2010 Program Annual - Status Report: Creative Economy by 18th Street Arts Center

18th Street Arts Center 2010 Program Annual

STATUS THE CREATIVE ECONOMY REPORT < <

ARE WE ON THE WAY UP?

ARE WE stuck in neutral?

ARE WE ON THE WAY down?

thank you INSTITUTIONAL FUNDERS

Alliance of Artist Communities, Asian Cultural Council, Australia Council for the Arts, Bergamot Station, California Cultural

& Historical Endowment, Charles Sumner Bird Foundation, Council for Cultural Affairs – Taiwan, Counterintuity LLC, Durfee

Foundation, Gyeonggi Creation Center, Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation, The J. Paul Getty Foundation, James Irvine Foundation, Jumex Foundation, Liberty Hill Foundation, Los Angeles County Arts Commission, Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, Marshall and Margherite McComb Foundation, Metabolic Studio, National Endowment for the Arts, Santa Monica Cultural Affairs Division, Trust for Mutual Understanding

PRIVATE DONORS

Abby Sher, Adam Somers, Alan Abramson, Alejandra Jerez, Alice Salinas, Alissa Arp, Allyson Hemstreet, Allegra Snyder, Amy Green, Amy Krider, Andrea Van de Kamp, Andrew Beath, Andrew & Bronya Galef, Antonio Quinn, Armin Ghalichian, Art McEvily, Ashley Donohue, Barbara Hunter Foster, Betty Jantzen, Bruce Robertson, Bruria Finkel, Carla Gluck, Cezar Mendoza, Cherna Gitnick,

Danny Juno, David Ross, Dallas Price, David Roman, Debbie Hu Ricks, Diana Attias, Diana Kulow, Diane Vanderlip, Dina Dalby, Diep Tran, Edward Ruscha, Elizabeth Kitchen, Emilie Conrad, Francine Ellman, Francis Shishim, Frank Jimenez, Frederick George, G. Ross Roskamp, Gary Miller, Gleam Davis, HaRa Beck, James Rojas, Janice Gordillo, Jason Schimpf, Jeff Decker, Jenita Milburn, Jim Charne, Joan Abrahamson, Joan Hotchkis, Joaquin Cortez, Joel King, John Malpede, Joseph Dalrymple, Josh Mullin, Julie

Herbert, Karen Robertson, Karl Doerrer-Attaway, Kimberly Kleinman, King H. Harris, Laddie John Dill, Laura Errico, Laurel de Leo, Leah Minium, Leslie Labowitz Starus , Lois Chiles, Lori Harris, Lori Zimmerman, Madoka Yamamoto, Margaret Linton, Marina Day,

Marshall & Margherite McComb, Masoud Pourhabib, Meg Linton, Melissa Bachrach, Michael Barnard, Micheal Fink, Michelle Bern, Miya Sumii, Nancy Berman, Patrice Winchester, Paul OLague, Phillip Marshall Vise, Phuong-Ha Ngo, Pilar Thompkins, Rachel BirdAnderson, Richard Erickson, Richard & Sabrina Fox, Sanjit Patel, Robert Rulec, Robert Wilson, Rudolph Kammerer, Russell Pearsall, Samuel Hoi, Sandra Liljenwall, Scott Sereboff, Serena Woodward, Sheila Pinkel, Stan Cornyn, Stanley Grinstein, Stephanie Figura, Susan Harper, Susanna Dakin, Suzanne Lacy, Tara Sterling, Terese Ritchie, Terry & Howard Rubinroit, Tom Van Sant, Tyler Stallings, Vincent Lopez, Yvonne Heyden, Yudhishthir Raj Isar

IN-KIND DONATIONS 100.3fm The Sound, Abbot’s Pizza, American Laser Center, The Argonaut, Art Source LA, Aubri Hathaway Occupational Therapy, Ballast Point Brewing & Spirits, Boston Beer Company, Cabot Cheese, Chateaux Direct, Crispin Cider, Deschutes Brewery, Duvel, Eat Drink & Travel.com, Eel River Brewing Company, El Dorado Distribution, Firestone Walker Brewing Company, Green Flash Brewing Company, Harbor Distributing, Hofbrauhaus Munchen, Hpnotiq Liqueur, Izze Sparkling Juice, Jax Bicycles, Jibbiddy.com, Karl Strauss Brewing Company, Lagunitas Brewing Company, Lesli Linka Glatter, Library Alehouse, LunAzul Tequila, Michael Beatrice, NDM Bollywood Dance Studios, New Belgium Brewing Company, New Leaf Brands, North Coast Brewing Company, Novel Café, City of Santa Monica, Pacific Libations Distribution, Palm Breweries, Pama Pomegranate Liqueur, Pizza Port, Santa Monica Daily Press, Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, Stone Brewing Company & Distributions, Sudwick Breweries,Tao Healing Arts, VICC Entertainment, Wine Warehouse Distribution

TO OUR 2010 SUPPORTERS

Lauren Bon, guest artist

Exhibitions

Love in a Cemetery

Fine Art

Prep Materials

Pain Management 100

Tianguis

FabLab (looking for patterns)

Making Change

Events and Projects

International Visiting Artists

Los Angeles Artists and Organization in Residence General Information

120

Coming in 2011

122

STATUS REPORT: THE CREATIVE ECONOMY Art Direction CLAYTON CAMPBELL & RONALD LOPEZ Graphic Designer GUSTAVO CORDOVA gusux@ucla.edu Proof Editor CALIFIA SUNTREE Researcher JULIAN SUHR

TABLE

OF CONTENTS

From the Directors

Photo credits: Aleksandra Adjukovic, Michael W. Barnard, Clayton Campbell, Irina

Cios, Wyatt Conlon (Highways Performance Space), Nicole Gordillo, Amber T. Jones, Jess Koehler, Ronald Lopez, Jay Oligny (Pain Management 100), Consuelo Velasco (Love in a Cemetery group photo), Joshua White (Strawberry Flag), Andres Fiorani (California Lawyers for the Arts)

from the Directors

We are pleased to share with you our 2010 annual program catalog, which provides an overview of our major exhibitions, a sampling of our numerous events, and documentation of the ideas and artworks generated by our international and local artists in residence.

It has been a fantastic year for 18th Street. Our annual research theme, Status Report: The Creative Economy, generated critically acclaimed exhibitions and projects by our 2010 18th Street Artist Fellows: Robert Sain, Andrea Bowers, Carla Herrera-Prats, Matthias Merkel Hess, Martin Durazo, Ana Guajardo, Dorit Cypis and Elena Siff. You will find scholarship and documentary evidence of their incisive ideas and artistic outcomes in the first section of the annual.

This year has also been rich in provocative dialogue and thinking outside the box. We hosted dozens of public events, including talks by arts critic Dave Hickey; Serpentine Galleryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Sally Tallant; an evening with Rick Lowe and Robert Sain; panel discussions with Hugo Hopping, Cara Baldwin, Ashley Hunt, Dee Williams, Micha Cardenas and many, many more.

Locally we have a far-reaching impact and commissioned numerous artists to develop public projects. Karen Mack of LA Commons headed up our public participation project in Santa Monicaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s GLOW festival; Marcus Kuilland Nazario conducted workshops at the annual Santa Monica Cloverfield Park festival; Martin Durazo organized a ten-week video workshop for young persons at Virginia Avenue Park Teen Center about the risks of drug addiction; and Ben Caldwell of KAOS Network developed a public video work for the grand opening of the new Santa Monica Place.

The award-winning Visiting and International Artist In Residence program had a number of firsts: our first artist from Tibet, Tsering Nyandak; our first artist residency with the Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation supporting artist Han Sungpil; and a new program with the University of Hong Kong that brought Kwan Wong and Zhao Liyin to work with us in our office as visiting arts management specialists. And then we have had crucial continuity with long-time partners that deepens our ties to numerous international communities. These included the

continuation of the New Media Collaborations project with the Trust for Mutual Understanding that brings Eastern European artists to our center; the Jumex Foundation residency that sponsors artists from Mexico; our longstanding and successful program with the Council for Cultural Affairs in Taiwan; and successful projects with the Asian Cultural Council and the Unesco Aschberg Bursary for the Arts. 18th Street Arts Center is the leading artist residency center in southern California, and in the past 12 years we have now worked with 27 countries and have received over 250 visiting international artists in residence.

18th Street has a unique, award-winning three-tiered residency program that includes long-time legacy artists, who serve as mentors; medium-term artists who come for terms of 3 years, which in 2010 saw the addition of artists Arzu Arda Kosar and Karl Doerrer; and short-term residents who normally come to us through the international program, or important programs such as the Visions from the New California project. In this way, we provide stability and direct support to artists to not only develop a significant body of work, but to develop skill sets that will help them prosper in the marketplace of commerce and ideas.

Finally, we wish to thank all of those individuals and organizations who have supported 18th Street with their passion, resources and belief in artists and art making as a way to make a real difference in the quality of life for all of our communities, and as a critical means of enlarging our worldview at a momentous period in our history. Enjoy our annual program catalog, and we look forward to seeing you in the coming year.

Yours truly,

Clayton Campbell Jan Williamson Artistic Director

Executive Director

Status Report: The Creative Economy

Each year 18th Street establishes a theme for its programs as a way of deepening artistic engagement

with the important issues of our time. In 2008 our theme,The Future of Nations, responded to election year issues. In 2009, Almost Utopia: Los Angeles 2019 took a proactive look at our future social structures.

This year our theme is Status Report: The Creative Economy. The economy was selected as a theme

prior to the worldwide banking contraction, and became even more relevant as artists proactively developed new strategies to address a host of complicated issues. In the past decade there has been an enormous conversation about the creative economy, and theorists such as Richard Florida championed the rise of a creative class. This discussion has had a major impact on some sectors of the arts and culture field. For example, in Florida’s view a creative economy is characterized by key economic factors of talent, innovation and creativity. As the notion of a creative class was widely promoted, it became apparent that these factors are not distributed evenly across the economy, but instead seem concentrated in specific locations characterized by environment, class and ethnicity. We invited artists and curators to examine this dislocation of resources and entitlement, responding to a market system that privileges some while discarding many others.

Our exhibitions are designed to be a platform for ideas and exchange. Los Angeles is often described

as having a dynamic creative economy. Yet after a turbulent economic year in which markets for consumption of art radically changed, 18th Street is interested in key questions such as: “Where do we stand? Are we on the way up, on the way down, or stuck in neutral? Who are the players and mediators in a creative economy, and how is it changing? Who is included and who is excluded? How are artists responding to seismic changes in the arts and culture market, and what are the new models they are developing to support the production of their work, and the dissemination of their ideas? How should our cultural institutions, both non-profit and for-profit, be responsive to the overall health of the Los Angeles creative economy?”

To address these questions, we selected eight Fellows for 2010, who were awarded grants and

residencies at 18th Street in order to pursue their specific projects as part of our overall inquiry. The 18th Street

STATUS CREA TIVE ECON OMY REPORT

Artist Fellows for 2010 were: Robert Sain, Andrea Bowers, Carla Herrera-Prats, Matthias Merkel

Hess, Martin Durazo, Ana Gaujardo, Dorit Cypis and Elena Siff. An overview of their research, investigations and art making follow.

Clayton Campbell , Artistic Director

Lauren Bon is the guest artist for 18th Streetâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s annual program catalog. Her visionary work has looked at microeconomies and new creative communities st as a 21 century imperative.

Strawberry Flag was a revisionist vision of the American flag as a self-sustaining system raised by Lauren

Bon and the Metabolic Studio at the West Los Angeles Veterans Administration (WLA-VA) from July 2009 to October 2010. An artwork in the form of a veterans’ program, Strawberry Flag nurtured reclaimed strawberry plants with an experimental aquaponic system using salvaged water and fish.

Strawberries, the second most lucrative crop in the United States, are grown in the electorally important

states of California, Texas and Florida, where many veterans also live. The strawberry plants that Strawberry Flag cared for were rescued from industrial farms that would otherwise have plowed them under after their first fruiting.

Working with social brownfields—locations that for environmental, political or other reasons are unable to

support life—Lauren Bon and the Metabolic Studio make metabolic sculptures that use creative endeavor to galvanize transition within complex bureaucracies.

At the WLA-VA Strawberry Flag generated a micro-economy that perceived “value”beyond the monetary.

In a context of care—a therapeutic economy—the artwork connected available land with salvaged strawberries, and veterans in need of employment with a low water method of strawberry growing. While creating significant veteran training and employment opportunities that spun off into professional placements, Strawberry Flag brought out the potentiality for meaning and value inherent in underutilized and often undervalued resources, and seeded the ground for future veteran-led projects to emerge.

Lauren Bon is the guest artist for 18th Street’s annual program catalog. Her visionary work has looked at

micro-economies and new creative communities as a 21st century imperative.

Following page: Lauren Bon, Strawberry Flag, aerial shot, Los Angeles, 2009. Photo: Joshua White.

ROBERT SAIN ANDREA BOWERS OLGA KOUMOunDOuROS Carmen Uriarte David Russell Ella Tetrault Felicia Montes Gabrielle Levine Jamie Crooke Rachael Filsinger Rodrigo Marti 12

love in a cemetery 13

love in a cemetery

some personal background thoughts In the early mists of art museum time, 1977, the fates presented

trope but the initial experience

me with the dare of starting Walker Art Center’s first development office.

of Frank Gehry’s raw T.C.gave

I say dare because I had never raised a nickel in my life but somehow

startling permission for the visitors

landed the job. Today, I realize this formative experience was not about

to create their own experience.

asking for the order but rather engaging people in ideas.…ideas generated

I shall never forget watching

by art, artists and the museum. This notion of engagement and ideas has

an office worker at lunch break

stuck with me over the years.

taking a buddy through a massive

Olga Koumoundouros, Display Transfer Display of Cottage Economies, salvaged furniture, Habitat for Humanity, hardware, gel medium, casters, silkscreen supplies

When asked, in the early 80s

cardboard installation by Michael

to launch the first development

Heizer; he was exclaiming to his

department for MOCA before there

friend with seeming delight, “This

was a there there, ideas were

is the stupidest thing I have ever

all we had…that and letterhead

seen” and then turned to me with

an explanatory, “I love to bring my

I remember Bob Irwin’s now nearly

friends here to show them stuff

famous declaration that museums

I hate.” Wow…talk about visitor

should be about the power of ideas

friendly environment where the

rather than bricks and mortar and

visitor could actually disagree (out

what better time and place to test

loud) with the institution. A new

this belief than in a temporary

level of museum engagement and

warehouse before the Isozaki

life was being glimpsed.

building was open? Well, the rest

is history and as Talleyrand said,

a fundamental shift in my experience

nothing is more permanent than

of cultural organizations when

the temporary.

I wound up running the Children’s

Museum in San Diego. It caused

Now in the next century,

In the 90s I experienced

viewing contemporary art in a

a stir in some quarters to change

warehouse has become a standard

the mission from cookie-cutter

playland to a bi-national program

leaned back, wine glass in hand, and snapped, “So, you are the dictator of

commissioning artists to do work

education!” I said we never use that word “dictator”. He said “dictator?”, I

for kids and their families. The

said “no education”. I hastened to explain that the LACMALab quest was

new mission was unique: learning

engagement rather than imparting information at people. He then smiled

through art rather than about art.

and said he was old enough to remember when art was not supposed to

This approach opened the way to

be good for you…it was filled with sex and violence, and what did we do, we

unlikely community collaborations.

cleaned it up, homogenized it and put it on a pedestal. Ah, Allan Kaprow

When Chris Burden’s Tale of Two

was on to something, “Life in a museum is like making love in a cemetery.”

