Los Angeles Downtown News 10-31-22

Grand Style, Grand Class.

255 Grand is located in prestigious Bunker Hill, the go-to neighborhood for fine dining, world-class museums and a thriving arts and entertainment scene. 255 Grand offers its residents immediate proximity to attractions such as the Walt Disney Concert Hall, Museum of Contemporary Art and the new Broad museum. With breathtaking views, awe-inspiring balconies, oversized patios and spacious floor plans, the 391-unit high-rise property includes studios, one- and two-bedroom apartments ranging from 480 to 1,335 square feet in a uniquely suburban-urban setting. 255 Grand’s newly remodeled apartments offer residents a true luxury experience, with stainless steel Whirlpool appliances, quartz countertops, deep soaking tubs, and Moen faucets. Life at the top awaits you! Enjoy the highest quality living experience at the Sky Level”. The 26th and 27th floors feature exclusive, premium finishes and enhanced amenities to complement some of the best views in LA. As a Sky Level resident, you can expect high-end features like premium Bosch appliances, Danze & Kohler fixtures, Nest 3rd Generation thermostats, oversized rainfall showerheads, luxury wood-style flooring, deep soak tubs, and ultra-modern luxury countertops. In addition, Sky Level residents also enjoy complimentary Wi-Fi, cable and parking.

255 Grand features a host of modern amenities for residents, such as an ultramodern fitness center, outdoor fireplaces, pool, spa, cabanas, yoga studio, private meeting room, Wifi Lounge with gourmet kitchen, state-of-the-art theater, 24-hour staffed lobby and more. Spacious apartment homes with floor-to-ceiling windows capture beautiful mountain and city views.

255 Grand’s tastefully complements the classy Bunker Hill neighborhood and you will under stand why so many consider it’s “suburban urban” the only place that feels like home in DTLA.

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THIS Let’s vote with our eyes open

By Ellen Snortland LA Downtown News Columnist

Now that many of us have dipped our big toe back into social engage ments, I was at an event, sitting next to someone I didn’t know but had heard of: “Emma Empowerment” (not her real name). She’s a pillar of several communities that empower women and girls. She asked what I do, and I said, “I am an empowerment self-defense advocate and have written a book about it which is also a movie. My next project is a musical about women’s self-de fense.” She looked taken aback, so I added, “Kidding.”

She brightened and said, “We just had a self-defense class for my group!”

“Terrific,” I said. “Who taught it?”

“Oh, this really nice guy, Marty Martial Arts!” (also not his real name).

“Can I be straight with you?” I asked.

A slight hesitation, “Oh, OK. Sure.” Our chat went from small talk to big talk in a flash. “You hired a man to lead a women’s self-de fense class?”

“Yes, of course,” she says.

“Why? I promote women teaching wom en self-defense. This is a pet peeve of mine so forgive me if I’m putting you on the spot.”

A bit flustered, she said, “I automatically looked for a man. OMG. And I know better!”

“How’s that?” I ask.

“I’m a women’s sports coach, and I get overlooked in favor of men all the time, and yet I didn’t catch it when I did the same thing with a women’s self-defense teach er. We’re marking 50 years of Title IX this year, and we’ve made enormous strides. But women coaches? Not so much. I basically let my unconscious bias for male coaching in form my ‘shopping’ for a self-defense instruc tor,” Emma said. “And that’s exactly what I hate about my own field.”

“Indeed. Our biases run deep and unex amined; they are rarely malicious or conspir atorial,” I said. I then exacted a promise that the next time Emma hosts a self-defense

class, she would call IMPACT Personal Safety (IPS), the nonprofit I have been on the board of for a long time.

We continued our chat and acknowl edged that we all have blind spots that will take time to discern and dismantle. Regard less of gender, we’ve all been marinated in white, heteronormative male superiority that we are currently breaking through in thought, word and deed … sometimes daily.

Many people don’t even want to know the heartbreaking statistics of gender-based vi olence regarding women’s self-defense. I’m reminded of a middle-aged Mexican stu dent in an IPS class in Tijuana. When some of the younger students doubted wheth er self-defense could work, she raised her hand. The older woman shared that when she finally got tired of her husband com ing home smashed, she did some smash ing of her own: with a cast-iron frying pan. She didn’t aim to kill him; she aimed to de liver a consequence that would prevent him from ever beating her up or batting the kids around again. And it worked — he never came home blasted after that. Don’t misun derstand: We don’t run around with pans and rolling pins, but you get the point of a woman breaking out of the stereotypes of emotional and physical submission.

