Native Intelligence

I was eager to see "The Scottsboro Boys," the Broadway musical onstage at the Ahmanson Theater. The show is based on a true story from 1931 about nine African American teenage boys falsely accused of raping two white girls--one of whom admitted the charge was not true--on a train. The boys were seized in Scottsboro, Alabama and, despite repeated attempts, unable to get a fair trial. It's heartbreaking how much they wanted to believe the truth would set them free. But it was not to be.

The stage production frames the story as a bawdy traveling minstrel show, a carnival spectacle. I couldn't imagine how that could work with such a dark subject and, for me, it mostly didn't. I understand that the show's creators wanted to make the audience uncomfortable, but, to me, the story is simply too tragic for buffoonery.

I'm especially sensitive about this because I lived in Scottsboro for two years and started school there. This was almost three decades after the events depicted onstage, but the town's character was still much the same; change came very slowly.

Scottsboro, in Northeast Alabama, is nestled against the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, where thousands of white people lived in abject poverty (and, no doubt, still do.) As a first grader, my heart ached to see kids come to school barefoot in all but the coldest months. They smelled of the wood fires that heated their houses and cooked their food. Most of their parents were illiterate--couldn't even sign their names. Truancy was a big problem--a county employee trudged up and down the hills every day, trying to get kids to school. Worst of all, those of us in stylish clothes with professional haircuts sometimes got classroom privileges not extended to the others. I hated that.

As racist and behind-the-times as the rest of the South may have been, issues surrounding justice and equality were compounded in Scottsboro by nothing more complex than rampant ignorance. And yes, many of the law enforcement officers, all white of course, were like Rod Steiger's character in "In the Heat of the Night" - uneducated, bigoted men who made snap judgments, asked no questions and took no counsel. That wasn't merely a stereotype. When we lived in Scottsboro, the police chief was known simply as "Bean Belly."

Today, my older brothers and I don't remember ever seeing more than a handful of black people in town, so cloistered were they in their own drab neighborhood with their own churches, substandard schools and meager little grocery stores. They didn't figure into the life of the town except for the few white people who could afford maids or needed manual laborers. We did sometimes see black chain gangs working on the railroad when we ventured out of town.

It's easy to see how the Scottsboro nine could have been falsely accused and held for so long, despite their innocence. White people's words trumped anything black people might be permitted to say. Truth didn't matter. The boys' fate is unspeakable and yet, in that time and place, it's likely no one was surprised.

It's a tragic tale and all the more because it's true. It needs to be told to every generation to remind us of where we've been and could easily go again. But it needs to be told in a way that communicates its gravity. Cruel injustice is not a laughing matter.

Some critics have hailed the show's "lampooning style" as a metaphor for a justice system that was itself a sham. They say the satire puts the travesty in high relief and makes it into art. I can't seem to get to that point of view. Maybe because in Scottsboro, where I learned the Pledge of Allegiance, I also discovered that "liberty and justice for all" was just an aspiration, and not one that everyone shared. At six years old, I found that terribly disturbing. All these years later, I still don't feel like making fun of it.

"The Scottsboro Boys" at the Ahmanson Theater continues through June 30.

Production photo by Craig Schwartz from Center Theater Group

Posted by Mary Daily at 11:53 PM | Permalink

The velvety, black night serves as both inspiration and backdrop for Los Angeles photo artist Darren Pearson, aka Darius Twin. Since 2007 he has refined his technique in light painting and established a keen following amongst a small but elite community of light artists around the world. His subjects are mostly an array of mythical creatures but his work with skeletons and dinosaurs has drawn the attention of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles, which has invited him to stage a live dinosaur "light art" presentation in conjunction with the museum's June 9 centennial birthday bash.

Light painting is both art and science. Using a digital camera with the capacity for long exposures, a tripod and a light source, Darren etches his visions onto the infinite canvas of space. His current camera is a Cannon 7DSLR with a Zeiss 28 lens, which he operates in bulb mode with a remote to open and close the lens when starting and completing his drawings. A simple flashlight on a key chain serves as his light source,but smaller LED lights, fire, Glo-sticks and even steel wool sparklers all can be used to create different photographic effects. For a better understanding he has recorded a great visual demonstration on his website.

A Southern Californian native, Darren moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in graphic design after attending UC Santa Cruz. As many in Hollywood have discovered, LA provides plenty of diversity for the aspiring artist and Darren's endless quest for unique backdrops has produced a spectacular series of photographs capturing Los Angeles by night. After sunset he scouts around LA's hidden underbelly to compile a list of potential locations. To avoid the cities excessive ambient light, he focuses on abandoned locations, many discovered simply by browsing blog sites or from Google satellite images: the sunken city in San Pedro, parts of the LA River, the Old Bank District, bridges and deserted railway tracks have all been catalogued in his photographs. Once he's pin-pointed his location he returns after dark or early in the morning to draw and shoot. Typically he's alone save for the homeless and the odd graffiti artist and so far has attracted little attention but he's alert about his surroundings, "follows his gut and carries a big tripod"!

"Los Angeles," he says "is just a fantastic pace to shoot because of it's versatility." There's plenty of steel and concrete but a lot of natural beauty in Silver Lake, Angeles Forest, Joshua Tree and of course along the Pacific Ocean.

Up until now the focus of his creativity has been, appropriately for Los Angeles, an unparalleled collection of dinosaurs and angels along with a large group of skeletons in various forms of motion. He starts with a sketch, which he saves to his cell phone and later decides what subject would best fit in which locations. Working in the dark, he uses his own body as a point of reference and the skeletal frame of his subjects facilitates his ability to get the proportions balanced. The skeleton, he says "is easy to relate to. There is no gender or skin color, we all have them." His fascination with dinosaurs started as a young boy when he drew them as cartoons and he's never outgrown his love for these prehistoric creatures. As a student he looked for ways to illustrate them within a photograph, but it was the photography of Pablo Picasso's "light" drawings of centaurs and bulls done in 1949 that finally shone the light on the medium he had been searching for. Before each painting Darren researches his dinosaur and practices at least a couple of times to get them to look right. He follows a strict routine; lens, lights, angles. Each swipe of light in space is a small piece of a very intricate puzzle, all of which must be captured in one single long exposure shot. From the first try to a successful painting there is plenty of trial and error.

The Centennial Celebration of the Natural History Museum provides an exciting opportunity for Darren to demonstrate his art. His goal is to have his work exhibited in museums and although he has done commercial work he feels strongly that light painting be viewed as art. One of the key misconceptions, he says, "is that people don't understand the process" and "think my work is conjured through trickery or computer manipulation." Technology is advancing and he keeps working on new techniques but don't be fooled; there are no short cuts to Darren's photographs. Painting in space requires incredibly swift hands, technical know how and a spectacular imagination.

Darren Pearson will be performing Sunday June 9th from 6-6:30 pm on the second floor of the Natural History Museum.

Artwork: Darius Twin

Previously on LA Observed:
Dinosaurs over Eagle Rock, not in neon

Posted by Andrea Brody at 11:20 PM | Permalink

Malin Christensson as Susanna and Edwin Crossley-Mercer as Figaro. LA Phil photo.

First, there was none (back when the sniffy cognoscenti called Los Angeles a cultural wasteland). Then the LA Opera finally took root, fed by the celebrity mega-seed of Plácido Domingo. And now Disney Hall, courtesy of Gustavo Dudamel and his LA Philharmonic, has jumped into the operatic garden.

But wait, in a single weekend we just saw three — count 'em, three — rings of action: LA Opera's "Tosca" at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, "Dulce Rosa," a world premiere by Lee Holdridge, inaugurating the company's Off Grand wing at Santa Monica's Broad Stage, and, most stunningly sophisticated of all, Christopher Alden's staging of "Le nozze di Figaro" with Dudamel helming his Mozart-sized band in a makeshift semi-pit at Disney.

Talk about brilliant. This time — in a second outing as purveyor of opera — the Phil found just the right way to incorporate its wonderful self into the milieu of the lyric muse. After all, Disney has no proscenium arch, no wings, no way to hang scenery or place side lights. It's designed to showcase a symphony orchestra.

I suspect it took a whole creative team to figure out the balance between "stage" and "pit." The solution, certainly with Pritzker Prize architect Jean Nouvel's input, along with his prop-based designs, boasted a wrap-around effect.

Sometimes Figaro or the Count or Cherubino would stroll to the front of the orchestra, and maybe even jokingly (when appropriate) jump onto the podium with the maestro. And yes, although music stand lights were low and the instrumentalists wore black shirts and trousers, we could see them — as background. But the big bonus came in seeing a very discreet but eminently follow-able Dudamel — his every small but emphatic gesture and cue and phrase-embrace, as it flowed through his dancerly body to his fingertips, to the band ("see the music"), and to the singers.

And, given that Alden kept the action on his raked stage limited we had equal value music-making and theatrics, with young, astute singing actors who could both understand and mean what they did onstage. Away with the stock operatic lurch-and-lunge stances or the mock exaggerations of comedy. As with his "Don Giovanni" last year and now this "Marriage of Figaro" — it pre-dates "Downton Abbey" by several centuries and is all about large incestuous households filled with nobles and servants — the innovative director strips things down to their essentials.

Forget the routiniers and their shenanigans. Not here.

Figaro, the darkly rich baritone Edwin Crossley-Mercer, makes his words sardonic, bordering on angry, when his scene with fiancée Susanna opens — it's all about a bed here, and not an ample one, but the spartan thing that denotes servanthood. We didn't know Mozart-DaPonte could be read as down-in the-mouth but now we do.

And then there are simple touches that signal everything. The Countess, for instance, sung by the splendid Dorothea Röschmann, spins out her "Porgi amor" while fingering Susanna's bridal veil — left on the bed in Figaro's room — as a sad reminder of her faithless husband's designs on the servant girl.

Others in the excellent cast included Rachel Frenkel, who made an un-silly but still intense adolescent in love with love and even lavished some nice flourishes on "Voi che sapete"; Christopher Maltman, a suave and lively and hip Count Almaviva; Malin Christensson, a soberly shrewd Susanna.

Haute-couturier Azzedine Alaïa, who flew the cast to his Paris atelier for fittings, costumed the singers in casual chic for their everyday doings and glorious runway numbers for their fancy occasion. The whole thing had to cost a bundle, but in the realm of corporate arts, and a special event like this, who's counting?

Back in the real world, though, where next day's dinner must be accounted for, LA Opera came up with a "Tosca" production that might better have been left off the table. John Caird's staging, borrowed from Houston, does everything to afflict an opera company that is charged with offering ever-new takes on bread-and-butter repertory. And although this director boasts a long list of notable credits his tack here is to deal with external add-ons, simply frame the piece in an idea that doesn't fit and ignore the essentials of motivated, interpersonal drama — or, at least, not help his cast do much that is convincing.

So we saw Puccini's musically keyed drama blunted, step by step. Floria Tosca, who is supposed to be Rome's celebrated diva, enters a dark, bombed out church, dressed like a peasant girl and acting like one. Where's the grand flourish to match the composer's notated description? Where's the bright daylight that accompanies her sunny appearance?

Worst of all, when the music tells us that she's running with triumphant news to her lover's jail, the director instead has her gawking at corpses hanging down from the prison ceiling. Not to mention the cartoonish blood-letting scenes where Tosca stabs her nemesis so effortlessly and so often she seems to be plunging her knife through jello and, for good measure, slits the guy's throat, his up-raised hand jabbing the air.

But there is one exceptional treasure in this "Tosca." Sondra Radvanovsky. Just to hear her voice blooming throughout — with its plummy tone, rich dimension, ease at the top, fullness everywhere on the scale — is a boon. And, of course, her "Vissi d'arte" brought the wildest stamping and hollering heard in a long while. Too bad the director couldn't help her find the role's meaty drama.

Nor did the two opposing forces in this Tosca's life fare better. Both Marco Berti as Cavaradossi and Lado Ataneli as Scarpia could easily be mistaken for bank tellers rather than deadly foes, notwithstanding decent vocal strengths. Especially unhelpful were Bunny Christie's designs: Baron Scarpia, the elegantly fearsome Roman chief of police, was gotten up as a low-level criminal ordering his slovenly thugs about in what looked like a garage full of art booty, not the luxe quarters befitting his stature.

Luckily, there was Domingo conducting — a powerhouse when he used to sing Cavaradossi, and one who now could guide the work with needed sensitivity. But that wasn't all. In something of a marathon he also presided over rehearsals and performances of "Dulce Rosa," racing back and forth between downtown and Santa Monica.

That work, based on a story by Isabel Allende concerning civil war in a generic South American country with all the expected martyrs and heroes, good guys and bad guys, devotion and treachery. It finally builds to a rousing climax via a love triangle.

Holdridge is a facile composer who can score anything called for in the book, be it conflict or romantic tenderness. By the second act he found his stride. The narrative had an urgent musical flow, with Domingo eliciting dark power from the orchestra, although prior to that "Dulce Rosa" had seemed like a Hallmark card of an opera -- especially so Richard Sparks' libretto.

The cast was strong. In the title role soprano Maria Antunez transformed herself from innocent, devoted daughter to heroic champion of her father's cause. Others, also excellent, included Greg Fedderly, Benjamin Bliss and Alfredo Daza.

Of all that went into the physical production it was Jenny Okun's projection designs that dominated and lent atmosphere.

But if you don't want to miss the most intense experience, get to Philippe Beziat's film, "Becoming Traviata," now at the Royal. The brilliant Natalie Dessay, with her director and conductor, take you behind the scenes through the real agonies and ecstasies of creating her character. It's like no other.

Tosca and Dulce Rosa photos: Robert Millard

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 10:33 PM | Permalink

Nearly all of my contributions to LA Observed tend to be about sports. But, I do sometimes care about matters other than Don Mattingly's penchant for bunting or other such minutiae. For example, my wife and I are members of LACMA. And on Sunday, we ventured out to see the new James Turrell exhibition, being touted as THE thing to see this summer.

Turrell is a light and space artist, which is not an easy medium to display. For starters, a museum needs to set up some fairly sophisticated lighting equipment. And there needs to be space because the light and the space work together.

But, from our first experience with the exhibition, albeit on its second day of display, the space part may require visitors to LACMA to arrive with a great deal of patience to take all of the exhibit in. LACMA is recommending 90 minutes, but it may take even longer judging from our experience on Sunday night.

Continue reading "LACMA mounts an exhibition that may be the best thing hardly anyone sees" »

Posted by Bob Timmermann at 5:07 PM | Permalink

Artist J. Michael Walker wrote this for LA Observed after an experience in Downtown last weekend. The artwork is his too.

Driving into Downtown, I float down Los Angeles Street, and now - early Sunday evening, the shops shuttered, an occasional street person the only pedestrian - I have the whole block north of Fifth to myself. Car parked and locked, I stroll up Fifth a couple of blocks and, detouring into the Last Bookstore and snagging a pair of arcane art books (Wenceslaus Hollar: "Delineator of His Time," and "Gothic Panel Painting in Hungary)", I pay with plastic and pop into my destination next door - CB1 Gallery - for the opening of André Goeritz's monumental woodworks and Kiki Seror's ying-yang porn-art photos and videos.

As happens at art openings, you see one friend: you see them all. Conversation with one acquaintance leads to hugs and news with another. Between the bonding, the attention to the art, and the wine, two and a half hours pass and it's time to go home.

As I set back out down Fifth, smokers ring the gallery door; and a small dark woman dressed in red, whom I'd earlier noticed perusing Kiki's adult-website-based photographs with a knowing, sly smile, harangues some long-gone male with a preacher's wrath.
Rounding the corner at Los Angeles, I spy my car, all alone on the trash-strewn street. Setting my art books on the car roof, I reach into my pocket- and fail to find my car key. The more pockets I check (and re-check), the less I find my car key. It's not in the ignition, and of course it's not lying on the asphalt. I could call AAA to dispatch a truck and jimmy my door, but then I would just have an open car and no key; so I retrace my steps to CB1, silently calling out, "Okay, Exú," - Exú, Lord of the Crossroads, the orisha of opening pathways - "Figure this one out for me."

The gallery's now closed: the artists, the faithful, and the owners hover out front, deciding on drinks, dinner or home. I approach Clyde, the director, and ask if someone happened to find a car key: "No one turned anything in," he responds.

I check in at The Last Bookstore next door: "Not that I know of," the first clerk, who had rung up my purchase, answers, "What kind of car was it?"

"Nissan Versa."

"Gail," he calls out to the tall woman in a cool blouse, who had bagged and handed me my purchase, "Anybody turn in a key for a Nissan Versa?"

"Yessss!" comes her cheery reply and Gail hands me my lucky car key. I kiss her hand and ask, "So, where was it, do you know?"

"Right here," and she peers over the counter, to the floor where I had stood.

As I leave the bookstore she adds, "One of our regulars turned it in; a character called Little Bit."

I'm elated: the scenario for getting home by bus on a Sunday night to retrieve the spare key, returning to Los Angeles Street, and purchasing a replacement key for $130, had not looked pleasant.

Stepping outside, the homeless woman dressed in red, now humming contentedly to herself, catches my eye: "Have a blessed evening," I say, full of gratitude and generosity of spirit for this turn of events.

"Excuse me, sir?" she calls after me, and I expect a request for spare change, deciding in a split second, as I turn to meet her gaze, that I will happily offer whatever she asks.

"Do you like Old School Jazz?" comes the unexpected question, "Because I'm going to perform here on June 15th."

Dazed, I reply, "Sure, I'd love to come. Of course," and I notice her twinkling eyes, her widening smile against teak skin. "What's your name?"

"Little Bit."

Little Bit. Of course.

I raise my car key between us. She acknowledges it without the slightest indication of surprise. Then her smile widens, her eyebrow arches, and she leans in low.

"They say," She whispers, "I play guitar just like Eric Clapton."

"Goin' Down to the Crossroads," I think as I walk to my car: Exú.

I know it's a stretch, but tonight, as the key unlocks my door, I'm inclined to believe her....

Posted by J. Michael Walker at 3:56 PM | Permalink

Okay. So the pure of heart may have missed it. But when the LA Philharmonic programmed two stellar women as headliners -- conductor Susanna Mälkki together with violin virtuosa Leila Josefowicz -- I said to myself: no male domination here, not for now!

And that, folks, is a rarity, a rebuff of tradition. Especially when we're talking about leadership roles. Especially when 2008 almost brought about the first woman as U.S president -- watch out for 2016 -- and when 2013 may see the same as Los Angeles mayor.

Oh, yes, we've had female baton-wavers at the Phil before, starting in the '70s with Antonia Brico, who, with skirts swaying, took the podium at Hollywood Bowl after spending a lifetime by then waiting in the wings (perhaps deservedly!)....and some recent others, including Marin Alsop and Joana Carneiro.

But Finnish-born Mälkki came with elite credentials -- a notable nod from Pierre Boulez to stand as director of the Ensemble InterContemporain in Paris. And she's being hailed as a conductor of today's most heady music, invited even to Milan's La Scala, that most hide-bound, male bastion where catcalls are commonplace and where she became the first woman to occupy the pit.

Mälkki's manner, like Boulez's, is to keep the scores at hand (even overly familiar ones, like Brahms' Fourth Symphony) and leave the baton at home. Ram-rod erect, tall and thin, she's something of a spectacle in a long, close-fitting tail coat.

Her calling card here was the U.S. premiere of the German composer Enno Poppe's "Markt," a thing of astringent beauty and startling clarity of lines, which the orchestra delivered in its full glory, along with powerful exclamations.

Bully for them all. And bully for that other star, Josefowicz, who opened new vistas with her account of Stravinsky's Violin Concerto. How often we've heard this alluring work on which Balanchine set his remarkable ballet (and thus do we "see the music"), yet never so alive or searingly intimate in its slippery asides as this fiddler made it. Mälkki backed up that interpretive stance, emphasizing the composer's devilish little dialogues, alternating the jaunty with the swoony.

In other circles, there were long careers to note. Namely those downtown New York avant-gardists, starting in the 1970s, who took on the same devotion to collaborative spirit as did Diaghilev in early 1900s Paris. Think Merce Cunningham, John Cage, Laurie Anderson, Robert Rauschenberg, Trisha Brown, et al.

Well, UCLA became the open arms of a major Trisha Brown Dance Company retrospective, the choreographer's last hurrah capping her career. There were site-specific offerings, films and theatrical events all over Westwood for several weeks. Its own kind of minimalism, the Brown aesthetic deals with repetitive movement, a softly shifting kaleidoscope of loose limbs swinging and hips undulating back and forth within an endlessly geometric network of patterns.

Guess The Ending became my own game while watching Brown's "Foret Foray" -- because the program note listed the Hamilton High School Marching Band as part of the piece. To be sure, distant sounds could be heard and they got closer and closer. But I was right: the marching musicians would not actually enter Royce Hall on whose stage the piece took place, they would not break into the sanctum sanctorum of this shrine-like, ever-closed-off opus...

At its end, though, Megan Madorin, who could have been Isadora herself -- such floated finger curls and foot falls as even that famous one had not the virtuosity to flaunt -- left us in staggering disbelief of her phantom image.

Brown's most current and, actually, her final piece, "I'm going to toss my arms - if you catch them they're yours" (a farewell title if ever there was one), shows her transition from that long-established uniform of floppy trousers and shirts to sleek swimsuits, a reflection of today's bare-it-all ethos, wherever you look. Who says nothing changes?

Probably not Bebe Miller, who qualifies as nearly vintage, celebrating her company's 27th year. She showcased Angie Hauser and the incomparable Darrell Jones in "A History," downtown at REDCAT. Throughout the piece, Miller seemed to be asking: What do we hold in our consciousness? Over and over, the duo showed us an answer: the creative process -- a whole variety of body linkages that are awkward and difficult. Through spoken word, sometimes by way of softly singing to herself (recorded), Miller also tells us they are dream fragments and that memory is possessed by the physical images of other dances.

But for the Trey McIntyre Project -- based in Boise and seen here at the Broad Stage -- there is no long history, just a wide net in which this gifted, young dance-maker catches fodder for his creative sensibilities. And what fodder that is. Songs of Richard Strauss, for instance (a recording with soprano Jessye Norman) form the basis of "Pass, Away," a mélange of lyrical movement that verges at times on acrobatic but strictly as an expression of intensity, not physicality for its own sake. The tone harkens back to German modern dance innovator Mary Wigman and even German cabaret, but the mode is rapturous, as in Strauss's sweeping music.

Altogether different was McIntyre's other extraordinary work, "Arrantza," a docu-dance of Basque immigrants in America, their recorded narratives heard above tambourines and recorders, their personas a thing of berets and kerchiefs, sneakers and jeans, their gathering place a village plaza filled with seemingly spontaneous but deceptively complex dances. Less known than the Ratmanskys and Wheeldons of the world, McIntyre is a genuine treasure.

And so, of course, is Angela Gheorghiu, who appeared in recital at that same Santa Monica oasis, the Broad.

"Brava, mi diva," shouted a fan from the audience, as the Romanian-born soprano headed out on stage, beaming broadly, taking a queenly stride. She knows she's beloved. And why. It's that magical voice, a liquid column of sound that can seduce with its sheer quality, its smoothness up and down the scale, its lustrous top and that signature Gheorghiu legato. Remember how she even captivated President Obama at the 2009 Kennedy Center Honors when she sang "Vissi d'arte?"

On this night, accompanied ably by pianist Jeff Cohen, Gheorghiu proved to be that same shrewd artist. Oddly, she kept a music stand throughout and used it almost like a prop, swinging it from here to there, making it a point of direction as she sang well-known ditties ("Plaisir d'amour") and other recital-appropriate songs in unrecognizable French before continuing to a whole range of lovely Romanian songs. All of it was gorgeous.

So was the singing at LA Opera's "La Cenerentola," or as it's lately called, "Cinderella." But as one wag put it, much of this Rossini work is repetitive, so that a good edit could ease its three hours to two -- nothwithstanding the lively treatment by James Conlon and orchestra, and the virtuosic performances of Kate Lindsey, Stacey Tappan, Ronnita Miller, Nicola Ulivieri, Alessandro Corbelli, René Barbera and Vito Priante.