Cities was installed in the lobby,

Yet through the LACMALab experiment, it was beyond clear that there is

there was concern about the

a hunger for a new kind of social intersection space where all ages,

aspect of violence so we brought in

incomes and ethnicities can come together through creativity.

the Chief of Police who developed

ideas for visitor feedback. In an

Astonished at the treasures they hold, seduced by the possibility of time

unprecedented partnership with

travel..the original “where do you want to go today”…yet exasperated at

UCSD’s Community Pediatrics

what museums don’t do but could. The week the U.S. started the shock

Department, the museum worked

and awe bombardment of Bagdad, LACMA opened a major exhibition

with teens to address public health

entitled The Treasures of

issues ranging from violence to

Mesopotamia. At the entrance to

drugs. I saw firsthand how

the show, the large tasteful beige-

a cultural organization could serve

on-beige didactic map looked

as convener to engage community

like bombing targets; there was

in concerns of our time.

Mosul, Fallujah, the very cities we

were decimating and yet never

Many years later at

I guess over the years I have had a love/hate thing with museums.

a LACMA reception, I had the

would the museum acknowledge

occasion to meet the late John

this was Iraq. As a result,

Szarkowski, MoMA’s legendary

everyone from school kids to the

curator of photography. In the

general public was cheated. The

course of the introduction,

museum could clearly have used

a colleague tried to describe that

this as a springboard to create

I was the founding director of

greater public understanding of

LACMALab and ran the children’s

the most traumatic issue of the

gallery whereupon Szarkowski

day. But this would require risk. Edgar Arceneaux and Rick Lowe, guest speakers

with this and proposed that we bring in as collaborators the Otis Public Practice MFA class she was teaching at the time. This proved to be the vital stroke that gave form and substance to the vortex of swirling ideas coming out of long conversations I had with Andrea. There was a stretch of time where ambiguity and prickly

Sally Tallant, director of public programs, Serpentine Gallery, in conversation during Love in a Cemetery

questions ruled the day. What are

And risk is increasingly in short supply within the museum domain.

the questions for the survey? How

would the results be displayed?

One of the great lessons of LACMALab was changing the

fundamental purpose and approach of conventional museology from

How would the survey relate to

providing answers to asking questions. The shift from the sterile voice of

the students work? How would

authority to a rambunctious environment of curiosity for all brought a new

their work in multiple and diverse

life that was waiting to happen.

communities throughout L.A.

translate into art installations in

As a culmination of these experiences, when Clayton Campbell

invited me to guest curate a show for 18th Street Art Center, I knew I

the 18th Street gallery? How would

wanted to address head-on the question of cultural organizations and

this form an exhibition? Could all

social responsibility. Rather than investigation as indictment, the hope

of this function as a laboratory?

was to create a constructive participatory model that would demonstrate

How would the public participate?

the possibilities.

Who was the curator and did it

matter? At some point well into

The fact that 18th Street was willing to support my pursuit of this

obsession was the starting point for Love in a Cemetery. I know of few, if

the project, Andrea invited the

any, arts institutions that would take on such a utopian, complex and risky

artist Olga Koumoundouros to join

venture with the organizing principle for an exhibition to be a survey of the

the fray with a new commissionâ&#x20AC;ŚI

arts community. And unlike my previous projects, here there were next

egged Olga on to redo the gallery

to no resources so the endeavor required a new level of ingenuity to pull

entrance. Nearly at the last minute

it off. Without a doubt, the most ingenious thing I did was to invite Andrea

I recruited Paul Wehby, LACMAâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s

Bowers to be the Artist in Residence for the project.

senior graphic designer, to create

a unifying look for the show. And

Andrea said at the very beginning we were going to need help

Suzanne Lacy, chair of the MFA

operate successfully in the dimension of social responsibility. Not just

Public Practice program at Otis,

through provocative work in a gallery but with activities of lasting value in

was helping plan a series of related

the community.

events. This was collaboration

on top of collaboration: a dozen

encountering the tip of an iceberg, for each installation had counterpart

people, a small space, and little

activities across an unlikely swath of L.A. neighborhoods. The gallery itself

budget…recipe for trouble? While

took on an expanded function. Otis held classes there. Conversations were

there was a contagious spirit of

organized with artists Rick Lowe from Houston, Martha Rossler from New

determination permeating all who

York and Sally Tallant, Head of Programs at London’s Serpentine Gallery.

got near the project, it proved to

But equally compelling were the evenings organized around the partnering

be more about trust and faith that

community organizations such as a film screening documenting L.A.

the participants would deliver

gangs and their deportation to El Salvador. Perhaps the spirit of the

something remarkable.

project was best exemplified by the opening reception featuring Aztec

dancers and a live auction of health care services. Well, now there’s no

Andrea’s Otis “classes”

were intense marathons. She

For the visitor to Love in a Cemetery at 18th Street it was like

turning back. I’m in search of the next place willing to dare. - Robert Sain

created an environment where everyone was both teacher and learner, gave the charge to pursue issues of personal passion, and insisted that each student leave something behind in their selected communities. Problem solving was the central thread. How to give form to art that would engage a general public with their work with a teen homeless shelter, a gang intervention organization, a free health clinic, environmental groups, and a men’s correctional facility? The outcome: the student’s

BIO

Robert Sain commissions artists to create new work based on

the quest of engagement and in the process transformed the possibilities of what arts organizations can be. As founding director of LACMALab, the former experimental arm of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Sain pioneered programs that were both participatory and intergenerational. As Director of the Children’s Museum / Museo de los Ninos in San Diego, Sain carved out a unique niche by launching the first major organization dedicated to contemporary art for kids and their families with a special emphasis on bi-national projects with Mexico. Sain opened The Museum School, the first charter school in California to use museum exhibitions and contemporary art as the basis for curriculum. Most recently, as Director of Montalvo Arts Center, in the heart of Silicon Valley, Sain implemented a new vision of engaging people in contemporary concerns through art.

installations modeled how artists, art, and an arts organization can

responsibility to address social and political issues of our time. As the artist in residence, I developed a laboratory where experimentations with interventions and collaborations between cultural and community organizations could take place. I saw this as a physical manifestation of my response to Bob’s questions. The heart of my project was not only discussion but also action and engagement. In order to create a series of activities that addressed multiple communities I chose to investigate the blurred boundaries between pedagogy and art production by collaborating with arts administrator Pauline Kamiyama, Sain, and the first year Otis Public Practice Program. The students formed small artists’ collectives engaged with such diverse Andrea Bowers, Educate, Agitate, Organize, Channel letter signs, low voltage LED lights, plexi, aluminum, 2010

communities as a gang intervention

Andrea Bowers

program, a free clinic, a rescue center

Critical conversations were the art materials of this collaborative project. In an

and a pairing of local youth groups

interview with Robert Smithson, Allan Kaprow said that, “Life in a museum was

with environmental groups focused on

like making love in a cemetery.” This project, Love in a Cemetery, developed out

the repercussions of ocean pollution.

of a series of discussions between LACMALab Founding Director Robert Sain

This project included traditional

and myself about our mutual interest in artists, art and social engagement. Bob

art production, panel discussions,

developed a survey of 4 questions that acted as a springboard for the project.

dinners, teaching, community

Sent to a broad range of the Los Angeles art community the survey asked

organizing, activism, performance

for personal opinion regarding social engagement and cultural institutions’

and agitprop. Blogs about each

for homeless youth, a men’s prison,

community project were updated on

Eloquent Woman at Galerie Praz-Delavallade, Paris, Your Donations Do Our Work: Andrea

a weekly basis. The Otis Public Practice

Bowers and Suzanne Lacy, UCR Sweeney Art Gallery, Riverside, CA; and The Weight of

classroom, located at the18th Street

Relevance at the Secession, Vienna and Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects. Bowers

Art Center complex, became the

is represented by Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, Andrew Kreps Gallery in New

artist in residence studio and the hub

York, Galerie Mehdi Chouakri in Berlin, Galerie Praz-Delavallade in Paris, and Van Horn in

for the projects. It was my hope that

Düsseldorf.

these projects would integrate diverse local communities with cultural institutions as well as propose an

Jamie Crooke

expansion of sites of production for

Collaborating organization:Hollywood Sunset Free Clinic

institutions. Projects took place not

Mission Over a 3-month period I will be working with a community organization in

only at 18th Street Art Center but also

my neighborhood called Hollywood Sunset Free Clinic to promote the organization’s

at alternative sites throughout the

mission of health care is a right and not a privilege. As an artist, I will create projects

city. Some of the students/artists are

to help support the infrastructure of the clinic, while also promoting the public option

still working with these communities.

on the larger scale of health care reform. The collaboration will result in an exhibition

My main requirement of the Public

at the 18th Street Gallery in Santa Monica in early 2010.

Practice students was to impact the

BIO

life of the community they choose

University, and has also studied art therapy on a graduate level at Lesley University

to work with in a meaningful way; to

in Cambridge. Over the years she

create something of value or use for

has worked with various nonprofits

the community after the exhibition

such as Arts for Learning, VSA Arts of

ended. It was my goal that this project

Massachusetts, Young at Art, United

serve as an example that encourages

Cerebral Palsy of Broward County,

cultural organizations to address their

Cambridge Public School system,

obligations to social issues, such as class,

Tewksbury State Hospital and MoCA of

ethnicity, gender and politics

Miami.

Jamie Crooke holds a bachelors degree in studio art from Florida Atlantic

Andrea Bowers ‘ work focuses

primarily on direct action and nonviolent civil disobedience enacted through the lives of women. She has an MFA from CalArts and lives and works in Los Angeles. Recent solo shows include An

Jamie Crooke, Save Yourself, medical supplies, video, wood and casters

Rachael Filsinger & Ella Tetrault Collaborating organization:My Friend’s Place Mission What is Your Hollywood? What is Your America? Our collaboration with My Friend’s Place is rooted in maps. We are developing the idea of personal geographies with the afternoon drop-in “transitional” youth. Through mapping the connections and linkages in our lives, mapping our daily routes, and mapping the events / personal relationships, the 3-d installation will materialize. Sharing the already established idea of many different “Hollywoods”, we’ll suggest a sense of weaving—to create a beautiful all encompassing piece. This has already started to appear on our U.S. maps, with

Rachael Filsinger & Ella Tetrault, Tansitional Youth Maps, maps & mirrors on plywood

intense interest in tracing their cross-country routes, where in many different

colors, they are already overlapping and creating a dazzling web. The iconic

degree from the University of Toronto

outline of the United States will be a reccurring theme, as most of the dropin

in International Development and

population is intrigued and eager to tell their traveling story. Those that do not

Art History. Ella co-organized the

already have deep personal connections with this image, have widely described

“Show and Tell me” lecture series and

dreams of where they are going, moving upward and onward.

worked as a youth worker and arts

Bios

facilitator at Phoenix Youth Programs.

Rachael Filsinger hails from Washington DC and is a photographer

working with images of social justice. Upon graduating from film school on the west

Her art practice explores the effects of

coast in August 2005, she worked with grassroots organization Common Ground

the representation of a group identity

Collective in Louisiana. She has taught black and white darkroom education for

upon an individual member.

middle schoolers in the at-risk neighborhood of Hunt’s Point, South Bronx, NY. More recently, teaching has brought her to Los Angeles, in area charter schools stretching from the desert to south central in everything from animation to pottery.

Ella Tetrault received her

Carmen Uriarte

Project Coordinator/Liaison

Collaborating organizationz: Norco Rehabilitation Center Medium Security

Pauline Kanako Kamiyama is

Correctional Facility

a nonprofit and cultural arts

Mission The California Rehabilitation Center is a medium Level II

administrator who believes it is

correctional facility with an inmate population that consists of felon

her responsibility to ensure access

commitments as well as Civil Addicts. The primary dual goals of CRC are to

and equity through advocacy,

provide an atmosphere of safety and security to the public, visitors, staff and

opportunities and linkages.

inmates and to successfully treat and return all civil addict commitments to

Throughout her career, she has

a useful and productive lifestyle.

provided services in program

BIO

development and management,

Carmen Uniarte is a Los Angeles native and recent 2006 graduate

of Pitzer College, Claremont, CA with a degree in Art and Art History. As a

volunteer management, special

Getty intern in 2005 she worked at the Center for the Arts in Pomona Art

events, and community advocacy on

Colony fundraising and organizing the â&#x20AC;&#x153;Annual Aztlanâ&#x20AC;? exhibition highlighting

both the local and national level to

emerging and established international Chicano artists. Carmen was awarded

build community capacity.

three consecutive Urban Fellowships in the Center for California Cultural and Social Issues at Pitzer College. Carmen Uriarte, Love in a Cemetery Map, paint and paper on cardboard

Gabrielle Levine & David Russell Collaborating organizations: Pico Youth And Family Center Rise Above Plastics Crossroads School of Arts and Sciences Surfrider Foundation Algalita Marine Research Foundation Mission Gabrielle Levine and David Russell will facilitate a dialogue between two local community based

David Russell & Gabrielle Levine, NURDLES, mixed media, 2010 (Mural by David Russell, oil on wall)

organizations paired with two youth based organizations. Algalita Marine

art history and Italian language.

Research Foundation will present a program to Crossroads School for Arts

Additionally, he pursued a

and Sciences, and Surfrider Foundation will present a program to the Pico

professional teaching license in

Youth and Family Center. An exhibition at the 18th Street Art Center will serve

Art Education, providing him with

as a communication forum where youths from each group can utilize their

eight years of public school teaching

creative voice to express their environmental concerns about plastic pollution

experience in K-12. Russellâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s large

in the community at large. The future generation of Santa Monica will create

format painting background has

art projects that demonstrate their understanding of the environmental

inspired the creation of his own

repercussions of single use plastics in our ocean. The visual presentation of

mural painting company called

ocean pollution, comprised of plastic objects and documentation materials

Idealwallarts.

displayed in the gallery, will visually influence its viewers to incorporate sustainability into their daily lives.

Felicia Montes & Rodrigo Marti Collaborating organization:Homies

BIOS

Gabrielle Levine was born in Los Angeles and graduated from

Crossroads High School in Santa Monica. Currently she is a graduate

Mission Rodrigo Marti and Felicia

student in the Public Practice Program at Otis College of Art and Design. She

Montes are working with Homies

attended and earned her Bachelors Degree at The Evergreen State College in

Unidos, a gang intervention program

Washington State.

in the Pico Union area of Los

Angeles. They hope to use their

David Russell graduated from University of Tulsa with a BFA in

Painting/Art History. He spent one year in Florence, Italy, studying painting,

Unidos

time and resources to find ways of

expanding the organizations network

community and event organizer, and poet and performer living and

and increase their visibility. Homies

working in the Los Angeles area. She believes art is a tool for education,

Unidos provides crucial reintegration

empowerment and transformation and has translated her passion for art

services for transitioning gang

and social justice as the co-founder and coordinating member of two

members, specializing in the Central

groundbreaking creative womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s collectives, Mujeres de Maiz and In

American population. Homies

Lak Ech.

provides an array of services

including tattoo removal, a formal

collaborative projects and thorough research in participatory art making.

integration program called The

Key work experiences include developing and teaching a Portraiture

Epiphany Project, they promote

and Identity course at Greenwich Secondary School, executing a mural

Know Your Rights cards and

project with the kids of CESCOM, a community center (both in Leon,

actively participate in public policy.

Mexico).

Rodrigo Martiâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work has steadily moved towards installation,

We will add to their impressive roster the development of an art program template for future use and executing the first of what will be an ongoing program that will Felicia Montes & Rodrigo Marti, Homies Unidos / Free Alex Sanchez, mixed media, 2010

be reinterpreted to match evolving concerns. We will be using our time with Homies Unidos to find creative and poignant ways to produce artwork that are both inspired from and executed in conjunction with this inspiring community based organization while concurrently expanding the conversation surrounding the incarceration and dubious judicial proceedings of their executive director, Alex Sanchez.

BIOS

Felicia Montes is a Chicana

Indigenous artist, activist, academic,

MATTHIAS MERKEL HESS

fine art 25

FINE ART 626-394-3963

BANDIT SIGNS

Making, selling and

Love them or hate them, the corrugated plastic signs on the side of the

exhibiting art is not exactly credit

road and elsewhere advertising “WE BUY HOUSES” or “I BUY HOUSES”

repair or foreclosed homes, but

most definitely work.

it is a business of a sort. As a

—from eBay seller, real estate supply store

young artist beginning my own professional career, I felt I was

I began this project out of a love for the corrugated plastic “bandit” signs

in the same position as the other

that dot Los Angeles and many other cities.

unknown entrepreneurs using

these signs. And since I was

Whether they advertise credit repair services, real estate

investors or pest removal, I enjoy these signs for their design, message

finishing my MFA and beginning to work outside the academic field, there seemed to be no better way to “market” my services than to place these signs around town.