So many things have shifted in our re cent history. Openly gay people are married and even serving in the federal cabinet! A POC vice president; women on the Supreme Court!

The list is inspiring. If you’d told any of us 60 to 70 years ago that women could be anything other than a wife, mother, nurse, maybe an author or actor, librarian or teach er, we’d think you were, at best, a dreamer or, at worst, bonkers. My mother couldn’t get a credit card in her own name, for good ness sake! In my own circle, I know female lawyers, doctors, consultants, clergy, pilots and self-defense teachers: badasses all. And judges. Yes — judges.

This brings me to the upcoming election.

Hey you! Speak up!

Downtown News wants to hear from people in the community. If you like or dislike a story, let us know, or weigh in on something you feel is import ant to the community.

Participation is easy. Go to downtownnews.com, scroll to the bottom of the page and click the “Let ter to the Editor” link. For guest opinion proposals, please email christina@timespublications.com.

As I wrote in June of this year for the pri maries, a confession: as election-aware as I like to think of myself, evaluating the judg es on a ballot has traditionally stumped me, and that’s embarrassing to admit. I’ll bet many of us are like that and possibly too proud to cop to it. To help make the most informed choices, I typically utilize the Con sumer Watchdog voting guides, Democratic party and union endorsements, and recom mendations from the League of Women Vot ers. I still feel ignorant about judges, but not this time.

bench with compassion.

EXECUTIVE EDITOR: Christina Fuoco-Karasinski

STAFF WRITERS: Andrew Checchia, Andres De Ocampo, Julia Shapero

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: Sara Edwards, Kamala Kirk

Finally, lest you think I vote a straight female ticket, many men also deserve our votes. Hyperlocally, for school board, I’m voting for Billy Malone. Hoo-boy, Kimber ly Kenne, the incumbent, is tone-deaf, en titled, and a generally despicable person who shouldn’t be allowed near a school, let alone a school governing body. Talk about blind spots: She’s a walking, talking example of one. Let’s all vote with our eyes open.

ART DIRECTORS: Arman Olivares, Stephanie Torres

STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER: Luis Chavez

I’m very impressed with the Defenders of Justice slate that consists of Elizabeth Lash ley-Haynes (Office 67), Holly Hancock (Office 70), Carolyn “Jiyoung” Park (Office 118) and Anna Slotky Reitano (Office 60). They know what life as lived is like and can sit on the

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS: Myriam Santos

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES: Catherine Holloway, Michael Lamb

FOUNDER EMERITUS: Sue Laris

Ellen Snortland has written this col umn for decades and also teaches cre ative writing. She can be reached at ellen@ beautybitesbeast.com. Her award-win ning film “Beauty Bites Beast” is available for download or streaming at vimeo.com/ ondemand/beautybitesbeast.

EXECUTIVE EDITOR: Christina Fuoco-Karasinski

DEPUTY EDITOR: Luke Netzley

STAFF WRITERS: Alex Gallagher, Morgan Owen

CONTRIBUTING WRITER: Ellen Snortland STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER: Chris Mortenson

ART DIRECTORS: Arman Olivares, Stephanie Torres

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES: Catherine Holloway (213) 308-2261 Michael Lamb (213) 453-3548 Denine Gentilella (323) 627-7955

FOUNDER EMERITUS: Sue Laris

1620 W. FOUNTAINHEAD PARKWAY, SUITE 219 TEMPE, ARIZONA 85282

PRESIDENT: Steve T. Strickbine

VICE PRESIDENT: Michael Hiatt

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Professor hosts judge-alumna as guest speaker

By LA Downtown News Staff

UCLA Filipino alumnus and Associate Professor Bobby Rimas hosted Judge Neetu Badhan-Smith as a guest speaker in his American legal systems course at the DTLA campus on Oct. 19.

Rimas said Badhan-Smith inspired students by talking about court procedures, the importance of having a work-life balance, and diversity on the bench. Badhan-Smith also emphasized the importance of legal teams’ preparation. They should thoroughly know the discovery of a case as well as the elements of a claim.

She ended her presentation by offering interviewing tips.

“Be and know why you are uniquely you,” Badhan-Smith said.

“Know how valuable you are … so that when you go on those interviews, you have the confidence to play it forward.”

