman addressed the council in a full-on angel costume.

Lo and behold, these efforts proved successful, and as a website strictly devoted toward promoting the arts, artists, and cultural community of Los Angeles, FineArtsLA would like to sincerely thank both the City Council members, and the hard-working advocacy organizations for their aid and congratulate them on their accomplishment today.

Of course the fight for the arts is never through—the council issue still undecided is whether the current cultural grants will be honored—but in celebration of this week’s victory, may I suggest checking out the DCA-funded Municipal Arts Gallery in the Barnsdall Arts Park.  From January 24th through April 18th, they are hosting an enormous series of participatory exhibitions entitled “Actions, Conversations, and Intersections,” all aimed at enhancing the artistic community of Los Angeles.  In residency this week is Smart Gals Productions, whose patented “Reading Preserve and Speakeasy Collection” features public readings from some of LA’s best authors, including John Albert, Noel Alumit, and Aimee Bender (my personal favorite).

The Smart Gals will toast off their weeklong program on Sunday, February 7th at 2:00pm with the collaborative “Winter Picnic Performance,” a fun mix of music, theatre, fresh bread courtesy of the Bicycle Bread Company, and hot coffee from Cafécito Organico.  So come along, fuel the arts that fuel LA, and if you get the chance, thank somebody.

Curated by Edith Abeyta and Michael Lewis Miller, “Actions, Conversations, and Intersections” runs until April 18th, 2010 at the Los Angeles Municipal Arts Gallery in the Barnsdall Art Park.  For more information, visit www.actionsconversationsintersections.com

Narelle Autio, breath, 2006

This past Sunday afternoon with the clouds heavy with rain, I made my way west to check out Photo LA.  This art fair signaled the beginning of a series of art fairs to grace Los Angeles and beckoned art-lovers, collectors, and dealers alike to scope out a wide stylistic range of photographs, which lined the impromptu walls of the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium.

Wandering through the booths of galleries from the US and abroad, there were a plethora of celebrity photos and black and whites  — and black and white photos of celebrities for that matter.  But also, politically themed photos, documentary pictures, and classic historical photographs set me in the correct mindset for more contemporary works while also flashing me back to an art history class of yesteryear.  A few of my favorites included Harry Callahan’s Eleanor, Bill Brandt’s Nude, and a few special Edward Weston’s.

The MR Gallery, a gallery from Beijing, presented a series of photos by artist Mo Yi that rendered brilliantly colored comforters being aired on a clothesline.  I fell in love with the fabric patterns and the intimacy the photographed captured.  There were 16 individual shots of the comforters arranged in a 4 x 4 grid.  Sometimes simplicity is key.

The Hous projects, a gallery that hailed from New York, featured Narelle Autio’s stunning underwater photographs of people seemingly caught in an undertow and floating with air bubbles sticking to their twisting bodies.  These photos captured magnificent color, light, and motion.

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Once you’ve been in South Pacific, The Pajama Game, The Light in the Piazza, and Jekyll & Hyde, you can generally be considered a Broadway big dog.  Having been nominated for three Tony Awards and two Outer Critics Circle Awards, perhaps Broadway heavyweight is more appropriate.

Kelli O’Hara, official Broadway heavyweight, is known for playing the doe-eyed ingénue a la Clara in Light in the Piazza, for example, or Nellie in South Pacific. The New York Times credits her with “single-handedly rescuing the ingénue from extinction.” Blonde and with a look as American as apple pie, O’Hara may play the young, impressionable, sweet girl, but she’s earned her stripes enough that she’s also performed concerts at such prestigious venues as Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, and with the Philly Pops.

Now, perhaps most importantly, she’s performing a solo concert at the Broad Stage on Wednesday evening.  Singing the songs that made her loved, the concert will be a surefire way to see just how strong of a performer she is and will serve as a reminder not to judge a book by its cover – that sweet, gentle girl can sing!  After the show, you can head to Angel’s in Santa Monica for the After Party to meet O’Hara in person.  Make sure to practice your handshake with friends before you go – don’t want to give a heavyweight a weak hand.

Kelly O’Hara will perform at the Broad Stage on Wednesday, January 20 at 7:30pm. For more information, please call (310) 434-3200 or click here.