THE PROJECT Truthfully, you can learn how to design five- and six-figure bandit signs. You don’t need to learn a software program or even how to draw. It’s a simple fivestep process that I could train a lobotomized chimp to master. Project #11, mixed media, 2010

–from banditsignsmadeeasy.com

and placement. Are they a nuisance? Maybe, but for me they are no better or worse than “official” billboards and advertising.

And if the websites are to be believed, they work.

Before deciding on the look and design of my signs, I had to figure

out what exactly I was going to do for the project.

Instead of just generally

marketing my art, I wanted to create a focused project that addressed my role as an artist, the space I was going to be exhibiting in, and used the signs as a way to advertise the project and spur participation by a wide audience. I was interested in asking questions about what people think young artists should be doing, what they want to see and experience in public art spaces, and what kind of art they might want in their homes. I initially thought I might do up to ten long interviews as part of the project but through discussions with the 18th Street

Fine Art sign installed at Fairfax & La Cienega

staff. (Thanks Clayton, Ronald and Amber!) I settled on asking just two

free as a thanks for participating.

questions so that a lot of people

THE MESSAGE

could participate. The questions

Your message is the most important thing besides your phone number

were:

that you can put on your signs. Your message should be short and simple.

1. What do you want from artists

If you’re driving down the road at 40 mph, you have about 3-5 seconds to

and institutions that exhibit art?

read the sign.

2. What can I do for you as an artist?

—from the essay “How To Use Bandit Signs Effectively” at banditsigns.com

As a response to these short

conversations, I would then make a

The next step in my project was choosing the text on the sign. I wanted to

modest work of art for the callers for

keep it simple, but also make it stand out. I settled on using just the words

“Fine Art” and my phone number in white text on a black background.

sign removal response.

In mid-March, a few weeks before the project officially began,

Hoping to target people

I set about plastering Los Angeles with almost 100 of my signs. For

that live relatively close to the 18th

placement, I chose telephone poles near major intersections or on streets

Street Art Center, I put signs up in

where traffic might come to a stop and drivers could read my signs.

Santa Monica, West L.A., Palms,

Culver City, Westwood and up and

I quickly realized that the best way to spot a good telephone

pole was to simply follow the other guerilla marketers out there and put

down La Cienega Boulevard from

my signs on the same poles. I also found that some areas of town simply

Baldwin Hills to Sunset Boulevard.

aren’t conducive to these signs because of a lack of wooden telephone

Then, I sat back and waited for the

poles or, as in the case of the City of Santa Monica, a quick and effective

calls to pour in.

Project #1, found objects

RESULTS I have personally made a small fortune off bandit sign marketing campaigns. —from “Marketing With Bandit Signs” at hubpages.com

In addition to putting the signs around town, I wanted to use the time and space of this project to investigate the way that I make artwork. And I was willing to take almost any request and work on it to make something, whether that was a tangible object or an experience. My hope was that someone would make such a compelling request that it might spur an entire new direction in my work.

I did receive a lot of

thoughtful comments and a total of 30 requests, with the bulk coming from people who visited the project room, followed by people who emailed via the blog I set up to document the project, and the lowest number was via the phone. But people have told me that they saw the signs and as of writing this in late July 2010, a few calls are still trickling in via signs that have not been torn down.

Project requests included

using found materials to make a work, teaching drawing lessons, reading books to kids, and giving away sandwiches to strangers. While you can visit the blog for this project {at fineart6263943963. blogspot.com} to read everyoneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s request and see what I made for them in response, hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a general summary of what I learned:

> Artists are generally expected to

Project #2 (Two Merkel Bill), graphite & gouache on paper

follow their own path and tangents of research, and then report back.

with the kind of things I know how to make or enjoy making.

So when I asked people what they

> A longer conversation or questionnaire might have helped close this

wanted me to make for them, I

gap between my interests and participantsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; desires.

often got the first thing on their

> Responses that were emailed in were generally longer and more

mind. I quickly learned that these

detailed.

requests did not exactly line up

> I initially thought that only people from the area around 18th Street

would participate. But by setting up a blog and email, I received requests from across the country and even one from the Netherlands. > For some reason, women were much more likely to participate in my project (but the relatively low number of respondents makes this an unscientific observation at best). > To get more responses via the signs, I should have used text like “Free Art” rather than “Fine Art” and included my email or website. It seems that the telephone is just not as common or comfortable for people to use these days. > Despite my efforts to engage a wider audience via the signs and blog, those that chose to participate in the project seemed to be already predisposed to looking at and thinking about art. I don’t think my little project widened the art audience in any way; if anything, it confused people who called me hoping to find realistic oil paintings or something like that.

CONCLUSION …bandit signs dollar for dollar outperform most all other forms of marketing that are available. –from mybanditsign.com

Fine Art 626-394-3963 was an effort to engage a wider audience

for art, ask people what they want from artists and art institutions, and like any show for an artist, promote and continue my own career. The 30 responses I received gave me a lot to think about, and a few of the

Project #13 (Cockroach), pencil on paper

requests led me to do things that I’ll definitely explore further. And for a dollar or two a sign, I got my phone number out there. Who knows who will call in the future?

Throughout this project, however, I did keep thinking about the

old truism of capitalism—that people don’t know what they want until they see it. As an artist, I could continue to work on commission or via requests but then I’m no different from the guy who mixes paint at the paint store—I’m simply giving people what they already know they want or what they request. Collaboration is good, but it’s hard for other people to tell an

artist what to do.

Instead, I think the role

of the artist is exactly the same as a scientist or researcher: go deep and far to explore different worlds, ways of thinking, and ideas, and then report back. Artistic freedom

and personal vision may be a cliché, but it’s these individual responses to

UCLA; and the American Museum

the world that make art a valuable contribution to society.

of Ceramic Art in Pomona.

BIO

In the inventive spirit of 18th Street Arts Center’s new theme,

the Creative Economy, artist Matthias Merkel Hess’ project consists of him contracting out his artistic services to the public for free. Hess’ services cover a wide array of artistic expertise ranging from ceramic art and wooden sculptures to oil, watercolor, acrylic painting, writing and photography. For advertising purposes, he has marketed his services through bandit signs that convey the irony between unnoted artists and what he refers to as “fly-by-night” businesses. The project’s overall goal is to comment on the economic status of artists and how our society values artistic labor, and at the same time bring Hess recognition as an artist.

A 2010 graduate of Cal Arts, Matthias Merkel Hess makes his

solo Los Angeles debut with Fine Art: (626)- 394-3963. He has exhibited in group exhibitions at Cal State, Long Beach; the New Wight Gallery at Project #17, ink on paper, 20 drawings

CARLA HERRERA-PRATS

prep materials 33

PREP MATERIALS

In 1929, Carl Brighman developed the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT).

Since then, it has been administered to millions of students every year in order

for them to begin their college education. The SAT is the first of a long list of

presented at 18th Street Art Center

standardized tests designed according to the Jeffersonian principle of providing

is the second iteration of my project

equal opportunity in education to all U.S. citizens.

Prep Materials. For this occasion, I

displayed a slide projection, two wall

Effective implementation of standardized tests required the

The exhibition that I

development of technology in order to print, distribute, and perhaps most

drawings, a series of photographs,

importantly, score student responses through an answer sheet system. In 1934,

and printed matter (a multi-page

three companies in particular raced to patent an efficient turnkey solution,

brochure). The material exhibited

seeking to accurately correct more tests more quickly. IBM, Educational Test

departs from archival research I

Service (ETS), and the Measurement Research Center (originally part of Iowa

performed within the three institutions

University) developed a technology that, in the 1970s, facilitated the invention of

previously mentioned.

the ballot machine as well as our contemporary desktop scanners.

As in many of my projects,

one of my main interests has been to Photo of Test Scoring Machine, Type 805, First Model, inkjet archival prints, 30â&#x20AC;? x 40â&#x20AC;?, 2008

investigate possibilities in providing a narrative that can convey the findings of my research process. Moving beyond the common criticism of standardization and its supposed translation into better education, my intention focused on relating the technology that has contributed in securing, in the last several decades, the principles of democracy â&#x20AC;&#x201D;in this case: the test-scoring machine, the ballot machine and the image scanner. Ultimately, I worked with

Photo of Equipment Reading Heads and Magenetic-Core Memory Module of early 1960; Dekatron-Tube Counter Module from Model I Era 1956; Samples of Printed Circuit Cards, CA. 1960-1970 (Four Bags) inkjet archival prints, 30” x 40, 2008

three primary elements.

the test-scoring machine, and further elucidated the ways in which it connected

First, I explored a relationship between

with the other scanning devices. The brochure combines quotes from various

text and image in the printed matter.

historical figures both supporting and rejecting the idea of promoting a standard

The brochure displayed hand-drawn

education, and renders transparent the stakes involved regarding social mobility

thumbnails for each photographic

and assimilation.

image in the exhibition, as well as

corresponding “footnotes” laid out

elements of the project. Two wall drawings were produced using a standard

in the form of a multiple-choice

“school” #2 pencil, the tool required to mark answers in the first model of test

test. The footnotes conveyed various

scoring machines distributed by IBM in 1934 (and a standard that continues

rationales behind the evolution of

today). One of these drawings represented the first ballot machine developed

Second, I used drawing as a formal strategy to bridge the different

my exhibition to the context of Los Angeles and helped nurture the relationship of 18th Street Art Center with its community.

Peter McLaren, Professor

of Education of Graduate School in the Division of Urban Schooling at UCLA, gave a second interpretation of the notion of critical pedagogy first developed by Paulo Freire (19211997). Professor McLaren spoke about the effects of global capitalism in the current crisis in education Photo of Shelves at Conant Library, inkjet archival prints, 30â&#x20AC;? x 40:â&#x20AC;?, 2008

by MRC (which, in 1962, patented its first high speed test scoring machine). The ballot machine was developed under a petition by Robert Urosevich (the current CEO of Diebold, the company arguably responsible of much of the electoral fraud in 2000 and 2004). The second drawing represents the latest model of the most compact test-scoring machine currently manufactured and distributed by Scantron, a company located in Irvine, California. The company denied my request for access to its facilities.

Third, I worked with spatial distribution and used digital photography

to point to my own relationship with the technologies of my analysis. The photographs in the exhibition were displayed in three groups. These clusters corresponded to each archive consulted, and presented a combination of images, all digitally printed. The use of the scanner was in each instance at play, either presenting 4x5 photographs (prints from digitalized negatives) or straightforward digital prints of scanned material from the archives. The dialogue among this photographic material linked the content of the images with the way they were produced.

As part of this exhibition, I set up a series of panel discussions and

screenings, organized in collaboration with several artists and theorists. All of them enriched the scope of my project. These panels allowed me to link

and introduced his ideas about Revolutionary Critical Pedagogy. LA-based artists Dee Williams and Ashley Hunt discussed possibilities of knowledge production and questioned hierarchical models of education. In his presentation, Hunt reflected on the construction of the subject through his education, and discussed the types of models of radical pedagogy in which he is invested. Through her paper/ performance, Williams examined a chronology of changes in higher education in the United States since the 1960s.

An L.A. artist currently

working in Copenhagen, Hugo Hopping coordinated a discussion with curator Jeffrey C. Stewart, professor

and Chair of the Department of

Erlich and Ricardo Dominguez, among others, invited participants in the growing

Black Studies at UC Santa Barbara.

resistance to discuss the tension between democracy and privatization and the

Together they explored questions

responsibility of the state regarding access to public education.

governing relationships and forms

given in movements and situations

CRCA and the b.a.n.g. lab at Calit2, set up a film series titled “Demand Nothing,

where issues of identity have now

Occupy Everything.” The films ranged from documentation of political actions to

been transformed by social singularity

examinations of political theory and fictional accounts of important moments of

and subjectivity.

political unrest.

BIO

The last two events

Micha Cárdenas an artist/researcher in the Experimental Game Lab at

Through archival research Carla Herrera-Prats’ work comments on

responded to the recent protests

the cultural and economic transactions that flow, often invisibly, in the context of

against the University of California for

a transnational world. She was co-director of the gallery Acceso A in Mexico City

its mismanagement of its budget, and

and currently is part of the collaborative CAMEL. Herrera-Prats has shown her

the subsequent reduction in school

individual work in Canada, Colombia, Japan, Mexico, Philippines, Puerto Rico, and

resources and increase in student

the United States. Currently, Herrera-Prats is a Visiting Lecturer at the School of

tuition. A panel coordinated by a group

the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and taught at the Department of Visual and

of active students and teachers in the

Environmental Studies at Harvard University.

movement, such as Cara Baldwin, Ken Photo of Shelves from the Special Collections and University Archives, inkjet archival prints, 30” x 40”, 2008

MARTIN DURAZO

PAIN MANAGEMENT 100 39

pain Management 100

The Pain Management 100 project’s aim was to investigate the

the allure of drugs, rave culture vs.

parallels of the war on drugs and the legal proliferation of the medical

television and print advertisement of

pharmaceutical trade. At the root of any usage of drugs is the alleviation of

pharmaceuticals, and other artistic

pain. The project was intended as a “working laboratory” to explore attitudes

results of the project. This was to

and interpretations of drug interaction(s) and the resulting economy through

take the form of a public open studio

video interviews with the community, installations concerned with images of

during gallery hours, a simulated rave-like party, a traditional art

Jesus Malverde, found objects, dimensions variable, 2010

opening, and various artist talks.

This “laboratory” had the

task of taking in information and in turn creating an exhibition of artworks that reflected attitudes of public perception pertaining to the economy of drugs, both legal and illegal. This dynamic created a polemic whereby the artist is ultimately in charge of creating works of art versus those who contributed to the conversation possessing their own vision of what the works should look like. This created a situation by which I had to assume the position of traffic cop, negotiator, soothsayer, and artist. I welcomed the challenge. To attack this challenge, I had to reinvent the overall look of the

Fortune Fountains, found objects, acrylic spray paint, dimensions variable, 2010

space each week. Again, I found that

from these approaches are relatively without any provocative nature. It is

my practice proved to be daunting

the subject that infuses the work that lends it its provocative stance. It is the

due to my open approach. I find it

history of the object that matters in my work. This is truly where the work

difficult to describe my practice. I

finds its center. The work shifts, avoids, and creates dialogue. In shifting

work with found objects that become

forms from the sculptural of a Halloween mask that may stand on its own,

sculptures and that often become

it is becomes infused with a history of its illicit use. Masks are used to

full blown installations. With these

encourage truthful actions with concealment of identity. This McCarthyesque

objects I often create photo imagery

technique is used to capture moments while protecting participants.

and video productions that stand on

their own but that often interact with

relation to hallucinogenic drug use. In creating these works I used spray paint,

the installations themselves. I draw.

sgrafitto, and stencils to show a balance between order and chaos. In some

I paint. I work with clay.

of the work, there are images that allude to roads and buildings, but most are

ethereal voyages into deeper places of the mind. The paintings comprising

The objects that come

Paintings are abstract interpretations of emotional discharge in

Management is a single channel video whose imagery is culled from the opening sequence of the Danny Boyle film Trainspotting, (1996). The image of the main characters â&#x20AC;&#x153;fixingâ&#x20AC;? doses of heroin is manipulated into an inverse reality of pleasure without consequence. The image is slowed, sometimes reversed, mirrored and often blurred Jeus Malkverde, found objects, 2010

the formal art exhibit are given the name of series 1 and series 2 due to

of beautifully abstracted images.

their times of production. It was my interpretation that when pharmaceutical

The resulting images are ones that

companies are working on new types of drugs, they work in a series of

soothe and mesmerize.

experiments.