Top photo: Susanna Mälkki. Bottom photos: Angela Gheorghiu

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 9:42 PM | Permalink

Paris Photo is the annual photography fair held in France — transported to the U.S. this weekend for the first time. On the lot at Paramount Studios are gallery spaces, booksellers such as Taschen and Aperture and live artist conversations and film screenings. Matthew Weiner, the creator of "Mad Men," is one of the featured speakers. At the preview on Thursday, City Hall's culture maven Olga Garay-English welcomed the organizers to LA and Councilman Tom LaBonge presented a proclamation and a calendar.

Photos by Iris Schneider. Top, looking onto the New York backlot at Paramount Studios from a facade occupied for the weekend by Zucker Art Books. Below, display space inside facades on the studio's New York street.

Posted by Judy Graeme at 9:52 PM | Permalink

New York based artist Shinique Smith is known for taking everyday, unwanted objects and transforming them into complex, colorful sculptures. Some hang from the ceiling in rope-bound bundles, others sit on the floor in bale formations. All are products of the artist's passion for discovering and collecting materials wherever she finds herself in the world. Fabric, discarded wrappers, cast-off toys, old clothing, and second-hand furniture are just some of the items that have found their way into her pieces. Also known for her large-scale paintings and installations, Smith, 42, brings a concern for finding common threads between people to her work. She was first inspired to incorporate used clothing into her sculpture after reading a New York Times Magazine story that followed a t-shirt donated to a thrift shop in Manhattan and eventually became part of a bale of used clothing that was shipped to Africa. Growing up with her fashion editor mother in Baltimore, Smith had a wide range of experiences with travel, art, clothing design, and spirituality, all of which inform her work today.

Another of Smith's passions is working with children — she earned a degree in arts education at Tufts University before going on to an MFA from Maryland Institute College of Art. This made her a natural choice for LACMA On-site's current project at Charles White Elementary School in the Westlake district near Downtown. LACMA On-site is a partnership with LAUSD that provides art programs and materials to schools, libraries, and community organizations.

"We selected Shinique because we thought her background and artistic practice would resonate with the students. She has natural instincts as a teacher. Her work is fundamentally about transforming everyday objects into something one-of-a-kind, special....and emboldened the students to see their environment through new eyes," says LACMA educator Sarah Jesse. The museum operates a gallery in the school, opened in the former Otis Art Institute on Wilshire Boulevard, and Shinique Smith: Firsthand is the fifth exhibition mounted there. The show has served as a catalyst for artist, museum, and community to interact. It consists of three parts; work by Smith, objects chosen by her from LACMA's Costume and Textile collection, and art by students at Charles White. A new piece made by Smith specifically for the show was inspired by her exploration of MacArthur Park and the downtown fabric district.

Smith was first introduced to the students at assemblies last September. She showed images of her art, talked about what inspires her, and posed questions to the students about finding beauty in their everyday lives. The children were asked to collect their own ideas and inspirations in sketchbooks which they later worked from to create paintings and collages that became part of the show. Smith later returned to the school and in partnership with Jesse, conducted workshops with the kids where they made small sculptures out of socks, ribbon, yarn, and tape. All of the students' creations will be assembled by Smith into one giant sculpture, and will remain at the school permanently. Smith gathered unused socks from a New York store that was going out of business, and also during outings in Downtown Los Angeles and Koreatown. During one recent workshop, she gently urged a group of fourth graders to think about the materials they were about to utilize. "Why do you think I use socks? Are you the only people who use socks? People all over the world wear them, so that's something that connects us," she said.

Smith said that working with the LACMA Costume collection was a joy. "This was a first for me, the first time I've used part of a museum's collection (as part of a show), and a great opportunity. I wanted everything!," she said. "I chose objects for aesthetic and formal reasons, things that related to my work. But I also thought about the designers that I knew of when I was growing up. That's why Bill Blass is in the show." Also included, and juxtaposed against Smith's and the students work, are pieces by Geoffrey Beene, Rei Kawakubo, and Yves St. Laurent.

Reflecting on exactly when it was she discovered that she wanted to work with kids, Smith says, "Maybe it was about thinking back to when I was a kid, and about the things that worked out for me." She came to the realization, very early on, that she did not want to teach in an everyday situation. "I want to work with kids when they choose to be there, not when they have to be there," she said.

"It's been amazing to have her here," said school principal Irene Worrell. "The students have responded so well to Shinique. They show me their art and I love seeing their eyes light up. It's esteem building. Everyone is successful." The school's primarily Hispanic students are not strangers to art instruction. Charles White is one of the few LAUSD elementary schools to offer art, music, and dance. But getting to the museum can be another matter. Says Worrell, "It's funny, LACMA is only ten minutes away, but for a lot of these kids, it's a world away."

Top and bottom two photos for LA Observed by Iris Schneider. Photo of This Year's Girl, 2009 by Stephen Brayne

Posted by Judy Graeme at 3:46 PM | Permalink

At last, a "Flying Dutchman" without irrelevant whimsy or silly symbolism or egotistical re-writing. And not even one tomato thrown (yes, an audience member threw a tomato — at previous director Julie Taymor — for her staging of Wagner's mythic work, mounted nearly 20 years ago by LA Opera.)

This time the company let Wagner be Wagner. It borrowed Nikolaus Lehnhoff's darkly ominous production from Chicago. And through it we could see the composer's roiling conflicts so wildly illustrated in his score, a thing of irresistibly stormy outbursts.

What can I say? But that it's wonderful — even with a last-minute indisposition of the central soprano and her replacement by Julie Makerov, who met the challenge handsomely, despite a few patches of vocal grief, but many more of glory, thanks to her stentorian high notes and thrilling ascents.

Between conductor James Conlon's all-in approach to heroic orchestral calls like this one and the spectral visions defining the protagonist, you really are swept into the drama and not distracted from it. Here is an ideal mix of stylization and theatrical impact, by the eminent German team of Lehnhoff, Raimund Bauer and Andrea Schmidt-Futterer. It conjures up an ornate Bauhaus ship emerging out of smoky sea depths, with a Wotan-like Dutchman, all in black, hat brim pulled down, framed in an angle of light. The images are striking.

As the title character, that accursed, storm-weary ghost of a captain, Tómas Tómasson gives off the morbid aura of his endless journey and sings in a commandingly dark voice. Makerov, as Senta, the woman who can bring him salvation through her purity of purpose, made a believable heroine. James Creswell, in his best role yet with LA Opera, was her mercenary father, Daland, his rolling black basso used with nuance. And tenor Matthew Plenk, as the Steersman, also sang with idiomatic refinement.

Not least in this Wagnerian cosmos of doom to redemption was the marvelous roaring chorus.

But then there's the current world beckoning. And if you're Gustavo Dudamel leading the Los Angeles Philharmonic, you answer the invitation.

After all, the New York Times has just declared our resident band and its starry maestro pre-eminent among orchestras — for commissioning a vast number of new works. Even to the point of tacitly down-grading its own New York Phil. And so lustily does that paper herald LAPO's upcoming tour to Lincoln Center and also Europe, that we're getting to feel like a try-out stop.

Before it played that touring bill-of-fare (Debussy, Stravinsky, Adams), though, we trotted down to Disney Hall to hear Dudamel rouse his confreres to ground-rumbling, deliberative depths in "Siegfried's Death and Funeral Music" from Wagner's Götterdämmerung — a short tease of things to come, we hope.

But in a curious juxtaposition to the Wagner, Gil Shaham was on hand for Brahms' Violin Concerto — such as I've never heard it played. Imagine. If Giacometti were a composer he might turn out the piece this way: remarkably deconstructed, with minimal vibrato, lacking any big, juicy flourishes, played with the slenderest, most refined tone including a cadenza that was nothing if not lean, linear and veering to modern.

And while achieving it all, the tall, thin violinist lurched about on the stage like a Giacometti come rhythmically to life — taking small, staccato steps right up to the conductor's podium, back-stepping to the concert-master's stand. Never in doubt was his intense physical connection to fellow players.

What a contrast beside him, though, when Dudamel & Co. finally had their chance to revel in the concerto's gutsy Hungarian finale, so full of stretched chords and plangent heavings.

More contrast came with guest conductor Charles Dutoit, who asserted uncommon control over the orchestra's outpourings, with an added notch up in refinement. The 76-year-old Swiss is a pro — there's something to be said for age, wedded to talent. Here, in the Mozart 29th Symphony, we could hear him allow plenty of leeway between the margins but always return to that over-arching net that holds the whole thing together. It's called integrity. It's not so readily found.

Then, for heroic imagery, Dutoit and the Phil turned to Strauss's "Don Quixote" — where we heard cellist Gautier Capucon "impersonate" the knightly character as gruffly tormented at the start, daringly soft and soulful at the end, along with violist Carrie Dennis as a Sancho Panza who seemed to dance around the hall in gorgeously robust animation.

But if you're in search of salon splendor — as opposed to downtown's Disney — look no further than Jacaranda, the new-music enterprise in Santa Monica that incorporates the bold and the beautiful — with informed taste, imagination and a polish now brought to a peak of excellence, after a gestation of nine years.

The source of all this wonderment is Patrick Scott — you may remember him from his erstwhile identity: Patrick Marca Registrada (yes, that jokey moniker), the founder of Eyes Wide Open, a performance art group back in the '80s. Together with conductor Mark Alan Hilt he sees to every detail of their small, smart operation here. It's located in one of the premier spots for acoustics and ambience, believe it or not, the First Presbyterian Church on Second St. And it has a following these days of Westside intelligentsia/older hippy types that sells to the walls.

Newly designed, it's spare but warm and light, with a pleasing balance of scale and suggesting a kind of architectural humanity. The only sign of churchiness is in the stark simple, modern cross above the stage, draped with a maroon sash.

Jacaranda's recent concert, a thoroughly designed and thought-out affair, was "Thresholds: The Scandals of 1912-1913," that era in new music where audiences took noisy umbrage at the experimentalism of Schoenberg, Webern and Berg who comprised the Second Viennese School.

So naturally Scott found plenty to theatricalize. For Schoenberg's "Pierrot Lunaire," ably led by Hilt, he had the men in white tie/tuxes and flute/piccolo player Pamela Vliek Martchev in a chic cocktail dress and hat of the period. They all turned in stellar performances, even if Julia Migenes, no longer in good singing form, resorted to shtick instead of capturing the eerie fantasy of the character, a mocking specter who both scorns and feels menaced by the world.

The small pieces by Webern and Berg were striking in their distilled expression and played with scintillating purity. The evening was capped by duo pianists Danny Holt and Steven Vanhauwaerts, whose "Sacre du Printemps" yielded that same overwhelming pagan force as Stravinsky's full orchestration.

Photos from "Flying Dutchman" by Robert Millard/LA Opera

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 9:52 PM | Permalink

Choreographer/dancer Melissa Barak might just be one of those rare people — a deeply committed artist who is equally passionate about business. If this is the case, then she will need all the business savvy she can muster because Barak has big plans. The Los Angeles native spent nine years with the New York City Ballet, four with Los Angeles Ballet, and is now hoping to establish a ballet company in her hometown that will provide it's dancers with "the environment I always wished I had been part of. I want to create my own dance heaven."

We spoke recently at Westside School of Ballet, where she is in the middle of rehearsals for her company's debut. "I've always admired innovation, and building something from the ground up intrigues me," says Barak. It's clear that, for the time being at least, she wants to keep things scaled down. "I'm not shy or embarrassed to say we're going to start small and work our way up. Right now I'm working with several dancers locally and bringing in guests from other companies. Ideally, I'd like to hire fifteen dancers." The company's repertoire will focus on contemporary pieces. "This is going to be all about the 'new'...new voices in choreography,"says Barak.

She acknowledges that Barak Ballet, still in its infancy, is currently a labor of love. She started with a few fund raisers to gather seed money, and proudly says that enough was raised to produce the fledgling company's first official performance on March 31. "This performance is going to be my 'big ask' to the community to help me make this a reality," she says. The program will feature ballets by noted choreographers Christopher Wheeldon, Darrell Grand Moultrie and Frank Chaves, and a new piece by Barak. She is getting a leg up from participating in the Pasadena Arts Council's "Emerge" program, which supports new arts organizations and enables them to have non-profit status. The focus now is on building some private donors. After that, she hopes to apply for grants while continuing to build on other forms of funding.

It's no surprise that Barak, 33, has arrived at this point in her dance career. "Growing up in Los Angeles, I was always choreographing in my head, always loved listening to music, especially classical, in the car." She began to take ballet seriously at the age of 6 and studied at Westside until 16, when she went to the School of American Ballet in New York (the official school of New York City Ballet.) While at SAB she participated in a student choreography workshop and got the attention of NYCB artistic director Peter Martins. She entered the company at 18 and embarked on a kind of split existence, divided between dance and choreography. Her 2001 piece, "Telemann Overture Suite," first created for a SAB workshop, was added to City Ballet's repertoire and earned Barak her first critical success as a choreographer. "That was one of my struggles because I had just started my career and I felt like right off the bat I was seen by my director as more of a choreographer than a dancer. But, I really loved to dance, and that was where I wanted to shine."

Although she spent her entire career at City Ballet in the corps, Barak didn't lack for opportunity. "Even as a corps member, you could really stand out in that company. You're given lots of chances. Toward the second half of my time there I was doing very nice roles. I was very happy with what I was getting to do." Martins continued to support her choreography, and in 2002 the company performed her piece, "If By Chance," featuring a young dancer named Benjamin Millepied, who more recently has become known for choreographing the movie "Black Swan" and founding the LA Dance Project.

In 2007 Barak took stock and decided it was time to move on. "I was happy by the time I left, which was on a positive note. I felt good about my career there and about what I had learned and gone through." She returned to California and joined the newly formed Los Angeles Ballet. "I had done the big company thing for so long. This was a small company and I felt like I'd stand out and be able to give what I'd always wanted to give as a performer. It was also nice to be back home in a city I love with a lot of people I know." Barak continued to choreograph and perform, as well as spending part of 2009 dancing with Christopher Wheeldon's company, Morphoses. The relationship with Los Angeles Ballet ended in 2011 and Barak found herself at a crossroads. "I thought to myself, now what? Do I go into another company, go up the ladder and deal with all the politics? Do I want to do all that over again at 31? Or do I want to do my own thing and start something different. I even thought, do I want to continue dancing, or should I go into something completely different? But I love business and I love working with people. Building this company felt like the right thing. I'll still have ballet in my life, I'll be able to choreograph, and who knows -- maybe I'll dance!"

Barak's timing may prove to be fortuitous. With Millepied departing for the Paris Opera Ballet next year, there will be a new opening in the L.A. dance landscape. The two were colleagues throughout her career at NYCB, says Barak."I think Benjamin, with the success of "Black Swan" and appearing throughout the mainstream media, was able to cast a real spotlight on dance in this city...which is a wonderful thing. I've always admired his tenacity and ability to make things happen."

For now, though, Barak is taking it one step at a time. "This first performance is like, what's going to be the response? After this, we'll assess where to go next, " she said. And then, as is her way, Barak's practical side inevitably re-emerges. "A ballet company is no different from any other business. You start small and grow organically. You take your time building a solid foundation with a network of supporters who believe in your vision and you grow as big as the company is meant to grow. You really can't force these things."

Barak Ballet, Sunday, March 31 at 7 p.m. Ann & Jerry Moss Theater, Santa Monica. Limited number of tickets available

Photos of Melissa Barak by Judy Graeme/LA Observed

Posted by Judy Graeme at 4:24 PM | Permalink

Joanna Wozniak in "Rite of Spring," photo by Herbert Migdoll

Robert Joffrey worshipped deeply, from afar.

So genuine was his devotion to the legendary past - say the Paris of Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, with its wildly rich collection of visual artists, designers, composers and choreographers -- that he bid his company to painstakingly recover some masterpieces from that 20th century peak of creative collaboration.

And lucky Los Angeles was the first city, back in 1987, to gaze upon the Joffrey Ballet's most famous reconstruction of them all: "Rite of Spring," or "Le Sacre du Printemps," as it's known around the rest of the world (also referred to by musicians and dancers simply as "Sacre.")

So, naturally, there it was on the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion stage, celebrating its 100th birthday -- yes, the infamous Stravinsky/Nijinsky ballet that caused a Parisian audience to riot at its 1913 premiere ("ballet brought to barbarism" and "music gone mad" wrote critics.)

Nijinsky's stylized choreography - dancers moving in profile at times, as in bas relief, like figures on a Greek vase; the sacrificial virgin, standing in the now-iconic pose as Nijinsky was often depicted, with head tilted sideways, eyes vacant, knees slightly bent, toes turned in - wholly rejected the classical ballet idiom.

And Stravinsky's cataclysmic score - with its skewed meters and pounding rhythms -- would haunt the halls of concert music from then to now.

Yet, a century later, our vision has broadened, our ears have stretched.

Now that doesn't mean we no longer admire immensely the meticulous Hodson/Archer recreation of the original "Sacre," with its attention to historical detail.

It's still startling, for instance, to see the tightly circling Maidens, facing outwards and lit overhead, along with other intricate interweavings, rock against the score's rhythms of foreboding.

But, pardon me, the whole of it seems puny today. Because the music has eaten the ballet! The visual events onstage are dwarfed by the score.

We're now used to hearing augmented orchestras turn "Sacre" - by itself - into an unequaled feast, more vast and overwhelming than any theater could contain. Our own Philharmonic powers through the score, courtesy of Salonen, Dudamel, et al - even though the pit band here, despite a wayward trumpet entry, did a creditable job, led by Joffrey music director Scott Speck.

Still, the adoring crowds seemed to get what they came for.

Speck also made the most of excerpts from Philip Glass's Symphony No. 3, the basis for Edwaard Liang's "Age of Innocence," which showed off the company's superb dancers - though he could lose the Jane Austen title borrowing.

But William Forsythe's constant-composer-companion Thom Willems surely offers too much of a crashing thing for the choreographer's "In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated," another engrossing exercise in his break-apart-put-together ballets of inordinate intrigue.

Meanwhile other events beckoned. And raised a question...

What, for instance, do Midori, Meredith Monk and Helmuth Rilling have in common? They are all musical brands, that's what.

The still-girlish violinist, known by her single name since blazing into the spotlight as a wunderkind more than three decades ago, recently played with the LA Philharmonic, led by a surprisingly uncommanding Pablo Heras-Casado, and put a virtuosa's shine on Peter Eötvös's 2nd Violin Concerto, cutely titled "DoReMi," and heard in its world premiere.

Intermedia maven Monk, now 71, has been collecting cult fans for four decades. Her brand of vocalizing, unique in the sound kingdom, her clear but complex compositions and theatrical esoterica, drew the usual suspects to UCLA's Freud Playhouse for "On Behalf of Nature."

At the same campus, and in that rarest of occasions - a completely sold out Royce Hall - music lovers showed up on a wet, blustery, cold night to hear acclaimed German maestro Rilling lead the LA Chamber Orchestra in Mozart's 39th Symphony and D-minor Requiem.

Talk about a diverse collection, it would be these three performing artists.

For the greater part of her career Midori enchanted audiences --- a mere slip of a thing, head bent over her instrument with an inward-curling intensity yet exhibiting powerhouse technique - playing the standard violin warhorses: Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Brahms, Sibelius. But now she has taken on thorny, new music and the Hungarian composer's work at hand proved no exception to the model.

As expected, here was Midori lavishing pinpoint perfection on the Hungarian composer's very graphic composition. She limned its glistening twitterings, lovely as a starry night, then turned to dangerous piercings high on the string before dropping down to earth, snarled and snared in cavernous terrors - the orchestral accents robust, sizzling and full of Magyar markings.

Monk, on the other hand, was always at the cutting edge - or better put, an original. She's another diminutive figure, recognized by her multitude of skinny signature braids (she once called herself "Inca Jewish," having been born in Lima), and alerted us years ago to a voice that ranged over several octaves, did astonishing stunts with dynamics, colorations, glottal clicks and warblings and could plunge the listener backwards to a pre-linguistic state of consciousness. I think of it as primeval. Add to that her astute fellow musicians, the entire stage pictures they paint and you have a unique universe.

But voices don't last. So the denizens at Freud could not sample Monk at her most compelling.

Conductors do last, though. And when Maestro Rilling raised his baton and leaned into the orchestra to draw out the portent from that first long majestic chord in Mozart No. 39, K. 543, we knew immediately this would not be a musical hologram of well-worn music but something created on the spot. This and the Requiem bore such rewards, courtesy of the LACO, guest soloists and USC Chamber Singers. There's something about these serious German conductors (Christian Thielemann, who led the LA Phil some years ago in a rare appearance, is another.) They go to the crux of things.

Photo of Midori by K. Miura

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 9:53 PM | Permalink

It's been hard to ignore the baggage that comes with aging. As the medicare cards and applications crowd my mailbox, and funerals of friends--not their parents--pop up in my emails, the signs are all around me. I guess I have to accept that I really am that old. Of course, as my mom told me, age is only a number and from someone who'll turn 99 on her birthday in April, she should know. Of course, she's also said "Getting old is not for sissies," and as I struggle with the ups and downs of memory lapses and other annoying changes, I concur. Fortunately I still have a kid in high school--if you want to do the math, I was just shy of 48 when she was born--so I'm hanging on for dear life to my membership in the child-rearing set. I guess in my neighborhood the thing that dates me the most is not my graying hair but the fact that I don't have a single tattoo to show the world how cool I am.

So it was with some trepidation that I sat down to watch "The Snake Can," Kathryn Graf's play about "middle age" at the Odyssey Theater through February 24. "Proceed with caution," the tagline warns, and duly warned, I was worried about seeing another treatise on the travails of navigating the aging process. But the piece was really more about the friendships, loyalties, yearnings and fears that accompany us on our life's journey, and it moved me to tears. Of course, as my children can attest, I cry during commercials, movie trailers and "Story Corps" on NPR. In fact, unless I can find something to cry about in a movie, I deem it a non-starter. So I am an easy target.

But I found the characters in "Snake Can" real and honest, and once the second act unfolded, I genuinely cared about their lives and their struggles.

The play, directed by Steven Robman, centers on three women (Graf has written in the notes that they actually each represent a part of herself): Nina (Diane Cary), an artist who has been living in the shadow of her famous actor husband; Meg (Sharon Sharth), a successful and outwardly upbeat career woman still looking for love after two failed and childless marriages and Harriet (Jane Kaczmarek), a widow with two children who's finally decided after seven years alone that it's time to get out there and date again. These days that means signing up on a dating website that eliminates the drudgery and uncertainty of actually going out, and soon we meet a sampling of what's available for women of a certain age. Of course, we don't need to be reminded of the narrow playing field, but Graf and her women navigate with humor and a good bit of wisdom.

Each of the women has their personal crisis, fostered by the men in, or in and out of, their lives, but what resonated for me was the love and loyalty that defined the long friendships these women have forged over years and years, and the strength and solace those friendships provide.

Their stories are familiar and we can relate, and they are seasoned with a good bit of candor. Afterwards I found myself thinking and talking with my husband about my own journey, and our struggles, triumphs and disappointments. If a good play engenders a good discussion, "Snake Can" more than passes the test. And anything that can make you laugh at getting older is a worthwhile way to spend some time.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 11:45 PM | Permalink

Either choreographer Benjamin Millepied was ready to move on or he got an offer he couldn't refuse. Millepied, the former principal dancer with the New York City Ballet and founder of the one-year-old LA Dance Project, was introduced today as the new director of dance at the Paris Opera Ballet, starting in September 2014. Millepied caused a sensation in the LA arts community when he moved here with his future wife, actress Natalie Portman, after retiring from the New York ballet in 2011.

