If you haven’t already been introduced, meet threadless.com – the made by you threads because you voted for it, entries from artists everywhere, in a competition that gets their artwork on our bodies. Please vote for this entry, as the artist is my beautiful and talented sis, but more importantly, the piece is incredible!!
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Joseph Rubinstein is hovering over my body. As my eyes gloss over and my body goes limp – my arms cradling a chainsaw – I’m aware that my Sister is lying next to me and I’m being covered in filmy plastic. But for Rubinstein, I’ll play dead any day.
My Sister brought me to tonight’s reception to see a man by the name of Joseph Rubenstein open his first Los Angeles show at a Gallery called Integrated Circus, a multimedia showroom for (as the owners Loni and Viktor say) “anything we happen to like.” It is only their second gallery reception. Joe is a photographer, whose recent contemplation of our relationship to death brought him to tonight’s offerings: a handful of saturated photographs of murdered and bloody young, beautiful women. Though the deaths are artificial and cosmetic, they could come out of any crime drama.
Photography with either a camera or phone is prohibited at this exhibition, so I’m allowed only a picture of the front of the gallery but here’s the point of tonight’s artwork:
“Death in our culture has morphed from a sacred or at least natural part of life to become the most sensationalized part of our everyday story telling. Crime Dramas like “CSI” focus so much on the prevention of the “Next Victim” that they forget to slow down and understand the initial exchange that is driving the story. The original victim’s body is fragmented and turned into factors in an equation. The human cost is largely ignored, and because of it we, the audience, develop a build up of these deaths that we know so much about, but have never really stopped to look at. I am offering a chance to stand and stare at a fictionalized death. The images I create are beautification, idealization, creative interpretations of death the same way CSI is an idealization of the criminologists. By creating the fantasy of it, I am giving the viewer emotional license to look at the body and try to see themselves in it. In photos of real death we feel too perverse, too indignant to explore them. It becomes very difficult to integrate those photos into the collection of stories in our minds. My goal is to create images that help us understand these stories, and maybe their relationship to ourselves.”
This is an art gallery. Every new exhibition they have, a new composition is created on this outside wall.
La Brea & Olympic Blvd
In the Spring of 1930, planning began for L.A.’s first ‘Great Park’. Costs were low due to the present Depression. For the same reason, talented architects were available, the finest stones and resources were prevalent. Earthquakes, Focult’s Pendulum, a planetarium and the observatory’s telescope tower were considered in preparation of this ‘Great Park’. Today, the observatory is a newly renovated mansion, closed in 2002 and reopened in 2008 at the cost of $93 million dollars. There are no parking or entrance fees and you no longer have to make a reservation to visit. In fact, the only fee is a ticket to see a half-hour show at the Planetarium, at a cost of seven dollars. The grounds are grandiose and pristine, the views wide and dramatic.
The Observatory is, as its shape suggests, toured as follows: an entrance, a left, then right, a downstairs and a roof – accessible by winding staircases along the side of the building. A telescope is brought out on the outside lawn daily for a closer look at Venus, the most visible planet in the L.A. firmament. Exhibitions cover the high points of astoronomy’s most notable celebrities and inventions, featuring the theories and beliefs that first brought our eyes skyward. Planetarium shows run every 45 minutes. Using digital laser technology, a Zeiss Universarium Mark IX star projector (latest in it’s field), live narration, and seamless dome construction to create an immersive program for viewers, the Planetarium is all about modern design. The narrator warns that you may get nauseous, to close your eyes if this happens, it’s only a visual affect. Follow signs to the lower level to view information about our planets, meteorites and the moon. Weigh yourself on Mars and Neptune, read about Saturn’s icy rings, and locate the stars in our sky. The upper level is about the past, the lower about our future. The whole is about our location in the galaxy.
Viewing our galaxy is profound and humbling, and the Griffith Observatory is all it was meant to be. A place for relaxation and education, a ‘Great Park’ as Griffith J. Griffith envisioned. The observatory makes the city remarkable, draws foreigners to its gates, and provides a heaven’s view of the dusty L.A. landscape. An alluring view from above.
Outside on the patio..
Arts Day LA…a day of free seminars facilitated by successful professionals in several different fields, many of whom currently teach classes at UCLA. There are four seminars for each subject – Creative Writing, Design Communication Arts (Graphic Design), Film, Interior Design and Landscape Architecture – spanning instruction on inspiration, tools and finally your life and career. Although at times I felt I was watching an infomercial for extension classes at UCLA, the information provided was well worth sitting through a little PR. Although Arts Day LA is only held once a year, UCLA sponsors several similar events through Summer and Fall.
Trueblood?
Writer Barbara Abercrombie & Playwright Leon Martell
Writer Jessica Barksdale Inclan, memoirist Diana Raab, mystery writer John Morgan Wilson & short fiction writer Victoria Patterson
Lunchtime: L.A. style
A closer look….
Goodbye UCLA!
It just so happened that L.A. is now officially Japan-infused. With Japanophiles popping up across the city’s landscape, and since L.A. is a bonified hub of the cutting-edge, welcome Royal/T cafe; a capitalization on the maid cafe trend of Tokyo’s Akihabara district. Although the little cafe off of Washington Boulevard is a bit more art gallery oriented, its novelty is enough to bring an influx of curious patrons and manga maniacs alike. However, nothing can replace the original design. See Here…STOP THE MAIDS!!
Modeled after cafes in Tokyo’s Akihabara district, Royal/T garnered a lot of attention, as it is the first of it’s kind in this big city.
Travel + Leisure reports, “One of the quirkiest phenomena in Japan has come to L.A. with the opening of Royal/T in Culver City (8910 Washington Blvd., Culver City; 310/599-6300; royal-t.org). The 10,000-square-foot, Japanese-themed space houses a contemporary art gallery, a shop with artist-designed toys and clothing—and a café where the waitresses are dressed up as French maids. ROYAL/T, owned by Whitney Museum Council member Susan Hancock, was conceived as a 21st-century “guerrilla” version of a traditional museum. None of the art in the gallery is for sale, and the café features Japanese comfort-food dishes such as tomato-rice omelets and macha milk. The debut installation, “Just Love Me,” includes works by Yoshitomo Nara and Takashi Murakami, from Hancock’s private collection.”
NO SAINTS IN L.A. 