The sculpture Harmony and Long life takes light and the found

The trajectory of this

project was to create a laboratory

object to create a micro-utopia of questionable behavior. From afar this work

that investigated drug world

creates geometric light strobes that beautifully loom above the viewer. The

structures both legal and illegal. As

viewer is then drawn in to excavate what is creating the colorful vision. Upon

artists we are free of the constraints

closer examination the viewer discovers turntables with etched images in

that journalists, scientists, or

crystals that disperse light through helping hand magnifying lenses that also

business people have in our quest

have clips originally designed to hold craft and electronic devices. They now

to create and interpret information.

hold promotional cards for Las Vegas prostitutes, syringes, acrylic laser cut

It is my finding that it is the eye of

shapes of stars and skulls, and other toy-like ephemera. The intention of the

the artist that is in the best position

work is a simultaneous small and large environment so that one may ponder,

to translate what is happening in

be lost, and perhaps be found again.

the wide world of narcotics. This

The centerpiece of the exhibition is comprised of two parts: the

is to propose that the use, misuse,

video Pain Management and a seating area with old leather sofas. While

abuse, treatment, criminalization,

not technically a work of art, the seating area creates a place for viewers to

decriminalization, and, ultimately, the

become visitors and occasionally participants. The use of a used leather sofa

profiteering of narcotics is at best an

is an iconic symbol of the drug dealer/drug users environment. Visitors are

abstract, non-linear proposition.

encouraged to sit, be comfortable, and digest the exhibition. The video Pain

to the point that it is a presentation

Series 1 Paintings, acrylic spray paint on canavs, 2010

BIO

Martin Durazo is a

emerges as the slick technical savvy of video and sound gadgetry is balanced

multimedia artist and curator

by the raw energy of industrial materials such as clamps and martial arts

whose work is concerned with the

weapons like thrown ninja stars. The dense web of shifting structural poetry

intersection between elements of

created by his works invites and mesmerizes. He received his MFA from

high-design and the grittiness of

UCLA and BA from Pitzer College. Recent exhibitions have included solo

social subcultures. He is best known

shows at the Mark Moore Gallery, GalerĂa MDF in Mexico City, Harris Art

for creating large scale installations

Gallery at the University of LaVerne, Bank Gallery in L.A., and at Jail Gallery

combining video, sound, light, works

in L.A. From 1995 to 2003 Durazo co-owned and directed Miller-Durazo

on paper, readymade objects and

Contemporary Artists Projects and in 2007 created Empathy Design Company

performance. A sense of harmony

as a temporary curatorial/artist project. Special Dose, performance & installation (Claudia Huiza pictured), 2010

ANA GUAJARDO

TIANGUIS 45

TIANGUIS

Tianguis- the Nahuatl word for open-air markets dating from

urgent political present. As a vendor

the Mesoamerican period, and a term that is still in use today to describe

artist myself, I have been interested

marketplaces in Mexico—is a project examining a contemporary community

in doing a project with this community,

of vendor-artists in Los Angeles that sell their works in vibrant public

and it seemed an ideal opportunity

marketplaces that reinforce a powerful cultural history and activate the

to do this during 18th Street Art Center’s focus on artists and the

Ana Guajardo., I Heart Doorknocker L.A. installation incorporating seven 10”x10” mirrors and paper flyers, 2010

economy. Art and commodity are connected today more than ever as artists must creatively find ways to fund their work. The artists I collaborated with in the

Tianguis project created powerful installations and works for a gallery setting, something they are rarely asked to do as street vendors. Yet, this experience affirmed, that be it art or craft, there are undeniable aesthetic qualities in their works that draws people to patronize their work in the first place. Alongside the opening of the exhibition, I also curated a markeplace that took place simultaneously where the artists exhibiting in the gallery sold their works in an outdoor tianguisstyle setting. The purpose of this and other aspects of my project was

Daisy Tonantzin, Calendula, mixed media installation incorporating photographs, scale, mortar and pestle, and fresh herbs, 2010

to generate economic opportunities

in Victor Hugo Viescaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s article â&#x20AC;&#x153;The Battle of Los Angeles: The Cultural

for the artists, as well as to break

Politics of Chicana/o Music in the Greater Eastside.â&#x20AC;? Viesca considers

down the craft/ art hierarchy and

musical groups like Ozomatli, Quetzal and Quinto Sol that are followed by

examine the work of these artists in

a predominantly Latino audience. Similarly, Tianguis artists are not only

multiple contexts (from the street to

connected spatially through the neighborhood from which they emerge and

the gallery).

venues where they perform, but they are also bound by a politics of identity

and resistance responding to emerging conditions affecting ethnic, working-

The majority of the artists

I consider are women. Many are

class populations in Los Angeles. Viesca cites the rise of this scene as

mothers whose children have

coinciding with the shift to a post-industrial economy in L.A. that limited

grown up attending community

opportunities for youth in Eastside and Southside neighborhoods. This,

events and markets. I locate the

along with oppressive immigration propositions on the ballots during the

Tianguis participants in the same

90s, as well as the Zapatista rebellion in Chiapas, presented opportunities

socio-historical context discussed

for intervention and response by bands, artists, activists and audiences,

thus cultivating a vibrant cultural scene that “serves as a floating scene for

hop, artists work with materials,

resistance, a mechanism for calling an oppositional community into being

themes and elements that connect

through performance” (Viesca, 720). Bands were not the only performers in

to their indigenous lineages and

this context. Audiences also staged their political and cultural identities (not

urban environment. This is evident

necessarily always ethnic) by fashioning themselves with t-shirts, jewelry,

in the works on exhibit in the

purses, tattoos and other accessories designed by the vendors served as

Tianguis exhibition. Lisa Rocha

the backdrop for many events featuring these bands. In the context of Los

is a silversmith whose jewelry

Angeles’ globalized landscape, this community of Latina/o artists outfitted

incorporates the Mexican Day of

a local community, crafting goods that circulated in dance clubs, street

the Dead tradition through her use

festivals, community farms, art openings and people’s homes. This network

of calaveras (skulls), papel picado

of artists and vendors generated a new economy conscious of identity,

(cut paper flags used on altars), and

community, sustainability, global and local politics.

the cempazuchitl flower (marigold)

traditional to the holiday. Araceli

In the same way that Eastside bands incorporate and hybridize

traditions and influences such as son jarocho, banda, reggae, salsa and hip

Silva’s work threads the lineage of

Araceli Silva. Aztec Creator/Energy. Ometeotl is God of duality known as the creator himself...or herself, mixed media work incorporating a bracelet mounted on a loom with string and paper, 2010

her bracelet to the spiritual thought of our pre-Columbian ancestors, philosophies that remain a present force in the literary examples she visually links to her process. Tanya Melendez (Nena Soulfly) incorporates African fabrics and aesthetics into her urban fashions, relating to the presence of an often silenced heritage in Latino America.

East Los Angeles has

historically been recognized as a center for political and cultural activity with roots in the Chicana/o civil rights movement. Since 1972, Self Help Graphics and Art (SHG) opened its doors to many artists who later entered the art market and constituted a canon of Chicana/o visual artists that today continue to exhibit at

Felicia Montes, Ten Fe, mixed media installation commemorating the women of Juarez and women activists, 2010

major museums. While famous for its printmaking studio and

Year and others involve the participation of local crafters who provide a

gallery, this cultural space has

mercado (market) backdrop where audiences can access cultural goods

long been home to events where

unique to this community. Usually regarded as â&#x20AC;&#x153;vendorsâ&#x20AC;? rather than

generations of artists working in

artists, they are another significant and influential artistic flourishing that

music, performance, muralism,

can be traced to L.A. Eastside culture and identity. While this neighborhood

metal work and graffiti showcase

has served as a hub to unite them annually at specific events, their work and

their work, hone their craft and

residencies are not geographically confined here.

cultivate audiences. Annual events,

Locating Tianguis artists politically and spatially is only one aspect

Day of the Dead, their holiday sale,

of the project at 18th Street Art Center. The next step is to dialogue about

Botanica de Amor, Mexican New

and conceptualize how public spaces and lives are transformed by the

very presence of the mercado along with the goods that are exchanged in

the cycle of sustainability that

these events. I turn to Lewis Hyde’s The Gift to consider the art production,

takes place in these spaces. The

commodities, or perhaps we can even call them gifts created by Tianguis

Tianguis is therefore not the

artists:“Gifts are a class of property whose value lies only in their use and

vacuous experience of shopping at

which literally cease to exist as gifts if they are not constantly consumed.

a corporate store. It is a meeting

When gifts are sold, they change their nature as much as water changes

place where people linger and

when it freezes, and no rationalist telling of the constant elemental

convene, dialogue and discover,

structure can replace the feeling that is lost.”

as well as consume goods that

carry within their composition,

I propose that the artists and entrepreneurs I include in the

Tianguis exhibition make art that exists somewhere between a gift and

this experience into their personal

commodity. While they must sell their work to sustain their livelihoods

spaces and lives. Buying a book

(commodity) and continue to generate the gifts that not only feed the

from Elisa Garcia at Imix Books

local arts and political communities to which they belong, but to continue

or a mercado, a magnet from Lilia

Tanya Melendez aka Nena Soulfly,Mixed media installation incorporating fashions made by the artist, 2010 Dresses

Ramirez to place on your home

include Oshun’s Love in Yellow, vintage 1950s style dress, Nigerian ankara fabric, 100% wax print and The Hands of

Oshun, modern day summer dress, Nigerian ankara fabric, 100% wax print, 100% Indian silk tiess

refrigerator, or a necklace from Araceli Silva, is an act of sustaining not only a local economy, but the process of the philisophical, political and spiritual exchange that occured within the spatial and temporal contruct of the Tianguis. These commodities circulating are more gifts than goods for sale. They are art, but art that needs to be used to remain energetically relevant. It is the functionality of these works that activates their reciprocation into the process of sustaining community, inciting activism, and fostering healing.

Finally, with this in mind,

I return to the practical aspect of

sustainability: the economy. While

they play in bridging audience support to events and nurturing a political

the economy has dramatically

and cultural identity that keeps communities engaged in events, political

shifted, causing many stores and

movements and the continued artistic flourishing in the Los Angeles urban

venues where vendors sold to

landscape.

close their doors, artists continue to create and subsist through the

BIO

Ana Guajardo is an independent curator, UCLA World Arts and

community into which they have

Culture graduate student, and professional artisan and creator of Los

long breathed life. Currently, these

Switcheros, a line of handmade home décor products. Her line is sold in over

artist rely on local and national

two dozen stores nationwide as well as weekly events, festivals and conferences

stores such as Olveritas Village,

in the Los Angeles area and beyond. She has worked in a curatorial assistant

Casita del Pueblo, Mi Vida, and

capacity at the New Mexico Hispanic Cultural Center, the Museum of

Gypsy, as well as events like the

International Folk Art in Santa Fe, and has recently curated exhibitions in Los

Anti-Mall, Caracol Marketplace,

Angeles. She’s Crafty was her first exhibit presented at Imix Books in Eagle

Day of the Dead events, and

Rock, which showcased the work of Los Angeles artesanas including clothing

others. I find it necessary to build

and jewelry designers, urban healers, altar makers, papier-mache’ and other

a discourse around these artists

media. MaquiL.A., presented at SPARC similarly incorporated these artists and

and their work, particularly during

considered the interventions their works staged by creating alternative modes

these economic shifts. As one artist

of production and consumption in a city with the most sweat shops in the U.S.

noted, “we are the vendors with a

Guajardo organized a group of artisans as part of Suzanne Lacy’s performance

lower case ‘v,’ as opposed to the

project Stories of Work and Survival, presented as part of MOCA’s WACK! Art

artist with a capital ‘A’.” Breaking

and the Feminist Revolution. Her commitment as a curator is to exhibit cultural

down the art/craft hierarchy is

histories in which art plays a vital role to incite dialogue and action.

one way of finally acknowledging the valuable contribution these artist gift community spaces and events. Doing so can be helpful for organizations such as Self Help Graphics and others to continue the legacy of support they have offered to artists of all media. Reciprocally,

Tianguis artists should be viewed as a powerful resource in the role Elena Esparza. Alignment, mixed media installation, 2010 & South Central Farmers’ Cooperative

DORIT CYPIS

(looking 52

FABLAB for patterns) 53

FABLAB (looking for patterns) towards an economy of inner and inter action

Artist Dorit Cypis’ FabLab (looking for patterns), is a living and performing

laboratory centered around Cypis’ 40 year personal archive of research,

cultural context of all space/no-

collectibles and written reflection on her artistic practice; a practice exploring

time, FabLab is a looking lens

the psycho-physical-social-political dimensions of identity and social

scanning time and space, pulling

relations. FabLab is as intentional as it is chaotic, poetic as it is strategic —

at threads I have collected and that

looking to connect, while acknowledging uncertainty.

have collected me. This is a process

Through October and November FabLab will inhabit the 18th Street

In our technology driven

endlessly dimensional, tripping over/

Gallery as a personal research lab open to the public. During this time the

across myriad threads, small and

space will be converted into a shifting visual terrain of text, image, prop and

invisible as they may be, scream-

multi media; all evidencing the shifting, overlapping and dissonant patterns in

ing for my attention. Which of these

Cypis’ seminal investigations on interiority and the world, since age the age of

warrant (my) attention...soon to be

17, 1968.

re-framed to demand yours? How do

In December 2010, FabLab will host meetings of invited creative

my eyes shape an archive, for whose

professionals from local communities in the arts, education, mediation, social

posterity and for whose scrutiny?

activism and somatic arts to engage, critique, expand, adapt and further the

discourse; as well as propose new tools for inner and inter engagement. On

process that has many built in traps

December 18th, 2010, Cypis will present a performative event that will be as

of uncertainty, doubt, hesitancy and

whimsical as it may be practical, inviting the public to witness the artist as she

failure even as it posits the possibility

inner/inter reflects and scrutinizes her own work.

of visibility, recognition, engagement

FabLab is a performative

and relationship building. I am looking

October 16, 2010

for patterns in nature, in physics, in

textiles, in architecture, in psychic life;

David, you are a perfect audience across virtual space and time.

We know each other, in my estimation dearly, through many years of rich

patterns that are visible and invis-

embodied exchanges across complex terrains of our personal and cultural

ible, mirroring, reflecting, simulating,

histories and questions on meaning, identity, and community. If I think of “my

attracting, repelling, continuous and

archive,” then I must consider our exchange threads too, engagements that

disturbed. There is not life without pat-

have certainly challenged, provoked and warmed me.

tern and its shadow.

History Scale (storage), 2000/2010 pine wood, clear adhesive tape, felt tip pen, bubble-wrap, hooks, nylon thread variable dimensions

In my studio and in my

flesh, the writerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s body, for self-knowledge...or at the very least for self-

home, as I move boxes, unwrap,

recognition. From here, many years later, I sense this early quest as one

open doors and drawers, I find

towards empathy for myself and I nod in recognition of a value that I now

histories that I have many years

highly honor as essential for engagement with others. To value you, I must

previously packed and put away.

value myself...easier said than done when the body carries histories of denial,

Messages from the past waft out

distortion, sacrifice and sublimation. To succeed at reaching you, I must come

and catch my attention. Some are

from and through reaching towards myself.

handwritten stories, in the then

present of another past, earnestly

made, wings of insects, placards and signs, inherited paintings, photographs

seeming to have needed to capture

and memories, not my own. I am looking at not having looked at before, to

some truth, imploring myself and

see again, or anew, or not at all what I once saw, to revisit yesterday from

others towards this or that emotion,

today and build capacity for engagements of tomorrow. What interests me

or insight. Texts, drawings, pictures,

is the uncertainty and compulsion towards an engagement with difference,

all traces of deft-digging, thrashing,

mine-and-yours. We are destined to be in relation, potentially generative and

sometimes burning through ossified

annihilating. It is a dance inside-outside-in, analogous in physics to a Lorentz

Here are textiles I have woven, books collected, images found and

Flow Charts, 2006-2010, flow chart paper, clips, felt tip pen variable dimension

Attractor reflecting symmetrical states that occasionally flip between them-

was entrenched by my own familyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s

selves, same yet different in perpetual and reciprocal movement.

fragmentation and internalization of past loss, having survived cultural

October 17, 2010

Today I write of engagement, a symmetrical flip to the anxiety of

yesterday. How bound up they are in each other. Engagement is as necessary as it is inevitably human. How sad that culturally we have lost a capacity to engage effortlessly with one another, that more often than not our engagements have to be carefully framed, designed and made intentional. Our age is one of hyper individuality, privatization and consumption that have eroded potential civic collectivity. Urban public spaces that once invited and contained random wandering, sitting, hanging out in close proximity to others, are few and far between, especially in Los Angeles.