Rimas said Badhan-Smith’s presentation was “phenomenal beyond words.”

Badhan-Smith presides at the Los Angeles County Superior Court in Van Nuys and was appointed by California Gov. Jerry Brown to fill the position in 2017.

Badhan-Smith earned her bachelor’s degree from ULCA and her Juris Doctorate from Southwestern Law School. Before her appointment as judge, Badhan-Smith was the deputy public defender in Los Angeles County and an attorney at the Southern California Housing Rights Center in Los Angeles.

In addition to being an associate professor, Rimas is a paralegal at the Larson LLP law firm. He is also the vice chair of the special committee on diversity, equity and in clusion for a Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization.

Rimas graduated with a bachelor’s degree in history from UCLA and a Master of Le gal Studies degree, cum laude, from the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law. He is the past chair/president of the UCLA Pilipino Alumni Association and past president of the Los Angeles Paralegal Association.

Bobby Rimas/Submitted

Judge Neetu Badhan-Smith and Associate Professor Bobby Rimas at California State University, Los Angeles.

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LA Mission unveils new ‘Dignity Shelter’

By Morgan Owen LA Downtown News Staff Writer

The Los Angeles Mission has unveiled a newly renovated stabilization center that in cludes over 100 new beds, soundproof office areas and state-of-the-art privacy pods.

Part of the broader Dignity by Design Ren ovation Project, the goal of this renovation is to transform the experience of homeless shel ters into a dignified, holistic and therapeutic setting.

Assemblymember Miguel Santiago spoke passionately about the project in his address during the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

“The ability to house 100 people means we are going to save 100 people from dying on the streets of Los Angeles. (The Los An geles Mission) has stepped it up,” Santiago said. “We’re not just talking about saving lives. We’re talking about bringing dignity to that experience.”

The Dignity by Design project focuses on

reimagining the physical space of the LA Mis sion to provide a cleaner, calmer and more private environment for those who utilize the organization’s services.

As an organization, Los Angeles Mission has been providing resources to the Los An geles homeless population since 1936. It is a privately funded, nonprofit, faith-based or ganization that provides stabilization and shelter services to the poor, addicted and homeless. It caters to both the short-term and long-term needs of the homeless population.

In addition to the LA Mission’s job training program, Dignity by Design focuses on pro viding additional resources that have been highly sought after by the homeless commu nity, such as privacy areas and locations to at tend Zoom interviews.

Upon completion, the Dignity by Design Renovation Project will expand the capacity of the LA Mission’s Skid Row Facility by 50% and provide updated amenities, including a cafe, legal clinic and community garden.

During the ribbon-cutting ceremony, the LA Mission also announced they would break ground on another Dignity by Design facility, this time geared toward the needs of wom en and children. Details regarding the proj ect have not been released, but the LA Mis sion plans to break ground on the new facility in 2023.

Troy Vaughn: ‘From resident to president’

The Dignity by Design Renovation Project is the brainchild of LA Mission’s president and CEO, Troy Vaughn, whose personal experienc es have deeply shaped the project.

“I was homeless many years ago, and be ing a person that was traveling from shelter to shelter, everything seemed dull and drea ry. … I’ve been in many of them, so I have a real idea of what shelter life should look like,” Vaughn described.

Vaughn became homeless after he discov ered his father died of a drug overdose. He was serving a tour in the Marine Corps at the time but could not complete it due to the mental anguish of his father’s death. Vaughn returned home and moved from state to state, jumping train cars. He soon fell into ad diction, using drugs and alcohol to cope with

the pain of his loss.

Vaughn became emotional as he told the story of how he eventually sought help from the LA Mission. When he arrived, there was a six-month waiting list to get a bed in the fa cility, but a priest at the mission found space for him.

“I’ll never forget him as long as I live. … I didn’t smile for six months, they told me, but now I can’t stop smiling. The light came back,” said Vaughn, quickly returning to his upbeat, joking demeanor.

Vaughn said he demonstrates the success of the LA Mission’s long-term efforts to fight homelessness through connection. After he arrived, he realized the mission was more than just a place to find a bed; it was a place where he experienced compassion and be longing for the first time in his life.

Design and environment have therapeutic value, explained Vaughn.

“If we allow our environments to have light and energy and color, it helps bring a sense of calm in situations that could bring agitation or uneasiness. We’ve done that here at Los Angeles Mission, and we are doing that in ev ery phase.”

