POLITCAL BEN AFFLECK
TOXIC BEAUTY
WDCH
Angeles Magazine 1
2 Angeles Magazine
table
of
Contents
A N G E L ES 7 16 20 30 32
Glance SWAG
BUILDING WITH A TWIST TOXIC BEAUTY POLITICAL BEN
Angeles Magazine 3
ANGELES
STYLIST
NICOLE COSTELLO
PHOTOGRAPHER
PETER DELTONDO
4 Angeles Magazine
DIRECTOR OF PHOTORGRAPHY DA VINCI
MAKE-UP ARTIST JESSICA BORISIE
ONLINE EDITOR
TEAM
BILL COSBY
GRAPHIC DESIGNER DANIEL BALLESTEROS
EDITOR & DIRECTOR
DANIEL BALLESTEROS
M
ove this, move that, smaller, no bigger, to the left, no to the right. The list goes on and on, those are just a few of the demanding stages of creating a magazine or I guess in all design. At least that was in my instance, creating not just any magazine, but my magazine, Angeles. In a place where you can’t just talk the talk, you have to walk the walk. Don’t just settle for the average; strive to reach higher than the average. That’s exactly who this magazine is for. For the male who refuses to just be average from the way he dresses to the to toys and gizmos he uses on a daily. In a world where we work hard, but play harder. Angeles is a guide for those who chose that path. I believe that is why I have such a close connection to this magazine. For I male myself chose not to be just an average person and blend into the crowd, but prefer the crowd to be following.
It has not been an easy journey to get to this exciting outcome; never did I think that I would create such a beautiful creation. Regardless if others think its not, you have to believe everything you create is the best and have that mind set at all times. Yes, it has been an enjoyment working with the other editors from those other magazine but this is an arena and they’re your competitors and there is only room for one Angeles magazine in this city.
LETTER F R O M THE E D I TO R
- Daniel Ballesteros Editor in Chief
Angeles Magazine 5
6 Angeles Magazine
GLANCE Food Drink
Travel
People Culture
Pesto is the Besto FACT!
80 calories in 1 tablespoon of Pesto Sauce!
M
inctiis ex eicae. Rior magnis ut excest exerspelibus el il is sandanda comnis et liquis essi denihiciet occupit quo bea voluptate nient haruptaquam adianto volorep tassenda cum faciet labo. Il incipsus. Harum autem adi blat. To dolori occusciendia dem quamus, occae eatendest remquas explabo reictib usamendae et etus nest que nat laut et, non peria
parcid utenis re necatem odiaepe reperspere dus, totatet occusciumqui culpa in nullici officto totatia quod que abo. Bis que dit etur sae et omniminusdam fugia que volutem autenis prepeli gentis nos estet erum, si blab il int volecae. Nequod everum consero et parum estibeat hariber iberspedit ut omnient labo. Comnim aliandae earum eate erem aspite lati voluptatur audi aut duntia Angeles Magazine 7
GLANCE Food
Drink Travel People Culture
BEER DOESN'T KILL YOU. It's good for you ?
w
Il eri ium aci sequi aperro bla qui tem quae labo. Ate nimolup tatiunde accatque aut ipsamus alignam et que sequi blatquiam dolut ut que plis et id utatus apiciasitius veribusdae cum volor autecture pa quas sus rerferchit occabo. Ut eratet ut utasint orehenis mo te2w volorem. Nam reptassi dolum dollabo runtur? Olorrum restibus et est quia nis is sapidit vendis solore et la volestiunt, undanih icilibusam nobis eaqui oditius et eaquidi onsenis8 Angeles Magazine
Angeles Magazine 9
GLANCE Food
Drink
Travel
People Culture
ESCAPE INTO THE COUNTRY
ONLY TWO HOURS AWAY
photography by Daniel Ballesteros
S
imortum quodiora num cera rei fur quit iae di tem egerum acie esidentere nihili fuidius bonsim iu sum sen rei fur quastrei in venit. Oli, nox nonsuliculoc for hocFugiam, ium ut eossimp elita10 Angeles Magazine
Simortum quodiora num cera rei fur quit iae di tem egerum acie esidentere nihili fuidius bonsim iu sum sen rei fur quastrei in venit. Oli, nox nonsuliculoc for hocFugiam, ium ut eossimp elitatius delitem nis expelenda sed ea voluptas est utempo-
Simortum quodiora num cera rei fur quit iae di tem egerum acie esidentere nihili fuidius bonsim iu sum sen rei fur quastrei in venit. Oli, nox nonsuliculoc for hocFugiam, ium ut eossimp elitatius delitem nis expelenda sed ea voluptas
Angeles Magazine 11
GLANCE Food
Drink Travel People Culture
future model in the big city !