I was raised to believe that survival was an individualâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s lot in life, not

a collective one, as the collective historically has lost its power. This belief

genocide, social annihilation in Eastern Europe, further entrenched by contemporary late capitalism and our cultureâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s refusal to look critically at itself, yet in love with endlessly consuming its own reflection.

Happily there are many of

us questioning this status quo, especially now that more and more of us feel our self-entrapment; a happy consequence of the failing empire. So what of social engagement

and how to begin trusting the other again? Almost a decade ago this question

tural, theatrical and performative

brought me to formally study the psycho-social dynamics of chronic cultural

strategies to frame the architec-

conflict and the strategies of intentional conflict transformation; a great

tural space of 18th Street Gallery,

segue to challenge my own ambivalence, mistrust and voyeuristic tendencies â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

to order/re-order, frame/re-frame,

tendencies that not only kept me away from recognizing myself, but from

juxtapose/overlap, play with form

understanding the differences in others.

and content and to reveal strategies

of looking. On the psycho-social side,

Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s easy to live as a self-inhaling victim. I choose to witness patterns

of my own bias, recognize wisdoms learned and further build my capacity to

pedestrian and direct, FabLab is a

develop critical and creative tools that celebrate the uniqueness of individuality

Status Report using strategies of

and the necessity for collective generative action.

anthropology, archeology and psychology to explore identity as shifting internal and social processes,

October 18, 2010

FabLab, Phase 1: setting aesthetic, conceptual, virtual and physical

stages for synthesizing personal inner reflection and public inter engagement.

reflection and critical social engagement.

These stages will evolve through December 2010.

dependent on ongoing critical self

On the aesthetic side, abstract and discursive, FabLab uses sculpInstallation view of FABLAB, 18th Street Art Center Gallery, 2010

Journals, 1968-2010, personal journals, variable dimensions

October 25, 2010

Today the storage space of my studio in Chinatown, and a corner of

my home living room have been connected with FabLab at 18th Street, via a live web cam. These spaces I inhabit now can fold in/with/through the work at FabLab.

BIO

Dorit Cypis employs strategies of photography, performance,

installation and social sculpture to explore identity via interiority and corporeal experience, history and psychosocial meaning, political affect and social relations. Cypis’ presentations are often immersive laboratories abstracting form and meaning to expose paradox and possibility.

Dorit Cypis’ work has been presented internationally at the Whitney

Museum of American Art, International Center of Photography, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Orange County Museum, Walker Art Center, Musee d’Art Contemporain/ Montreal, Musee des Beaux Arts/Bruxelles, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Orange County Museum of Art, as well as many international galleries and artist spaces.

She has received numerous awards including the National Endowment

for the Arts, Japan Foundation, Bush, McKnight, Jerome, Ordway, Durfee Foundations, City of Los Angeles Cultural Arts Department and the Fellows of Contemporary Art. Placards and Tubes, 2010, picket signs, document tubes, documents, variable dimensions

MAKING CHANGE 60

ELENA SIFF

MAKING CHANGE

I came to activism in my life and in my art through my son, Noah

NEA grant. I was given a storefront

Erenberg, who at two years old was diagnosed with autism. Until he was 21

for three months and created a large

years old, my life was consumed with fighting for him in the very challenging

circular structure. On the outside of

public school system and finding the best resources available. Years later I

the structure were quotes by people

ended up becoming a licensed supported living vendor through the State of

with differences in text and in Braille

California, as all the other supported living agencies he had been with were so

such as “You have to make thunder!”

unsatisfactory. Now Noah and I can hire (and fire) as needed, the people

“You have to speak for your rights!”.

who give him support in his home. As Noah had always been encouraged

to be creative, living in a family of artists, he has evolved into a very good

included images of people

painter and has shown his work across the country and in Europe. He had

representing all eras and styles

a very successful exhibition at the Drawing Center in New York early on in his

of art history. The public was

professional career. After I had advocated for him fiercely for 21 yrs, I turned

encouraged to add art/messages/

my energies to making art, being inspired by the experiences of people with

offerings of all kinds. My hope with

differences. I created SPEAKING THUNDER, an installation shown at the

the Santa Monica Place installation

Santa Barbara Museum and later at Santa Monica Place, supported by an

was to alert the shopkeepers in the

The inside of the structure

shopping center that people with Dave Quick, Mother Earth, 2009, mixed media,

differences can make excellent dependable employees. However, no jobs were created as a result of the installation, although I approached each merchant individually. Unemployment is a huge issue and problem for people with differences.

More recently I devoted

two years. Of my life to curating

RADIANT SPACES:PRIVATE DOMAIN, an exhibition of art from

artists with differences from all

shops opened by artists with differences, some managed by the artists

over California. This exhibition was

themselves and some by their families. There are autism teams on ETS;,

presented at Track 16 Gallery, Santa

a great source of support for families.

Monica, Irvine Fine Arts Center

and at the Wignall Museum in

valuable resources are wasted through war/corruption/greed and our natural

Rancho Cucamonga. We produced

world is being destroyed. We must learn to live lightly on the earth! I do not

a wonderful catalogue from this

see enough artists taking on these issues when I go to see exhibitions these

exhibition, which is on sale in the

days. I decided to seek out activist artists onETSY and artists locally to create

MAKING CHANGE store.

the MAKING CHANGE store and have found some powerful work as a result.

The MAKING CHANGE store is as an extension of my activism: Empowering

The internet is a powerful

Over the years I have become more actively outraged about how our

and valuable tool for the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;disabilityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;

the artist/artisan/craftsperson:

community. Support groups are

numerous. There are now ETSY

these days and are marketing their creations in new and innovative ways, with

Artists and craftspeople are taking matters into their own hands

Installation shot, Making Change, 18th Street Arts Center Project Room, 2010

Elena Siff, Material World, digital print on photo paper, 2010

the internet playing a major role in this new artistic economy.

a chance to sell their creations in the

I have an on-line store on ETSY http://www.etsy.com/shop/

ElenaMary as do many other artists in the MAKING CHANGE store. A list of all

Project Room during the 3 month

the on-line ETSY stores is available to customers on 18th Street’s website.

residency, and if they also have

ETSY stores, on-line as well through

This method of selling does away with the middleman, the brick and

mortar gallery/store, which usually takes a 30 to 50 % commission, cutting

Decemeber 23, 2010. Art to be

significantly into the artist’s profits. My three-month residency involves

found in the Making Change store:

setting up an actual marketplace in the 18th Street Project Room and a virtual

painting, sculpture, books, posters,

marketplace via ETSY with some of the same creations on-line. The ETSY

prints, fabric art, toys, jewelry and

artists in this project have all been interviewed about their political views on

functional objects of all kinds. The

the MAKING CHANGE blog: http://artofmakingchange.blogspot.com/

Center for Political Graphics has

generously lent many powerful

I have invited artists to create objects which address an activist

perspective— art which deals with issues of politics and the environment.

Participating artists have

posters to the MAKING CHANGE

store. Best of all, artists get 100% of any sale. I take no commission.

last 13 years and was started mod-

The store is open Thur/Fri/Sat from 12:30 pm to 5pm until

estly in Santa Barbara, California in

December 23, 2010.I hope my 3-month residency at 18th. Street Arts Center

1995 with 12 women. Elena Siff also

translates into arenewed sense of political awareness for my customers

is an active book maker and creates

during this volatile political season and a financial success for the artists

unique book objects, which have

whose work is on view.

been in many international exhibi-

BIO

Elene Siff has been a mixed media artist for the last 30 years (col-

lage, assemblage, installation, unique book objects) and has also curated

tions and are sold through Vamp and Tramp Booksellers.

several large exhibitions such as The Magic Show, an exhibition of international mail art in 1983, Southern California Assemblage: Past and Present for the Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum and the Museum of Santa Cruz in 1986. In 2004 Siff curated Radiant Spaces: Private Domain, an exhibition of the work of 80 artists from all over California who are challenged with developmental differences. This exhibition was presented in three venues in Southern California. She also is the co-founder of Women/Beyond Borders, an international exhibition, which has been traveling around the world for the Elena Siff, Power, digital print on bristol board, 2009

Urban Based Design Planning

Martin Durazo

Pain Management 101

GLOW

Howling at the Sun

Pasillos Annual Benefit Dinner

Featuring Dave Hickey

Los Angeles Marathon BAM fest Santa Monica Mall Video Project Santa Monica Festival ArtNights

EVENTS

& PROJECTS

James Rojas

JAMES ROJAS

Urban Based Design Planning

18th Streetâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 2010 Latino CAPS project, funded by the City of Santa Monica, commissioned artist and city planner James Rojas to work closely with the Pico Youth and Family Center, devising through playful sculptural exercises new spatial models that allowed the young participants to re-envsion their community.

MARTIN DURAZO

Pain Management 101

The Experimental Documentary Video Workshop (EDVW) in partnership with Virginia Avenue Park Teen Center in Santa Monica has been developed by Martin Durazo to engage local Santa Monica teens in the filmmaking process while sharing dialogue and information with them on issues related to illegal and legal drug use. The workshop is to be informed by Durazoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Artist Residency and exhibition at 18th Street Arts Center titled Pain Management 100. Durazo will lead the young adults through all the phases of developing and creating a short experimental documentary film. Young people will explore the current trends and issues involved in legal pharmaceutical drug use and the illegal drug trade and be encouraged to tap into their own diverse backgrounds so that they can create a vision that best represents their views and their community. For many young people, this is the first time they will be afforded the opportunity to express their views on this important subject in a creative and powerful way.

glow 18th Street, in partnership with L.A. Commons, sponsored Howling at the Sun. According to the Tongva/Gabrielino, native people that once populated Santa Monica, Sun and Sky Coyote once per year came together in a great gambling match to determine the fate of the Earth. A crowd-pleasing performance of mythic proportions between Nigerian drummer Najite Agindotan (Sun) and Afro-Cuban drummer Angel Luis Figueroa (Sky Coyote) began at 7 and went into the early morning hours. From rival drum camps in real-life, African vs. Afro-Cuban, they gambled until the fate of the earth was revealed. What that fate may be is only known to them!

pasillos (Hallway galleries) Special exhibitions are presented in our Pasillos galleries throughout the year. Clockwise: Darlene DiBona, Tattoo Paradise; Clayton Campbell, Digital Wagner; Rick Mendoza, A taste of LA via the writings of Jim Marquez; Sk8Dk Pandemonium, Group exhibit

annual BENEFIT dinner 18th Streetâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s annual benefit dinner featured speaker Dave Hickey, whose musings on the state of arts education provoked a lively after discussion. The video of his talk is on-line at 18thstreet.org.

Above:Artists Laddie John Dill and Ed Moses with Diane Vanderlip.

bove: Featured guest speaker Dave Hickey

Left: L.A. Louver owner Peter Goulds and Mrs. Goulds with Bronya Galef

Above: Attendees enjoyed artwork that was projected form previous to current artists

LOS ANGELES marathon Our annual marathon benefit was held last March amidst great fanfare, merriment, and tired feet!

Left: Jan Williamson joins friends Above: Nicole Gordillo passes mile 25!

Above: Max Roussel-Kennar crosses the finish line and makes the grown ups look bad; Right: Amber Jones poses for the camera with volunteer Maira Ascencio

BAM FEST 18th Street, in association with popular Santa Monica restaurant Library Alehouse, brought the first Craft Beer Festival to the Westside of L.A. B.A.M. Fest, which stands for Beer, Art and Music Festival, is a celebration of locally produced art, music and the finest craft beers around. Elena Siff (Project Room) and Create/Fixate (18th Street Gallery) presented a unique installation exhibit, and numerous bands entertained the huge crowd.

Santa Monica Place Mall Video Project 18th Street, in partnership with the new Santa Monica Place Mall, commissioned media artist Ben Caldwell to curate six one-hour video programs that are beamed on to the floor of the Colorado Avenue entryway into the mallâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s main courtyard. Entitled

Gateless Gates/Where Land and Water Meet, it included artists Michael Miner, Masha Vasilkovsky, Carlos Spivey, and Adrien Beard as well as Ben Caldwell.

SANTA MONICA FESTIVAL Artist Marcus Kuilland-Nazario held workshops at the Santa Monica Festival, working with families and children in a hands-on crafts workshop.

artnight, February 7 Clockwise: At the opening of Love in a Cemetery artist extrordinaire Andrea Bowers takes a pic; Otis College of Art President Sammy Hoi and the inimitable Suzanne Lacy make a point; Aztec Dance blesses the gallery; Santa Monica College students on display in the Pasillos Gallery.

artnight, May 1 Clockwise: While Carla Herrera-Pratts and Mattias Merkel Hess open their exhibitions, participants in the Highways Rising Stars Youth Slam light up the night on our parking lot stage; Yette Gellis drapes the property with a vibrant installation; Artistic Director Clayton Campbell and 18th Street Board President Lori Harris are down with fine art!

artnight, August 7 Clockwise: The fabulous Darlene DiBona in front of her exhibit of tattoo art in the Pasillos; Old Memories SGV car club struts their stuff; Massaro plays a mean guitar during Martin Durazoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Pain Management 100 exhibit; 18th Street Program Coordinator Ronald Lopez with g727 Gallery Director Adrian Rivas and curator and 18th Street Board member Pilar Tompkins.

artnight, October 23 Clockwise: Sonia Santos, Ana Gazzola and Brasil Brazil live on stage; Performer from Sexorcism: Eyelashes of the Damned presented at Highways Performance Space; Pasillos II, Sk8dk Pandemonium, group show to benefit 18th Street; Open studio of visiting Taiwanese artist Chen Ching-Yao .

INTER VISITING ARTISTs NATIONAL

wong kwan

zhao liyin

University of hong kong internship program In our first partnership with the Chinese University of Hong Kong, arts management MFA specialists Liyin and Kwan spent two months with us and were involved with every aspect of arts management at 18th Street. In particular, they worked closely with our 2011 Pacific Standard Time exhibition by researching and prepping a major historical exhibition of performance artists from the 1960’s and 1970’s. Both students left Los Angeles with a deeper appreciation and knowledge of nonprofits arts management in the United States.

cios irinA

CEC artslink fellow

Our second residency sponsored by CEC Arts Link brought Irina Cios, art critic, curator and director of the International Center for Contemporary Arts (ICCA) in Bucharest, for a six week residency. Cios oversaw ICCA’s transition in 1999 from the Soros Center for Contemporary Arts to its current form. She has managed many local and international collaborative projects, curated exhibitions and lectured and written about important trends in contemporary Romanian art. Cios spent her residency learning more about audience development and observing the effects of artistic practices and public artwork on communities throughout Los Angeles.

stepinski

Maciek

trust for mutual understanding visiting artistS Roads and highways have inspired Maciek Stepinskiâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work since his post-grad days in France, where he created photos and films about the dehumanized nature of transportation infrastructure. So, fittingly, Maciekâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work in Los Angeles looked at our particular breed of car culture. Maciek Stepinksi, untitled, pencil and ink on paper, 2010

In a city that was instantly

familiar from Hollywood movies, he was still astonished by the altered sense of scale and distance created by freeways that go through cities instead of skirting them, as is common in Europe. After driving around town in a rented Mustang convertible, Maciek made drawings and videos, including a large-scale drawing that he intends to continue in Poland. Maciek has two solo shows scheduled in Poland and France that will feature his work from L.A., and he hopes to return next year for a show in Culver City, in which he will revamp the image of a vintage economy car, the Polish Fiat 126p.