By Morgan Owen LA Downtown News Staff Writer

Earlierthis year, LG Business Solutions opened a new Business Innovation Center in Downtown LA to showcase their latest technology to potential clients. The center is geared toward showcasing LG’s medical-grade technology and OLED monitors. Still, Todd Best, sales engineer, and Yoosoo Choi, product manager, said LG has something for ev eryone.

“LG has much more than your TV, your washer and your refrigerator,” Best explained. “When you bring a customer down here, they come for (something specific), but I can’t tell you how many times they say, ‘I didn’t know you did all this stuff.’ It opens up an entirely new direction for these people.”

The facility has a very futuristic feel. Every corner features a new piece of LG’s technology, including the CLOi Guidebot, which is available to give customers a tour of the facility and answer questions. Choi said this reflects LG’s mission to inspire innovation and customer de votion.

“The objective is selling the product,” Choi said. “That’s my goal, but I think having this fa cility in Los Angeles can give people some idea about the future (of technology). And they can talk to their children (about it). They may not just think about technology; they may think about their future, too. That’s something I’ve thought about.”

Choi underlined that LG’s medical technology conforms to essential industry standards. For example, the monitors they create for surgeons and other hospital departments follow FDA regulations regarding brightness, color spectrums and sanitization. The showroom also showcases LG’s innovative medical technology, such as its CLOi UV-C cleaning robot.

The center focuses heavily on marketing LG’s medical equipment and technology because California is the largest consumer of health care services.

However, LA’s film and video production industry has not been overlooked at the Business Innovation Center. The center also featured LG’s UltraFine OLED Pro monitors in its Creative studio, which caters to the film industry through its color quality and high-resolution dis plays.

According to a statement from LG, the monitors in their creative studio “take Emmy Award-winning LG OLED reference display technology to the next level and feature advanced capabilities to meet the demanding needs of production studios and digital video.”

Best said that LG has been very successful in marketing the center’s Creative Studio, which showcases the different uses for LG’s OLED Pro monitors. He explained that the monitors are not just for production studios but also for photographers, content creators and other artists that rely on high resolution and color quality.

Best emphasized that, at the end of the day, the facility is an innovation center as well as a business center. He said the center has already evolved in the short time it has been open and that he and Choi are continually looking for new technology to showcase and new ways for customers to utilize their products.

One way the center accomplishes this is by setting up displays demonstrating different ways clients can use their transparent OLED glass screens to market in-store products or as design elements in hotel lobbies. Best said LG has even entered discussions with the hotel in dustry to pursue ways the hospitality industry can use their medical sanitization robot.

“We will continue to innovate and push the outer boundaries of what we can do with our technology,” Best said. “That is part of what the LA Business Innovation Center is all about.”

Chris Mortenson/Staff photographer

LG’s Downtown LA Business Innovation Center. Chloe, the center’s hospitality robot can be seen on the right.

Dignity Health CHMC provides financial assistance

By LA Downtown News Staff

Dignity Health California Hospital Medical Center provided more than $188 million during fiscal year 2022 in patient financial assistance for those unable to afford medical nec essary care, unreimbursed costs of Me di-Cal, community health improvement services and other community benefits.

Dignity Health California Hospi tal Medical Center takes a comprehen sive approach to improving communi ty health, including not only inpatient, outpatient and emergency medical care but also a range of prevention and health improvement programs delivered alongside community partners, financial grants to nonprofit organizations, and

investments in efforts that address the social determinants of health.

Dignity Health provides emergency medical care and medically necessary care in its hospital facilities to all pa tients, without regard to a patient’s fi nancial ability to pay. The hospital has a financial assistance policy that describes the assistance provided to patients for whom it would be a financial hardship to fully pay the expected out-of-pock et expenses for such care and who meet the eligibility criteria. The financial as sistance policy, a plain language sum mary and related materials are available in multiple languages on the hospital’s website.

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Little Tokyo murals pay homage to Ellison Onizuka

By Luke Netzley LA Downtown News Deputy Editor

When Ellison Onizuka was a young boy growing up in Kona, Hawaii, he looked up at the night sky and dreamt of floating among the stars. He would grow up to become the first Asian American and the first person of Japanese origin to reach space aboard the Discov ery shuttle in 1985. Onizuka became an in spiration to Japanese Americans across the country, and is the subject of a new series of murals painted by multimedia artist Kent Yoshimura in Little Tokyo.

