Offbeat Art: The Koos Art Center

Whether you're looking to spy some interesting art or rock out to your favorite band no one's ever heard of, the Koos art center most likely has what you're looking for.
The center started out in early 90s Santa Ana as a beatnick's paradise; a small cafe that featured spoken-word poets and local independent bands.
The Koos also ran several art education programs, notably the Awareness Through Arts and Community Program, and served as a base for the "Food Not Bombs" activism movement.
The center was also awarded a $10,000 grant in 1998 by MTV's Do Something Foundation to fund its programs.
The year 2003 saw the relocation of the Koos to Long Beach's downtown arts district, where it has resided ever since. This change in locale was brought about by the need for a bigger space for art, bands, and its various programs.

video courtesy of YouTube.com

Arts Week At Long Beach State

Everything from Andy Warhol to art tours constitute the daily exhibitions of Arts Week at California State University, Long Beach.
Displays are available for viewing from November 13th through the 20th, with a different artist or exhibit shown each day.
Most of the shows are free to CSULB students, such as the "Warhol; 15 min/24 fps" and "Maya Schindler: Present Progressive" shows, held last Thursday, November 13th.
Of course, the activities for students to partake in aren't strictly limited to displayed works of art; the World Percussion Concert (Nov. 14, $7), featuring a Latin-jazz fusion type musical performance is also on the bill for arts week.
Artist Tomory Dodge will be at the University Theater onn Wednesday, November 19th, at five o clock to discuss his craft and what it means to him with the students who care to join in. Dodge's work with landscapes and imagery have made him a well known artist in the Los Angeles area. There is no charge for this event.
Thursday November 20th an art showcase called "The King and The Condemned" will be available for viewing in the showcase and theater arts rooms 24 and 26 at CSULB. This week student artist Gowen's art will be prominently displayed. A later show, this one is at 11p.m. and also free.
As an added bonus to this tapestry of artistic events, there will also be, as mentioned earlier, art tours of the university every day during arts week, starting promptly at noon at the University Student Union information desk, located on the second floor in the center of the foyer.

V.I.P. Fundraiser Nets Big Money for Kid's Programs

A whopping 35-thousand dollars was raised for such children's theater programs as Music Theater West's Youth Cultural Enrichment program at an upscale benefit party held Spetember 27th.
The event took place at the palatial home of Linda and Howard Knohl. Mrs. Knohl is the board president of Music Theater West, an organization that brings theater to roughly 15 thousand children a year through its various outreach groups and programs.
Hosted by a support group of MTW, called Footlighters, the fundraiser featured an auction, through which the majority of the money was raised. Up for bidding were, among other things, a theater trip to New York city.
Also rounding out the evening were musical performances from the various plays that MTW had put on at the Carpenter Center, including "The Producers," "Forbidden Broadway" and "Dreamgirls."

Rock Opera "Spring Awakening" Now At The Ahmanson

Teenage angst and where babies come from are central topics of this rock-opera remake of 19th-century playwright Frank Wedekinds work.

Originally quite a somber and dark work, the modern version has been infused with a vivacous energy, with the cast leaping around the stage in constant motion.

The play centers around the lives and exploits of a brooding group of teens in 1890's Germany, particulary Moritz and Melchior, two school friends from whom most of the trouble in the play is generated.

Melchior is the suave, debonaire counterpart to the social awkwardness of Moritz, and tries to help his friend out at one point in the play by making for him an illustrated sex manual, according to an article in the Orange County register.

Melchior's smooth ways get him in trouble, however, when he gets the girl...and accidentally gets her pregnant, due in part to the fact that her mother never told her how babies were made.

As Paul Hodgins put it in his OC register article, "Spring Awakening is not for purists - or the prudish."

The play is directed by Micheal Mayer and choreagraphed by Bill T. Jones, with Blake Bashoff and Kyle Riabko in the male lead roles. It will be at the Ahmanson through december seventh.

Link to Ahmanson's page: http://www.centertheatregroup.org/

"The Art of War" at the Norton Simon Museum

In a small room next to the entrance of the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, California, there are a group of items on display that some might not expect to find in a museum.

These pieces of art are not sculptures by Degas or paintings by Picasso, though both are on dsplay in other parts of the museum. No, displayed on the walls of this room are propaganda posters collected during the time of the first and second World Wars.

One of these posters depicts three children, two boys and a girl, cowering in fear as a shadow in the shape of the nazi swastika looms over them from above. They are in the light spaces created by the crooks of the swastikas arms, but the shadow is close. The caption reads, "Don't let that shadow touch them."

Another shows a stoic-looking soldier, head wrapped in a bandage like the Civil War soldiers of even earlier times. This one states, "Doing all you can, brother? Buy war bonds."

One cannot help but notice the parralels to our present condition of hard economic times and long periods of war, though the messages are not as obvious today as they were then.

"I think it's so interesting to see this history, and how close it is to what's happening now. That poster about saving your waste fats for explosives could be how recycling started," said Andria Rothenberg, a 20-year-old CSUN student.

"Its very topical," said Mary Lynn, another museum patron and mother of two.

The exhibit will be on display through January 2009.