In interviews at the time, Millepied was often quoted expressing his sense of liberation in leaving the New York dance scene and talking about the possibilities of creative freedom in Los Angeles. LA Dance Project, a small and experimental company, and primarily funded by local dance philanthropist Glorya Kaufman, had it's premiere September 22, 2012 at the Disney Hall. Created as an art collective, Millepied's plan for LA Dance Project was to collaborate with artists in multiple mediums and perform not only in traditional venues, but also in alternatives spaces, such as museums.

LA Dance Project has a guaranteed budget for the next three years, the New York Times says, and Millepied is expected to continue to run it until he moves to Paris. Today's news was broken by the New York Times, which also carries an interview with the choreographer.

Previously on LA Observed:
Benjamin Millepied at MOCA
Zocalo goes dancing -- but never back to Saddle Ranch
Natalie Portman, Millepied marry in Big Sur

Photo of Millepied dancing at MOCA in 2012 by Iris Schneider

Posted by Judy Graeme at 3:37 PM | Permalink

Evening dresses by Jean Dessès (1956), left, and Madeleine Vionnet (1925.)

"It started with a cold call from someone representing a collector," said Sharon Takeda, senior curator and head of LACMA's Costumes and Textiles department. "Would we be interested in a 20th century couture collection? It was all very anonymous." She and fellow curator Kaye Spilker were recalling the long and involved process of acquiring their latest find, a group of 158 examples of couture designs dating from 1880 to 2008. Nearly fifty important fashion designers are represented, including Coco Chanel, Madame Grès, Madeline Vionnet, Jean Dessès, Jeanne Lanvin, and Alexander McQueen.

The mystery soon began to lift and the two curators discovered that the collector in question was Dominique Sirop, a French haute couturier who in addition to running his own atelier in Paris has also published books on fashion history. "When we learned that the pieces were collected by a haute couture designer we felt that meant the selection would be good. The list of names were a 'who's who' of fashion." said Takeda. When the two curators arrived at Sirop's studio in Paris they were pleasantly surprised. "It was all in a database system with photographs, which isn't always the case with collectors. They (Sirop and his collections manager) had done quite a lot by the time we got there."

The curators were also mostly pleased with the condition of the pieces, which took nearly four days to examine. "Couture isn't always pristine," said Takeda. "Sometimes things have been altered by different owners. Can this or that be reversible? Is the integrity of the initial design there?" Sirop, who had not dealt like this with a major museum, paid close attention to how the curators worked. "I had to kind of educate him" said Takeda. Spilker added, "the people selling the objects don't always think about the museum's costs. There are also multiple steps (once the powers-that-be at the museum approve the purchase) including cataloging, labeling, tagging, and shipping."

Not only were the curators negotiating with a relatively inexperienced seller, they also had to raise the money to buy the collection. Enter philanthropist Ellen Michelson, a member of the LACMA Costume Council who has helped with the purchase of two previous collections, including the one which contributed to LACMA's major 2010 exhibit, Fashioning Fashion: European Dress in Detail, 1700-1915. Michelson began her relationship with the department about six years ago during a tour in France with Takeda. A collector of vintage clothing and children's books, Michelson elicits high praise from the two curators. "She is absolutely the best donor one could hope for because she's so generous, and it's no strings attached," said Spilker. "She respects the professional staff and doesn't try to influence us. She likes our scholarship and the time we take with it."

"I think she enjoys learning from us," said Takeda. "She will come down for the day (Michelson lives in Atherton) to visit. We want her to understand what we do. I recently overheard her telling someone that 'getting involved with LACMA and these collections has changed my life.'"

After nearly two years from that initial phone call, the collection finally arrived at LACMA four months ago. Before being introduced into the museum's storage areas the objects were put through a freezing process that ensured the elimination of any unwanted critters (Takeda's term), which might include moths, silverfish and their eggs. The items have since been cataloged and photographed. Luckily for the department's conservation team, the pieces are considered mostly exhibit ready. "These pieces will form the impetus for a show on twentieth century couture," said Takeda.

As excited as Takeda and Spilker are for the public to see the new collection, that will have to wait. The curators are currently focused on their next exhibit , "Reigning Men: From the Macaroni to the Metrosexual," opening in January 2016. It could be a few years before the couture show opens. As they told me, "stay tuned."

Lower photos: Madame Grès evening gown (1987), middle, and Alexander McQueen evening dress (2007.) Click images to enlarge. Courtesy of LACMA.

Posted by Judy Graeme at 4:28 PM | Permalink

Last Sunday, the Santa Monica Conservancy celebrated the birthday of Marion Davies at the Annenberg Community Beach House, which is appropriate since the center occupies the spot where William Randolph Hearst and Ms. Davies once shared an opulent Old Hollywood mansion and now shares the site with the remaining pool and a guest house designed by Julia Morgan in 1928.

Given my passion for other properties in the famous couple's real estate portfolio, I really appreciated the guided tours of the Guest House. Conservancy docents, dressed in vintage, assumed the role of a Davies' contemporary in order to share tidbits about the residence and its owners.

We had a swell time in the dining room listening to Joan Crawford discuss Marion's parties.

And Hedda Hopper dished about that infamous cruise with the couple while we stood in the foyer.

Later, there was vintage dancing, toasts and cake. Notables in attendance included Old Hollywood historian Marc Wanamaker and author Ernest Marquez. I even learned that Charles Hood is the 2013 artist in residence at the Davies Guest House. You can read his beach house blog here.

It was a beautiful day to be by the sea. More pics below and on Flickr.

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 4:47 PM | Permalink

I only have a few minutes left before 2012 turns into 2013. I'm observing the folk tradition that you should envision the best moment of the last year in hopes that it will manifest again in the new one.

My best moment of 2012 was visiting with Hutton Wilkinson at his home in Beverly Hills in April. Interior designer, jewelry guru, businessman, socialite, native Angeleno, author, raconteur, and Old Hollywood maven, Hutton Wilkinson is the perfect embodiment of Los Angeles past, present and future.

I'd been aware of him through his role as protégé and business partner of the late artist and interior designer, Tony Duquette, but had never had the opportunity to meet him until a journalist friend invited me along on a visit to Mr. Wilkinson's compound in Beverly Hills, which includes, Dawnridge, Duquette's magnificent house, for an interview about his latest jewelry collection and its accompanying book, Tony Duquette Hutton Wilkinson Jewelry.

Charming, funny, erudite, gracious and kind, Mr. Wilkinson is one of those people who make you feel smart and witty just being in his presence. Wearing a fantastic silk robe from Duquette's personal collection of Asian textiles, he welcomed us as we stepped into Dawnridge's mirrored foyer.

"Ask me more questions, " he commanded as we sipped ice tea in the beyond-baroque living room.

"What kind of jewelry looks best on the jolie laide?" I said.

"Pearls! No, you have to have attitude to wear my jewelry. You need lots of self-confidence. Like Elsie De Wolf, you have to make people see beyond [the plainness of your face]."

Continue reading "Visiting Dawnridge with Hutton Wilkinson" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 6:11 AM | Permalink

Ballerina Tiler Peck and her Nutcracker partner, Joan Boada, at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza. Photographs by Iris Schneider

Last July I visited with Tiler Peck, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, while she was guest teaching at her old ballet school in Santa Monica. She was emphatic then about her desire to return to her home state whenever possible. This past weekend, she came back to California to dance as the Sugar Plum Fairy in the Pacific Festival Ballet production of The Nutcracker in Thousand Oaks. It's her third year helping out with the local production.

Many ballet stars hit the road during Nutcracker season to perform with local companies. Benefits include extra income and stage time, as well as the knowledge that they are inspiring and motivating the younger dancers in the production, many of them still students. "I look forward to this gig every year," Peck told me. "It's fun to share the stage with so many children. Also, my family and friends come and they don't normally get to see me dance in person." This year she performed alongside Joan Boada, a principal with the San Francisco Ballet who danced the Cavalier.

Peck, right, and Boada stretch in their dressing room.

"One of the things that makes Tiler so endearing is that she always makes time for the kids, always finds time to sign their pointe shoes," said Kim Maselli, the company's artistic director. Young starstruck fans knocked steadily on Peck's dressing room door for a treasured autograph. "One kid wanted me to sign her face in permanent marker!" she said. It was the one request that went ungranted. An hour before the Sunday matinee performance, three eleven-year-old girls, dancers in the show, hovered close by, giggling and gawking at Peck while she prepared her pointe shoes. They declared her their favorite ballerina, and when asked if they had ever seen her perform before this, they said in unison, "only on YouTube!". (Here's a sample.)

The pre-show mood in Peck and Boada's shared dressing room was relaxed and chatty. Since the two didn't have to appear on stage until the second act, there was plenty of time for makeup, hair and gossip. Topics of conversation included Hurricane Sandy, movies, basketball, fashion, and choreography — good and bad. Chocolate was consumed. Boada, who grew up in Cuba, compared notes on Havana with Peck, who recently performed at the Havana International Ballet Festival.

Left, Peck with her tutu. Right, getting ready to dance.

Peck casually transformed herself into the Sugar Plum Fairy while sharing iPhone photos and holiday plans. Her glittering tutu, made for her by the New York City Ballet costume shop, lay safely on the floor waiting to be put on. "That's the one thing I don't check through luggage," she said.

Peck talked about what she considers to be the highlight of her year: dancing at the Kennedy Center Honors earlier this month. Chosen to dance for prima ballerina Natalia Makarova, one of the honorees, Peck performed "Other Dances," a Jerome Robbins piece originally choreographed for Makarova and Mikhail Baryshnikov. Peck admitted to having major nerves, finding it all "crazy" but thrilling at the same time. She had starstruck moments of her own, meeting Glenn Close, Morgan Freeman, David Letterman, Rahm Emanuel (a ballet dancer in his youth), Bill Clinton and celebrities-in-chief the Obamas.

In the wings between scenes.
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Finally, with warmup clothes over their costumes, Peck and Boada made their way to the wings. Now all business, they became part of the huge machine that is any production of "The Nutcracker," with dancers of varying ages whizzing on and offstage in all manner of exotic costumes. When not on stage, Peck and Boada kept to themselves in the area reserved for them, equipped with folding chairs and box of rosin, which dancers dip the toes of their shoes in to prevent slippage. This weekend was their first time dancing together, so they exchanged tips and checked each other's costumes. Boada at one point smoothed Peck's hair. After the performance, Peck's parents, sister, and grandmother came backstage. Like anyone who doesn't get to see their family as often as she'd like, Peck looked really happy to have them there.

Cavalier and Sugar Plum Fairy on stage.

The Thousand Oaks stop is the midway point for Peck on her Nutcracker circuit. She performed earlier in the NYCB production (dancing both Sugar Plum Fairy and Dewdrop) and she next heads to Vancouver for a week of performances with the Goh Ballet. Though Peck is a world traveler, Vancouver is a new city for her and she plans to squeeze in as much sight-seeing as possible, along with some last-minute holiday shopping. After that it's back to New York by Christmas Eve. Her family will be spending the holiday with her in New York, giving Peck an ideal ending to what has been, for her, a pretty spectacular year.

The Kennedy Center Honors gala air on CBS on December 26, at 9 p.m.

Photographs by Iris Schneider

Previously on LA Observed:
Ballet star Tiler Peck is a devoted California girl

Posted by Judy Graeme at 10:26 PM | Permalink

The Downton Abbey roadshow came to town Friday night in the form of an event promoting season three of the wildly popular British program that depicts the lives of the aristocratic Crawley family and their servants. The show resumes in the U.S. Jan. 6 on PBS. More than 300 fans (there were thousands of requests for tickets) came to ooh and ahh over cast members Hugh Bonneville, Joanne Froggatt, Rob James-Collier and Lesley Nichol at the Silver Screen Theater in the Pacific Design Center. The audience watched the first twenty minutes of episode one, then Hollywood Reporter chief television critic Tim Goodman moderated a panel with the actors, executive producer Gareth Neame and Masterpiece executive producer Rebecca Eaton. I sensed that by now, in terms of press tours, these actors are a well-oiled machine and could probably do these things in their sleep. However, they did seem to enjoy speculating (as they have been doing ad nauseum for the past two years) why Downton is such a hit with American audiences, and updating their characters' story lines.

Series three has already aired in the UK, and many in the United States have illegally watched the episodes online or in bootlegged files passed by email. (As Eaton acknowledged to me.) But if these people already have seen the shows, they didn't give anything away. Nor did anyone inquire about rampant rumors that certain cast members, Dan Stevens in particular, might not be returning for the just-commissioned season four. This was a polite and respectful crowd, with no hardball questions for actors or producers.

Fans came in all shapes and sizes and and from many parts of Southern California. Sheri Earls, a manicurist from Orange County, told me she had only discovered Downton a month ago and has rapidly caught up on seasons one and two via Amazon. Waiting on a very long line at the "meet and greet" for James-Collier, who plays gay footman Thomas Barrow, Earls made it clear that she is addicted. "Anna (the ladies maid played by Froggatt) is my favorite. Her spirit is so sweet...and Hugh Bonneville (Lord Grantham) would have to be my heartthrob." At the other end of the fan spectrum were Jennifer Ramone and Jim Dover, from North Hills. The couple, who have watched from the beginning, love the historical aspect of the show. Jennifer, a marketing consultant for Paramount, wasn't interested in meeting any of the cast members: "I've learned to stay away from the talent. I don't want to spoil the illusion." A few fans dressed in costume from the 1920's, the show's current period. All waited patiently to meet each of the actors, who appeared to be having a genuinely good time. At one point Bonneville yelled good-naturedly at a shy fan, "Hey! Take a picture! Whaddya here for?" Froggatt seemed to spend more time hugging than conversing, and James-Collier spent extra time chatting with an elderly woman in a wheelchair who is from Manchester,England, near where the actor was born.

Next stop for the group is New York City, where there will be more events like this one, and lots more press to do, as well as a season three premiere party hosted by Vanity Fair and Ralph Lauren at MOMA on Monday night. CBS Sunday Morning aired a behind-the-scenes feature on the coming season this weekend. Bonneville also was on NPR's Wait, wait...don't tell me on Saturday in a show taped last week at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles.

Photos: Sean Roderick/LA Observed

Posted by Judy Graeme at 9:29 PM | Permalink

One of the great perks of being a kid is that people read to you. I still miss it. That may be part of why I was so enchanted by "Gatz," currently playing 9 performances at the Redcat at Disney Hall. The theater production, put together by the New York-based avant-garde troupe called Elevator Repair Service, brilliantly performs F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" by reading the entire novel onstage, incorporating every written word into the production. In doing so, it becomes so much more than the novel is, or than a play could be--I guess that's why the word transformative was invented.

I admit I was nervous before the show. But it was a nervous anticipation. Could I last seven hours (eight including a dinner break) in a not-that-comfortable chair listening to a whole novel? Within minutes I was swept away. If you're going to read a novel in one sitting, better make it a good one and in choosing "The Great Gatsby," ERS chose well.

I was awed by the beauty of the words, the way they sounded strung together, the images they painted. The staging was quirky and minimal. It allowed my imagination enough room to fill in the blanks, making the event participatory and thrilling. Like good theater should be, it was a very social experience: the intimate Redcat is a perfect venue — everyone knew from the start that we were all in it together and you could sense that excitement as we took our seats.

Set in a dingy office, the play begins with the narrator, Nick, played by Scott Shepherd, finding a copy of "The Great Gatsby" in a Rolodex on his desk. While waiting for an interminable reboot of his aging computer, he picks it up and starts reading. His bored colleagues gradually drift in and out of their workaday doldrums playing the characters so elegantly drawn by Fitzgerald. The seminal novel about the dreams and delusions of the young strivers of New York's upper and wannabe-upper class took flight onstage. The drab office was a perfect contrast to the life, both lofty and artificial, depicted in the book.

There are many surprises. First, it's funny — something unexpected from one of the great tragedies in American literature. But it's undeniable when hearing and seeing it onstage. Of course ERS has helped entertain with its inventive staging and visual touches. You feel you are witnessing something fresh and new. Great art often makes you see something familiar in a totally new way. Director John Collins said recently, "We knew we might fail, but it would be a worthwhile failure."

As Shepherd reads and the action takes place around him, the novel he holds becomes the most important character on the stage. In fact, when he leaves the book after Gatsby's murder and starts reciting the words by heart, it's somehow shocking to see him go on without the novel in hand.

It was exhilarating, exciting, hypnotic, poignant, heartfelt, intelligent and utterly charming theater. It lasted from afternoon 'til evening and it didn't make me tired. I laughed, I cried and felt everything in between.

When it was over, I was weirdly energized. I confess that somehow I had gone all these years without actually ever reading the novel, having started it a few days before I saw the show. After it was over, I couldn't wait to go home and finish it, relishing the thought of being immersed in the writing all over again.

Elevator Repair Service has been trying since 1999 to do a staging of "The Great Gatsby." Initially, it was not their intention to read the whole book onstage. But in trying to structure a play from the book, Collins and Shepherd said that every time they tried to extract something meaningful from the novel, it always seemed to diminish the work.

After years of wrestling with the book they decided the only way to do this was to read the novel it in its entirety. It took years to get permission from the estate to play in New York and Los Angeles, although it has been performed abroad intermittently since its Brussels premiere in 2006. Redcat finally succeeded in bringing it to its stage. It will run for 9 performances through December 9.

After seeing this production, I watched a trailer for the upcoming film of "The Great Gatsby" by Baz Luhrman, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey McGuire, Carey Mulligan and a cast of thousands. Multitudes of elaborately costumed extras leap off the screen, carousing in opulent locations featuring Gatsby's extravagant mansion lit up like a house on fire. It was a cacophony of excess. Nothing was left to the imagination and I'm sure no expense was spared. The clip only lasted two minutes, but I afterwards I thought "Now THAT was exhausting."

It was so much more satisfying to settle in for 7 hours of inventive storytelling, seated in a roomful of perfect strangers who had gathered together to share something unforgettable.

Photos of the production and of Scott Shepherd by Iris Schneider

Posted by Iris Schneider at 11:47 PM | Permalink

It wasn't the usual ladies room chatter the other night during intermission of "Anything Goes" at the Ahmanson Theater. "Damn, why didn't I take tap?" one woman said. Others murmured in agreement . I myself was still in a daze, recovering from the blast of energy we had all just witnessed. "People love the finale of act one" said Sean McKnight, dance captain for the national touring company of the 2011 revival of the Cole Porter musical. "They love a huge tap number. It's like coffee. It's energizing and puts people in a good mood."

I couldn't find the Los Angeles cast on video, but here is the first act finale performed by Sutton Foster and the Broadway cast, from the 2011 Tony Awards broadcast.

"Anything Goes," originally produced on Broadway in 1934, takes place aboard an ocean liner traveling from New York to London. It's pure escapist fare with iconic songs one after another, so the Ahmanson audience was already in a happy place when the theater filled with the pounding of tap shoes on floor boards. The cast here stars Rachel York as Reno Sweeney.

It's clear that dancers (and sometimes critics too, it seems) keep a special place in their hearts for tap. Robert Fairchild, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, told me he studied tap as a child, long before he started his ballet training. "It's great for a kid. You get to make noise with your feet." Fairchild, whose dance idol is Gene Kelly, got the attention of New York Times dance critic Alastair Macaulay during a gala performance last September of "Not My Girl", a Peter Martins choreographed pas-de-deux inspired by music composed by Fred Astaire. "'Not My Girl' began with a tap solo for Mr. Fairchild...that was the evenings freshest dance moment," Macaulay's review noted.

Says Fairchild, "it's a real treat for me to tap with the company. Some people think it's not new age or cutting edge, but tap has evolved and it's such a huge tool to have." Explaining the appeal to audiences, he says "they are watching AND listening. People enjoy the sound of tapping. It just adds another aspect to the dance experience."

Rogelio Douglas Jr., a triple threat performer (singer, dancer, actor) who has appeared in LA in "In the Heights" and on Broadway in "The Little Mermaid" and "Riverdance," started his tap training at age 8. "My mom was a big fan of Sammy Davis Jr. and I loved Gregory Hines. What makes tap different [from other forms of dance] is that you have to be a musician. You are creating music, different rhythms and patterns...Tap is a hybrid art form."

"A lot of singers I know do tap," says McKnight, the dance captain for "Anything Goes. "For them it's part of musicality, and the form of dance they are most drawn to." McKnight frequently teaches dance to children and at the college level. "I always tell kids..do tap, you'll find yourself smiling. Tap dancers are a different breed, they're always happy to tap. The minute you put on the shoes you want to make sound."

Audience response at the Ahmanson confirmed tap's enduring allure. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a sudden rise in L.A. tap class enrollment.

Anything Goes runs at the Ahmanson Theater through Jan.6, 2013

Bonus video: Fayard Nicholas and Harold Nicholas from "Stormy Weather," in what some consider the best tap dancing scene ever filmed. It was shot at 20th Century Fox, per IMDb. Fayard Nicholas died in Burbank in 2006.

Photo of touring company of "Anything Goes," by Joan Marcus

Posted by Judy Graeme at 2:42 PM | Permalink

We've had the whole range — from traditional to poetic to deconstructed, the last one a stunning abstraction by Robert Wilson. But now, in its umpteenth production of "Madama Butterfly," LA Opera has gone back to basics. After all, Puccini's cross-cultural tragedy is a box office shoo-in, so no matter what form it takes, there's an audience beating down the doors.

This edition — by the Ron Daniels-Michael Yeargan team — hails from San Francisco and rolls out across the full horizontal stretch of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion's stage — no clutter, simplicity itself, with an almost utilitarian sense of japonaiserie. (Don't look for a cozy love nest here!) But all the central pieces are in place: an innocent geisha from Nagasaki, an American lieutenant who caddishly engineers his way through a fake marriage to her, an honor-bound suicide that becomes the only way out, a small child left in its wake.

And so does the cast solidly support the above game plan, albeit with little directorial dimension. Oksana Dyka may look a tad matronly for a 15-year-old Cio-Cio-San who is described as "a flower of a girl" (no thanks to her overly-padded traditional wedding gown), but she boasts a sturdy soprano that can cut through heavy orchestral fabric for her big outpourings. Brandon Jovanovich also trumpets a bright tenor that resounds strongly, as the single-minded Pinkerton who maneuvers his temporary way to her bed, though without anything resembling ardor.

Milena Kitic, a Suzuki full of empathy for the jilted bride, sings with deep expressiveness. Rodel Rosel is an animated, fleet-footed marriage-broker, Goro. Not least, Eric Owens endows the American consul Sharpless with subdued understanding for the sorrowful situation. And Grant Gershon coordinates stage and orchestra ably, with emphasis on the score's soaring melodies. However, the question of whether a tiny child — Garret Chang, as Trouble — could sit quietly onstage for at least a half hour proved a distraction from the high drama going on around him.

But, ah, our memories of past "Butterfly's" do not evaporate. Could anyone forget Maria Ewing in the title role — that porcelain figurine of a geisha, a picture of stillness and gravity (no pattering feet or metaphoric wing-fluttering) — even though she lacked vocal heft? Or Tom Allen as the horror-struck, husky-voiced Sharpless, shadowing the tragedy to come? Or Plácido Domingo's dashing lieutenant, enveloping his bride in tender eroticism? Or the dark, Debussyean currents Kent Nagano unearthed in Puccini's score?

Sometimes, though, memories get reinforced. Take the performances of Barbara Cook, for example.

Yes, she can still make you cry. Such is the pinpoint pathos that the cabaret singer extraordinaire unfailingly evokes — at 85 — -together with all the other magical facets of her artistry.

She walks onstage now with a cane, to roaring ovation, and (reluctantly) sits in a chair huddled against the piano's crook (remember Mabel Mercer?), where, even seated, she can glitter and be gay. That's what Cook did at Disney Hall — backed up by the LA Philharmonic, led to loving effect by the savvy Rob Berman and surrounded by her own superb, hand-picked instrumental quartet.

So what is it about her, you're wondering. Why is she a Kennedy Center honoree, a master of the master-class, one who draws gifted musicians and composers to her side and other famous singers to her feet?