Maciek Stepinksi, untitled, pencil and ink on paper, 2010

krakowiak kasia

trust for mutual understanding visiting artistS

Mixed-media artist Kasia Krakowiak explores different formats in her projects, combining elements of research, drawing and experimentation to investigate locations and spaces. While at 18th Street, she used her urban planning/architecture background and her European perspective to look closely at how the American Dream is evidenced in open and undetermined spaces. Specifically, she chose to look at California City, a planned community near Death Valley that suffered from some neglect earlier in its history but is experiencing a revival. Kasia interviewed planners and documented the empty spaces of that city in panoramic images; she plans on returning to visit the city in November. The work she accomplished at 18th Street will be included in a book, White Elephant, to be published in January of 2011. Kasia enjoyed having the time to develop and accomplish a project during her first ever two-month residency, and was inspired to do productive work with her time here.

California City planning document

Kasia Krakowiak, untitled, photograph, 2010

bravo hernain

jumex foundation visiting artist Visual artist Hernain Bravo found it difficult to produce a body of work during his stay at 18th Street due to social constraints: how do you stage an intervention in which you place a mattress in a shopping cart and light it on fire in a city where the police will pull you over for riding a bicycle on the sidewalk? That was a frustrating experience, but

Hernain Bravo, Puente, on site intervention, 2006

during his stay Hernain was able to develop several ideas and realize

learning about Los Angeles,

them virtually, including a village of homeless people in a parking

particularly the homeless

lot and an intervention where the LoJack system on a shopping cart

community. Hernain was struck

would be bypassed with four sticks of butter. He also spent time

by the discrepancy between the almost hippie lifestyle found

Hernain Bravo, Curvilineo, on site intervention, 2006

among the Venice homeless and the true destitution found Downtown. He works with the homeless in Mexico too, and thinks that his observations from this residency will inform his future work.

sungpil han

Gyeonggi cultural foundation visiting artist Han Sungpil is the first Korean visual artist in residence sponsored by the Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation. Known for his site-specific murals, the artist researched the public mural painting tradition for which Los Angeles is known. Working directly on safety fabric, which is then installed in front of existing structures, Han continued this work at 18th Street working with local history and imagery derived from his experiences while in residence. Site-specific screen murals, Korea

oak jung ho

asian cultural council visiting artists While in residency at 18th Street, Jung Ho Oak, an artist known for his on-site interventions, created a series of panoramic photos of Koreatown here in Los Angeles. He was surprised to discover that Koreatown was larger than both Little Tokyo and Chinatown, and to find many stores named after famous places in Korea, something both familiar and

Jung Ho Oak, Untitled, video, 2010

totally alien, as stores in Korea arenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t named after local famous locations. The panoramas seek to capture Oakâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s experience of Koreatown, particularly the scale. Back in the studio, Oak was happy to have an opportunity to work on projects in peace and quiet. Jung Ho Oak, Untitled, video, 2010

nyandak tsering

asian cultural council visiting artists Tsering Nyandak is the first Tibetan artist to be in residence at 18th Street. He lives and works in Llasa, Tibet, and is part of a dynamic community of contemporary painters and visual artists. During his residency he developed new paintings, but also shared his knowledge of the Tibetan contemporary arts scene, which is generally under-represented in the West where we tend to think more of their traditional culture.

Tsering Nyandak, Flight with Baloon, acrylic and oil on cnaves, 2006

Tsering Nyandak, Penile Power, wood paint and shoeshine, 2009

liu

Shih-tung taiwan Council for cultural affairs visiting artists

Mixed-media artist Liu Shih-Tung uses collage, drawing and fresco to create new images out of familiar materials. At 18th Street, Liu worked with images from local magazines and newspapers, leaves and bark from trees at 18th Street, his own hair, and flowers from around Santa Monica, as well as paint and, most recently, clear resin. With these materials, he creates fantastical paintings that encourage viewers to stretch their imaginations and consider how familiar images can join together and become new works of art. Liu achieves this unity by paying attention to the details of a painting, looking at the ways the individual parts interact instead of the image as a whole. His previous work aimed to address the role of human structures in the environment. During his residency, Liu sought to learn through the difficulties of adapting to an unfamiliar culture, while observing the art scene in Los Angeles.

Shih-Tung Liu, Untitled, mixed media painting, 2010

chen

chING-yao

taiwan Council for cultural affairs visiting artists Ching-Yao Chen’s tableau-style photography has been developed over a period ten years, investigating themes which are a reinterpretation of a Chinese technological encyclopedia from the Ming Dynasty. The collision of nostalgic and contemporary notions results in a commentary on our ongoing reception of technology as a cultural imperative. At 18th Street the artist continued working on

People with Dogs- Sargeant Kiroro, laser image on photo, 2008

his “restaurant project” begun in 2009 while in residence at Location One in New York. His new work presents a series of surrealistic images of people of various ethnic backgrounds, as a way of investigating racial issues in countries other than China.

Overlock Sewing Machine, laser image on photo paper, 2007

sauer

birgit

Birgit Sauerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s residency at 18th Street culminated in a show,

Permanent is Nowhere, at the OMC gallery in Huntington Beach. The paintings, a series created during her stay, incorporate imagery from her travels in Southern California and Nevada, combining these experiences with subjective/emotional distortion and embellishment, the interaction between internal and external perceptions. Of course, this style of enhanced-reality painting is indicative of Birgitâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work as a whole. Her images seek to address the fleetingness of moments as seen through the lens of the human experience. While at 18th Street, Birgit enjoyed having the time to work out her ideas and collaborations with other artists, and will be returning for another residency in the near future.

Birgit Sauer, from Permanent is Nowhere series, oil on wood, 2010 Birgit Sauer, from Permanent is Nowhere series, oil on wood, 2010

fox

chris

AUSTRALIA Council FOR THE ARTS VISITING ARTIST Fantastical inventor Chris Fox initially planned on using his 18th Street residency to explore an imaginary infrastructure for his Salon

Jetpack project, mapping routes of transportation between hair salons for a community of coiffure-dependent jetpack users. The jetpacks, designed and created by Chris before his residency, are both whimsical and visionary, seemingly functional objects helmed by brightly colored retro hairdos. Once he started exploring hair salons in the various neighborhoods of Los Angles, though, Chris started to think about the people who would use this network, and decided to

Chris Fox, Salon Jetpackers - Bob, 2010 (Photography: Josh Raymond, Styling: Tawny Featherston, Makeup and Hair: Erika Diehl)

focus on filling out the story behind this community of Jetpackers. And so the project changed direction, culminating in a location and studio photo shoot, complete with models, makeup artists, stylists and props. This residency led to a shift in the way Chris thinks about his work: now, he aims to focus on the storytelling behind his art, creating a larger narrative out of his inventions. Chris Fox, Salon Dock - Ponytail, 2010

ebtekar

ala

visions from the new california fellow Ala Ebtekar is one of six visual artists in California to be a recipient of the 2010 Visions from the New California award, selected from a pool of over 180 visual artists statewide. Of Iranian descent, Ala explores the formality, spirituality and social realities of Iranian culture and the implications of being a member of the Iranian diaspora community in the United States. His residency is supported by a partnership grant between The James Irvine Foundation and the Alliance of Artists Communities. Ala Ebtekar, â&#x20AC;&#x153;Returning Of The Sunâ&#x20AC;?, acrylic, watercolor, and ink on book pages mounted on canvas, 2010

LOCAL IN RESIDENCE ARTISTS

ABAIT LUCIANA

Luciana Abaitâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work is all about the creation of livable environments and new realities where beings adapt and turn into something else to survive. She finds it fascinating to mix elements from different parts of the world to create something new: tiny swimmers float through gardens, model insects camouflage themselves inside buildings, and the silhouettes of hummingbirds are made from images of flowers. Creatively, Luciana has been experimenting with construction using painted

Luciana Abait, Untitled#80866 from Mixed Nature series, mixed media on wood panel, 2009

materials, like two-by-fours and

working on a new series where imaginary worlds are constructed out

curtains. Looking ahead, she is

of found elements and toy furniture. Her work will be featured in the photography book Rap-10. Sheâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s also taking part in the Sketchbook

Project, a traveling library-style project where artists fill a book with work devoted to a certain subject, and then the books are taken on tour and checked out like library books. At the end, the books will end up in the Brooklyn Art Library. Luciana also had/will have shows in Greece, Chicago, Buenos Aires, Provincetown, MA, and Santa Monica.

ALBUQUERQUE

LITA

This was an unusual year for Lita Albuquerque: usually she’s busy with exhibitions, but this year she stopped to focus on a few specific projects. One proposed project for the city of Paris is a continuation of her work mapping the position of the stars on the surface of the earth. In the installation, she intends to place large gold balls on the Place de la Concorde in exact alignment with the stars above, to be installed by a team of skydivers wearing gold jumpsuits and parachutes, designed by the artist. In addition to that, Lita is working with 18th Street Artistic Director Clayton Campbell to re-create her 1978 work Spine of the Earth as part of the 2011 Pacific Standard Time project, organized by the Getty Foundation. These days, her inspiration seems to find its roots in performance. She continues to teach in the grad program at Art Center College of Design.

Lita Albuquerque, L’avenue du Roi Soleil, Proposal for “LA Nuit Blanche”

LIGHTNING BOLT PIX MICHAEL w. BARNARD

An accomplished filmmaker

and photographer, Michael W. Barnard has kept busy securing a distributor for his featurelength documentary, Santa

Monica 90404. Most importantly, he published a limited-edition book, 100 Waves, a collection of sketches going back 50 years chronicling his experiences surfing all over the world. He completed a short film for the

Michael W. Barnard, 100 Waves, 2009

20th anniversary of 18th Street, featuring interviews with past and

filming across the Southwestern

present artists. Currently, he is working on finishing a documentary

United States and Kentucky.

on solar spectrum artist Peter Erskine and started work as the head of production and DP on an as-of-yet untitled feature, which lead to

Michael W. Barnard, Photofield #89, giclee print mounted on aluminum,2009

BERNE MICHELLE

Michelle Berne is a multidisciplinary, multi-media artist who specializes in community celebration art. She has created processions, “people-powered” parades, spectacles, and sitespecific performances featured in events such as the Grand Opening of the Getty Center;the Mark Taper Center for Inner-City Arts in Los Angeles; and the Los Angeles Music Center’s 30th anniversary celebration. Michelle Berne’s work incorporates music and dance with monumentally-scaled fabric and papier-mache’ sculpture, giant puppets, masks, costumes and body adornments to co-create colorful and imaginative community events.

Michelle Berne, Working in studio, 2010

CAMPBELL CLAYTON

This year, 18th Street’s Artistic Director Clayton Campbell continued to tour his traveling exhibit Words My Son Has

Learned Since 9/11; recent destinations include the WYSPA Art Institute in Gdansk, Poland, the Nam June Paik Arts Center in Korea, andthe Aaran gallery in Tehran, Iran. He also showed

Wotan Wills Brunnhilde into Sleep and Mortality; from Digital Wagner, 24 photographs for the L.A. Opera’s production of Richard Wagner’s The Ring Cycle, 2010

After Abu Ghraib, his work about human rights abuse and torture,

Spring ArtNight. As for future projects, Clayton is working on a video

at the Aaran gallery. Back at

art wall installation for the critical care ward at St. John’s hospital in

18th Street, Clayton showed

Santa Monica, featuring healing and restorative imagery. Creatively,

Digital Wagner, an interpretation

Clayton continues to experiment with digital media, specifically

of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, at the

the reprogramming of digital photo files to create altered finished photos. He remains a social commentator and storyteller, working in a narrative representational style.

The Gods Cross Over into Valhalla; from Digital Wagner, 24 photographs for the L.A. Opera’s

production of Richard Wagner’s The Ring Cycle, 2010

FOR THE ARTS

CALIFORNIA LAWYERS

California Lawyers for the Arts celebrated their 35th anniversary this year with their third annual Artistic License Awards ceremony this May. In addition to the festivities, the organization continued to serve the artistic community by providing educational workshops on a variety of relevant issues (copyright and trademark law, health insurance basics, and how to navigate the world of independent film, to name a few), offering lawyer referrals (where artists can, for a nominal referral fee, speak to a lawyer for half an hour free of charge), and by running dispute mediation and resolution meetings. Last year they offered 30 educational workshops, serving 587 individuals, and helped a further 377 in mediation and referral services.

The staff at their Artistic License Awards this year at the William Turner Gallery with First Lady of California Maria Shriver

STUDIO CONTINUUM

Through our workshops and classes we are led into experiencing these undulating wave and spiraled movements as bio-cosmic sources of renewal. These movements resonate with a variety of inner intelligences that reveal a wide range of kinetic vocabularies. In this, movement becomes the message, the messenger, and the nutrient...MOVING MEDICINE.

We thrive by expanding the scope of our sensory experience,

leading us to access alternative streams of life. Our movements become fractals of universal motifs orchestrating themselves within our versatile tissue. No longer bound in limited time/space, we move freely within the universe of our organism. Our description of the human body emerges as a continuum of creative possibilities freely expressing the dexterity of an encompassing life.

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MONTAGE

CONTINUUM

Continuum Montage is an organization founded by Susan Harper, which offers workshops and seminars in the U.S., Europe, Japan, and Canada. Susan Harper offers Continuum Movement events, Emâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;oceans and Sensations Trainings, and Portals of Perception seminars with Hubert Godard. Susan teaches a wide range of skills and inquiry in the fields of movement, emotions, shock and trauma resolution, dreams, perception and relationships. These experiential contexts are relevant for professional therapists, somatic educators, bodyworkers, and anyone interested in the creative art of living. The intention of Susanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s work is to elaborate somatic awareness, emotional communication, creative expression, movement and thinking. Artist, Kristy Schaefle works with Susan to produce and care for these events.

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DAKIN SUE

18th Street co-founder and artist Sue Dakin is expecting immanent publication of her long-awaited book, An Artist For President, chronicling her presidential campaign in 1984, when she ran for President of the United States, on An “Artist for President” platform. Sue’s concept was that we need to become a nation of artists, honing the necessary skills and taking responsibility for the work we create. If that happens, then eventually we’ll end up with an artist for President. This might get the nation out of its troubles, because artists are creative problem solvers. She sees politics as a form of “systems sculpture”. The thing is, one artist can’t do it all alone, thus the need for a whole nation. Once the frenzy over the book dies down, Sue intends to return to working on more tactile forms of sculpture, and finishing her novel that’s been sitting on the back burner.

sculpture fragment from the buried past:

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Bird Man attempting to play Harmonica

from the Summer Solstice press conference: Uncle Sam on stilts

DAY MARINA

This has been a year of creative transitions for Marina Day. Formerly more of a conceptual/ideas-oriented artist, working in binges as she developed her thoughts, Marina tried something different in the summer of 2009 with her100 Daze piece, where she created a small work every day for 100 days. The result was a more emotional form of art, a kind of visual journaling where the images are capable of bringing her back instantly to any given day out of the 100. The creative excitement comes from embracing the uncertainty of what the final product will be. Marina continues to work primarily with old objectsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;letters, comics, prescriptions, bits of fabricâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;in her collages; they have a kind of energy about them from having been handled in the past, and she holds onto them for a while before she feels that their energies would work well in a particular piece. She is also looking forward to a show at the Pavel Zoubok gallery in New York in November of 2011.

Brother, mixed media on paper, 2009

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DOERrER KARL

After earning his BFA from Rutgers this past May, Karl Doerrer-

interpretation up to the viewer.

Attaway headed out to California in October and began his residency

Karl also participated in a Haiti

at 18th Street this February. Heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s been working on his first series of

benefit art show at Bergamot

work since his arrival, and plans on having a preview show of about

Station this year.

three pieces this coming February. Karl sees his art as his version of a Rorschach test, but more fun: a way for people to interact with art on an individual level and then talk about their perceptions with others. His paintings are abstract and intentionally ambiguous, so everyone can see different things; he tries to keep it simple, leaving

Karl Doerrer, Blimp #28, acrylic and resin on canvas stretched on wooden board frame, 2010.