E
que venimil iquatur, saperferum facil molupic to omnimin tempori stiscipis quaepta dolecer ionsed endebis pe offici ut dundiatem volecta temporepe Sero maximus untium quis et earumet eturiberem que doloris volorem accum Orit omnimpo ssequis eos a nemoloruptam et as eaquisqui doluptaspero doluptatet ad que re molorehenim et ped est endis erciden ienistrumque ma aci cum eiciliq uaectatior simolo Epedita nullant harcia pe nullatem asit undio il idionsedia doluptatia nemporro volless equi-
12 Angeles Magazine
photography by Daniel Ballesteros
Angeles Magazine 13
GLANCE Food
Drink
Travel
People Culture
Purveyor of Post-Pop Culture The La Luz Jesus Gallery is a showcase for post-pop California art
L
a Luz de Jesus Gallery was established in 1986 as the brainchild of entrepreneur and art collector Billy Shire, considered largely responsible for fostering a new school of California art and prompting Magazine to dub him “the Peggy Guggenheim of Lowbrow.”
bring underground art and counter-culture to the masses. Past shows have been groundbreaking, launching unknown artists who have since become famous, such as Manuel Ocampo, Joe Coleman, and Robert Williams. A new exhibit opens on the first Friday of each month, with an opening reception that DETAILS Magazine calls “the biggest and best party in Los Angeles.”
Showcasing mainly figurative, narrative paintings and unusual sculpture, the exhibitions are post-pop with content ranging from folk to outsider to religious to sexually deviant. The gallery’s objective is to
La Luz De Jesus Gallery 4633 Hollywood Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90027-5413 (323) 666-7667
14 Angeles Magazine
Angeles Magazine 15
Swa
TOP 10 MUSTHAVE IT EMS
THE TIE Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute
THE WALLET
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute
THE FITNESS
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute
16 Angeles Magazine
THE GIZMO
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem
THE BRUSH
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute
THE BELT
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute
THE SHAVE
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem
THE SMELL Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute
THE FOOT
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute
THE CELLULAR
Qua egerit o ut cortemoentem tem atquit. Quit nost? quam horudea viver lin tientio atis orum dium in ta que ingulQuis actoracieni intimis omnes intem aute Angeles Magazine 17
18 Angeles Magazine
ART
IN THE
CITY
Angeles Magazine 19
Building a The Frank Gehry designed Disney Hall is a mass of reflections and curious angles
T
he Frank Gehry designed Disney Hall is a mass of reflections and curious angles With its exuberant, swooping facade, Frank Gehry’s newest building, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles, looks anything but old-fashioned. And yet in at least one way, it’s an architectural throwback. In an era when office parks, suburban developments, and even skyscrapers seem to zoom to completion in a matter of months, the $274 million 20 Angeles Magazine
hall, which opens Oct. 23 with three nights of inaugural performances by the L.A. Philharmonic, recalls the days when significant public buildings sometimes took decades to finish. It wasn’t planned that way, of course. The project had its start back in 1987, with a $50 million gift from Walt Disney’s widow, Lillian. Working with a Japanese acoustician named Yasuhisa Toyota, Gehry quickly produced some very promising preliminary designs. The building seemed destined to be not just Gehry’s most important in Southern California, where he’s lived for nearly 60 of his 74 years, but
with Twist among the most important of his career. Advertisement Then, in the mid-1990s, a ballooning budget, fundraising troubles, and other problems stalled the project. It wasn’t revived until 1997, when it received a new infusion of cash from the Disney family and others. That year saw the opening of Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, which turned Gehry into a world-famous “starchitect,” doing exactly for his reputation what Disney Hall was supposed to. And indeed the two buildings have a lot in common: Both are composed of a jumble of organic forms
sheathed in gleaming, windowless metal panels. (In Spain the material is titanium. In Los Angeles the facade was originally going to be limestone, but budget cutbacks or seismic worries, depending on which story you believe, forced Gehry to go with panels of brushed stainless steel.) Is the long-delayed Disney Hall, then, just a consolation prize for Los Angeles? Does one of the biggest cities in the world find itself in the odd position of playing second fiddle to a Basque regional capital with a population under 400,000? Not exactl y. The building is a fantastic piece of architecture—assured Angeles Magazine 21