Well, if you have a discerning ear you'll know: it's the same as for any purveyor of art songs — and I say this because she raises American show tunes to the level of Lieder.

You can hear it in her phrasing, which purifies to poetry and emerges as natural utterance, not words mashed into music. It's in the voice itself which spans to an architectural overview so that every line makes sense. It's in the coloration within a single note — all at the service of expression and word pointing. It's in the manner of delivery, with a legato that's like a leaf floating on a breeze as it turns this way and that.

Never mind that her pitch strayed a bit at the start or even that she ever so mildly resorted to parlando at times. Just try, if you can, to not come to tears listening to her sing Sondheim — in this case, "No one is alone," from "Into the Woods." I wish I could tell you more about this emotional mystery, how she touches the innermost heart. It happens regularly: a few years ago at a Cerritos concert with "Anyone Can Whistle" and, until she retired it, with "Send in the Clowns." Something about Cook and Sondheim...

As for her forays into those foot-tapping bar-room ditties, she loses me. It's the sophisticated intimacies that Cook unveils that are hers alone — in songs that capitalize on sophisticated intimacies.

But the always-questing singer digs deep into the lore; she lavishes great regard on composers and librettists by name. I especially love how she explains why Cole Porter, for all his cleverness, escaped her — how she never could fantasize "flying too high in the sky with a guy" — until the day she sang "I've Got You under My Skin" as a slow, serious confession. And what a coup that was at Disney with her quartet's masterly arrangement. The same goes for "Bye Bye Blackbird," deciphered (and sung) as an antidote to "House of the Rising Sun" (a capella), about the enslaved girls' misery at a brothel.

And, again, dramatic misery engulfed Disney Hall when Esa-Pekka Salonen returned to the podium, with his Philharmonia Orchestra for Alban Berg's "Wozzeck" - forever destroying the myth that it takes a fully-staged performance to bring powerful immediacy to a work like this.

What a night it was. The house lights completely up, no props, the mostly male cast in black suits fronting the band. And yet, all vestiges of their semi-staging in London a few years ago, with costumes and video, had rubbed into the portrayals — they were vivid, riveting. As the haunted proletariat Wozzeck Johan Reuter was believably delusional, made so by his antagonists: Peter Hoare, an aptly hectoring Captain; Kevin Burdette, the equally cruel Doctor; Hubert Francis a preening Drum Major; and Angela Denoke, his common-law-wife who showed him no regard but provoked him to murder.

Salonen wrung from the orchestra a lean, clarified sound that could explode with the score's roiling anguish or taper into palpable hopelessness or exquisite yearning - momentous from beginning to end.

Also with house lights up, and deliberately so, is the jaunty, almost ironic "Hamlet," courtesy of Shakespeare's Globe Theatre and playing through Nov. 25 at the Broad Stage. Touches of late-night humor here and there prove that nothing is beyond reach anymore.

LA Opera photos: Robert Millard

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 8:43 PM | Permalink

1960s television had its moments. Bo Diddley and Norma-Jean Wofford on ABC's "Shindig!," originally aired August 18, 1965.

Diddley died on June 2, 2008 at home in Archer, Florida. Diddley gave Wofford, who followed Peggy Jones as his guitarist, her stage name The Duchess. She left the band in 1966 and died in Fontana, Calif. on April 30, 2005.

Posted by Editor at 6:45 PM | Permalink

The National Ballet of Canada's hugely ambitious production of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" (in Los Angeles for a brief three day run at the Music Center) has much to offer. A world-class choreographer in Christopher Wheeldon, an original score by Joby Talbot, superb dancing, romance, and a surprise ending. There's even a tap-dancing, if slightly twisted, Gene Kelly-esque Mad Hatter. But for me, the real stars are the sets and costumes (by Bob Crowley) and the special effects.

Alice's journey must be a theatrical designer's dream and in this case the creative team didn't hold back. Our heroine's wild descent down the rabbit hole and inevitable shrinking and growing are experienced through video projection (used frequently throughout the show and designed by Jon Driscoll and Gemma Carrington) which employs a mix of animation and stills. The "Mad Tea Party" blazes with wacky color, the Caterpillar and his magic mushroom have been given an exotic Oriental twist, and the Queen of Heart's garden and courtroom are a geometric revelation. The costumes are sumptuous, and humorous when they need to be. A clear audience favorite is the super-sized Cheshire Cat who, through the use of puppetry, moves his independent body parts at will to surprise and confound Alice.

It's always a pleasure to experience a story and characters you think you know in a new way. The ballet is long, running a little over two and a half hours, but the anticipation of each scene and how the designers might wow us helped it to move along quickly. This interpretation of the much loved children's classic is a collaboration between the Canadian company and London's Royal Ballet and first premiered in 2011. It's only here through Sunday, Oct. 21 so those who want to see it should take a cue from the White Rabbit and move quickly.

Video tour of the costumes and sets back home in Canada:

National Ballet of Canada website

Photos: Cylla von Tiedemann

Posted by Judy Graeme at 12:50 PM | Permalink

"Surely he hath borne our Griefs, and carried our Sorrows/Yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of GOD, and afflicted." - Isaiah LIII, 4

LONDON — I heard the sad news about George McGovern, the former senator and Democratic presidential candidate — age 90, in hospice, said to be "unresponsive" — as I was on my way to the Tate Britain to visit its stunning exhibit on the Pre-Raphaelites, whose unsparing naturalism and often tragic subject matter suddenly suited my newly melancholy mood.

Wandering through the galleries as I glumly reflected on that dainty euphemism, "unresponsive," i.e. comatose — and his daughter Ann's more blunt assessment, that her father was "nearing the end" — I looked up from my reverie and found myself gazing at "The Scapegoat," the extraordinary 1851 work by William Holman Hunt. The biblical quotation above adorns the top of the frame, while below the inscription reads, "And the Goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a Land not inhabited." (Leviticus XVI, 22)

I was utterly transfixed by the power of this painting, whose grim composition offered an almost mystical relevance to my ruminations. Inspired by Hunt's first visit to the Holy Land and his research into Biblical legends, it depicts the hapless goat ritually cast out into the wilderness by the ancient Hebrews, bearing a scarlet cloth on its horns representing the collective sins of the community.

As portrayed by Hunt, a bleaker scene could hardly be imagined. The luckless beast stands in the foreground, mouth agape as it gasps for breath, its doleful eyes rolled heavenward in futile supplication as it totters on faltering legs. Around it, a barren landscape of perfect desolation: the salty flats of the Dead Sea, littered with the skeletal remains of other doomed creatures who perished before.

I'm always wary of resting too heavily on metaphors — as the British humorist Spike Milligan said of cliches, they're like handrails for a crippled mind — but this one was inescapable, and it sent me hurtling back into time 40 years before, when I worked in McGovern's presidential campaign.

As it was for many of us, it was my first foray into politics. Although 18-year-olds had been granted the vote a year before, I was still too young to cast my own ballot. So, fired up by youthful idealism and undisturbed by any intrusion of political reality, I plunged into fevered volunteer work on the McGovern campaign, my 15-year-old brother in tow beside me.

The Vietnam War raged on, despite Nixon's promised "secret plan" to end it, and the draft was still in effect. Rejecting the moderate findings of an obscenity commission originally charted by President Johnson, Nixon threatened a new crackdown on smut, not exactly a top policy priority for a teenage boy with raging hormones. And his "Operation Intercept" program aimed at interdicting cheap Mexican marijuana flowing over the border - well, let's just say any adolescent of that era with a measurable pulse had compelling reasons to prefer McGovern.

That said, I had learned at my father's knee that Tricky Dick represented everything loathsome in postwar American politics. He launched his career in 1946 by Red-baiting FDR liberal Rep. Jerry Voorhees out of his long-held congressional seat, then followed that up by cross-filing in the Democratic primary two years later and obscuring his Republican affiliation so effectively that he defeated the Democratic opponent in his own party primary. Two years later, in 1950, capitalizing on his exploits as an anti-Communist crusader in pursuit of alleged Soviet spy Alger Hiss, he defeated incumbent Sen. Helen Gahagan Douglas by attacking her as "pink right down to her underwear." By 1952, Eisenhower plucked him out of the Senate to join the ticket as vice-president. But not everyone who liked Ike also liked Nixon, and explosive revelations of a hidden slush fund from political supporters soon prompted his legendary "Checkers" speech, a desperate but successful effort to save his career. After a failed presidential run in 1960 and in quick succession, the California gubernatorial defeat in 1962 - capped by his embittered blast at the press, "You won't have Dick Nixon to kick around anymore" - the political establishment pronounced him dead and buried.

Until, that is, a reanimated Nixon rose from the grave in 1968 with what became known as a "Southern strategy" of thinly-veiled racial messaging coupled with pandering to fears of urban unrest and vows to restore law and order. By 1972, the Nixon campaign - "Four More Years," "Now More Than Ever" - was rolling in lobbyist cash, run by a sinister cabal of lackeys heading up a campaign operation called The Committee to Re-Elect the President (aptly known as CREEP), while in the background lurked a mysterious unsolved burglary hinting at even darker misdeeds yet to be revealed.

In short, Nixon to us was The Fiend Incarnate. And imbued with youthful idealism and base adolescent self-interest, we eagerly enlisted in what cynics mockingly dismissed as McGovern's "children's crusade."

We did it all, from cold-calling potential donors to writing them personal thank-you notes. We set up for events, greeted walk-ins, canvassed precincts, handed out door-hangers, put up lawn signs. We stuffed envelopes and leafleted factory gates. We met visiting pols who'd agreed to host local fundraisers, including then-state Sen. George Moscone, later to be elected - and murdered - as mayor of San Francisco. Once, we even crashed a Nixon homecoming rally at the Ontario Airport, talking our way in and getting as close as we could to the candidate's podium before proudly stripping off our jackets to flaunt our McGovern for President T-shirts. How we avoided getting pummeled by the crowd or roughed-up by security I'll never know.

Heading into the final stretch, we dialed names off mimeographed lists to get out the vote, and even drove people to the polls on Election Day (for a kid with a license less than a year, the liability today would be unimaginable.) Oblivious to the polls, we knew that somehow good would triumph.

And so, on election night, we were stunned - and crushed - when McGovern was buried by a 49-state landslide in which he lost even his own state of South Dakota.

He broke our hearts, and as the song says, the first cut is the deepest. But where some turned away in disgust and disillusionment, I found a new sense of engagement and empowerment. Yes, we lost. But we did something that mattered: We believed. We participated. We acted.

And not long after, when the Watergate scandal exploded and the foulness of Nixon's "White House horrors" was finally revealed to the world, we felt we had finally been vindicated.

McGovern, however, never recovered. His campaign was — is — viewed by party regulars as the low-point in modern Democratic politics, emblematic of everything wrong with the nomination and vetting process, a casualty of naive amateurs and interlopers, the very apotheosis of far-left, unelectable self-destructive kookery.

Forty years down the road, there's a lot I wish he would have done differently. His foreign policy isolationism looks more like modern Republicanism than the FDR global engagement I prefer. His cavalier and irresponsible VP selection of Sen. Thomas Eagleton rivals that of Sarah Palin. He made it almost a point of pride to alienate the core constituencies any Democrat needs to win. And ultimately, he just had no clue what he was up against, which raises real questions about what might have followed as President.

As I said, metaphors can be over-extended. But George McGovern never deserved to become the lonely scapegoat for the entire Democratic Party's failure of imagination, of principle, of nerve, and ultimately of competence.

He was an honorable, decent, idealistic and conscientious politician. Now he is dying, abandoned and alone in the political wilderness. With his passing, it's long past time for Democrats to lift the burden of all the sin and iniquity they have inflicted on his reputation and show him the respect and affection he surely has earned.

Editor's update: McGovern died early Sunday morning, Oct. 21, under hospice care in South Dakota. He was 90 years old.

Posted by Joel Bellman at 12:30 PM | Permalink

When Arnon Goldfinger's 98-year-old grandmother Gerda passed away, the Israeli filmmaker and teacher set out to make a short film about her flat in Tel Aviv. He remembered it from his childhood as a place where Germany was very present. Although they had emigrated from Germany to Israel in the 30's before World War II was fully raging, his grandmother and grandfather never assimilated into Israeli culture. Their books, spoken language, furniture and clothing remained as it was in Germany, simply transported to another city. In order to process her passing and say goodbye to her, Goldfinger set out to see what he could learn about her from the things she left behind. He thought about what he had always told his students: In your work, you must do something that is meaningful to your life. And the most meaningful work is that which you really do just for yourself. But he hoped that perhaps what was meaningful to him would also be meaningful to others.

So, he brought his camera crew to his grandmother's flat and filmed everything as he and his family unearthed her treasures, her ephemera, and eventually, her secrets.

Although his grandparent's story is a very individual one it brings up issues that we all deal with in our lives, from the mundane--what do we save and what do we throw away—to the very emotional--what do we share with our family, what do we talk about and what do we hide?

"The film is talking about very basic things," Goldfinger said recently as he passed through Los Angeles to discuss it. "Friendship, longing for the motherland and our connection to our past." He talked about how the second generation of Holocaust era survivors rarely asked questions, for fear of bringing up painful memories. It was easier for the third generation, a bit removed, to ask the tough questions about a painful past. But in talking to audiences at his screenings, he discovered that many children of all backgrounds know little of their family's history.

Goldfinger's film is really about two families, his grandparents and a family in Germany to whom they remained connected during and after the war. In a probing, yet sensitive way, Goldfinger peeled back the layers of their history and discovered some troubling surprises. He knew he could never have asked his grandmother the questions he tried to answer after her death.

But in making this journey to unravel a tangled web of secrets, "I feel much closer to them now," he says of his grandparents. "They became much more human. I felt compassion and sometimes anger. I feel I know them better but that knowing is connected to emotions. When I learned what she was hiding, I was astonished. But people are very complicated. Not everything is in your control."

For many of the German Jews who emigrated to Israel, their connection to their past and to their adopted country was fraught with many conflicting feelings. "When the State of Israel was started, the pioneers and leaders wanted to make a new nation--fresh, brave, strong, with no connections to the Diaspora, to weakness. Of course, it was an illusion," he said. "No one can live without the past."

"The Flat," Goldfinger's exploration of his family's complicated and very unique history, is haunting, thought-provoking and universally human. It opens at the Landmark Theatres on October 24.

Photo of Goldfinger: Iris Schneider. Photo of Gerda and Kurt Tuchler © Goldfinger / Tuchler Family Archive.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 12:21 PM | Permalink

Disney Hall is not just alive with music these days -- it's throbbing with dance. For their kick-off gala, Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Philharmonic enlisted nothing less than American Ballet Theatre stars and stage-worthy others as the featured attraction.

And that's a relatively new activity for the house that Frank Gehry built to show off the city's musical jewel.

So here was the question: what space did our celebrated conductor and his band occupy -- while dancers trod a cleverly arranged mid-level ad hoc stage? The answer: one just below the jerry-rigged platform that cleaved out seats from the hull-shaped hall. Conclusion: the orchestra did not play in an actual pit, but occupied an approximate one, just below the fleet-footed collaborators. The verdict: it all worked surprisingly well, the logistics, that is.

The best meeting of minds between "pit" and stage came in Barak Marshall's choreography for "The Chairman Dances" from John Adams' "Nixon in China." It's a distinctly rousing pièce d' occasion -- one that catches the ethnic flavor with red flags flying, white fans flaring and regimental corps enlivened by the dance-maker's signature semaphores. What's more, the 10-member Body Traffic brought terrific energy to the task, as a grateful complement to Adams' rip-roaring rhythmic engine. And not least, the piece fit its frame to a T.

So did Josh Rhodes' episode from Bernstein's "On the Town" work out well, with wit to boot - although the familiar piece had four sailors here instead of three.

Those were the easy parts. But when it came to ballet repertory icons and the absolutely critical heartbeat collaboration needed between soloist and conductor things became iffy.

So no matter the sculptural perfection of Roberto Bolle's "Apollo" variation, with his young god's commanding insouciance, Dudamel and Co. could not muster Balanchine's and Stravinsky's accents, critically-timed here to the dancers. Ditto the "Swan Lake" excerpts for him and Veronika Part. Yes, the two performed with that sense of ingrained virtuosity and depth of expression. But, like watching people talk on screen with audio out-of-sync, the power of their dancing was short-changed. Also there were no wings to fly into, so steps had to artificially halt so as not to hit a wall at full momentum.

Apparently, none of the musical misalliances escaped Dudamel's notice.

"It takes a great specialist to accompany dancers," he said at an interval, implying his apology for not being one!

Still, there were wonderful moments: as when Part, the Black Swan Odile, surreptitiously turns her head back to see if her trickery has worked on the duped Siegfried, Bolle; and there was Martin Chalifour's accompanying violin solo to their pas de deux -- with its fine, old Slavic vibrato - which brought out the narrative's romantic darkness.

No matter what, these are two gorgeous dancers; the glitzy gala audience roared with appreciation and Dudamel and the Phil gave full-out performances, concluding with the finale of Stravinsky's "Firebird," music that defies anyone not to love it.

The next night, with not a trace of dance feathers floating down, the musicians alone took center stage, but continued on the Stravinsky path -- this time with that other storied ballet score, "Rite of Spring," or "Sacre du Printemps" as the 1913 Parisians who rioted in its cause called it.

And you can be sure that Dudamel ripped into the pagan ritual, a model of modernity, with cataclysmic force. But there was less of the razor's edge here that some others find and more emphasis on earthiness - all those deep, rich, lower-string glissandos - without ever slighting the lyric wisps left hanging seductively in the air. If there's sensuality to be had, the Phil and its director will latch onto it.

The same goes for fullness of sound elsewhere. Which means that their outing with an all-Beethoven program boasted robust, big-breadth playing that blazed and soared in the "Eroica" Symphony. They luxuriated in it. And how the band loves to be given its head!

Somehow, though, the smaller-scaled vision of pianist Leif Ove Andsnes in the C-Major Concerto No. 1 did not conflict with Dudamel's zestful approach -- they got along quite nicely. The tall, slender no-nonsense Norwegian did strike his own kind of blow - with pristine pianism that found the living breath of Beethoven. It came in his phrasing, built on the impetus for these sentences, their beginnings and endings that were of a complete, single impulse. Great musicians - be they singers or instrumentalists or dancers all have this gift. He's one.

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 10:42 PM | Permalink

Domingo and Poplavskaya during "I Due Foscari"

One week before Carmageddon II the whole city seemed to converge downtown - luckily, the Music Center opened its various doors to the new season before freeways posted their Closed signs.

There was dance at Disney, opera at the Pavilion, premieres of everything, much hullaballoo all around.

But some of it stood out indelibly.

Take Plácido Domingo, for instance, our all-time music magnate who directs companies, sponsors competitions, conducts and oh, yes, has been singing to world acclaim for nearly half a century over a span of 140 roles.

Well, note this: He gave his first absolute powerhouse performance as a baritone. I say - first - having heard him sing these lower-voiced roles before. But never with the vocal fullness and expressive impact that he managed here, in LA Opera's premiere of Verdi's "I Due Foscari," an undeservedly ignored and splendid early work .

At 71, the celebrated tenor has arguably begun a new career.

And instead of finding him again as a dreary old Doge (Simon Boccanegra was the last such role he took on for the company), as another white-bearded paterfamilias type in long robes, we saw and heard the viscerally anguished father whose only living son was falsely convicted of murder by a wicked political rival. Oh, did our Plácido sing the role -- with that same brightly burning tone of his erstwhile tenor peak, only darker and deeper. And oh, did he act it, with the same immediate ferocity of his golden days.

Nor was he alone in this relatively compact and altogether stage-worthy opera based on a Lord Byron play.

Marina Poplavskaya, a strong presence as Foscari's daughter-in-law Lucrezia, matched him as more than an aggrieved wife but also a determined foe of her husband's torturers and corrupt judges. Their scenes together were electric, and shades of Sutherland could be heard in her lustrous, ample soprano with its all-encompassing bloom. Tenor Francesco Meli sang Jacopo, the younger Foscari, to good effect, although he blew his big opening aria - while descending picturesquely onto the stage in a prisoner's cage - by yelling full blast instead of detailing its bel canto shadings.

But Thaddeus Strassberger's aptly formalized staging, with its phalanxes of 15th-century Venetian councils parading in geometric patterns and adorned in the usual red-black-white scheme, hit the mark. Even the final scene, a carnival with a colorful angel hovering in space and dispensing confetti, showed a savvy artistic hand at work. Conductor James Conlon ably commandeered the whole thing from the pit.

Not so enterprising was the burned-out looking, much-traveled, now-crude "Don Giovanni" production originally directed by the innovative German dramaturg Peter Stein, but here entrusted to the American rookie who gave us a connect-the-dots "Bohème" revival last season. Whatever special insights the staging may have had, none remained.

Instead we had a perfectly pleasant generic model of Mozart's masterpiece. That meant traffic-cop direction, with singers depending mainly on whatever various devices they could dredge up. And it left Ildebrando D'Arcangelo to float about as a mousy little man with long payes (sidelocks), hardly the notorious womanizer of lore. No matter his velvety burnished basso, this Don was not grand or sly or elegant or charismatic - he did not command or maneuver or outsmart or even hint at having any powers, much less seductive ones.

The others went through their little routines less calamitously and sang well - David Bizic made a blustery, comic sidekick as Leporello, Juliana di Giacomo a sturdily accurate Donna Anna (except for a grievous ending to "Non mi dir"), Soile Isokoski a mock-vamp as Donna Elvira, Andrej Dunaev a supplicating Don Ottavio, Roxana Constantinescu a playful Zerlina and Joshua Bloom an easily pacified Masetto. Conlon led all with authority.

But what a sad decline from the work's previous standards here - LA Opera stagings that boasted distinct directorial points of view and casts that included, several times, the dynamic Erwin Schrott and the inspired Thomas Allen. And we won't even mention the LA Philharmonic's deconstructed "Don Giovanni" - across the street at Disney just months ago - with its high-end creative team including Rodarte costume design. I guess we know where the money is.

Sure enough. The brand new, highly endowed, Glorya Kaufman-blessed LA Dance Project is headed by leading light Benjamin Millepied - you remember him, the emerging choreographer/dancer from New York City Ballet, who played Natalie Portman's partner in "Black Swan," then married her in real life and continued his career as a bold face name.

Well, he staged his first full LADP event at Disney and, indeed, his own new piece, "Moving Parts," also listed celeb costumer Rodarte, the well-known painter Christopher Wool's tri-panel installation that did some moving around and composer Nico Muhly's attractive commissioned score. Big budget all around. Little to remember.

But curiously (or not so curiously), it wasn't the Millepied work that marked the moment. Nor was it a revisitation of Merce Cunningham's 1964 "Winterbranch," seen a few decades back at Royce Hall (at Disney it was an unbearably painful earful neither worth the endurance nor the potential hearing loss.)

No, it was the 1993 "Quintett" by William Forsythe, the brilliant American expat lured away years ago by the Frankfurt Opera Ballet. If Millepied does nothing else but bring us a rare extraordinary work like this - the kind that makes us think that most other choreographers might as well hang it up - he'll have earned his investment dollars.

And this is not said lightly. When all the other decorative choreography-by-the-yard filling our stages pales by comparison and goes to instantly forgettable, it's a wake-up call.

So here's what I saw in "Quintett": a dynamic of life, reposeful to frenzied, internally and organically motivated movement, the dancerly whole of it pristine and spare and sumptuous, a fractional ballet breakdown, a puncturing of space by singles, duos, etc. with each dancer motored by an inner centrifuge that results in a swirl, a twist, a connection - all of it reactive to some ongoing stimulus.

I think that stimulus was Gavin Bryars' famous archival song-find of the worn and weary vagrant's voice lifted up by its innocence, softly rasping "Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet," and the composer's string complement slowly building around it.