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FOX

BERNADETTE

Bernadette Fox continued to use â&#x20AC;&#x153;houseâ&#x20AC;? as her base material this year, as work on her current intervention progressed. For this project, Bernadette has taken a house in Santa Monica and systematically reconfigured it by removing and repositioning sections of the building. The resulting transformation explores the release of space and the collapse of systems, as observers find their perceptions of the house expanded via the alteration of the space. The release of latent historical energy is also meant to inspire debate about the current directions of urban renewal. In addition to the themes addressed by this project, Bernadette is interested in the transformation of energy, the collision of systems, displacement, trace, extensions and cantilevers.

Work in progress, site specific architectural elements, 2010

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INTERNATIONAL ELECTRONIC CAFE

After the successful conclusion of the original two-month-long Electronic Cafe Network, commissioned by MOCA from Kit Galloway and Sherrie Rabinowitz for the 1984 L.A. Olympics Arts Festival, a safe harbor was needed to establish the first public venue dedicated to continuing the exploration of the artistic potential and implications of an emerging multimedia-networked world. As soon as 18th Street Arts Center became functional in 1989, Galloway and Rabinowitz launched Electronic Cafe International, the anchor that inspired, facilitated and established a global network of autonomous nomadic artists and institutions interested in telecollaboration. Forty informal affiliate sites were established around the world before the Internet opened to the public in 1992 and the first graphical web browser appeared in 1993. ECI-Santa Monica was unique because it also embraced non-Internet “broadband technologies” that enabled artists around the world to use fast, low-latency audio and video to connect performers in ways that remained ahead of the Internet’s capabilities for over a decade, ways that technology is only now able to approximate.

This once dynamic laboratory, public venue and showcase for telecollaboration arts is remembered by

thousands of participants worldwide as the place that blazed a trail of innovation and historic firsts—the place where artists and others took their first steps towards what has become a global migration into cyberspace that still has a long way to go in realizing its artistic and human potential.

Now, Guggenheim Fellowship recipients Galloway and Rabinowitz have turned their attentions to the

challenges of preserving the recordings, data and artifacts that profusely document the countless artists and collaborators that were a part of the ten-year journey of historic achievements that took place at ECI between 1989 and 2000—including preserving all of the projects that Galloway and Rabinowitz manifested prior to ECI between 1975 and 1985, now considered telecommunication-arts and networked-arts classics.

Thus the existence of a global network of irreverent public venues dedicated to pioneering new genres

in cyberspace has disappeared from the cultural landscape. That’s not to say that globally networked cultural venues are no longer needed, it’s just that sometimes important things get misplaced in the chaos of progress until, out of necessity, they are rediscovered and reinvented anew.

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GELLIS YVETTE

Yvette Gellis continued to experiment with the idea of threedimensional painting this past year, her area of focus since coming to 18th Street. She pursued this direction with her show Violet Jolt in New York last year, and in an exhibition in the project room at 18th Street, Aqueous/Igneous. These two were technically installation pieces, being actually three dimensional, but were presented conceptually as paintings. Now, returning to the two-dimensional world of the canvas, Yvette has found that her work is informed by these forays into space, as well as her inspirations drawn from just living in the world around her. Soon she will head to Vienna to have a show at the Exner Gallery, and possibly another show in Linz, Austria, her first exhibitions in Europe.

Violet Jolt, Site-specific installation, 2010

Breaking Point (New York City), oil on canvas, 2010

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PERFORMANCE SPACE HIGHWAYS

LEO GARCIA, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR Southern California’s boldest center for new performance inaugurates its 22nd year with a season of diverse, provocative and ambitious work from both emerging and established artists working within, around and about a range of identities and disciplines. Artistic Director Leo Garcia and Associate Artistic Director Patrick Kennelly stay true to Highways’ mission to develop and present innovative performance, promote interaction among people of diverse cultural identities, and foster a critical dialogue among artists concerned with

Walks Through Walls, created by

social issues and the communities they serve.

Caleb Hammonds, 2010

The local, national and international artists and companies who will present new and in-

development work in the coming months include Barbara T. Smith, Katsura Kan, MGM (Modern Garage Movement), John Sinner’s Theatre Revelation, Simone Forti, Dandelion Dancetheater, The Discount Cruise to Hell, Annie Sprinkle, Libby Larsen + Philip Littell, Sheetal Gandhi, Degenerate Art Ensemble, Sam Kim Porphyrion’s Revenge, written and performed by Paul Outlaw, directed by Patrick Kennelly, 2010

w/ Nancy Sandercock, and the Los Angeles Poverty Department. Highways continues to outreach to local communities with three annual programs of Performance Poetry, new Latina/o work, and

Behold-A Queer Performance Festival, which features a panoply of radical spiritual/ spirited witnessing through song, dance, performance and visual art.

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iIDA ASuKA

Asuka Iida has been lying low

imagination. Her work has been evolving from a more baroque style,

this year, taking some time to

involving all sorts of materials and themes, into something a little

restore her creative energies.

more subdued and focused but still wholly her own. Later in 2010,

Her work still addresses all

Asuka plans on taking part in GEISAI # 13, the big arts festival/free-

manner of subjects: pop culture,

for-all event organized by Murakami. She is also working on a project

childrenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s books, things from the

called Rakugaki; the word roughly translates to scribbles or doodles,

environment, whatever happens

and a company in Japan has artists turn doodles into art. And this

to her in her day-to-day life,

past January she participated in a group show as part of the Raid

all reinterpreted and crafted

Project in Los Angeles.

anew through the powers of her

Asuka Iida,Tree,Mixed media and acrylic on panel,2010

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IRIE ICHIRO

After a busy 2009, in which he had three solo shows in Mexico City, Guadalajara and Chihuahua, Ichiro Irie decided to take a break from exhibitions and turn to producing some new work. He also started a gallery in West L.A.:Jaus, a non-commercial space with no set parameters designed to let artists show what they want to show. In addition to all that, Ichiro has been busy teaching at SMC and Oxnard College, particularly a class at SMC called the Art Mentor Program. The class isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t as much a traditional art school course Ichiro Irie, Lucas (Face) from the Sarah/Lucas series, poster putty on panel, 2009

as it is a sort of think tank,

where the focus is on developing oneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s own work and forming relationships with other students and instructors. Ichiro has found that he spends a lot of time thinking about that course, and the unique instructor-student relationship that he developed has informed his latest series of work.

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KOSAR ARZU ARDA

Arzu Arda Kosar has been busy with two big projects this year.

Mapconception is a map of Los Angeles upon which she and her project partner, Deb Dielh, plotted historical boundaries and territories over current boundary lines. She then surveyed people, asking them what they considered to be their own territories and which territories they considered scary and unfamiliar; later, she hopes to combine these two portions into a multimedia exhibit. In Coming of Age/TransIstanbul, Arzu and her project partner, Gul Cagin, wanted to figure out how kids come of age in Istanbul, a city of conflicting identities and constant transition. Arzu tapped into graffiti culture by developing a series of stickers showing the faces of lower-class kids that she has distributed around the city. She also held art workshops for people of varying ages and backgrounds in which each participant was invited to cut and paste skyline images of Istanbul into their own vision of how the city should be. They have a gallery exhibition scheduled for November, for which Arzu is planning a video installation.

Both images from the series Coming of

Age, stickers on wall,untitled street graffiti installations, from 2009

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KWONG DAN

This past November, Dan Kwong was awarded a residency through 18th Street at the Gyeonggi Art Center in Korea, located on a little island just outside of Seoul. During his one-month residency, Dan worked on an installation piece,The Lost Boys of Seon-

gam Won, and had a chance to really sit down and focus on his art without the distractions of a city. The experience there

Dan Kwong, The Lost Boys of Seon-gam Won, installation in progress, 2010

was spectacular, leading Dan to both start taking Korean classes here and to put together a proposal to return to Gyeonggi to teach, hopefully in January of 2011. The art world in Korea is very young, and Dan is excited to be a part of it. In addition to his Korean sojourn, Dan went on a two-week lecture tour of Japan, directed a music video on the environmental impact of disposable chopsticks, made a documentary about his mother’s 60th college anniversary,Momo’s Excellent

Adventure, and continued to teach.

Dan Kwong, It’s Great 2B American, video still, 2010.

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McDONALD

DAVID

David McDonald had a number of shows this part year, with more scheduled for the near future: a solo at Jancar in Chinatown, a group exhibition at Marine in Santa Monica, a group show, â&#x20AC;&#x153;2D/3D,â&#x20AC;? at Traywick Contemporary in Berkeley, and another group show in New York. Creatively, this has been a year of steady productivity and consolidation, as David continued to work on his large sculptures and figured out how to successfully exhibit his smaller works. He was also reviewed by Christopher Miles in the LA Weekly. David also continued to teach at New Roads and as an adjunct professor at USC. This summer, he will be teaching at California State Summer School for the Arts, an intensive but rejuvenating experience that will consume his David McDonald, Honshirabe, wood and acrylic,

July.

2009

David McDonald, Ikebukuro, Wood and Acrylic, 2009

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EZTV

MICHAEL j. MASSUCI & KATE JOHNSON

Last year was EZTV’s 30th anniversary, which meant celebrations and

work for the 7th annual Women’s

commendations, but also some mourning for the artists they have

Conference and the climate

lost over the decades. In addition, Michael Masucci and Kate Johnson

summit in Copenhagen. Michael

have still managed to work on myriad projects. Together, they are

worked on a science-inspired

collaborating on a documentary that looks at the rise of ballet in the

collaboration between a dance

United States immediately after World War II. They have also been

company and string theorists

selected to participate in 18th Street’s Getty-sponsored research

from Cal Tech to produce a dance

project,Collaboration Labs: Southern California Artists and the Artist

and digital recording, and also

Space Movement. Individually, Kate is doing a one-woman show on the

collaborated with glam/punk

experiences of being a woman in the digital art world, and did design

artist Kate Crash to make a live performance and video.

Kate Johnson, XVII-The Moon, still from video, revised 2009

Michael Masucci, Upload, still from video, 20 min, 2010

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LACY SUZANNE

Suzanne Lacy is currently producing three international projects, including The Tattoo Skeleton for the Museo Nacional Centro Reina Sofia in Madrid. Suzanne is working with local artists on a video of women who have escaped violence; a performance that features a conversation between advocates, activists and governmental officials seeking to create a “renewed narrative” of domestic violence; and a performance set “inside” an awards ceremony by the Spanish Ministry of Equality. Other projects include setting a woman’s political agenda in Anyang, Korea (with Korean feminists, city councilwomen and Los Angeles photographer Raul Vega) and The University of Local Knowledge in Bristol, England with the Arnolfini Gallery and the Knowle West Community Centre. Two new books feature Suzanne’s work:[Suzanne

Lacy: Spaces Between] by Sharon Irish, published by University of Minnesota Press, and [Leaving Art: Writings on Performance, Politics,

and Publics, 1974-2007] a collection of essays by Suzanne, published by Duke University Press. Recent monograph by Sharon Irish, available from University of Minnesota Press

The Tattoo skeleton, performance & installation, 2010

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LABOWITZ STARUS LESLIE

Sproutime: Old Jewish Cemetary in Prague, installation at Long Beach Museum of Art, 1983

Sproutime, represents the beginning phase of my 30-year Life/Art project that started in 1980 as Sproutime, a series of installations and performances on the environment, agriculture, economics and my personal journey as the child of a holocaust survivor. From that series of artworks evolved a real-time food business now called Foodology.(www.foodology.com). This year it was a major struggle for my business to survive the economic downturn. The Award in the image shown was a high point in the business sector recognizing my efforts as an artist to create a sustainable and humane business.

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MFA PUBLIC PRACTICE OTIS

The only program in the region dedicated exclusively to providing artists with advanced skills for working in the public sphere, Otisâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; MFA in Public Practice program focuses on collaborative and individual art production. Suzanne Lacy, the renowned artist, educator and theorist of socially engaged public artdirects the program. Students begin with a collaborative project led by guest artists such as SA Bachman (Think Again!), Andrea Bowers and Rick Lowe. They meet artists

Otis alum Andrea Domiquez

such as Mel Chin and Martha Rosler and network with critics and curators from around the world. Traveling individually or as a group, students explore cultures in diverse locations: a small farming town in Californiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s San Joaquin Valley, hurricane-ravaged New Orleans, new art scenes in Tijuana. The Field Internship allows students to work with an artist of their choice, providing invaluable insights into professional practices and connections to the field. Otis students in May 1st march

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Warmest thanks to the many wonderful people who dedicate their time and resources to ensure that 18th Street can continue to be an essential part of the greater California arts community. Aaron Stannard, Aaron Dubois, Adam Gibbons, Adam Hartwick, Aleksandra Adjukovic, Alex Sobotowski, Alexandra Clingan, Ali Mirian, Alicia Ashenden, Allan Mouw, Allison Miller, Amir Wahab, Amy Goldstein, Amy Anderson, Amy Panza, Ana Minatti, Ananda Mayi, Andrea Bennett, Andrew Rodriguez, Andrew Tenn, Andrew Brentano, Andrice Arp, Anita Williamson, Ann Jankowski, Anna McDonnell, Annette Mitchell, Ashley Roberts, Atilio Meza, Audrey Posl, Barb Neff, Barbara Fox, Barbara T. Smith, Barbara & William Crockett, Ben Schwartz, Ben Kates, Bette Braxton, Billy Duke, Bird, Randy & Jake Anderson, Brett Schneider, Brian Taylor, Brian Kratz, Brian Miller, Brian Gerrard, Brie Boss, Brigid Flaherty, Brigitt Jandreau-Smith, Brittany Quiroa, Brock Stearn, Brooke Beane, Bryant Galindo, Caleb Stone, CalvinPan, Candace Tysdal, Carlos Mendez, Carmelita & Omar Ramirez-Sanchez, Carolina Korman, Carolyn Cummings, Carrie Paterson, Carrie Brown, Cecilia Lumpkin-Phillips, Cesar Mendoza, Chad Edwards, Chad Scott, Charlie Choi, Chelsie Ricci, Cheryl Watkins, Cheryl Raiss, Chris Alford, Chris Gordillo, Christian Knudsen, Christian Knudsen, Christina Damiano, Christina Nunn, Christine Fisher, Christine Levinson, Christopher Knight, Christopher Cannon, Christopher Bly, Christopher Williams, Ciara Ennis, Cindy Persky, Clayton Campbell, Colin McGookin, Corey Evett, Cornelia Bruning, Cynthia Kershaw, Damein Mitchell, Dan Leibson, Dan Brown, Danae Newton, Danielle Brazell, Danielle Loefflad, Danielle Divello, David Bond, David Nickerson, David McDonald, David Latt, Dawn Petschauer, Dean Bochner, Dean Matsubayashi, Debbie Robins-de la Bouillerie, Debbie Scott, Deborah Tennant, Dennis Farber, Dennis & Faith Agius, Deryn Springer, Diana Lin, Diana Li, Diane Streeper, Dina Dalby, Donna L. Kinsler, Dora Gallo, Dorit Cypis, Doug Lunn, Dustin Black, Ed Galvez, Edgar Nunez, Edmund Hanlon, Edward Boyer, Eileen Eib, Elaine Wu, Eleanor Schneir, Eli Rivera, Elise Shapiro, Elissa Zimmerman, Elizabeth Vaughn, Elizabeth Rial, Elizabeth Hurwitz, Elizabeth Petschauer, Ella McEvily Messina, Emily Brennan, Emily Aldrich, Emma Lewis Thomas, Eric David, Eric Kramon, Eric Horton, Erica Jarvis, Erik Baker, Erika Moreno, Evelina Fernandez, Fergal Lyons, Galyn Gorg, Garrett Cobb, Garrett Baldwin, Garrett Brown, Gary Lu, Gary A. Dancy Jr., Gavin McMillan, Gayle Taylor, Georgian Alex, Graciela Martinez, Grant Rickhoff, Greg Lyon, Greg Garza, Gregory Sibley, Gwendolyn Burke, Haley Webb, Hannah Vaughan, HaRa Beck, Haynes Stephanie, Heather Smith, Heather Fetter, Heather Gabel, Hongdao Nguyen, Howard Lee, Inliss Kyte-Obayani, Ioannice Lee, Jackie Rosales, Jackie Scardino, Jacob Alves, Jaime Morales, James Forsher, James Lloyd-Smith, Jamie Morris, Jan Williamson, Jan Book, Jane Glassman, JanineCohen, Jason Trainor, Jason Savage, Jason Schimpf, Jeff Edsall, Jeff Mindes, Jeffrey Oâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Neal, Jennifer Hertrich, Jenny Bowen, Jerri Allyn, Jessica Slama, Jessica Stock, Jessica Ferraro, Jessica Richards, Jessica Chang, Jessica Lowe, Jesus Reyes, Jim Roney, Jim Grimes, Joaquin Ortega, Joe Stone, Joe McGovern, Joel King, John Highkin, John Steen, John McCoy, John Cha, John Petschauer, John Vandevelde, John Chapman, Jon Neustadter, Jordan Wright, Jordan Forsland, Joseph Leibrandt, Judy Branfman, Judy Richards, Juhyun Yoo, Julie Nguyen, Justin Hart, Kabir Affonso, Kalyana Wind, Karen English, Kathleen Dugas, Kathryn Kempton, Katrina Schiller, Kay Yamamoto, Keisa Davis, Kelly Contessa, Kelly Porterfield, Kelly Lawton, Ken Watanabe, Kent Yu, Kevin Rhone, Kevin Wise, Kevin Kelley, Kevin Geary, Kim Worobec, Kimball Woodbury, Kimberly Wong, Kori Kanayama, Kristofer Pina, Lacie Marshall, Larissa Atamian, Laura Judson, Lauren Carter, Lauren Kerr, Lee Desser, Leo Garcia, Linda Baer, Linda Kramer, Lindsay Carron, Lindsay Grant, Lindsey Butterworth, Lisa Conklin, Lisa Welch, Loren Philip, Lorraine Warshaw, Louise Halevy, Luis Tellez, Madeline Koch, Mandalit del Barco, Maria Springer, Marina Espinoza, Mark Moshlak, Mark Rose, Mark Steven Greenfield, Marta Wenker, Martin Ryan, Matt Shumway, Matthew Ponichtera, Matthew White, Matthew Partney, Matthew Gehl, Maura Chwastyk, Maureen Garza, Maya Emsden, Megan Smithyman, Melanie Saulo, Melisa Gourley, Melissa Hallbourg, Melissa Bachrach, Michael Vittum, Michael Petschauer, Michael Myers, Michael Rushlow, Michael Soutar Michael Greco, Michela Swarthout, Michelle Baldwin, Miguel Loaeza, Mike Johnson, Mimoza Lazarevska, Miriam Cutler, Miyuki Takemoto, Myriam Altounji, Nancy Micklewright, Nancy Petschauer, Nicholas Cobb, Nick Durazo, Nicole Werner, Nicole Kau, Nikalas Mauck, Nikki