Link to current exhibitions page: http://www.nortonsimon.org/exhibitions.aspx?id=6#1060

Exhibit At the UAM Showcases Old Artistc Footage

An exhibition of art pieces in the form of video clips, called Art/Tapes/22, is on display at Cal State Long Beach's University Art Museum until October 19th.
The exhibit is basically a gallery of video clips, made from 1973 to 1976. The pieces vary greatly in what they display. Some are silent, but a great number of them have headphones provided to listen to the audio on the tapes. The majority were filmed in black and white, though a few of the works are in color.
Among those works being displayed are "In Version", made in 1974, featuring nothing more than a man pressing his face up against a pane of transparent glass multiple times being played over and over on a loop, as are all the pieces.
Also displayed is "Theme Song", a tape of a man laying on the floor and looking into the camera, casually talking to it with music playing in the background, as if the camera were a lover. He attempts to seduce the viewer by looking directly at them and saying things like, "Whatever you wanna do baby, whatever is fine..." in a singsong voice.
Over 150 artists contributed to this exhibit, which began its life in Florence, Italy and has traveled all around the world. The medium of display ranges from old television sets, to projectors, to cameras that make the viewer part of the exhibit.

Saturday Art Walk Provides Venue For Local Artists

   Local artists, musicians, painters, and more are given a chance to showcase their talents to the general public, in the East Village Arts District of downtown Long Beach, on the second saturday of every month.  

   Its called the Second Saturday Art Walk, and since 1997 its been giving Long Beach residents a chance to let loose onstage, or just take their better half to a cheap night out on the town.  Admission is free as well as parking on public streets, if you can find it.  If not, parking is available in nearby structures for four dollars.  

  Ocean Avenue, Broadway, Elm, and Linden Avenue are cordoned off for this event, and people can grab a bite to eat at the restaurants along these streets.  Wine tasting is also an option.  The art on display ranges from sculpture to photography in addition to live music, dance, and performance artists who's acts include fire-hoop dancing and vaudvillian melodrama.  Car shows featuring vintage modified cars have also rounded out the event in the past.  

   The Second Saturday Art Walk benefits the community by providing extra revenue for downtown's small businesses through proximity to the event and press gained from it, and the strong presence of an artistic commnuity there has attracted more attention and more residents, according to an article in "Harbor Living" by Noel Barr.

*note: the video below was not taken by me, I found it on 2nd Saturday Artwalk's myspace page.

    

Garage Theater Provides Refreshing Alternative To Conventional Stage

We've all heard of garage bands, but to most of us the term garage theater is a new one. That is the name of the theater company formed by CSULB alumni and playwright Jamie Sweet in 1996. The first show was, you guessed it, in a garage. A garage in Costa Mesa, to be exact. His first official play, "Egg Man," became very popular for the short two nights it ran, and marked the beginning of Sweet's career as a playwright.
Sweet learned everything he knows about the theater and the stage during his academic career at Orange Coast College. The drama department there was student-run, and thus allowed him a hands-on approach to acting, directing, and writing.
Sweet met up with other, like minded people at Orange Coast College, and that group transfered from there to Cal State University, Long Beach.
The Garage Theater Company was born out of this group of playwrights who wanted to produce and perform "art that spoke to them, whether it sold tickets or not" according to an article in the Press-Telegram.
The Garage is now located at 7th street in Long Beach, and has been releasing roughly two original plays per season since 2005, many of them penned by Sweet and fellow playwright/actor Amy-Louise Sebellius.

Art Theatre Of Long Beach Newly Renovated

The Art Theatre Of Long Beach, deemed one of the top five independent, or "indie", movie theaters in Los Angeles, has recently recieved a much needed restoration from the inside out.

Originally unveiled under the name "The Carter Theatre" in 1924, it had everything you'd expect from a theater of the silent movie era, right down to the pipe organ and orchestra pit. At first it looked something like Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood.

After the '33 earthquake, the theater was remodeled in 1934 in the "art-deco" style popular at that time. It was again remodeled in 1947, with additions like a wider marquee, and given the new name, "The Art Theatre."

This year, it has been restored to the original "art-deco" specifications, with the addition of some modern amenities. The original blueprints were used as a guide, and new sound and visual equipment has been installed. The two storefronts that flanked the theater on either side have been converted into a wine and a coffee bar. The interior and exterior alike appear to have been painstakingly reconstructed with a minute attention to detail.

New Exhibits At The Torrance Art Museum

There are three new exhibits currently on display at the Torrance Art Museum, located in the Civic Center right next to the library, police station, and local theater.
Every day from 11 to 5 the museum is open for the public to come observe. All three artists are local, that is to say from the south bay area, and all the works on display fall into the category of abstract art.
The three artists featured at the moment are Marco Casentini, Mary Pichette, and Eric Johnson, each with a different take on abstract art.
Casentini's section, entitled "Have A Nice Day," is a collage of his very colorful paint-on-glass, Piccasso-esque works against a colorful background the artist painted himself to accentuate the feel of the paintings. The bright, vibrant colors he uses in his pieces are meant to invoke a happy, easygoing feel that Casentini feels is characteristic of his California experience.
Pichette's paintings center more around using the shadows that occur in nature to create an "organic abstraction" affect. She believes that nature functions as a kind of catalyst for her artistic process. Her section in the museum is fittingly called "Building Into Shadows."
Johnson's medium is perhaps the most eccentric of the three, because he works almost entirely with polyester resin cast into different shapes. His main work on display at the museum takes the appearance of a gaint ear of corn, and is called "The Maize Project." It is made of over 300 individual cast resin "kernels," which contain mementos and keepsakes from different people. Some of these people Johnson knew, but others simply felt moved to donate their personal items to be a part of the Maize Project. A row of pictures is posted on the wall of everyone who donated something to the project.