'Moving Parts.' Photo by Eric Politzer

The whole serene thing aches in a sublime way. You sit there riveted. This is dancer definition that's thrilling. (Forsythe sent three ballet masters from Frankfurt to set the piece on LADP's marvelous contingent of six, the same ones who were anonymous in "Moving Parts.") A special wonder was Frances Chiaverini, who showed how a long-limbed figure in a gauzy tunic with a long sheet of hair that flies loose can reveal the movement's power and her own power within it.

We hear that Millepied is bringing Forsythe to Los Angeles. There's reason to cheer.

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 2:50 PM | Permalink

Just look at Yuja Wang, the whizbang pianist currently wowing 'em on concert stages, particularly at the Hollywood Bowl where this gorgeous 25-year-old recently played.

You need to know that she's the hottest example of what our screen-crazed world has produced. And the mammoth amphitheater could not be a more perfect place to advertise her extra-musical charms.

Now, by mentioning this up front I do not minimize her virtuosity - prodigious and stunning by any standard — but that subject is not the news. Screens, screens everywhere is. They're numerous on most restaurant walls, sky high in open-air malls, hand-held by a majority of passers-by. So it's no surprise that some performers at the Bowl, with its mega screens now, are taking huge publicity advantage of our picto-tronic world where everything is a giant-sized close-up.

Remember what happened last year, when Wang played not only the Steinway but for the Jumbotron at the 18,000-seat outdoor showplace? In her mini bandage dress, an orangey-red thing not much bigger than a swim suit and her stiletto-heeled sandals, she sent an image that carried to newspapers and also went viral on the internet.

As a mere starlet or model, Wang would hardly stand out from the crowd. But as a prototype of this generation's burning technicians - those keyboard wizards who can take on the literature's blockbusters and play faster, louder, softer than the norm; who can grab up the dense-est, knottiest passages with what seems like 20 fingers, pound out the octaves with thrilling weight and excitement - her physical appearance is, to put it mildly, unexpected.

Maybe it's proof that women can have it all, including a multi-faceted feminine identity (thank you, at last, Helen Gurley Brown.) And that a serious virtuosa like Wang can compete in the sex-doll sweepstakes no matter how dissonant that chic vamp image might have seemed in the realm of classical music.

In any case, she has mapped out an m. o. by now. And for this second Bowl date she looked as ready for her close-up as before - bare arms and shoulders above a purple gown, with a slit to the high thigh that angled to the audience. Last year, also playing with the LA Philharmonic led by Gustavo Dudamel, she championed Rachmaninoff's murderously hard Third Piano Concerto, aka "Rach Three." This time it was Tchaikovsky's First. (Incidental intelligence: Van Cliburn played both, back-to-back on a single Bowl program some years ago.)

On both of Wang's outings there was that soupcon of disbelief: a kitten at the keyboard -- so petite, but commanding it, conquering it. She could make the sound of a cat's paws skipping over the ivories but a ferocious tiger, too. She knew where the work waxed and waned, how to set up for the big, cadential flourishes and had full grasp of its overall structure as well as the ability to let loose for free-floating lyricism. To boot, there were unstoppable driving furies and an elastic snap to vehement passages.

No matter that there was also a share of dropped notes. Indoor listening, though, would tell if Wang could deliver the inner poetry of this and other music, as well.

Dudamel and the orchestra seemed to be in sync with her most of the time, although theirs was not an ideal collaboration - at least not here.

The Bowl, with its amplification infidelities and sundry environmental disturbances, hardly provides a testing ground. And that strangeness also beset what came next: the Tchaikovsky Fourth Symphony. What I heard, courtesy of Dudamel & Co., was a kind of reductionism, notwithstanding the lovely second movement tune — as though the work was a collection of etudes, each performed with great care (except for horn bobbles), but almost tediously. It can be this way at our musical oasis under the stars, even though sheltered by those surrounding Aleppo Pines (yes, trees from the besieged Syrian city.)

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 4:23 PM | Permalink

Black and white photos by Marissa Roth; portrait by Iris Schneider.

Common wisdom advises that life is a journey. For photojournalist Marissa Roth, life and art conspired, taking her on a worldwide odyssey that rambled over 28 years. The work she produced will be on exhibit at the Museum of Tolerance beginning August 16. "One Person Crying: Women and War" began for Roth when she was working on a book project in the Philippines. A colleague advised her that there would be a coup the next morning, just the day she was supposed to leave the country. At 3 a.m. she jumped on the back of his motorscooter and headed out, on assignment for the Los Angeles Times, to cover it. But she realized as the mayhem unfolded, "it wasn't my thing. I was more interested in the other side, what was happening in the homes while this was going on."

This became a recurring theme of interest in her work, eventually taking her to Cambodia and Vietnam, Kosovo, Bosnia Herzegovina, Pakistan, Hiroshima, Afghanistan, Northern Ireland, Novi Sad in Eastern Europe where her grandparents lost their lives in World War II, and the United States.

Women are the real collateral damage when wars are waged. Though they are not the fighters, their struggles are far more personal, as they are left behind to keep the home functioning, the children fed and clothed, the cities and villages alive. These women are the survivors who soldier on in war's aftermath. Roth traveled around the world, bearing witness as she let them tell their stories. "I can't explain it. I couldn't get away from it. It's like I was following my path and my passion. I just had to surrender to it." Her photographs, while steeped in the physical and emotional wreckage of war, show no guns, no blood, no combat.

I've known Marissa for decades. We met while I was working as a photographer at the Los Angeles Times and she was freelancing for the paper. She was always flying off somewhere to shoot something on her project and I always wondered how she was able to fund all that travel. Through a combination of some savings, some inheritance and a lot of hustling she was able to make intermittent trips. "I've probably spent close to $200,000 on the project. I could have given myself a masters and a doctorate! But I thought 'I just have to do this, no matter what it costs.' It's been a great lesson in trust, I suppose, trusting the unknown. Not letting fear be my copilot. I had to learn to just trust the process." And she never let go of her vision.

Now that the exhibit is close enough to be real, she has turned to Kickstarter to help raise $15,000 to pay for some of the costs of exhibiting the work here and elsewhere and give voice to women all over the world who have been affected by war.

Although she has published several books, Roth was unsuccessful in finding a publisher for this project. She changed her game plan and looked instead for an exhibition space. With the help of Howard Spector, a curator and mentor, she created a Powerpoint presentation for a lecture, and last October she showed it to Liebe Geft, director of the Museum of Tolerance. Geft committed to doing a show at the museum. But that commitment was for the exhibit space only.

"She basically said that a show like this would cost $50,000-60,000 to produce and an additional $40,000 for travel costs," Roth said, and those were costs which Roth would have to pay. "I wanted it to be beautiful. I knew it would be expensive but after all the work I'd done, I wasn't going to scrimp on prints, mats, frames." She forged ahead finishing the work. Her brother passed away and left her some money and that gave her the impetus and the means to make the final push.

With a recent trip to Vietnam, her travels came to a close. "I thought that once I found my grandparent's home and memorial in Novi Sad in 2009 that I was done." But she realized that she needed to go to Vietnam after talking with Spector, who was working to create a cohesive exhibit from all her years of work and images. "I was tired, but knew I needed to go."

"Vietnam was my coming of age war and I realized it was a huge influence on me. I didn't fully appreciate how it shaped me in terms of my desires as a peace activist, and to become a photojournalist. I still have vivid memories of sitting on my bed as a kid and looking at Life, Look and National Geographic. I was conscious of those pictures early on."

Often the trips would take a year of planning, so she could hit the ground running and maximize her time in the country. Once she returned from Vietnam, and with Geft's commitment to a show, she hired a designer and set about creating the exhibition. "Because I deal with so much history and address so many wars and conflicts, I felt I had to also give history lessons in the exhibit. We determined we would create freestanding text panels that give background to the wars I've covered."

Some private donors and foundations have come forward with grants. She is represented by Creative Visions Foundation, a non-profit foundation started by Kathy Eldon to fund visual projects and honor her son, photographer Dan Eldon, a Reuters photographer who was killed at 22 while on assignment in Somalia. To help pay for the remaining exhibition costs, Roth turned to Kickstarter.

Now that the traveling and photography are done, and the show is coming together, "I find myself weeping a lot," she said. "In a funny way, now I find myself feeling all the pain of these women. I don't have to keep myself cinched up in order to keep going." She has already moved on to another project, a book of images she made in Tibet. "I don't want to do too much more war stuff. I've hit my pain threshold," she says. "I'm not sure where the road will take me. I had to do this documentary project, but my roots are in art. The Tibet project is very different, almost like a photographic meditation," she said. She paused and took a breath. "I want the lights turned on in my life."

The exhibition at the Museum of Tolerance will run from August 16 to October 25. Visit Kickstarter to support this project.

Corrected post

Posted by Iris Schneider at 3:34 PM | Permalink

Neil Diamond gets his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, accompanied by Los Angeles City Council members Tom LaBonge (clutching a loaf of pumpkin bread), Eric Garcetti and Joe Buscaino. Diamond noted it has been 40 years since his first concerts at the Greek Theater, and that his his first Los Angeles concert was in 1966 at the Hullabaloo, the Sunset Boulevard club of KRLA disk jockey Dave Hull that was located where the Nickelodeon theater is now. His performance was panned by the Los Angeles Times, he said.

Photo by Gary Leonard

Posted by Editor at 5:12 PM | Permalink

Joel Bellman, formerly an award-winning radio reporter and editorial writer for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner, is a longtime journalism instructor for UCLA Extension and the communications deputy for county Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky. He submitted this piece as an individual.

"The past is never dead," William Faulkner wrote, "It's not even past."

I beg to differ. A significant part of my past is dead, buried, never to be exhumed and resuscitated. Missed, mourned, lost, lamented, certainly not forgotten. But gone, baby, gone.

I read recently that a young filmmaker has gone public to plead for funding to complete his documentary "Rhino Resurrected," an earnest and reverential attempt to evoke and recapture the spirit that animated the celebrated Westwood record store. I saw the rough cut he screened at a local art house last summer, and it wasn't bad. His fundraising window has only a couple of days left to run, and I wish him luck. I hope he finds his audience. But really telling that tale will be harder than capturing lightning in a bottle.

Let me offer a personal chapter you won't be seeing in that film: my three-year stint working at the Rhino Records sister store out in Claremont, about 60 miles east of the uber-hip Westwood location. Not exactly a canny career move for an aspiring journalist marking time between college and grad school, I grant you. But in some ways it wasn't that different than what I trained to do, and what I've done in every job I've had for the last 30-plus years. Spreading knowledge. Hipping people to what's happening. Trading information. Learning new things. Championing the underdog. Arguing endlessly with genuine passion.

And I wouldn't trade it for anything.

"Happy to be a part of the industry of human happiness," Andrew Oldham's Immediate Records label used to boast. Well, I certainly was. Back in the day - especially in a college town like Claremont, where I grew up - the record store in The Village downtown seemed like the coolest place around. With seven private universities within walking distance, we rarely lacked for customers. They were smart, eclectic, and as besotted with music as we were.

What a gig! Sit around in a rock t-shirt and jeans all day playing whatever records we wanted, hanging out, spewing opinions, and getting paid for it! I still can't believe it.

But like I said: Dead. Past. Gone.

I don't remember when I first discovered the place; it opened in 1974 or 1975, a year or two after its more famous Westwood counterpart. The original location on Second Street (directly next door to the police station!) was barely larger than my living room today. Tiny two-person counter, manned by a taciturn young guy and his wife. Cash box. Little carbon note pads to write up the orders. Credit cards? Forget it. Checks? Each one had to be called in to a credit service individually, the bank routing number read aloud, and cleared. Modern retailing, it wasn't.

Inventory, maybe a couple thousand LPs. But what albums they were! British and European imports. Out-of-print and overstock cut-outs. Deep catalogue stuff, not just the latest releases. Obscure jazz and blues reissues of uncertain provenance. Used and promo copies (price tags plastered, hilariously, on top of the "Promotional Copy - Not for Sale" sticker). This wasn't your parents' Wallich's Music City.

Did I mention the bootlegs? Live concert recordings, outtakes, unreleased studio sessions, out-of-print B-sides - many featuring superb covers by William Stout, today a recognized master of commercial and fine art - they were a record geek's delight. For pop music acolytes, the place was a holy shrine. And about as anti-corporate as it was possible to be while still turning a decent profit.

So when Rhino finally outgrew its space and decided to relocate to larger quarters a block away on Yale Ave., I was astounded when the taciturn manager offhandedly offered me a part-time job. Summer of '77, I'd just graduated college with a degree in communications, desperate to become a radio journalist, and no job in sight.

I took it.

The pay was modest - the first day, my wages included a second-hand copy of Neil Young's "American Stars 'n' Bars" - but I would gladly have paid them for the privilege. If there was ever a dream job, that was it.

If you remember the film "High Fidelity," that was us. Yes, we, too used to run people out if we didn't like their music, like the poor fellow who came in one day looking for a Village People album. "We don't carry that kind of stuff," I sneered. "Why don't you try The Wherehouse." And if they ever argued with us about our trade-in appraisal - they were dead. We almost bodily threw one grumbler out of the store - to the lusty cheers of the other patrons.

Now if, on the other hand, you came in looking for Kevin Coyne, or Kraftwerk, or Holly Near, or virtually any pub-rock, punk, New Wave, progressive rock, minimalist jazz or '50s and '60s reissue compilations - you were our kind of customer. It really was like a family. And Amazon algorithms that today cheerily inform us, "People who bought this also bought these" really can't compete with the human factor when it comes to sussing out the needs and wants of the discriminating record buyer.

There was the dapper little guy who dropped by every few months and collected only soundtrack albums - we'd always stash the rare trade-ins for him, which he'd delightedly snap up. One day he showed up, and handed me a mint copy of an impossibly rare import pressing of Pino Donaggio's score for "Don't Look Now," which he remembered I'd been looking for. "That's just to say thanks," he said. Another regular customer - a bluegrass and folk fan - appeared one Saturday and handed me a paper bag. Inside were mint copies of two out-of-print John Fahey albums I'd once mentioned to him. "For you," he said simply. And I still fondly remember the older guy with the duck's ass haircut whose face lit up when I handed him a copy I'd found for him of a rare Coasters anthology with "Idol With the Golden Head" that he'd been searching for since his high school days back in the '50s.

One Saturday morning, I'd just opened and the store was still empty when a kid wandered in with an old Beatle album he wanted to trade in: "Yesterday and Today" - the first pressing, with the notorious pasted over "butcher cover" I'd only heard about but never before seen. Another Saturday morning, the singer Iggy Pop unexpectedly walked through the door, joined by one of his former bandmates in the Stooges who'd become a friend of one of my co-workers. Among our other customers, a young Ben Harper, whose grandfather founded the legendary Folk Music Center across the street that today Ben owns.

I worked at Rhino part-time and then full-time for two years, and when the manager who'd hired me left to take a job with a record company, I took over. But by then, I already knew that my record store days were numbered. I'd enrolled in graduate school, had ramped up my writing, and soon landed the radio internship I'd long been seeking. When it turned into a paying gig in another radio news department in Los Angeles, I quit the store for good and moved west to be closer to school and the job.

Rhino grew from a couple of stores into an independent record label, and eventually into a major-label division that set a global standard for high-quality archival reissues. But the big wheel keeps on turning, and eventually the label's founders were bought out, the division downsized, and the business increasingly migrated into little more than digital downloads. The old business model has almost entirely collapsed, and the retail music store is today virtually obsolete.

I never again worked in any aspect of the music industry, or ever wanted to. But my passion for music - and my vinyl addiction - have never abated. My voluminous record collection has survived intact one divorce and half a dozen moves. Those long, lazy days I shared with my fellow employees - Mark and Linda, Jeff, Karen, Eva - are among my most cherished.

There was a time when it took me more than 30 years to hunt down another copy of the obscure British 45 I once briefly encountered in a dusty little record shop on a back street off Caledonian Road in North London on my first trip to the UK. Another time, it took several miles of walking through some pretty dicey New Orleans residential neighborhoods far from the tourist-friendly French Quarter for me to finally locate a rare original local-label version of a minor R&B favorite of mine by Big Sambo and the Housewreckers. I may be nuts, but I've got at least a dozen stories like that.

In today's world, when virtually any song anyone's ever heard of can be streamed and downloaded within seconds, legally or otherwise, most music fans would surely find such behavior unfathomable, if not psychotic. How can a little scrap of plastic with a hole in the middle in a paper sleeve or cardboard jacket possibly mean that much to anyone?

But once upon a time, there was magic in those grooves. And for those of a certain age, they cast a spell that still enchants - and always will.

Posted by Joel Bellman at 7:58 AM | Permalink

Costumes from "Downton Abbey"

One of my favorite things about "Downton Abbey" (besides the addictive story lines and actor Dan Stevens' blue eyes) are the costumes. They've attracted attention for their opulence and historical accuracy since the "upstairs/downstairs" drama about an aristocratic family in early 20th Century England premiered there in 2010. Designer Susannah Buxton won an Emmy for her work on the show in 2011 and is nominated again this year. Starting Tuesday, Los Angeles fans of the show and its costumes can see some of them up close, as well as sartorial creations from other Emmy-nominated shows such as "Boardwalk Empire," "Game of Thrones" and "Once Upon a Time." They are featured in FIDM's new museum show, Outstanding Art of Television Costume Design.

Not nominated this year, but included in the show, are costumes from "Pan Am," "Smash," "New Girl," and "Magic City." Devotees of "Mad Men," however, will be disappointed. Not only was the show's designer Janie Bryant not nominated for an Emmy this year, the producers decided not to participate in the FIDM show this time around. Oh well, there's always next year.
"Magic City"

The 2012 Emmy winners for outstanding costumes will be announced at the Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards on Sept. 15, 2012.

"The Outstanding Art of Television Costume Design" runs through Oct. 20, 2012 at the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in the South Park area of downtown.

"Once Upon a Time," left, and "Boardwalk Empire"

All photos by Judy Graeme. Click any picture to view larger

Posted by Judy Graeme at 8:03 PM | Permalink

The Ramones at Eric's Club, Liverpool, England, May 1977. Courtesy of Ian Dickson / www.late20thcenturyboy.com

If the question is "Who Shot Rock and Roll," the answer according to the new show at the Annenberg Space for Photography would have to be everybody.

The show is a rambling exhibition of 166 images, some iconic and many obscure, documenting rock and roll and and along with it a slice of cultural history. Most photographers have only a single image displayed, including Annie Liebovitz — whose early unrehearsed black and white images for Rolling Stone are so different than the posed portraits she is more well-known for — and some such as LA's own Ann Summa, who documented the early punk rockers, are ignored. The show marks the first time that the Annenberg Space for Photography has collaborated with a museum, taking a show curated by Gail Buckland that began at the Brooklyn Museum and adapting its space to fit the show.

With so many photographs plastering the walls, the exhibit is as overstimulating as a concert whose speakers are turned up to 11. But a very fine film made to accompany the show features 8 photographers — Bob Gruen, Norman Seeff, Lynn Goldsmith, Henry Diltz, Guy Webster, Mark Seliger, Jill Furmanovsky and Edward Colver — and helps to distill the experience down to something manageable, enjoyable and educational.

I have found some of the shows at the Annenberg too overwhelming, with images hanging up and down the walls, impossible to physically see unless you are Kobe Bryant, and difficult to process because there are just too many images competing for your attention. But for me, the films always come to the rescue, allowing you to sit and take in the experience from a different perspective, then attack the images again.

In this exhibit's film, created by Arclight Productions, photographers whose iconic images are seared into our memories — Norman Seeff's vibrant and sexy Tina Turner, the innocence of Joni Mitchell captured by Henry Diltz, Bob Gruen's John Lennon touting New York City, Colver's raw punk energy — reminisce and tell stories out of school. I learned that Guy Webster's famous Mama's and Papa's album cover photograph of all four of the bandmembers in a bathtub happened because everyone, including the photographer, was too stoned to leave the house. Often the photographers developed friendships with their subjects first, and photography came afterwards. Some, like Diltz with the Lovin' Spoonful, were invited to hop on the bus and tour with the band as their first professional gig.

"So many people say, 'Oh, this was my life,'" Diltz said at the show's opening. As the only official photographer at Woodstock, Diltz's images provide a history of rock that marked milestones for a generation, most of whom remember not only the songs but where they were when they heard them, and what they went through to hear them live. Diltz lived in Laurel Canyon during that golden time when Joni Mitchell, Mama Cass and so many other folk icons hung out together in their backyards, making music and mayhem, and then rolled down the hill to play the Troubador or watch their friends perform on Sunset Strip.

Diltz had been a musician, singing harmonies in a folk group that toured the college circuit. He picked up an old camera on a whim at a flea market while on tour and was blown away when he did his first slideshow for his friends. Totally self-taught ("I learned by reading the directions on the yellow box of Kodak film") he got special access because he was a friend first, photographer second. "It was all by accident," he said.

Left: Tupac Shakur, August 1993 - Courtesy of Danny Clinch; Elvis Whispers Softly, 1956 - © Alfred Wertheimer, The Wertheimer Collection

Indeed, many of the photographers represented in the show started out by touring with a band, gaining the access that made those special and unique images possible simply by being there, camera in hand. It was a much more innocent time. The bands were new themselves, not worried about controlling their image like they are today. There were no restrictions or rules. No limits on what could and could not be shot. They were too involved with having a good time to worry about being in control.

Diltz said that many times he would sit for hours and not shoot a thing. "I learned an important skill as a musician on tour myself. The art of just hanging out."

As these photographs and stories have shown, it paid off.

The show has proven to be extremely popular, and the Annenberg has extended its hours to accommodate the crowds. Indeed, I stopped by on a Saturday night close to the 9 pm closing time and the place was packed. Besides those milling around looking at photos, about 50 people were seated in the area usually reserved for film watchers, totally mesmerized by slides of album covers flashing on huge screens because it was too late to begin a screening of the film.

People connect with these images not only because of what they are, but because of what they mean to them, what memories they trigger, what part they played in the history of their own lives. Music accompanied us along our path in life, whether it was the music we danced to in the 60's or rebelled with in the 80's. For whatever the show lacks in focus, it does provide an opportunity to appreciate some great photography on a communal head trip into our past.

The Annenberg always schedules a series of lectures during their exhibits which are usually sold out immediately and this time they have also added three live, free concerts hosted by KCRW. Despite my reservations about the overkill of imagery, I have to acknowledge the Annenberg Space for its efforts to make photography hip, and accessible to new audiences.

Edited post

Who Shot Rock and Roll: A Photographic History, 1955 to the Present is at the Annenberg Space for Photography in Century City through Oct. 7. Info

Color photo by Iris Schneider

Posted by Iris Schneider at 4:40 PM | Permalink

Benjamin Millepied and Amanda Wells give a free performance for his LA Dance Project last night at the Museum of Contemporary Art. The crowd included actress Natalie Portman. Photos by Iris Schneider.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 9:49 AM | Permalink

Tiler Peck teaching a class at her old ballet school in Santa Monica.

On a recent Wednesday morning, Tiler Peck, one of the most brilliant young stars in the world of ballet, strolled through the 3rd St. Promenade in Santa Monica completely unnoticed. The New York City Ballet principal dancer and California native was on hiatus from the company and quite happy to be back on home turf.

Dressed like any other girl out for a day of cruising the beach-side mall in shorts and sandals, Peck blends right in. The only clue to her dance pedigree is her slender frame and graceful carriage. Unlike in NYC, where ballet is a major part of the cultural scene, Southern California is a haven of anonymity for Peck. The exception is when she walks into a class at the Westside School of Ballet, where she studied as a child. She's a guest teacher at the Santa Monica school for a week, and couldn't be more cheerful and welcoming. The 12 to 16-year-old advanced students, however, look at her with silent awe. Most of the girls are too shy to approach her, but they are clearly eager to soak up any wisdom she has to offer. She has made it to where they dream of being.