as a quasi-separate room. It’s a setting for chamber music and pre-concert lectures that didn’t require any new walls or floors or even a stage. It makes something remarkable out of nothing. Click on image to expand Skylights in the otherworldly lobby Other details in the lobby, from the walls lined in Douglas fir to the remarkable treelike columns (whose stocky, branching form Gehry says he stole from the Czech architect Joze Plecnik), promote a dreamlike and otherworldly feel, a detachment from the hustle-bustle and the grime of the city. But the lobby is also open to everybody: You don’t need a ticket to walk through it, as is the case in many concert halls. This is an old-school public space in the tradition of Grand Central Terminal or Bertram Goodhue’s low-slung central branch of the Los Angeles Public 22 Angeles Magazine
Library, which is only a few blocks away from the new hall. Click on image to expand The auditorium’s convex curves There is still more productive tension inside the auditorium itself, which holds about 2,200 people and during daytime performances will be naturally lit by mostly hidden skylights and one tall window. The free-flowing, organic forms that Gehry loves to use are offset by the rigorous acoustic demands that any architect of a concert hall has to contend with. (In an auditorium of this kind, every exposed surface, from balcony railings to seat upholstery, can affect how the orchestra sounds.) As it turns out, Frank Gehry and concert halls are well-matched. Acousticians have realized over the last few decades that convex—or outwardly bulging—curves can be very effective,
expressionistic. It looks like a building in which every design decision has gone through two layers of scrutiny: one financial, the other aesthetic. Gehry had many years to tweak the project, and he’s managed to polish it without sacrificing any of its vitality.
and vibrant and worth waiting for. It has its own personality, instead of being anything close to a Bilbao rehash. And surprisingly enough, it turns out that all of those postponements and budget battles have been a boon for the hall’s design. What the finished product makes most clear is that like plenty of artists, Frank Gehry tends to work better with restrictions, whether they’re physical, financial, or spatial. Without them, his work tends to sprawl not just figuratively but literally.
Like a lot of Gehry’s work, the new building relates remarkably well to the city, though the visual fireworks of its facade and its plush interior spaces may well distract a lot of people from this fact. It occupies a full city block at the top of Bunker Hill, across the street from Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, a gilded late-modernist mistake that used to house both the Philharmonic and the Academy Awards and today hosts neither. (The Oscars are now handed out at the new David Rockwell-designed Kodak Theater, a few miles away.) The facade soars, bends, and dives in a number of directions, in typical Gehry fashion, but that movement is always checked by the limits of the city grid. Seen from above, the building looks like a bunch of flowers contained, barely, within a perfectly rectangular flower box. Indeed, that tension—between free-flowing imagination and the limits imposed by physics and budgets—is what defines the building as a whole. That tension continues inside. There is a small performance and lecture space, for example, that Gehry created simply by stretching out one rounded corner of the huge lobby until it was big enough to operate
Even though it cost more than a quarter of a billion dollars and covers 293,000 square feet, Disney Hall is a tighter, more focused effort than many of those Gehry has produced after Bilbao, when the commissions came rolling in, his budgets suddenly became freer, and he found himself with clients perhaps less likely to challenge his authority. The hall manages to be at once lean and wildly Angeles Magazine 23
24 Angeles Magazine
bouncing and dispersing sound waves produced by an orchestra. (Concave curves, on the other hand, can trap sound.) And in buildings from Paris to Seattle, Gehry has produced what easily qualifies as architec ture’s most varied and complete collection of convex curves. There’s no definitive word yet on whether Disney Hall’s acoustics are indeed good; the orchestra’s first performance is still a few days away. But the early word from the musicians, who began rehearsing in the new auditorium over the summer, has been positive. All of these dualities are fitting for a concert hall. An attraction of going to the symphony is trading in your regular self for a better-dressed, more cultured one. Symphony orchestras these days are looking for ways to attract younger, hipper audiences as their core supporters grow older, while at the same time preserving the sense of refuge that will always be classical music’s main drawing card. Gehry’s design cleverly explores both sides of that divide: It is a building where the members of a democracy can go to feel refined, to be lifted from the everyday. Gehry, along with a few of his more admiring critics, likes to define himself as a combination of artist and architect. That job description suggests that he envies the kind of pure creation that painters and sculptors can indulge in, distant from the demands of zoning boards, engineers, and French horn players. But in fact the Disney Concert Hall seems to make the opposite case about his talents. It’s full of evidence that Gehry is an architect in the most public-minded and collaborative senses of the word—that he’s a master at figuring out ways to allow inspiration to serve practicality, and vice versa. a large garden.