“I just resonated with this whole idea of dreaming big, not just looking at space as an object but really as a metaphor for all the things that us as a community in Little Tokyo could accomplish,” Yoshimura said.

Yoshimura was commissioned by Etco Homes in collaboration with the Little Tokyo Community Council to create two murals on the sides of the new Āto development, a seven-story collection of urban flats taking shape on Astronaut Ellison S. Onizuka Street.

Yoshimura has deep ties to the Little To kyo community and was one of 20 artists whose work fell victim to a fire that de stroyed the Little Tokyo Art Complex in June of 2021.

“Little Tokyo has been my home, espe cially as a Japanese American, my entire life,” Yoshimura recounted. “When I was young er, my parents used to take me here to go to the temples, go meet with community members. I grew up in Burbank, so it’s also not that far away. And in recent years after college, I moved back here, primarily to the Arts District, and I started doing a lot more

community-oriented art projects that even tually led to having a larger career in murals.”

In his murals at Āto, Yoshimura sought to capture Onizuka’s spirit of unbridled am bition and adventure, using vibrant colors and working with the theme “Reach for the Stars.”

The murals will cover the north and south side of the development, with both piec es portraying different iterations of Onizu ka. The northern mural shows a boy look ing through a magnifying lens while kneeling among distinguished and histori cal elements of Little Tokyo, such as orange trees and the Sun Building, and Onizuka holding the world in the palm of his hands. The southern mural depicts a Tintin rock et with silhouettes of some of Little Tokyo’s most famous establishments paired with the image of a boy holding a telescope but looking up to the stars through his hands.

“(Onizuka) was a pretty incredible per son, and also during that era he had no one to look up to in regard to role models that were going to space,” Yoshimura said. “Like he’s coming out of nowhere … and then had the opportunity to take this Challenger trip to go back into space.”

On Jan. 28, 1986, Onizuka was one of sev en crew members killed in the Space Shut tle Challenger disaster, which resulted in a 32-month hiatus of the Space Shuttle pro gram and the creation of NASA’s Office of Safety, Reliability and Quality Assurance.

Despite his death at the age of 39, Onizu ka’s legacy has remained, and his achieve ments have inspired generations of Jap anese Americans. Yoshimura called him a “hero” and said that, although the Challeng

er disaster happened before he was born, Onizuka’s story was still a part of his life growing up.

“My dad used to have a surf company, so I used to go to Hawaii a lot, specifically Kona … also the place in town that Ellison Onizuka grew up in,” Yoshimura said. “There’s something about just imagining this Jap anese American boy in the coffee fields of Kona looking up at the sky and being like, ‘You know what? Not only am I going to travel beyond these islands, I’m going to travel beyond this Earth.’”

One of Yoshimura’s personal goals is to create art that inspires coming generations of Japanese American artists. He described that his work stands as a visual representa

tion of his inner self and that much of his artistic expression is informed by children’s book illustrations, magical realism and au thors like Ray Bradbury.

Yoshimura’s mural on the south side of Āto, for instance, is based off of Bradbury’s book, “R is for Rocket.”

“In the epilogue … I see the parallel to Ellison Onizuka, but in different mediums,” Yoshimura described. “It talks about (Brad bury) being a little boy in Illinois looking up at the stars and just thinking of all the sto ries that he could write and the magic that’s out there. And I imagine Ellison Onizuka be ing exactly the same: a little boy in Kona, Ha waii, looking up at the stars and seeing what life he’s going to live.”

Chris Mortenson/Staff

Chris Mortenson/Staff photographer

Multimedia artist Kent Yoshimura painted a new series of murals about Ellison Onizuka in Little Tokyo.

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Petrucci reunites with former bandmate for new tour

By Alex Gallagher LA Downtown News Staff Writer

Grammy-winning prog metal gui tarist John Petrucci has always been a fan of trios.

A self-proclaimed fan of Rush and the Steve Morse Band, Petrucci felt com pelled by their big sounds.

“There is something organic about bands with three guys like Cream and Rush,” Petrucci said.

So, when Petrucci decided to hit the road for his first solo tour — which comes to The Theatre at Ace Hotel on Friday, Nov. 4 — he added two es teemed musicians to share the stage with him.