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Duplessis, Nikolai Sivovol, Nina Berson, Nuttaphol Ma, Ofunne Obiamiwe, Olga Kay, Olivia Sequoia Mercier, Paiwei Wei, Patricia Rosales, Patrick Courtnage, Patrick Burton, Patrick Sims, Paul Casken, Paul Hayne, Paul Lazebnik, Pauline Kamiyama, Phil Cook, Phuong-Ha Ngo, Phyllis Green, Quentin Archibeck, Rachael Leblond, Randall Woodbury, Randi Clausen, Ravi Malhotra, Ray Mirian, Raymund Agloro, Rea Mara Crinklaw, Rebecca Ansert, Rebecca Logue-Bovee, Rebecca Lee, Ricarda Delgado, Ricardo Correa, Rob O’shaughnessy, Rob Ellis, Robert Sweedler, Robert Haber, Robert Aguirre, Robert Cramer, Robert Licalsi, Roberta Doheny, Rolando Guillen, Ron Conner, Ronald Jones, Ruth Tavlin, Ryan Smith, Ryan Wallace, Ryan Halverson, Ryan Wise, Rynol Dahlman, Sachi Swick, Sam Harper, Samuel Ory, Sandra Hardy, Sandra Cox, Sanjit Patel, Santiago Capdepont, Sarah Ruttinge, Sarah Schneider, Sarah Dinkfeld, Sarah Calabro, Sara Jane Bos, Scott Johnson, Scott McCullough, Shaleah Soliven, Shan Watters, Shashi Bhatter, Sheila Morris, Silvia Marjoram, Simon Carroll, Sinan Germirli, Stacy Cullington, Stanford Asato, Stefanie Lujan, Stephanie Lieu, Stephanie Argueta, Steve La, Steve Petterborg, Steven Laff, Susan Riney, Susanna Knittel, Suzanne Steed, Suzanne Dwyer, Sylvia Salazar, Sylvia Mejia, Takao Suzuki, Tara Perillo, Taylor Avery, Ten Terrell, Teri Jones, Terry Holzgreen, Thom Dower, Thomas Tomezsko, Tj Trapp, Todd Schellinger, Tom Engell, Troy Alvord, Ulysses Jenkins, Valentina Ayzenband, Vamsi Vemuru, Van Savage, Veronica P. Herrera, Victoria Lee, Victoria Kheel, Vince Maccani, Wesley Montalvo, William Rodgers, Yana Bille, Yesenia Alvarez, Yoko Sugioka, Yolanda Galvan-Macias, Yvette Gellis, Zoey Zimmerman, Zosya Ippolitov.

COLLABORATORS Abdul Mazid, Alex Donis, Alex Kizu, Alfred Duron, Alma Ruiz, Alpha Gamma Sigma at Santa Monica College, Ana Baranda, Annette Lopez, Araceli Silva, Artillery, Asuka Hisa, Barbara T. Smith, Becky Cortez, Brian Thomas Jones, Brittany Freeman, Cal State Los Angeles EPIC Program, Carla Fantozzi, Virginia Avenue Park Teen Center, Carlinhos Pandiero de Ouro, Carolyn Martin, Christian Knudsen, Christopher Hawley Rollers, Citizen LA, Claudia Hirsch, Claudia Huiza, Cole Akers, Crossroads School for Arts and Sciences, Daisy Tonantzin, Dewey Tafoya, Diane Meyers, Elaina Leibee, Elena Esparza, Elena Rosa, Eli Joteva, Elisa Garcia, Elizabeth Weber, Erin Hees, Felicia Montes, Felipe Sanchez, Frankie Gladden, Gabriel Tenorio, Gail Taylor, Gary Frederick Brown, Gina Peterson, Gustavo Cordova, Jaime “Germs” Zacarias, James Mathers, Jason Wheatley, Jeanne Roderick, Jeremy Green, Jess Barnard-Koehler, Jessica Burton, Jessica Cusick, Jim Marquez, John Robertson, JT Ross, Juan Carlos, KC Bitterman, Kiki Seor, Kylie Michel, Laddie John Dill, Joe Smoke, Le-Ti, Lee Wochner, Leo Garcia, Lilia Ramirez, Linda Burnham, Lisa Ann Soltis, Lisa Rocha, Lynn Hanson, Makepeace Brothers, Malina Moore, Mama’s Hot Tamales, Marcos Castro, Marcus Kuiland-Nazario, Marko Tadic, Marquis “Retna” Lewis, Marti Koplin, Marvin Zeidler, Max Diamond, Mei Wah Koa, Melly Trochez, Michelle Berne, Miguel Loaeza, Mosaic Sound Production, Nena Soulfly, New Playwrights Foundation, Old Memoriees SGV, Orchid Violeta, OTIS College of Art and Design, Paige Wery, Pat Ngoho, Phyllis Elliot, Pico Youth and Family Center, Reyes Rodriguez, Rob Gilligan, Rudy Rude, Rumeng Fang, Ryan Zufryden, Santa Monica Museum of Art, Sarah Riedman, SPARC, Steve Olson, Tacos Por Favor, The 3 Heads, Yolanda de Cordova

VOLUNTEERS Aleksandra Adjukovic, Angel Franco, Angel Villanova, Angie Brooks, Beth Kaplan Karmin, Brittany Harris, Camia Frank, Carlo Serna, Cassandra Ibarra, Charles Salas, China Brotsky, Christine Lopez, Claire Desser, Cynthia Guedea, Danielle Lopez, Danny Junod, David Shealor, Denise Gray, Denise Harris, Derek Hebner, Elaine Blaugrund, George Kochi, Jason Schimpf, Jennifer Lukich, Jenny Jenson, Jie Qiao, Joan Ling, Julia Bryan Wilson, Julian Ayala, Julian Suhr, Kari Sakurai, Kate Park, Kayla Emter, Keith Lungwitz, Kevin Schadt, Kristy Schaefle, Laura Satterfield, Laurel DeLeo, Lauren Wilhite, Liony Suciawan, Lisa Wildfeuer Jones, Lucas Kazansky, Mary Hom, Melissa Rittenhouse, Michael Campbell, Michael Lucas, Miku Yoshida, Mollie Tarlow, Paul Daniels, Pedro DeBora, Rachel Bird Anderson, Rafa Lum, Rafael Lopez, Rick Fenchel, Robin Adsit, Roger Weaver, Ruth Sze, Severiano Medina, Stephen Lee, Steve Blackburn, Steven Harrison, Suzanne Woodruff, Taaj Roussel, Thaddeus Gallizzi, The Dark Bob, Tim Wride, Vida Vierra, Wintor McNeal, Yulia Mizushima, Zandie Brockett

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th STREET 18 STAFF

Jan Williamson, Executive Director, has been with 18th Street since 1995. She manages the overall business,

fund development, civic advocacy and facility redevelopment for 18th Street. She is a practicing artist as well as an active member of the Santa Monica City Arts Commission, and serves on the Commission’s Artist Live-Work Task Force.

Clayton Campbell, Artistic Director, has been with 18th Street Arts Center since 1995. He designs, curates and

fundraises for the programs at 18th Street. He is the Artist Residency Advisor for United States Artists and past President of the International Network of Residential Arts Centers (Res Artis). He is a practicing artist who writes extensively on the arts for a variety of international arts magazines.

Ramla Roussel, Business Manager, is responsible for daily facility management and business administration. A graduate of California State University, she held the position of Administrator of Chagdud Gonpa Foundation, a nonprofit international Nyingma Buddhist organization.

Nicole Gordillo, Development Associate, is responsible for fundraising and grant administration. She has

worked closely with government agencies including the City of Pasadena, Americans for the Arts, Inner City Arts, L.A. Freewaves and the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department.

Ronald Lopez, Program Coordinator, manages the programs, events and exhibitions at 18th Street. A practicing artist and curator, he founded the Aden Art Center in Istanbul, Turkey is former gallery manager for the Couturier Gallery in Los Angeles, and this year he was a recipient of a NAMAC Fellowship.

Amber T. Jones, Marketing and Volunteer Coordinator, manages the volunteer program and daily marketing

activities. A recent graduate of Bethune-Cookman University, she received her Bachelor’s degree in the area of Journalism and Public Relations.

Adela Ruelas, Housekeeper, has been with 18th Street since 1988. She ensures that the studios for the visiting artists are prepared for each incoming artist and she cleans the gallery, offices and common areas of the Center.

To learn much more about 18th Street’s fantastic staff, go to www.18thstreet.org.

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OFFICE INFORMATION Hours Monday - Friday 11 a.m. - 6 p.m. Closed Saturday, Sunday, and major holidays MISSION To provoke public dialogue through contemporary art making. VISION 18th Street is a community which values art making as an essential component of a vibrant, just and healthy society. Admission and Parking

PUBLIC

310.453.3711 fax 310.453.4347 www.18thstreet.org

Admission to 18th Street Arts Center is free, unless otherwise noted for special events. Getting Here From the 10 West: Take the 26th Street-Cloverfield Exit Turn right and travel two stoplights to Olympic Blvd Turn left and continue to 18th Street

INFORMATION

1639 18th Street, Santa Monica, CA 90404

Turn right (our parking lot is at the end of the block on the righthand side)

For more information on our programming and future events please call 310-453-3711, email office@18thstreet.org, or visit www.18thstreet.org

BOARD OF DIRECTORS Suzanna B. Dakin

Leslie Labowitz-Starus

Joan Abrahamson

Meg Linton

Andrew Beath

Vincent Lopez

Dina Dalby

James Rojas

Laddie John Dill

Alice Salinas

Francine Ellman

Pilar Tompkins

Lori Harris

Lori Zimmerman

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Each year 18th Street sets annual an theme which provides a unifying principle for our artist’s

research and inquiry. The theme for 2011 is Legacy, and is a look at our artistic legacy and the numerous forms it can take and the debates this provokes. According to 18th Street Artistic Director Clayton Campbell, “18th Street is one of the venues organizing a 2011 exhibit for the Pacific Standard Time initiative sponsored by the Getty Foundation. The nature of PST, concerned with Southern Californian art between 1945 to 1980, involves a critical examination of artistic legacy. This opens up numerous questions and lines of investigation for artists whose work is ephemeral, durational, or fugitive. Because of our PST exhibit (featuring Suzanne Lacy, Leslie Labowitz- Starus, Rachel Rosenthal, Barbara T. Smith, EZTV, and Electronic Café International), we decided to devote our entire exhibition year to the theme of Legacy.

We have selected four fellowship artists from a competitive process who will activate our galleries as

artists in residence from February through late August 2011, followed by the opening on September 24 of Collaboration

Labs.

The 18th Street Artist Fellows will address basic questions about how artistic legacy is passed down,

whether it should be passed down, and whether ephemeral performative and media based work can be reperformed/re-envisioned by the authors or by new generations of artists. The projects of the fellows involve a strong degree of public engagement that will open new lines of thinking while considering the legacy of artmaking and intellectual ferment that has made Los Angeles such an amazing site for creativity.”

Beginning in February 1 through April 30, 2011, Richard Newton will be in residence in the main

gallery. His project, In the Privacy of Your Own Home, will involve multiple presentations of video, ephemera and correspondence accompanied by public dialogues with artists active in Southern California from 1960 onwards. Newton will actively collaborate with younger artists to develop three performances allied with the presentations.

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UPCOMING in 2011- a Legacy year

At the same time in the 18th Street Project Room, Vincent Ramos’ research-based project, Outsider

Art: Others From Elsewhere Doing Something Altogether Different…Sort Of will look at works developed in Southern California in the 1960s by artists who were not from the region, but whose projects informed and influenced the work of local artists. He will develop new works along with constructing a visual timeline of the many disparate pieces from these “outsider” artists.

From June 1 through August, 30 in the 18th Street Gallery, Artist Jerri Allyn, collaborating with

Inez Bush and Linda Kunik, and other debating artists, will present Debating Through the Arts, based on a continuation of the United Nation model as its paradigm. Besides promoting debates, they will create a mediation environment that houses and exhibits creative proposals emerging from the debates.

In the Project Room, York Chang’s Second Life imagines itself as the art world version of the video

game ‘second life’ where participants construct their own fictional artistic identities drawn from LA artists from 1965-1985. His exhibit will reconstruct the offices of Artist Actualization Services, a short-lived but influential artist organization in Los Angeles between 1980-1985, which called on artists to constantly reinvent themselves.

On other fronts, we look forward to our international visiting artist program that will host numerous

artists and curators from Taiwan, Tibet, Hong Kong, Mexico, Poland, Australia, Ireland and Israel, making 18th Street the leading international residency center in Southern California. We enjoy our first partnership with the Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation in Korea, and our continuing partnerships with the a network of international curators who serve as nominators for our international residency program.

We will also have our quarterly ArtNights, public talks, screenings, artist talks and concerts as we

bring the best of contemporary arts to Los Angeles. And we are very happy to announce our partnership with the Herb Alpert Foundation, who will sponsor our first American Jazz Artist residency in late 2011. Stay tuned, check out our website and be part of the historic and vibrant 18th Street Arts Center.

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ENGAGE EKOVORP INSPIRE

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1639 18TH STREET, SANTA MONICA, CALIFORNIA 90404 310.453.3711 WWW.18THSTREET.ORG