Peck, 23, first studied dance at her mom's ballet studio in Bakersfield, where her family still lives. At 7 she began commuting to Los Angeles to take private lessons with former Bolshoi ballerina Alla Khaniashvili, and later enrolled at Westside. While taking ballet classes, she also was focused on jazz dancing, acting, and singing. She had small parts in movies and in TV commercials. She also had a refreshingly normal childhood. "I was brought up with dogs, and we had the back yard and pool parties...lots of fun," she said. At 11 she auditioned for, and got, the part of Gracie Shinn, the mayor's daughter in the Broadway revival of "The Music Man." She and her grandmother moved to New York and lived in a tiny apartment for the one-year run of the show. Daytime classes at the School of American Ballet (NYCB's official school) made her realize that ballet was her passion. Subsequent summer courses led to an apprenticeship at NYCB and ultimately, in 2005, to a place in the company's corps. Peck was promoted to soloist in 2006, and became a principal in 2009.

Audiences at Lincoln Center are as likely to see her dance in a traditional story ballet such as "The Sleeping Beauty" as in something like "Two Hearts," a contemporary piece showcasing Peck by recently retired NYCB dancer and choreographer (now Los Angeles resident) Benjamin Millepied. She has performed roles in ballets by George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, Susan Stroman, Christopher Wheeldon, and company director Peter Martins.

Peck in excerpt from "Two Hearts."

Peck is always on the lookout for a reason to jump on a plane headed for her home state. In 2010 she came back to guest-perform on ABC's "Dancing With the Stars." This past April she and fellow NYCB dancer Joaquin De Luz brought the house down at the Laguna Dance Festival. When she is here, if she isn't performing or visiting her family in Bakersfield (where she often teaches at her mom's school), there's a good chance she can be found relaxing in Santa Monica. Her favorite store is Fred Segal, and she loves to hunt for clothes in surf shops. On this visit, she was joined by her boyfriend, Robert Fairchild, also a principal dancer with the company. Peck delighted in showing him her favorite spots. "The first day we played Foosball and air hockey on the pier and then just sat on the beach for two hours," she said. The couple checked out the Santa Monica Farmers Market and scored a table on the patio at Gjelina in Venice. She always tries to get to a favorite outdoor café in Sunset Plaza and has a soft spot for Ventura Boulevard near Universal Studios, where she spent time as a child performer. "I love to come here, have my own car to drive around in and not worry about hailing a cab. I love the sun, the beach, and the weather."

It's hard not to wonder about a possible collaboration in Los Angeles with Millepied, who recently founded the L.A. Dance Project and with whom Peck has a long professional relationship. When asked about this her face lights up. "I think it's amazing Benjamin is trying to start something really unique here and I think he'll do it," she says. "I just hope there will be the audience for it which you always worry about in Los Angeles because there are so many other mainstream things like sports. I do think he's very smart and he knows the way to reach out to all kinds of different crowds and bring in the audience. I feel that we work really well together. If he were to ask me, I would definitely come out to guest in a heartbeat.".

Peck is currently in the middle of a typically busy year. In addition to her work with the New York City Ballet and trips home, she has performed in Germany and China. This summer she will dance in Vail, Jackson Hole, Santa Fe, and Nantucket, and then it's back to New York by August 28 to begin rehearsals for the fall season. Speculating on her future, as dancers inevitably must, Peck says: "After I can't dance anymore I would love to do Broadway, or go back into film and TV. I still study and keep up my acting and singing in case I have to transition.

"I've also thought, maybe at the end of my career, of maybe opening a studio. I've been around teaching for so long and I love it. Even if you don't want to teach that day, somehow if you get into class and you see the faces, the excitement, it's hard not to want to give what you know.".

While her life and career are, for the time being, very much based in New York, Peck admits "it doesn't feel like home to me. I see New York as a place for when you're young to live temporarily, and I see California as a place to settle down and have a house and a back yard....When people ask me where I'm from, I say California. It's where I feel at home."

All photographs by Iris Schneider

Posted by Judy Graeme at 4:25 PM | Permalink

The Costume Council saluted 100 years of service to Hollywood films by the Western Costume Co. on Wednesday night at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Moses (Ned Albright) chatted with Miwa Kosuga in the museum's atrium after the program. Photo by Iris Schneider.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 2:37 PM | Permalink

Vincent Floderer's gorgeous construction Boom! assails the retina like a burst of intergalactic activity frozen in time, not the work of a contemporary origami artist. Instead of folding, the French artist's technique involves the application of watercolors and Indian ink to Wenzhou calligraphy paper, which he dampens, stretches and crumples to form jagged three-dimensional corals, sponges and other organic and abstract creations.

Boom! is among the many highlights of The Japanese American National Museum's Folding Paper: The Infinite Possibilities of Origami, the first major exhibition to look at origami as a contemporary art form. Featuring 150 works by 40 international artists from 16 countries, it is also a survey of the explosion in global origami art over the past fifty years.

Some of the show's exquisitely beautiful origami forms are the works of artists with backgrounds in sculpture, architecture or design; others trained as physicists, mathematicians and engineers. Many have turned their childhood passion for origami into complex explorations of tessellation (the creation of repeating abstract and textured patterns), modular origami and sculptural animal, insect and flower shapes. The work of the scientifically based artists has given rise to "origami math," "computational origami," and algorithms that map the way for artists to fold increasingly intricate shapes from a single sheet of paper. The exhibit also includes examples of origami's infiltration into the worlds of fashion, design, architecture, medical research, astronomy and manufacturing.

"Folding Paper" will be on view in Los Angeles through August 26, then travel to museums in Sacramento, CA; Portland, OR; Keene, NH; Peoria, IL, and Wasau, WI through August 2014. Organized by independent curator, author and educator Meher McArthur for the traveling exhibit service of the non-profit organization International Art & Artists, the show, which opened on March 10, has been the hit of the season for JANM.

McArthur, who specializes in Asian art, compares origami in Japan to woodblock prints in the late 19th century, when Japanese treated them so casually they would pack pieces of porcelain in them to send to Europe. Or to Japanese bamboo baskets, which only recently gained the status of an art form in Japan. "There was never a distinction between art and craft," she explains, although today the Japanese have adopted the Western distinction.

One artist represented in the exhibit, physicist and full-time origami artist and educator Robert Lang, has designed and catalogued over 500 original origami patterns, created origami algorithms, and invented a revolutionary new technique that allows for the addition of multiple appendages using a single sheet of paper. Lang has also applied origami techniques in his designs for a folding glass lens for a giant space telescope at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and an automobile air bag. The algorithms, he says, involve the principles of both algebra and geometry, and "a lot of manipulating squares and rectangles, like packing shapes in a box."

Yet Lang notes that the "growth and interest in origami preceded the heavy involvement of math," with the real renaissance occurring in the mid-20th century. Pioneer Akira Yoshizawa was responsible for turning what had been considered a children's pastime in Japan into a form of sculptural art. On March 14 of this year, Yoshizawa's birthday, Google asked Lang to design (after signing a non-disclosure agreement) the origami shapes that became this logo on Google's Web site.

The architectural portions of the exhibit include this short documentary on an origami-inspired temporary chapel, St. Loup, in the foothills of the Jura in Switzerland, and a reference to another origami-based building, the Klein Bottle House in Melbourne, Australia. Origami fashion is represented by Linda Tomoko Mihara and L.A. fashion designer Monica Leigh, and the exhibit's one installation is a menacing swarm of origami locusts made from sheets of U.S one dollar bills, by Swiss-South African artist Sipho Mabona.

Nancy Matsumoto is a New York City-based freelance writer who writes frequently on Japanese American issues and culture.

Posted by Nancy Matsumoto at 12:58 AM | Permalink

Dancers enjoy the music on Saturday at the Getty Center's "Saturdays Off the 405" concert series. Photograph by Iris Schneider.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 9:46 AM | Permalink

What? An opera sweepstakes going on in the city formerly known as opera-poor?

Well, try this: at Disney Hall a posse of arts-elite collaborators led by Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Philharmonic put on a new, fanciful, hyper-stylized production of "Don Giovanni," while across the street the LA Opera trotted out its old Herb Ross staging of "La Bohème," both houses doing bang-up box office at the same time.

Not bad at all.

But now we get to the interesting parts. Frank Gehry's deservedly famous Disney is a favorite tourist attraction. It was built, to acoustic perfection, as a concert hall, the one that would showcase the Philharmonic in all its splendor and provide the proper venue for sending out its glorious sound.

Aspirations do grow, though. And along the way Dudamel et al hatched the idea to "stage" opera: the Mozart-DaPonte trilogy in three successive seasons, for starters, beginning with "Don Giovanni." Nothing standard, of course, because the hull-shaped hall has no proscenium - it cannot accommodate the trappings of scenery, etc. Nor, importantly, is there an orchestra pit.

So they opted for a contemporary realization with creators who are adept at experimental ventures, director Christopher Alden chief among them. And there could hardly be a better choice -- we knew him from his revelatory work years ago at Long Beach Opera, a master at deconstructing a set piece like this, but not one to go in for the usual hijinks.

Even without Rodarte, whose sumptuous-to-sleek costumes are a Baroque eyeful in themselves, and even without Gehry's "installations," crumpled paper icebergs and giant cubes that provide platforms for the singers to cavort on and climb around, Alden brilliantly makes the case for the characters' inner drama - their floating urges, their undersea lusts. These nobles and peasants are no longer cardboard cutouts.

Now we know that Donna Anna openly acknowledges her guilty pleasure with the Don, why she kisses and caresses him while her fiancé - three's a crowd - stands breath-close to them. She's acting out what she feels and will not suppress, rather than just playing a wronged woman vengeful over her father's murder. And, earlier, after their night together, the Don slithers elegantly along a cube's side wall as Anna languishes on top of it, still in her erotic throes. So we actually see him as a louche lingerer. And Alden, defying the moralistic "crime does not pay" meme, even brings him back at the end -- triumphantly alive.

Over and over they all reveal themselves, in elongated episodes. When Zerlina sings "Batti, batti" to her bridegroom Masetto, she reverses her plea for punishment and beats him instead, frustrated with his non-assertive manner. And Leporello, while "cataloging" his master's many conquests, goes up on his toes and down on twisted knees, to show how hard a task it is to follow the philanderer. Everything Alden maps out telegraphs a value; there are no typical operatic stances here. And that's the beauty of this show.

But then there's the rest - beginning and ending with an irony: the world-class Philharmonic, with its inspired maestro, Dudamel, are consigned to the rear, out of good-hearing range, and nearly covered by the ersatz set. Not surprisingly, the sound has little presence. This, in a hall storied for its vibrant sound.

What's even worse, the singers and conductor have no chance at all for the electric connection, phrase by phrase, that sparks the best opera performances - the swoop and sweep of single-breath music-making that depends crucially on eye-to-eye proximity between stage and orchestra leader.

There's got to be a better way.

But the cast did not disappoint - even while we knew how many notches higher its performances would go under normal circumstances. The men were strikingly lean and virile in their space-suit whites, with hair fashionably slicked back. Mariusz Kwiecien, in the title role, epitomized those features, sometimes brutally, and sang with dark luster to match the persona of history's most obsessive womanizer.

So did the others come through. Kevin Burdette's basso power served up Leporello as both a cowering servant and willing conspirator. Tenor Pavol Breslik, as the good guy Ottavio, did take too many liberties in "Dalla sua pace" (and nearly came to grief, as a result), but recovered in "Il mio tesoro," while Ryan Kuster's Masetto was a tad complacent as cuckolds go.

The women looked delectable in their costumes - all ruffled, be-feathered whimsy. But Carmela Remigio's soprano was not quite up to Donna Anna's outpourings - Aga Mikolaj clearly had the edge here, not to mention the coloratura chops, as Elvira. So did Anna Prohaska excel -- injecting a pert, even defiantly off-center portrayal of Zerlina underlined by her radiant voice.

What we're left wondering is whether the LA Phil has, perhaps inadvertently, set up a strange rivalry with its neighbor the LA Opera - given future plans that indicate more of the same. At any rate, the traffic does get heavier, the more the merrier and all that. Come September, watch for a proscenium-style "Don Giovanni" across the street, bearing the exalted directorial name of Peter Stein. But don't count on that hand to be much in evidence . A relative rookie will direct traffic.

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 1:10 AM | Permalink

Baseball: The All-American Game, an exhibition of pieces owned by Los Angeles memorabilia collector Gary Cypres, opens Sunday at the Craft and Folk Art Museum on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile district. The exhibit "explores the influence of baseball on American folk art made between the late-1800s to present day. For the first time in Los Angeles, the public will have access to the largest exhibition of baseball-related traditional folk art since the American Folk Art Museum's historic "Perfect Game: America Looks at Baseball: in 2003, says CAFAM.

There's a public opening reception at the museum tonight from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

The photo above shows an arcade display of a batter and catcher with moving arms, produced by Strike-em out Baseball Co. in Boston about 1929.

LA Observed photo: Judy Graeme

Posted by LA Observed at 3:16 PM | Permalink

Now we call him Sir Simon. But back in the day — before his curly top turned white — Simon Rattle was an enormously gifted principal guest conductor of the LA Philharmonic.

He'd joined forces with Carlo Maria Giulini. Remember him? The old-world maestro who led our resident band on excursions of poetic transport? Who looked every part the willowy patrician and got the orchestra to play like heaven's tribunes?

Of course you do.

Okay, that was an earlier golden era — well before this one headed by the spirited, infectious Gustavo Dudamel, who belies its administration's corporate style.

We cannot forget any of those from the '80s -- not Rattle, the young Liverpudlian, nor native Angeleno Michael Tilson Thomas, co-principal guest conductor. Together they stood next to Giulini, breathing in his aura, forever to be held to the Italian podium meister's standards.

So here's what happened in the wake of the Sainted One's 1984 departure from this country.

LA Phil director Ernest Fleischmann passed over MTT for the chief post, allegedly because the candidate had a same-sex partner and in those pre-historic times of full-bloom homophobia, such preferences were a no-no.

And Sir Simon — now ennobled by the Brits — reportedly turned down the offer, preferring to be back across the pond with his orchestra in Birmingham. Finally, he was tapped by the Berlin Philharmonic to head that Rolls Royce of orchestras, where perfection does not go wanting.

In 2003 he and the Berliners joined Disney Hall's glitzy inaugural revelries — with an unforgettable sonic blast that still reverberates. And now, at last, the beloved Brit returned to his old chums here who still remain in the LA Phil and the newer hires.

In a word their concert together was fabulous. Rattle gave us modernist Ligeti's long-lined floating essences, "Atmosphères," devolving into Wagner's similarly long-lined "Lohengrin" (first act prelude) - both works cosmic to the core. An inspired stroke to present them as a unit.

The solo spot fell to his wife, the dazzling Czech mezzo and European star Magdalena Kozená, for Mahler's "Rückert Lieder." And while we could hear her voice in the drifts of velvet gorgeousness that wended their way to our side seats at Disney (hardly an ideal location), her sense of the poems — wistful, innocent, profound — was always evident, as was Rattle's and the players' collaboration in same.

Next came Bruckner's massive 9th Symphony, which he conducted from memory. There were extraordinary stop-on-a-dime moments that dropped from big striding basses to sudden, suspended quiet and delicate playing. What treachery lurks in this work, as performance goes, and what a physical workout for any ensemble.

What's more, we could see/hear in his ministrations where much of Dudamel's influences came from. For instance, Rattle sometimes stands stock still, in a groove with the players as they go at it, conducting with his eyebrows! And there's the trick of passing his baton from hand to hand as needed, as though a it's a mere extension. He even joins his musicians at curtain calls, shoulder to shoulder with them on the stage floor, not on the podium.

Another hero in our midst, Mona Golabek, has taken her talents to the Geffen stage in "The Pianist of Willesden Lane" (through June 24) as actor/musician (have you heard her reading Chopin's letters to George Sand on air, courtesy of K-Mozart, 1260 AM?) So powerfully moving is Golabek's chronicle of her mother, Holocaust orphan Lisa Jura — an aspiring pianist who boarded Vienna's Kindertransport to London at age 12, never to see her parents again — that the one-woman bio-show is an epic not to miss. Hershey Felder, the creator of this genre, helped bring the memoir to script form.

So much for performing artists. And now a little something about a woman who presents them, Dale Franzen. The former opera singer surely qualifies as LA's leading impresaria — she even undertook the project of building a concert hall, Santa Monica's Broad Stage, bankrolled by, of course...

Franzen's last event of the season there was the recital of big-time tenor Piotr Beczala. The Polish singer, seen recently in a Met simulcast of "Manon," with Anna Netrebko, drew a sellout crowd of voice fanciers to the Broad. But although he boasts a stellar, ringing voice, Beczala hasn't adjusted down to the scale of an intimate 500-seat theater that is already resonant to the nth degree. Nor did he bother much with the recital mode: nuanced singing, subtlety of characterization, word pointing. And because he used the same big projection technique needed for a 4,000-seat house, some of us — and I'm not exaggerating — required ear-stuffers.

Rattle photo courtesy of LA Phil; Mona Golabek by Michael Lamont.

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 11:34 PM | Permalink

Exhibition extended, see below

Carol Wells loves learning. As a researcher and UCLA graduate, she has spent most of her life learning about history through the art of politics. Political posters to be precise. And since she first began collecting, on a trip to Nicaragua in 1981 in the middle of the Sandinista revolution, she has amassed an impressive collection of posters that chronicle labor, and political movements filtered through the prism of art and activism.

After a few years, she had to move her collection out from under her bed and the Center for the Study of Political Graphics was born. Nestled among bakeries and design boutiques along the tony stretch of Third Street between Fairfax and La Cienega, in a building dedicated to peace and justice and shared — through the beneficence of a sympathetic landlord — with other like-minded organizations, the center occupies several rooms filled with flat files and vertical shelving brimming with art that is a call to action. Over the years, through persistence, dedication and some luck, Wells has amassed an impressive collection of 80,000 posters. "There are ten dissertations here, waiting to happen," she says. What started simply as an appreciation has become a calling that has helped Wells do what she most loves to do: teach.

"Posters are a very efficient and powerful way of teaching history that you don't learn in school." She talks about children of color seeing people who look like them portrayed as heroes, something that can be in short supply in school textbooks and on television. She worries that kids aren't reading anymore and much of history will be lost to them.
On her school visits, she will sometimes show the iconic and powerful image familiar to anyone who lived through the 60's, the victims of the My Lai massacre, lifeless bodies of women and children strewn on the road. "Children will ask me how they put those babies into the photograph," she said. "Teachers are getting younger and younger and didn't experience these events firsthand. Digital manipulation means that we can no longer believe what we see, and that terrifies me."

Her knowledge of the backstory of events depicted in these posters has enabled her to connect the dots of events worldwide, showing how they have reverberated through history. She pulls out a folder of Cuban art done by an artists collective called OSPAAAL ( Organization in Solidarity with the People of Asia and Latin America), protesting the Vietnam War. She credits the Cubans with the revitalization of postermaking in the late 60's, many of which were folded and and inserted into magazines of the day. They document solidarity with the people of Vietnam, Latin America and Africa. Another group of posters was done by a Mexican art collective, Taller de Grafica Popular (Popular Graphic Arts Workshop), started in the 1930's and joined by some blacklisted American artists who left the U.S. to escape political persecution.

Wearing white gloves to protect the sometimes disintegrating paper works, Wells pulls out a group of posters printed by Peace Press, an organization of artists protesting the Vietnam War. "Peace Press was founded by artists who could not get their work printed by mainstream printers. Unions at the time were very conservative and supported the war. So the artists did it themselves." The posters were printed on anything they could get their hands on, some silkscreened onto castoff computer printouts with mundane office business printed on the back, having been culled from the floor or trashbins next to the printers.

CSPG is reclaiming the power of art to educate and inspire people to action. "If it doesn't make you angry or make you laugh, we haven't done a good job,"
Wells says. "And you learn that one person can make a difference." She herself still walks the talk. She remembers the first demonstration she participated in, an anti-war rally at Century City in 1967 that changed her life. "Lyndon Johnson was doing a fundraiser and mid-rally our demonstration permit was rescinded by the LAPD," she says. It was the largest anti-war rally ever up to that time in Los Angeles and she remembers motorcycle officers riding into the crowd with their batons swinging. "That rally changed me from a naïve liberal into an activist."

She and her husband Ted had their first date at an anti-war demonstration and she still believes in marching in solidarity for causes she supports.

In its efforts to encourage education, the center also organizes forums for discussion and debate. This past November it co-hosted a conversation between Angela Davis and Reverend James Lawson at Temple Emanuel. On Saturday an event at the West Hollywood Library discussed how art and activism relate in Ray Bradbury's work "Fahrenheit 451."

There is still time to see CSPG's current exhibit. "Decade of Dissent: Democracy in Action 1965-1975," at the newly redesigned West Hollywood branch of the Los Angeles County library, ends April 28 [extended to May 7.] It is a collection of posters printed around the turmoil of the 60's: the American involvement in Vietnam, the Free Speech Movement on college campuses nationwide, the injustices that sparked the Civil Rights movement, the fight for equality by women and minorities. As Wells wrote in the exhibit notes, and firmly believes: "Dissent is patriotic." The posters on display prove the point powerfully, passionately and eloquently.

While on the topic of dissent, the organizers of an exhibit right across the street, at MOCA at the Pacific Design Center, argue that Rudi Gernreich, he of the one piece topless bathing suit that shocked the world in the 60's, was not crafting a design but rather making a statement on women and their right to freedom. An interesting addition to an afternoon studying dissent would include a visit to the exhibit currently on display there through May 20. Through costumes, film and still images by the brilliant photographer William Claxton in conjunction with his wife, and Gernreich muse Peggy Moffitt, the exuberance of the 60's are celebrated. Well worth a visit.

Bottom photo: Peggy Moffitt models a Rudi Gernreich design, photographed in 1968 by her husband William Claxton.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 12:24 PM | Permalink

Searching the vinyl bins for bargains at Amoeba Music Hollywood on Record Store Day.

Music fans began lining up before dawn on Saturday. The line stretched down Ivar Avenue in Hollywood.

Early arrivals had plenty of room to spread out and look for today's new releases.

LA Observed photos by Sean Roderick

Posted by Editor at 8:39 PM | Permalink

Yes, it's Misha. There's no mistaking him: the ever-chic haircut, the stern expression peering out from a face that now has added lines and deep crevices, the allure of an icon.

And 18 years past the prime of his career - we're talking about the one-time heartthrob who could toss off balletic pyrotechnics with laughing ease, defy gravity, devour space and dazzle us with the purity and power of his dancing -- he's basking in a new vehicle, once more at the hospitable Broad Stage.

It's called "In Paris." And the producers identify it as a play. But don't be fooled. Just remember that Mikhail Baryshnikov is a moth to the flame, a performing artist to the stage. Whether he finds heat burning bright, or a dim though artful hangout for his persona, is iffy.

You can't blame him for not habitually trying: he did speaking parts in Hollywood feature films, Kafka-esque experiments on Broadway, TV guest-star episodes, and pseudo-modern-dance forays that gave him no more than the movement equivalent of butlers' lines -- with the spotlight shining all the while.

The single stellar event we've seen since the end of those high-flying days came on his visit three years ago to this same Santa Monica venue. Actually, it was a marvel. Why? Because he put himself in the hands of choreographers who knew how to bring out the best of Baryshnikov - to find the vital dancing actor that is his core, the artist who can extract a deeply human element in characterizations of elegant, ironic humor or burning ardor.

Those three dance-makers -- Mats Eks, Alexei Ratmansky and Benjamin Millepied - got it. And so Misha, the master mime magician, re-materialized as the snazzy Jimmy Cagney vaudevillian, and as the proper Chaplin-esque suitor, and as the ardent Siegfried of romantic fatalism. All of it allowing the unregenerate star, no longer so springy or well-oiled, not to be over-taxed.

This time, though, he put himself in less knowing -- albeit illustrious and theatrically elite -- hands: Moscow's Dmitry Krymov Laboratory. And again we saw Baryshnikov reaching for High Art Experimentalism. But this time, with his fellow Russians as production collaborators, he became just one more object amid a stage of poster cutouts that went in search of a play.