The first to sign on was Petrucci’s for mer drummer in the prog metal act Dream Theater Mike Portnoy. The two haven’t been onstage together since Petrucci left Dream Theater in 2010.

The two did reunite in 2020 to record “Terminal Velocity,” which greased the wheels for a potential onstage reunion.

“I asked Mike to play drums on ‘Termi

nal Velocity,’ and that was fun because, in that case, I had written all the mu sic already, and Mike came in the studio and played drums on it,” Petrucci said. “Now we’re going to take that music and bring it to life onstage, so it’s exciting for the both of us.”

Rounding out Petrucci’s band is bass ist Dave LaRue, whom Petrucci said he had admired from afar.

“I’m the biggest Steve Morse fan on the planet, and I’ve been going to see Steve Morse and his bassist Dave LaRue as long as I can remember and I was al ways enamored by Dave’s talent,” Petruc ci said.

It was the perfect fit. LaRue laid down the bass parts on Petrucci’s first solo al bum, 2005’s “Suspended Animation,” and had joined Portnoy in projects like Fly ing Colors, the Led Zeppelin cover band Hammer of the Gods, and Petrucci’s lat est album.

“Mike has experience playing with Dave as well since Dave plays in a couple of projects of Mike’s, so the chemistry is

perfect,” Petrucci said.

That chemistry will best be displayed on some of Petrucci’s favorite tunes from his latest work.

“There’s an old song that I put on my new album called ‘Gemini,’ and it was a song I wrote back in the ’90s as a guitar master class demo and I finally recorded a version of it,” Petrucci said.

“This is something only whatever fans happened to be at a clinic I did back in 1995 would even know, but I’m looking forward to playing that song live since it’ll be a throwback to when I used to do those guitar clinics, but this will be a live band version,” he added with a laugh.

Because Petrucci has two talented mu sicians accompanying him on his cur rent North American jaunt, he said fans can expect the songs to sound different from his recordings.

“The arrangements of the songs might be slightly different from the album ver sions,” Petrucci said. “We might stretch some things out a bit so we can have some improvisation.”

Even though the songs might have an elongated run time when played live, Petrucci said fans can expect to hear him hum on his guitar — a lot.

“Basically, in my solo stuff, the gui tar takes on the role of the singer and the soloist and everything else,” Petruc ci said.

He alternates between using standard tuned six- and seven-string guitars, but he also teased he could break out an eight-string guitar.

Although Petrucci was eager to take the stage with his talented duo, he’s equally as excited to tour with the re united all-female thrash metal outfit Meanstreak — which features Petrucci’s wife Rena Sands and Portnoy’s wife Mar lene duetting on guitar.

“My wife (Rena) is a guitar player, and when we met, she was in a band called Meanstreak with Mike’s wife, Marlene,” Petrucci said. “Meanstreak just reunit ed, so I told my wife, ‘If you guys reunite, you can open up for my tour,’ so for the first time I’m touring with my wife and

I’m excited about that.”

At the shows, Petrucci hopes that fans will rekindle their once-lost love of live music.

“I hope that they have fun since live music was taken from us for a couple of years there and everybody is getting back at it now,” he said. “It’s great to be together seeing an instrumental show since it’s a unique type of audience be cause they’re going to see three guys play music, and usually there’s a lot of musicians in the audience.”

John Petrucci w/Meanstreak

WHEN: 8 p.m.

WHERE: The Theatre at Ace Hotel, 929 S.

COST: Tickets start at $25

INFO: johnpetrucci.com/tour

John Petrucci/Submitted

Prog-rock guitarist John Petrucci is set to play The Theatre at Ace Hotel for the first time on Friday, Nov. 4, with bandmates Mike Portnoy and Dave LaRue.

Brandi Milne’s ‘Everything I Ever Was’ opens at CHG

By Luke Netzley LA Downtown News Deputy Editor

For self-taught pop-surrealist Bran di Milne, art has been a vital form of self-expression since childhood. Growing up in Anaheim, she was en gulfed in a world of classic cartoons, toys and candy, images that have inspired de cades of work.

From Oct. 29 to Dec. 3, Milne’s new est body of work, “Everything I Ever Was,” will fill the walls of the Corey Helford Gallery’s main gallery space in what is its largest October exhibition, showcasing a collection of over 40 paintings and illus trations.