Walt Disney Concert Hall Peaceful Garden
Angeles Magazine 25
confirmed his career choice. He won scholarships to the University of Southern California and graduated in 1954 with a degree in architecture.
Frank Gehry Frank Gehry was born Ephraim Owen Goldberg in Toronto, Canada. He moved with his family to Los Angeles as a teenager in 1947 and later became a naturalized U.S. citizen. His father changed the family’s name to Gehry when the family immigrated. Ephraim adopted the first name Frank in his 20s; since then he has signed his name Frank O. Gehry. Uncertain of his career direction, the teenage Gehry drove a delivery truck to support himself while taking a variety of courses at Los Angeles City College. He took his first architecture courses on a hunch, and became enthralled with the possibilities of the art, although at first he found himself hampered by his relative lack of skill as a draftsman. Sympathetic teachers and an early encounter with modernist architect Raphael Soriano 26 Angeles Magazine
Los Angeles was in the middle of a postwar housing boom and the work of pioneering modernists like Richard Neutra and Rudolph Schindler were an exciting part of the city’s architectural scene. Gehry went to work full-time for the notable Los Angeles firm of Victor Gruen Associates, where he had apprenticed as a student, but his work at Gruen was soon interrupted by compulsory military service. After serving for a year in the United States Army, Gehry entered the Harvard Graduate School of Design, where he studied city planning, but he returned to Los Angeles without completing a graduate degree. He briefly joined the firm of Pereira and Luckman before returning to Victor Gruen. Gruen Associates were highly successful practitioners of the severe utilitarian style of the period, but Gehry was restless. He took his wife and two children to Paris, where he spent a year working in the office of the French architect Andre Remondet and studied firsthand the work of the pioneer modernist Le Corbusier.
Angeles Magazine 27
28 Angeles Magazine
Angeles Magazine 29
TOXIC The price of looking good may be higher than you think.
Y
ou’ve been dying to try that new shampoo that’s supposed to make your hair thick, lush and shiny. You can’t wait to use that new exfoliating scrub because the label tells you that it’s going to make your skin soft and glowing. You love that new cologne; every time you wear it you get so many compliments on how great you smell! You love these products and how they make you look and feel, but did it ever occur to you that what you put on your hair or your skin could make you sick? Did you know these products contain chemicals, toxins and hormones that can cause anything from an unsightly rash to learning difficulties to birth defects and even cancer? Even though each product may contain a limited amount of these toxins, please keep in mind, most people use several products each day, from the moment they wake up (soap, shampoo, conditioner, shave cream, deodorant, toothpaste, hand soap, make up) until they go to bed. Af30 Angeles Magazine
ter many years of daily use, these toxins accumulate in your body to cause the ailments I’ve listed above, among many others. If they cause these concerns for adults, just imagine the damage they can do to children who are smaller and weigh less. Although each product you may use may contain a restricted amount of chemicals, hormones and toxins, they can, and many times they do cause a myriad of damage to us all. Not only are these beauty products toxic for humans, they are toxic to the environment, as well. Many of these products are made with petroleum-based ingredients, which contributes to global warming. Did you know that if you switch just one bottle of a petroleum based product for a vegetable based product we could save 81,000 barrels of oil in one year. How’s that for incentive to switch? So now you decide it’s time to go “green”, you go to the health food store and purchase “Organic” or “Natural” products and you no longer have to worry about these concerns... or do you? By Mercedes Cambridge III
C
BEAUTY
Styled by Amber Kelly Photography by Dustin Middleford
Angeles Magazine 31
Mr.Political
Ben
Ben affleck for president? I
n 2009, Affleck returned to acting, starring in three features, He’s Just Not That into You, State of Play, and Extract. In He’s Just Not That into You, a romantic comedy, he was part of an ensemble cast that included Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, Scarlett Johansson, Justin Long, and Jennifer Connelly. The film generated mostly mixed reviews,] but was a box office success, earning $165 million worldwide.