Oh, it was artful, this 80-minute rollout. And distant. And remote. At no time did director Krymov, who adapted Nobel-winner Ivan Bunin's short story about two White Russian fugitives thrust together while living lonely lives in Paris, let up on his compositionally perfect and ever-changing stage pictures - what with English translations of the French and Russian texts crawling up a black screen in huge letters that became part of those pictures; and the black-and-white '30s aura of Baryshnikov in a general's long coat; the cardboard poster look throughout, grouped singers taking up the slack; and at several points a mezzo wailing Mozart and Bizet arias designed to sound as though sung underwater.

There were stagecraft visuals to mildly engage us. But, apart from the momentary fun of listening to him recite the texts in low-voiced French and then in stilted Russian, there was little for the show's star to do that was worthy of him.

What? That old vaudeville shtick of hanging a coat and hat on a wall hook only to have them fall off just as he walks away? (then repeat.) Or the ultimate tedium of watching him apply shaving cream, then comtemplate the razor's edge? Or of unbuttoning a shirt, taking it off, then putting it back on and re-buttoning it? (Total: 10 long minutes.) Do we spy the emperor's new clothes? Or what about the finale's 15-second matador sequence, where he whips a red cape around? Does it seem like an ad-copy reminder that, yes, Misha was a dancer?

We must hope the quest is not over.

Now that I've read April Dammann's book, The Exhibitionist: Earl Stendahl, Art Dealer as Impresario, I'm discovering more and more that art dealer Earl Stendahl still influences our city's artistic evolution.

There's a Stendahl connection to LACMA's exhibition "Children of the Plumed Serpent: the Legacy of Quetzalcoatl in Ancient Mexico," which opened April 1st. Stendahl, the first U.S. dealer in Pre-Columbian art has a piece in the show, a large capstone from Teotihuacan, Mexico, which the late Dr. Virginia (Ginny) Fields acquired for the museum before her untimely passing. In addition, Stendahl Galleries loaned Earl Stendahl's letters from Diego Rivera, promoting Emmy Lou Packard, a young American artist who worked with Diego and Frida Kahlo in Mexico, to the current LACMA show "In Wonderland: The Surrealist Adventures of Women Artists in Mexico and the United States." Earl Stendahl became Packard's dealer and sold her work at rates equal to his male artists at a time when many dealers did not.

Upcoming are two rare occasions to tour Earl Stendahl's home/gallery in Hollywood. Author April Dammann will be discussing her book and Earl Stendahl's work at an open house with the Los Angeles Visionaries Association on Sunday, April 22nd at 1 PM. Make your reservations here.

Stendahl Galleries will host a new show that is only open for one weekend. From Friday, April 27 through Sunday, April 29, the work of Maynard Hale Lyndon will be on view in an exhibit called "Looking Boxes: Playful Ways of Seeing the World." "Meet the Artist" receptions are planned for Friday, April 27, 6 - 9 pm and Sat, April 28, 4 - 7 pm. RSVP. Contact stendahlart@aol.com for details and reservations.

Be sure to check out the Pre-Columbian art in the garden as pictured in this post. If you like what you see, here's the book's video.

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 3:52 PM | Permalink

Walking through the J. Paul Getty Museum's new exhibition, Herb Ritts: L.A. Style, I kept thinking back 20 years to when I wrote a profile of Ritts for the Los Angeles Times. I was writing about the photography market for the paper, and there were few bigger players locally than Ritts.

Djimon with octopus, Hollywood. 1989. © Herb Ritts Foundation

Familiar photos of such people as Madonna and Richard Gere are among the show's highlights, but the beautifully printed photographs feature unfamiliar as well as familiar figures, celebrities as well as people made celebrities by Ritts' photos. Perhaps more important, the exhibition demonstrates a very creative mind at work, maximizing his models, light and settings.

Not that I was surprised. The day of our visit, Ritts eagerly gathered up his magazine layouts and books, proudly turning pages for me to see one photograph after another. As he did so, I sensed that the tentative smile and ingenuousness charming me must surely have gone a long way in similarly charming his photography subjects. This show proves me right with its oiled bodies, strangely turned limbs, unexpected celebrity poses and even a model crowned by a dead octopus.

Ritts' Hollywood Hills home was a showplace for photography, including print after print by photographers he admired. I recall he'd built ledges along the walls for photographs, rather than framing them, so he could move them around. The day I was there, his library's prime spot was held by one of Berenice Abbott's glorious photos of New York at night, and around the house were recognizable masterpieces by other legendary photographers.

He considered himself a photography collector, he told me, and on display were great photos by Man Ray and Edward Weston, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Paul Outerbridge. He said he had just purchased others by Joel Peter Witkin and Robert Mapplethorpe, and when we later discussed the photo market, we talked as much about his buying more of their work as about others buying his work.

The Getty's companion show, "Portraits of Renown: Photography and the Cult of Celebrity," places Ritts' work adjacent to walls of iconic photographs by everyone from Nadar and Edward Steichen to Diane Arbus and Andy Warhol. Ritts died in 2002, but remembering the way he spoke of his photographic influences--including Weston for his simplicity, Helmut Newton for his risk-taking, and Irving Penn for nearly everything else--I imagine the juxtaposition would have made him a happy man indeed.

Stephanie Seymour, Cindy Crawford, Christy Turlington, Tatjana Patitz and Naomi Cambell pose for Herb Ritts in Hollywood in 1989. © Herb Ritts Foundation

Tatjana, veiled head, Joshua Tree 1988. © Herb Ritts Foundation

"Herb Ritts: L.A. Style" is at the Getty Center through August 26.

Barbara Isenberg is a Los Angeles-based arts writer. Her most recent book is the Los Angeles Times bestseller "Conversations with Frank Gehry."

Previously on LA Observed:
Getty acquires 69 Herb Ritts photographs
The Getty's gardens to close for three months
Getty Research Institute acquires two Man Ray archives

Posted by Barbara Isenberg at 4:42 PM | Permalink

Something rare is afoot in Los Angeles. To put it simply, "Swan Lake." Yes, that icon of classical exactitude and style is popping up on stages all over. And the producer turns out to be not some long-standing, well-endowed enterprise on tour here, but the LA Ballet, which is a mere six years old.

Why? Why would brand-name husband/wife directors Thordal Christensen and Colleen Neary be confident enough to mount this behemoth of a ballet? This vast spectacle designed for the likes of kingly companies with multi-millions -- the Bolshoi, American Ballet Theatre, Royal Covent Garden, Royal Danish?

Answer: They have the chops now, that is, the dancers, together with their deep, artistic savvy. And they know it.

All I did was tip-toe into Royce Hall - the first stop in a city-wide tour of major Southland venues that continues through March 31 - only to discover a production of the Petipa-Ivanov-Tchaikovsky ballet that approximated world-class standards.

The capstone of all this cheering came in the second act - you know, the famed lakeside scene, that moonlit mirage with the snowy white swan corps floating about and Prince Siegfried sensing the imminent appearance of his fateful inamorata Odette, aka the Swan Queen, turned from maiden into an avian creature by an evil sorcerer.

And when she alit onstage, in the person of Allynne Noelle, the effect was dazzling -- as that first sighting was meant to be. Tall, with perfect proportions and gorgeously tapering long limbs, this Swan Queen had both bird-like spark and human pathos, her hand articulation spelling out regal elegance. She danced with alacrity and definition and fluid musicality. It was as though she'd been in training at Vaganova since adolescence - not a girl from Huntington Beach - although she'd done stints at redoubtable dance oases (National Ballet of Canada, Villella's Miami City Ballet and not least, Vicky Koenig's Inland Pacific Ballet).

So...with Noelle and a host of others now just in their second season with LAB, Christensen and Neary knew this was their moment. In fact, the bench is deep enough to alternate the lead role, as well as others.

But that's not all. These high-pedigree directors (he a Royal Dane, she a Balanchine Trustee), who have both formerly danced the "Swan Lake" lead roles for years, boast wide contacts for bringing resources to the company -- the dancers, for instance -- and this production, originally designed for Pacific Northwest Ballet.

Besides Noelle, who joined LAB only 18 months ago, is Alyssa Bross, the alternate lead. I glimpsed her rehearsing Odile (the Black Swan), and saw richly expressive qualities - she used every enticement to undermine the Prince's oath to Odette and was a dewy seductress, not the hard, haughty type who would laugh at her easy conquest. And when she danced Odette, it was with aching vulnerability - which belies her photograph on the program book cover, a misleadingly placid look.

No wonder Christensen went forward with "Swan Lake." He knew he'd recruited the talent - many had trained at prestigious schools and had danced with top companies. As Noelle's and Bross's partners, both Kenta Shimizu and Christopher Revels acquitted themselves nobly, if not exactly at the danseur level. Guest artist Akimitsu Yahata did his thrilling bravura stuff as the Jester.

But down to the last coryphée, the coaching was scrupulous. Everyone had clear focus and a sense of unanimity, even the mimed gestures were natural. What's more, the muted, old-world sets and costumes looked lovely on the Royce Hall stage, as if made for it.

Considering that taped music allows for no moment-to-moment variation, the company coped well.

Photos above: Reed Hutchinson

Previously on LA Observed:

Photo slide show: Inside the Los Angeles Ballet studio on the Westside, meeting the dancers and seeing them rehearse.

LA Observed photo of dancers Katie Tomer and Drew Grant: Judy Graeme

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 9:25 PM | Permalink

How is it that until about a week ago I'd never heard of the photographer Francesca Woodman? She has been hovering about in my universe for years, but I'm embarrassed that I completely missed her. It took a look through LACMA's newly opened In Wonderland: Surrealist Adventures of Women Artists to be enlightened. Fate intervened and our paths finally crossed.

Woodman is one of the nearly 50 artists included in this "first exhibition devoted to the female surrealist artists who worked in Mexico and the U.S," as the press materials read. Born in 1958, she is the youngest and one of the lesser known artists in the show that includes superstars of the movement Frida Kahlo, Louise Bourgeois and Louise Nevelson.

Woodman's black and white images, made primarily with a square format camera and printed small, demand that the viewer come in close. Reading the wall label next to the first photograph, "Self Portrait talking to Vince" (top photo here), told me that her life was shockingly brief (1958-1981) and that she photographed in Providence, R.I. My first thought was that perhaps she had been a student at the Rhode Island School of Design, where I graduated. Later in the day a Google search confirmed it. Woodman was a photography student at RISD from 1975 to 1978, around the time I was there, and in the same department, although she was 2 years behind me. It's entirely possible that we may have passed in the hallway or on the street. Other images in the LACMA show were made in Rome where Woodman spent her junior year as part of RISD's European Honors Program.

Like the mystery of her abbreviated life, Woodman's images are haunting and provocative. The level of her work is highly sophisticated for someone so young and still in school. Woodman often photographed herself, sometimes nude, sometimes clothed. She used props, blurring, and dilapidated interiors (not hard to find in Providence.) She experimented with cut paper, reflections and alternative processes. She used her sexuality, her relationships and her environment to develop themes in her work. The disturbing spookiness in some of them hit me hard. Sadly, an ominous feeling about her proved true. I learned that Woodman committed suicide in 1981 at the age of 22, not long after graduation and a move to New York City.


In the 2010 documentary The Woodmans, a revealing and sometimes unsettling look at the photographer's family that I watched after seeing the show at LACMA, her close RISD friend Sloan Rankin acknowledges that Woodman was far more artistically evolved than the other students. But also chronically needy. "She was a fragile person. It caused her to make beautiful pictures," Rankin says. As I watched the film, clues about her emotionally complex life emerged. Maybe also clues into her imagemaking. I felt little sympathy for her parents, both accomplished artists in their own right. They are clearly still wrestling with not only their daughter's suicide, but with the fact that her artistic success has far eclipsed their own. "As Francesca has become more and more famous, we've become the famous artists family," her mother Betty says in one scene.

While Woodman is part of a large group at LACMA, she is currently the star of her own show up north at SFMOMA. Francesca Woodman is the most comprehensive exhibition of her work ever mounted. Her RISD work is well represented, as well as her experiments with the diazotype process (think architects' blueprints) and her fashion photographs. The show fully explores Woodman's body of work, which impressed me as hugely accomplished for someone barely entering adulthood. She had hoped to pursue fashion photography in New York, but struggled with finding opportunities.

Even a drop of the attention her work is now receiving might have been a huge gift to Woodman following her graduation from RISD. She battled to survive professionally in New York, and according to her father was "discouraged and demoralized in her personal life." There was intense therapy, medication and a failed first attempt at suicide. Making photographs became a rarer and rarer occurrence.

Then again, perhaps no amount of validation or success would have been enough to save the life of a young woman so deeply in pain. Her apparently overwhelming inner demons broke her spirit before she could find a way to harness them. Surely trouble was brewing long before she arrived in Providence. However, her images have survived and taken on a brilliant life of their own. Although I'm late to the game, I'm glad that at last I've found them.

Trailer from the documentary on Woodman's life:

"In Wonderland: Surrealist Adventures of Women Artists" runs at LACMA's Resnick Pavilion through May 6.

"Francesca Woodman" runs at SF MOMA though Feb. 20 and will travel to the Guggenheim Museum in New York in spring 2012.

Photographs by Francesca Woodman courtesy of the Marian Goodman Gallery, New York

Posted by Judy Graeme at 5:06 PM | Permalink

Wim Wenders photos by Iris Schneider

When avant-garde choreographer Pina Bausch died suddenly in 2009, filmmaker Wim Wenders not only mourned his close friend. He felt he could no longer make the film they would have begun shooting two days later. His hope of finally bringing her emotional and ground-breaking work to a larger audience ended abruptly after almost twenty years of collaboration.

"My interest was to see and film Pina's eyes at work. We cancelled the film and pulled the plug," he said. "Only when the dancers made me understand a month or two months later that we could make a different film, not of Pina but for Pina, did I think I could do it."

What Wenders and the Pina Bausch company have created with their documentary, "Pina," which opens in Los Angeles January 13, is an elegy, a meditation, an emotional roller coaster ride through life and all its emotions depicted almost soundlessly through movement.

Recently, Wenders sat down for interviews to talk about the experience of making his latest film. Dressed in a natty but rumpled three-piece suit, and in a blue mood with royal blue glasses framing his eyes, a blue shirt and a blue wristwatch on his arm, Wenders talked passionately about the challenges of making this film. He had pondered for years just how to capture and communicate the power, emotion and simplicity that characterized Bausch's work.

Finally, in 2008, he started playing with 3D technology. "I was convinced that 3D was the perfect language for dance, the answer to 20 years of hesitation, and stalling and ruining my brain wondering how to make an appropriate film of Pina's work. Dance and 3D could bring out the best in each other...But this was before 'Avatar,' and 3D was really in its infancy."

There were many physical challenges working with unwieldy cameras unable to capture the fluidity and elegance of Bausch's movements. "My assistant became a four-armed Indian goddess" trying to move and shoot in 3-D with the bulky cameras available at the time. Wenders also sensed a huge opportunity and he dove in, modifying the cameras and adapting them as he went along. In the end, Wenders was able to stand back and allow the dancers to pay their very personal tribute to Bausch, in the visual language that Bausch taught them to use. "In the best possible sense of the word," he said, "technology was at the service of these emotions."

"I cried my heart out the first time I saw a piece by Pina, not really knowing what hit me," Wenders explained. "Her dance is so physical, it involved the bodies of her dancers so much...Pina's work was not just an aesthetic experience, it is an existential experience. It is about life. She said it best herself. 'I am not interested in how my dancers move, I'm interested in what moves them.'"

The film was shot in and around Wupperthal, Germany, where the company is based. "Wupperthal has an incredibly rich history, industrial landscapes, a richness of possibilities. It was great to be outdoors in the sunlight, have the horizon, the hanging train, the city and industrial landscape," Wenders said. Indeed, seeing the dancers move along mountaintops, on streetcorners, with railways speeding above them or onstage in the pouring rain is shocking, and exhilarating, and gives the film a very unique visual framework. Wenders, who has been a photographer since his teens, used his sharp eye to great advantage.

Moving on without Pina by his side was difficult. "I had to face the question every day: What would Pina think? She was looking over my shoulder with each and every shot. Does Pina like it? Is this good enough? She was very present, for the dancers and myself. Her spirit is there and amazing...Only when I edited the film and first showed it to the dancers and they felt that Pina's universe was well-preserved in the film did I feel that Pina would approve."

Working with Pina's troupe was also a very different directing experience for Wenders, whose films include "Wings of Desire," "The State of Things," "Paris, Texas," and "The Buena Vista Social Club."

"She had assembled a strange utopian humanity around her," he said. "So different than the typical directing experience, where you work with actors for a few months. Pina's relationship with her dancers went on for decades...

"I don't know how I will continue working with actors after this experience. Over the course of one year I did not have one complaint, not one single scene of jealousy. None of that stuff you are used to on every movie crew. I was privileged to work with them."

And ultimately, Wenders was satisfied by the technological accomplishment of "Pina."
"The challenge was big, working with such a new language. We tried to imitate what two eyes are doing, and what the brain does with what two eyes do. To really be in awe of what our two eyes do every day," he said.

He must have done something right. After a brief opening to qualify for Oscar consideration, "Pina" is currently on the shortlist for an Oscar nomination in the documentary category.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 9:40 PM | Permalink

Chris Burden's Metropolis II installation opens to the public on Saturday. It was previewed for the media yesterday. Read more

Photos: Judy Graeme

Posted by Judy Graeme at 9:27 AM | Permalink

Weegee's plastic lens turned on Elizabeth Taylor circa 1950..

Here's a riddle from the art world: Who was part huckster, part experimental trailblazer and part social commentator, lampooning society's adoration of celebrity, but longing to be one at the same time? Warhol, you say? No, turns out it's Weegee, the cigar chomping photographer — aka Arthur Fellig — who fled New York in 1946, where he made his reputation as a chronicler of the night, of crime scenes and the spectators who gathered to watch, to turn his sights on Hollywood.

Claiming he was "through with the newspaper game," after selling the title of his book of New York photographs called "The Naked City" to a producer who turned it into a movie, he was drawn to Hollywood. But, as the sweeping show currently up at MOCA proves, Weegee was a lot more complicated than we thought.

Continue reading "Weegee's Hollywood" »

Posted by Iris Schneider at 10:43 PM | Permalink

Thursday, November 17, 2011

• Los Angeles Press Club honors Hugh Hefner at its Fourth Annual National Entertainment Journalism Awards dinner at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel
• Victoria Patterson speaks at Gustavo's [ Arellano] Awesome Lecture Series at Fullerton Library about her new novel, This Vacant Paradise. 6:30 PM
• Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra hosts "Austria a la Carte" at the Austrian Consul's residence in Brentwood.
• Author Richard Polsky converses with Shepard Fairey about Polsky's book, The Art Prophets: The Artists, Dealers, and Tastemakers Who Shook the Art World, at Book Soup. 7 PM

• The Spa Less Traveled: Discovering Ethnic Los Angeles, One Spa At a Time editors read their book at Vroman's. Oh, and happy 5th birthday to Prospect Park Media. 7 PM
• Pasadena Children's Guild hosts its 44th Annual Snow Ball Preview Party and Auction at the Castle Green in Pasadena. 6:00 PM. Event continues with a brunch and holiday boutique at the same location on Saturday.
• Filmmaker Wim Wenders discusses and signs Places, Strange and Quiet at Book Soup at 4 PM.
• Randall Robinson discusses his novel, Makeda, at Eso Won Books at 7 PM.
• Soil Desire People Dance performance starts at The Velaslavasay Panorama. Continues to Saturday. 8 PM

Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- November 17, 2011" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 7:26 AM | Permalink

Friday, November 4, 2011

• Dick Howard and Martín Plot discuss "Democracy in America" as part of the new West Hollywood Lecture Series curated in partnership with CalArts at the West Hollywood Library, City Council Chambers, starts at 7 PM
• "Antiquity in the Twentieth Century: Modern Art and the Classical Vision" symposium starts at the Getty Villa and continues to Saturday. 10:30-5 PM
• Los Angeles Transportation Club hosts its 88th Annual Installation Dinner at the Hyatt Regency Long Beach.
• Lupus LA hosts its Ninth Annual Hollywood Bag Ladies Luncheon at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel.
• La Luz de Jesus Gallery 25th Anniversary Celebration Part 11 with Mark Mothersbaugh, Mark Ryden, and many, many others. 8 PM
• Designer Alber Elbaz visits Lavin Store in Beverly Hills tonight.
• Night & the City: LA Noir in Poetry, Fiction, & Film events at Beyond Baroque: Raymond Chandler and his Los Angeles Legacy at 7:30 PM and A Night with James Ellroy, live and in person, at 9:30 PM. Venice

• SNL's Molly Shannon signs new book, Tilly the Trickster, at Barnes & Noble at the Grove. 1 PM
• Los Angeles Police Foundation hosts its True Blue Gala at L.A. Live.
• American Indian Arts Market at Autry National Center 10 AM -5 PM.
• Friends of the Los Angeles River benefit hosted by the LA Weekly at its LA 101 Music Festival at the Gibson Ampitheatre, Universal City.
• Leslie Klinger discusses Before Dracula: History of Vampire Literature at Brentwood Branch Library. 2PM
• Los Angeles County Museum of Art honors John Baldessari and Clint Eastwood at its inaugural Art and Film Gala.
• Seth Rogen, Adam Arkin and others host Exceptional Children's Foundation's Fourth Annual Art Sale Fundraiser at Downtown Art Center Gallery. Los Angeles. 6 PM

Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- November 4, 2011" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 2:31 PM | Permalink

Come Fly Away

Yes, the physical distance between Northridge and Hollywood and Vine might seem daunting. But an adventurer needn't miss either Twyla Tharp's extravaganza "Come Fly Away," her latest ode to Frank Sinatra, or the new Valley Performing Arts Center's headliner, Valery Gergiev with his Mariinsky Orchestra, those venerable Russians.

Both, you see, are storied artists. And what's a few scrappy miles down the freeway for the hardiest among us? Right now it's possible to catch the ultimate Sinatra-phile's show at the Pantages. It was only a few blocks from there, actually, that dance fans feasted on the choreographer's "Nine Sinatra Songs," back in 1982.

Remember? We left swooning over "Strangers in the Night," which Tharp's lead dancer Gary Chryst let us see as the sleek tango rhythm that underpins ol' blue eyes balladeering. No less were the other songs/dances in this black velvet dazzler, the women in Oscar de la Renta's swirly chiffon dresses, the men in black tie.

But don't start thinking Fred and Ginger - because, in contrast to them, Tharp came up with wonderfully inventive subtexts for each song, often cued to night-time mischief or silly weariness or lush nostalgia, with touches of sly humor when least expected.

Both in "Come Fly Away" and in "Nine Sinatra Songs" Tharp gives us "That's Life" as a low-down, treat 'em rough, deadpan farce. And in the closing number, "My Way," she's back to dreamy idealization. But no matter what the song in her earlier work it became potent stuff, tapping images in the collective pop unconscious.

There ends the similarity between Tharp 1982 and Tharp 2011. Sorry to say, the road gets rougher here. From the upside-down splits for women -- aka crotch dancing that's featured in at least 15 lifts -- to the sleazy-schlock costumes, to the glaring back-lit tinsel set imitating a chintzy exurban roadhouse club, "Come Fly Away" has transformed the original into a coarse spectacle.

Still, it's Sinatra - boasting some newly-discovered tapes from his voice-troubled years (sung slightly off-pitch) - and it's Tharp. So the show's credits outweigh its debits.

It was credits also that piled up at Valley Performing Arts Center, when Cal State Northridge's new $17 milliion edifice hosted Gergiev/Mariinsky. First came the shock of this ensemble's crystal-clear sound in Stravinsky's "Firebird" Suite: each section and each instrument within it emerged as a separate entity that massed into a gleaming, smooth, and rich avalanche. Then, together with long-time Russian compatriot Alexandre Toradze, they dug deep for an earthy, inward, dark but still explosive Prokofiev 3rd Piano Concerto, unlike the purely lyric/percussive piece we usually hear.