“My dream behind this work … it was really out of necessity,” Milne explained. “I needed to trust myself. I’ve been work ing on this work for three years, so that was right before pandemic. I started and then the pandemic hit, and I needed art again in my life. … The dream behind this work was more of a trusting of my subconscious. I didn’t want to curate ideas to aim at this show and work on those. I wanted to listen to myself and give myself some space to just express what my subconscious wanted to say.”

Inspired by her own life experienc es, Milne’s work is a visual interpretation of the world around her. In “Everything

I Ever Was,” her acrylic paintings depict surreal visions of a world in which love, loss and heartbreak dance beneath a candy-coated surface. It’s an exploration of personal stories and emotions that blends Milne’s two favorite holidays: Hal loween and Christmas.

“I get the Christmas stuff from my past,” Milne explained. “That was one of the things in my childhood that was very happy, Halloween and Christmastime. My mom did it up at home with all the decorations and music. … My work can’t escape from that time, that joy. Even Hal loween time, like spooky stuff, just ignit ed my imagination.”

The largest piece in the show, and its namesake, depicts a bulbous snow man surrounded by a cast of whimsi cal, dreamlike characters such as gin gerbread men and colorful insects in a snow-laden forest of Christmas decora tions, candy and toys.

“It’s a big story,” Milne described. “It’s me screaming about life and love and light. I don’t come from a particularly light place in my history and my past, so this was my big need to create a space and an image and a place for me to reach for that light and that love and then, in turn, because I’m making some thing visual, give that out to the world.”

Corey Helford Gallery/Submitted

Brandi Milne

Corey Helford

00

“Visually, I want vibrant. I want lots of things to tickle my eyeballs. … I want ed to be as vibrant as I could, kind of in contrast to the darkness I was feeling and lots of people were feeling during pandemic and the world gone crazy. … Though the meanings behind (the work itself) are mostly, I would say … very serious and honest, I wanted that to contrast in the visuals, in the color, the vibrancy, the palate and even the char acters.

“There’s a lot of innocence in my work and in the characters that I choose, and that’s just deliberately in contrast to the heaviness of life, the darkness and the struggle. Life is hard and it’s scary and it hurts, man. So that is my aim in my work.”

To further combat this darkness, Milne hopes that visitors to the gallery can en joy a sense of peace, safety and connec tion with the work and its emotions.

“It’s a safe place for me, and I want people that are viewing my work or spending time with it to feel safe and to feel accepted,” Milne said. “A lot of my work is about self-acceptance, a journey of self-acceptance and finding out who I am. And I want that for other people, too.”

Three years in the making, “Everything I Ever Was” marks Milne’s fifth solo show at CHG after her “Once Upon a Quiet Kingdom” show in 2017.

“I’m excited, and I’m nervous be

cause I haven’t really been out in like three years, too,” Milne said with a laugh. “What an opportunity to fill a space as beautiful as Corey Helford and fill the walls with love and light and true, hon est authenticity and self-expression and self-acceptance. I don’t take that light ly. And every show that I do, every piece that I put out, I don’t take lightly. …

This is a great opportunity, and I’m very grateful for it.”

In regard to young artists learning their craft and beginning on their own journey of self-discovery, Milne’s advice is to “accept yourself, know yourself well, listen to yourself … be very familiar with the light inside of you and keep that alive, keep that going, shining brighter than even the people around you want.

“(Art) has been maybe the biggest, I call it a, friend in my life. Starting from a very young age, we found each oth er. And I don’t know that I would’ve sur vived some of the hardest times in my life without art and the way that I’m able to express myself, because as a little kid I didn’t necessarily have a lot of words or a lot of space to speak my truths and how I was feeling.

“Art has given me a voice. It’s given me a safe place to find myself and expand myself and express exactly how I feel and what I think and what I want and what I see in my imagination. … It has given me life.”

Lily Burton S9 Personal effects $516 00

Derek Thornsberry E14 Personal effects $1853 10 Moises Placencia L6 Personal effects $458 00

Rene Alexander A8 Personal effects $1657 00 Carlos Serrano C44 Personal effects $850 00

Purchases must be paid for at the time of purchase in cash o n l y A l l p u r c h a s e d s t o r a g e u n i t s w i t h t h e i t e m s c o n t a i n e d herein are sold on an “as

the time

settlement

Thriftee Storage Company

Dated at Los Angeles,

October 18,

P U B

1

by Felipe

“Everything

Corey Helford Gallery/Submitted

Brandi Milne expresses herself by painting a piece in her studio.