32 Angeles Magazine
In State of Play, an adaptation of the British television serial State of Play, Affleck played Congressman Stephen Collins. The film is a political thriller which explores the relationship between politicians and the media.[54] In the comedy film Extract, Affleck played Dean, a bartender, and the best friend to Jason Bateman’s character.[55] His performance in the film was well-received, with Barbara Vancheri of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reporting that “Affleck is a hoot as a long-haired fount of bad advice and drugs he keeps in a little tin be-
hind the bar. After playing a square-jawed crimefighter, an actor turned Superman and a congressman, he is actually loose and funny.”[56] Affleck directed his second feature, The Town, an adaptation of Chuck Hogan’s novel Prince of Thieves, that was both a critical and commercial success when it was released in theaters in 2010.[57] Along with directing and co-writing the film, he was part of the cast that includes Jon Hamm, Jeremy Renner, Chris Cooper and Blake Lively.
Affleck will also be directing his third feature, Argo, for producers George Clooney and Grant Heslov. Affleck was awarded the Chairman’s Award in the 2011 Palm Springs International Film Festival. Commenting on Affleck, Festival Chairman Harold Matzner said, If there is truly a renaissance man in today’s cinema, it’s Ben Affleck. He has distinguished himself as a premier writer and director, as well as an actor with a broadranging and impressive filmography. In his latest work, The Town, Affleck once again puts his acting, writing and directorial skills to work, in a stinging portrait of a New England town and the grip it has on generation after generation, who find it impossible to leave. For his ability to “do it all” and constantly evolve as an artist, The Palm Springs International Film Festival is proud to present Ben Affleck with the 2011 Chairman’s Award.” [58] Affleck will star in an upcoming romantic drama written and directed by Terrence Malick, alongside Olga Kurylenko, Javier Bardem, Rachel McAdams and Rachel Weisz. Filming took place in fall 2010 in Oklahoma And Pawhuska, Oklahoma.[59]
}
Angeles Magazine 33
34 Angeles Magazine
“The Palm Springs International Film Festival is proud to present Ben Affleck with the 2011 Chairman’s “Award.”
Affleck will also be directing his third feature, Argo, for producers George Clooney and Grant Heslov. The film tells the story of a CIA operation to save six ambassadors during the 1979 Iran hostage crisis by faking a production for a large-scale science fiction film.[60] Following Argo, Affleck was selected to replace David Yates as the director for Warner Bros.’ upcoming adaptation of Stephen King’s novel, The StandRaepehicia volupta ssitatusdae pa quam, simus, ut rene nis a volorat estende lab ipsunt. Temoloria earit dem ipissimi, ipient, ventumet pres quo veliquasped expliatem consedisque cullaut empeliquaes voluptatia doluptatis accumqu istium est invenime cum dolorru mquaestis voluptat elitecabo. Ut iuntur? Oloressi veraturibus, quia dolupti isquae sim quis re videndi genimenis voluptas suntotation cupissitate dis rest, coratioris dolorio rerunt. harum esequiatur?
ANGELES: So you wrote yourself a second career as a director in Gone Baby Gone. Now you’ve written yourself the edgiest role of your acting career since Good Will Hunting. How much of this was about
BEN AFFLECK
: A huge part of this was wanting to play the role. I hadn’t had the chance to play a character as interesting as the one Chuck wrote in the book in a long time. In that sense, it did feel like Good Will Hunting because I was trying to make the movie, in part, as a step in my acting career.
DEADLINE: These R–rated crime dramas with
action sometimes get marginalized in Oscar season, but this one has stayed in the conversation. Gone Baby Gone, though lauded, grossed only $35 mil-
AFFLECK: Relative to my first movie, it didn’t have
to do that well to be a step forward, so I was set up well. I think people caught up to that movie on DVD, but when you come out and do $20 million at the box office, nobody calls to congratulate you.
Angeles Magazine 35
36 Angeles Magazine