Valery Gerviev by Valentin Baranovsky

Shostakovich's 1st Symphony, written when the composer that Stalin hated was a teen, completed the bill. A pity there was no Tchaikovsky, but Gergiev had fully exhausted that realm on his previous nights in Orange County.

Not to be outdone by these Russian riches, though, was Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra at UCLA's Royce Hall - in a concert that featured Britten's ravishing "Les Illuminations." So, yes, the world of poetry - Rimbaud's, for instance, which the British composer set so powerfully to music here - can pierce the thickest skin. And thanks to conductor/director Jeffrey Kahane and Co. who delivered this song cycle's shimmering vivaciousness we're left to wonder why it is rarely performed.

Maybe because the evening's protagonist, soprano Katrina Gauvin, is also a rarity. She took us through the texts - an outsider's observations of life as "a savage parade" - by getting inside the physical nature of the words with her whole being, her whole demeanor. And she painted those words in a myriad of colors, with a voice ranging from its pure, delicately disembodied high notes to broad, dramatic ones. A standout event.

For different reasons, we can remember Gustavo Dudamel's last concert with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for a few months. Why, exactly? Well, because I can't recall a program that opened with so sparse a composition and ended with one so ferociously packed.

Start with sparse: That would be Kurtág's "Grabstein für Stephan," consisting of a few musicians scattered around stations within Disney Hall, each emitting a single note or two, then another, and another. The whole 10-minute thing could stand as a parody of new music, or so this non-elite perceived it.

End with enormous: That would be Strauss's "Also sprach Zarathustra," the pan-Galactic piece, now an icon, because its opening bars are used in Kubric's classic "2001: A Space Odyssey." Well, folks, you can imagine the mighty Philharmonic spilling over the stage (as augmented orchestras do) and making splendid Straussian noise in the manner Dudamel luxuriates in. It was that, and more. It was also, after the sonic fireworks, a darkly somber, back-to-earth splashdown of Nietzschean matter.

Everything you can think of seems to happen in L.A.

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 8:59 PM | Permalink

Friday, October 28, 2011

• Young Literati 4th Annual Toastbenefit for the Los Angeles Public Library hosted by Shepard Fairey and featuring the talents of Russell Brand, Demetri Martin, Henry Rollins at Richard J. Riordan Central Library, 630 W. Fifth Street, Los Angeles, CA 90071. 8 PM
• Zombie Prom starts at 9 PM in the historic Linda Vista Hospital , formerly Sante Fe Railroad Hospital, 610 S. St Louis St, Downtown, continues Sunday.
• Peace Over Violence honors Los Angeles Police Chief at its 40th Annual Humanitarian Awards at the Beverly Hills Hotel. 6 PM.
• Urban Land Institute hosts Night at the Square on 10/27 from 6-8 PM
• Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Los Angeles throw the The Big Bash! fundraiser at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.
• Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra (LACO) presents "BELGIUM à la carte" at the Hancock Park residence of the Consul General of Belgium 7PM

• ¡Vivan Los Muertos! at The Autry in Griffith Park, 4700 Western Heritage Way, Los Angeles, CA 90027-1462. 3-9 PM
• Janet Fitch reads at the Hedgebrook LA Alumn Garden Party at the historic Stendahl Galleries in Hollywood Outpost Estates, benefiting Hedgebrook Women's Writer Colony in the Puget Sound.
• First annual Automotive Authors Book Signing featuring Matt Stone, Steve Lehto, & Phil Noyes at Petersen Museum, 6060 Wilshire Blvd, Miracle Mile. 2-5 PM
• Night & the City Lit Bar Crawl with PENUSA. 7 PM h/t Rina Rubinstein's Culture Alert newsletter: CultureAlert@hotmail.com
• Cedars-Sinai Medical Center hosts the Women's Guild Annual Gala at the Kodak Theatre.
• Girl Scouts of Greater Los Angeles hosts Girltopia: The World of Girl Live at the Los Angeles Convention Center. Run for cover from the Girlzillas running amok Downtown at the sold out event.

Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- October 28, 2011" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 6:37 PM | Permalink

Los Angeles Review of Books (LARB) devotes a week to the work of Joan Didion, who has just released another memoir, called Blue Nights. Meghan Daum, Susan Straight, Amy Wilentz, Richard Rayner, Amy Ephron, and today, Matthew Specktor, who grew up around the corner when Didion lived in Brentwood, contribute essays contemplating the author and her place in the L.A. literary landscape.

The upstart literary review now comes in e-book format via Kindle. And on Thursday, November 3, Live Talks Los Angeles hosts a benefit for the LARB in the form of a conversation between the New Yorker's Adam Gopnik and filmmaker Ed Zwick.

Can't get enough of La Didion? Catch "An Evening with Joan Didion" at Vibiana on Nov. 16 through the ALOUD lectures program.

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 1:19 PM | Permalink

Thursday, October 2011

• Celebrity Chef Tour fundraiser for the James Beard Foundation, featuring the cooking of Iron Chef Marc Forgione and family at Chaya Brasserie, West Hollywood, 7:30 PM. h/t Eater LA
• Outfest Legacy Project honors Adam Shankman at its Legacy Awards 2011 at the Directors Guild of America. 8 PM
• Eric Olsen, Glenn Schaeffer, & Michelle Huneven discuss and sign We Wanted to Be Writers: Life, Love, and Literature at the Iowa Writers' Workshop at Book Soup at 7 PM.
• Boys & Girls Clubs of America honors Earvin "Magic" Johnson at its Heroes & High Hopes Award at the Ritz-Carlton, Los Angeles at L.A. Live.
• Bonnie Nadzam will read and sign her debut novel, Lamb, at Skylight Books at 7:30 PM

• LA Fashion Week starts today at the Sunset Gower Studios.
• Thad Nodine will read and sign his debut novel, Touch and Go, and Andrea Portes will read her novel, Hick, at Skylight Books, starting at 7:30 PM
• GLSEN-Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network honors Chaz Bono and Rob Reiner at its Seventh Annual Respect Awards at the Beverly Hills Hotel. 5:30 PM

Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- October 20, 2011" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 1:34 PM | Permalink

Friday, October 14, 2011

• Congresswoman Karen Bass discusses Obama's Job Package at the Urban Issues Breakfast Forum of Greater Los Angeles in the North Campus,Crystal Ballroom of the West Angeles Church of God In Christ, 3045 Crenshaw Blvd., Los Angeles, CA. 7:30 AM
• William Shatner signs his release of his new space-themed concept album, "Seeking Major Tom." at Amoeba Music in Hollywood. 7 PM
• American Cinematheque honors Robert Downey, Jr. at its 25th Annual Awards at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Starts at 6:30 PM
• ArtNight starts in Pasadena at 6 PM

Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- October 14, 2011" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 2:24 PM | Permalink

After viewing the traveling show "The Elizabeth Taylor Collection" at MOCA PDC this morning, it isn't hard to understand why Andy Warhol once said, "It would be very glamorous to be reincarnated as a great big ring on Liz Taylor's finger."

Taylor, who died last March at the age of 79, spent a lifetime amassing her legendary collection of fabulous jewels, fine art, and haute couture. The show, which represents just highlights of the collection that will be auctioned by Christie's this winter, is a window into Taylor's dazzling life. After being on display in Moscow and London, the exhibit will run in Los Angeles for four days beginning Oct 13 then move on to Dubai, Geneva, Paris, Hong Kong, and New York.

Sapphire & diamond sautoir by Bvlgari.

The jewelry is considered one of the greatest private collections ever assembled. There are stories behind numerous pieces. Many were gifts from the men in Taylor's life. Viewers can drool over gems from husband numbers 5 & 6, Richard Burton — including the 33-carat "Elizabeth Taylor Diamond" ring; "La Peregrina," a ruby and diamond necklace incorporating a 16th century pearl once owned by King Phillip 2 of Spain; and the "Taj Majal Diamond," a 40th birthday present.

From husband number 3, Mike Todd, there is the "Mike Todd Diamond Tiara;" given to Taylor in 1957 and the "Cartier Ruby Suite" which Todd gave her while she was swimming in their pool in St. Jean Cap Ferrat. One of the most unique pieces is the necklace fashioned from ivory theater tokens once owned by Hollywood costume designer Edith Head. This was Head's signature necklace and Taylor admired it throughout the years of their close friendship. Head left it to Taylor in her will.

Warhol's 1963 portrait of Taylor is there, representing just a small part of Taylor's art collection. Also on display is a Versace beaded evening jacket from the 1990s, arrayed with portraits of Taylor in her most famous roles, a Chanel ballgown, and a Tiziani black velvet evening cape from the late 1960s which Taylor wore to Princess Grace's 40th birthday ball.

It's not surprising that tickets sold out quickly. Exhibit organizers announced this morning that viewing hours will be extended to include Friday and Saturday evenings from 8 p.m. to midnight on Oct. 14 and 15. Tickets cost $50.00 and will go on sale tomorrow morning at www.christies.com/elizabethtaylor. A portion of the profits will be donated to The Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation.

Those lucky lucky enough to score tickets most likely won't be disappointed. Fans will get a close look at many of Taylor's most treasured posessions. Collectors will no doubt contemplate making arrangements to attend the auctions in New York and London. Taylor herself would be pleased. She always planned to put her jewelry up for auction with the hope that the next owners would "give them a really good home."

"The Collection of Elizabeth Taylor" @MOCA Pacific Design Center
Oct. 13-16, 2011

Photos by Sean Roderick except sautoir, which was provided by MOCA.

Posted by Judy Graeme at 5:25 PM | Permalink

Thursday, October 6, 2011

• PEN USA and The Paris Review host a party featuring insights from Ann Louise Bardach, David Kipen, Jonathan Lethem, Tom Lutz, Mona Simpson, and Michael Tolkin in the Cactus Lounge of the Standard Hotel. 7:30-10 PM
• The Drucker Business Forum hosts Deputy Mayor Austin Beutner for a look at "Keeping LA Competitive in the Global Economy" at Crawford Family Forum, 474 S Raymond Ave, 3 PM
• LA Times architecture critic Christopher Hawthorne discusses cars, freeways, & getting around LA as part of a series on "Transportation & Living Streets" at Occidental College
• Documentarian Aron Ramen screens his documentary "Pwer & Control: LSD In the 60's" at Beyond Baroque , 681 Venice Blvd, Venice 5 PM
• LA artists Larry Bell, Billy Al Bengston & Betye Saar reminisce at Natural History Museum as part of Pacific Standard Time. Natural History Museum, 900 Exposition Blvd
• Aloud presents criminologist David M Kennedy in conversation with LAPD Police Chief Charlie Beck at 7 PM.Taper Auditorium, LA Central Public Library, Downtown LA
• "The Hollywood Librarian" documentary screens at CSULA, U-SU Theatre, Cal State Univ, 5151 State University Dr, LA. 6 PM
• Harry Gamboa, Jr. & Willie Herrón lead a tour of the exhibition "Asco: Elite of the Obscure, A Retrospective, 1972-1987" at 7 PM at LA County Museum of Art

• Art Opening and memorial for late Looney Tunes animator, Corny Cole, at the Animation Guild Local,1105 N Hollywood Way in Burbank. 6 PM
• 3 nights of Burlesque, Erotic Plays & Hot Music at Theater of Note, runs thru Sunday. Friday night event starts at 8 PM.
• World Festival of Sacred Music starts at Art of Living Center, 948 W Adams Blvd, West Adams
• Judge Glenda Hatchett discusses her book Dare to Take Charge: How to Live Your Life on Purpose at Eso Won Books. 7 PM

  by /ul>

  Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- October 6, 2011" »

  Posted by Adrienne Crew at 6:54 PM | Permalink

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

• Los Angeles Philharmonic's gala "Rhapsody in Blue" expects about 650 guests at Disney Hall.
• Chris Salewicz discusses his book, Bob Marley: The Untold Story, at Book Soup, 8818 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. 7PM
• Aloud at Central Library presents Adam Winkler, the author of Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America in conversation with UC Irvine School of Law founding dean Erwin Chemerinsky. Richard J. Riordan Central Library, 630 W. 5th St., L.A. 7 p.m. Free.

• Jaimy Gordon: The National Book Award-winning author of The Lord of Misrule will read and discuss her work at Otis College of Art and Design, 9045 Lincoln Blvd., L.A. 7:30 PM
• Violence Prevention Coalition of Greater Los Angeles honors Connie Rice at its Angel of Peace Award Luncheon at the offices of the California Endowment.
• Amor Towles signs his new novel, Rules of Civility, at Diesel Bookstore, 225 26th St., L.A. 7 PM

• Joachim Sauter, Art Center alumna Rebeca Méndez and Christian Moeller discuss digital media in a built environment at Art Center in Pasadena 7 PM, as part of the school's 3X3 series: "Get Physical, New Media in Space."
• Author Mark Z. Danielewski ("House of Leaves," "Only Revolutions") will give a talk on Thomas Pynchon's three Los Angeles novels, not counting Gravity's Rainbow. Libros Schmibros, 2000 E. 1st St., L.A. 7

Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- September 27, 2011" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 7:11 PM | Permalink

Sam Maloof music stand and chair

An exhibition of the artists who formed a community around Sam Maloof in the Claremont area opens today at the Huntington Library. The House That Sam Built: Sam Maloof and Art in the Pomona Valley 1945-1985 includes furniture by Maloof, ceramics by Ward Youry, paintings by Karl Benjamin and Millard Sheets and works by more than two dozen other artists. The show runs through Jan. 30, 2012 as part of the Pacific Standard Time series. Rocking chair by Sam Maloof

Ceramics by Ward Youry

Oil on canvas by Karl Benjamin

Also today: Q&A with April Damman of the Stendahl Gallery by Adrienne Crew at Native Intelligence.

Coming up: Blue Sky Metropolis: The Aerospace Century in Southern California opens at the Huntington on Oct. 8.

Photos: The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens. Click to enlarge.

Posted by Judy Graeme at 10:26 PM | Permalink

Ah, love! Ah, love lost! Ah, love deliciously betrayed! So begins the Los Angeles Opera's seasonal salvo: with the profound Russian melancholy of Tchaikovsky's "Eugene Onegin" and the antic comeuppance of Mozart's "Così fan tutte."

So if you run down the freeway to catch both works, bear in mind that the two are worlds apart in their notions of the human condition.

Continue reading "Opposites still attract in L.A. Opera's 'Onegin' and 'Così'" »

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 4:12 PM | Permalink

Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945-1980 -- that Getty-supported initiative documenting the origins of the area's contemporary art scene currently on display at various cultural institutions across the Southland -- provides Angelenos with unprecedented opportunities to peep into hitherto hidden private collections and galleries all over town. One such treasure is the Stendahl Galleries in the Hollywood Hills. It is the legacy of legendary art dealer, Earl Stendahl, who played an important role in incubating a market for Modern art in Southern California in the early 20th century.

Continue reading "Q&A: April Dammann on Earl Stendahl and the early LA art scene" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 8:49 PM | Permalink

Thursday, September 8, 2011

• Zócalo at the Hammer: Randall Kennedy ponders "Is Obama Erasing the Color Line?" at Hammer Museum at 7 PM.
• Taschen Beverly Hills hosts a tasting and book party for Jim Heimann's Menu Design in America from 7-9 PM. Reservations required. Call 310 274 4300.
• MAK Center Exhibition Opening Reception for "Final Projects" 7:00 PM
• Fashion Night Out events all over town

• Hammer Museum presents the New American Writing: Leopoldine Core & Dinah Lenney. 7 PM
• Original Long Beach Lobster Festival in Rainbow Lagoon. Long Beach.
• Quebec in Hollywood Festival opens (continues through 9/25)
• Santa Monica Museum of Art hosts its opening reception for the "Beatrice Wood: Career Woman" exhibit at 6:00 PM. Santa Monica Museum of Art.

Continue reading "Angeleno Datebook- September 8, 2011" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 4:35 PM | Permalink

Late into the season, what does a week at Hollywood Bowl bring? Memories of big-boned, sweeping symphonies? Of long-built explosive climaxes? Of thundering musical monuments? No, to those.

But yes, to what guest conductor Leonard Slatkin and the L.A. Philharmonic delivered in their Ravel evening. Afterwards, how about having the tenderly misty strains of the "Mother Goose" Suite, followed by the glinting sensual silver of the "Daphnis and Chloe" Suite No. 2, branded in your brain for days and days? Spinning 'round and 'round on that imaginary turntable, despite all the more sensational works that came before and after.

The likeliest bet is that such textural delicacy will dissipate, and certainly not haunt us. What we've come to expect at the orchestra's summer home in Cahuenga Pass is big-muscled music with broadly stated themes. You know, the resounding stuff.

But there it was, the L. A. Philharmonic waxing luminous in the Ravel. And there he was, hometown hero Slatkin, back from musical wars around the country, finding both a lofty place via the French composer, and kindred musician spirits to commune with.

We never quite know the magic ingredients, besides the artistic ones -- climate conditions, sound engineers turning knobs and all other variables that affect outdoor music - but somehow they coalesced to a state of near-perfection here.

What's curious, though, is how the powerhouse piano/orchestra works that Slatkin and the band also dug into made less of an impression. For starters, there were two soloists: the veteran André Watts and the young Russian Olga Kern -- both of them keyboard firebrands who go for the literature's knuckle-busters. And if you think that they're not compelling, with the Bowl's cameras zooming in on their every cheek-muscle spasm, every elbow thrust skyward, guess again.

But listening to music needs a focused ear, not a captive eye, per se. And so, the big screens don't always do us such a favor. Especially in Watts' case, playing Liszt's 2nd Concerto.

Because here is a pianist who, even without a close-up capturing him, entertains us with his facial antics. To the point of laughter, I'm afraid. Just imagine what the Jumbotron adds: his fast-fluttering auctioneer lips with silent incantations of gibberish that never stop; meanwhile his physicality at the keyboard -- those big hands that grabbed up fistfuls of notes and unleashed percussive might -- were a thrill. In a concert hall, without a camera? Okay, if you like his brand of pianism. Here, a severe compromise.

Kern, on the other hand, didn't put on that kind of show. Although the tall, gorgeous blonde came close histrionically several years ago when she then, also, took up Rachmaninoff's "Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini" at Royce Hall with the touring National Philharmonic of Russia. She was more assured earlier (better rehearsed, having played it countless times with the same orchestra and conductor). Here, her approach to it seemed broken down, section by percussive section, with some sound lapses between -- until, of course, she got to the big, dreamy, all-encompassing ultra-romantic theme. It always scores.

Lesson learned: Mammoth amphitheatres can sometimes win with the most intricately spun music and fall behind in blockbusters.

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 11:35 PM | Permalink

I love books. I also love historic architecture and gossip, especially gossip involving historic architecture. So I was delighted to mix all my obsessions at a reception celebrating the publication of George Snyder's novel, On Wings of Affection, in William Randolph Hearst's two-story, customized suite at the historic Los Altos apartment house near Hancock Park.

The novel is about a well-connected Angeleno immersed in the West Hollywood substance abuse-recovery scene who struggles to keep his social circles from intersecting when his young ward befriends a notorious gigolo kept by a Beverly Hills interior decorator who turns up dead. It's a sexy read and well-written.

Continue reading "Sunday afternoon with books and Mr. Hearst" »

Posted by Adrienne Crew at 3:15 AM | Permalink

Another opening, another show. Last week the faithful trekked up to Cahuenga Pass, with their picnic baskets, to inaugurate the summer season at Hollywood Bowl -- both before and after our so-called Carmageddon put us in the national spotlight and had Angelenos quaking in their driving shoes.

Yes, it was splashy. Gustavo Dudamel's name on the marquee, alone, guarantees big notice. He could have programmed the Yellow Pages and, as always, caused a box-office bonanza. But our LA Philharmonic director didn't leave it at that. The celebrity conductor added the celebrity pianist Lang Lang to the first bill and put on a concert version of Puccini's last opera "Turandot" for the second.

Now everyone knows that the Bowl crowd feasts on familiar, hummable fare and that our Venezuelan man of the hour doesn't have an elitist bone in his lithe body - which make evenings at the mammoth showplace happy, easy-going affairs.

Especially so when, at last, we get an ear-opening account of Moussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition" after having it served as pain quotidien every summer for as far back as I can remember. No surface contours alone -- the usual -- would do for Dudamel and his band.

Instead there was depth of characterization, with more seriousness and more mystery, so darkly vivid in the low strings that the big, heavy, striding chords seemed to shake the huge amphitheatre from the ground up. So immersed was our podium meister in getting what he wanted that once we even heard him explode in a grunt, forgetting the live mic, and that this was not a rehearsal where a conductor's audible urgings are commonplace.

And if full-out explosions are Dudamel's order of the day (they are), then it came as no surprise that Lang Lang -- in all-white attire sans neckwear, his black hair moussed high to perfection - provided the keyboard pyrotechnics. His launchpad was Prokofiev's Third Piano Concerto (remember "The Competition" with Richard Dreyfus and Lee Remick? That concerto.)

Ordained for virtuosos with the chops for dense, raging octaves and the snap-and-spring for tinkling effervescence, it was a mere toy in his hands. Dreamy, ghostly effects emerged in the slow movement, with a growing sweep that spread through the orchestra, before arriving at the tumultuous, heart-stoppingly percussive climb to the finale.

The Chinese wonder played an encore: Liszt's Consolation No. 3. And we could see he was ready for his close-up. Cameras complied and took in his face -- eyes shut, head tilted back so as to capture the chiseled cheekbones, lips in open ecstasy. Yes, the showman lives.

But he was not the only guest force at work opening week at the Bowl. On Sunday Dudamel & Co. let it rip as they enlisted Christine Brewer, she of the powerhouse voice, as Princess Turandot. And while she made us wince deeply at some wayward high notes yelled out too close to the mic, not to mention at the strangest slurs down from the top, her soprano, when warmed up, cut through full-decibel orchestral tuttis and overwhelmed other voices - including Frank Porretta, as Calaf, who, in his best moments, could recall Franco Corelli; Hei-Kyung Hong, who sang a gorgeously wrenching Liù (after a dry-throated start) and the terrific LA Master Chorale and Children's Chorus.

Overall, though, this concert version was arbitrarily staged. Calaf turned, at the end, to give his X-sized Turandot a big smooch, but Liù did not gesture her knife-to-the-gut suicide, even with the music charting it.

Main afterthoughts: Puccini's opera, not grounded in the composer's skilled music drama, but overridden with grandiose, ceremonial Chinese motifs and bulked up here with the Bowl's amplification, never sounded so much like a score to fit the name Hollywood. All those triumphal climaxes, coming at key junctures, one after another, made me feel like a witness to the birth of overkill, movie-score glory. Did the composer know what he wrought?

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 12:30 AM | Permalink

"Isn't there some millionaire out there who can save all this?" The question hung in the air as hundreds of ordinary people, film buffs with their kids, designers and lookie-loos lined up to ogle the astounding array of costumes and props collected over the years by Debbie Reynolds and now, sadly, being put up for auction.

The collection is on display for preview before Saturday's auction at the Paley Center in Beverly Hills. A visit is a jaw-dropping experience. So many costumes from so many landmark films, it simply boggles the mind that no one has stepped forward to save the collection before it's dispersed in a diaspora of Ben Hur-ish proportions.

As I worked my way through the crowd, I overheard again and again that same lament: "Why couldn't this be saved?" Apparently not for lack of trying, as Reynolds has found out. She has finally given up her dream of creating a museum in Los Angeles to house her vast collection of some 5,000 costumes and sets after a failed attempt to open one in Las Vegas in the 80's. Now she is ready to move on.

Walking through the rooms of pristine costumes, each accompanied by a loop of the scene from its movie, I was awestruck at the tenacity of Reynolds, who attempted to save all this history. Where did she keep it all? And how did she keep them in such good condition? Every gown looked pristine.

"They all came folded in plastic tubs," said a Paley Center employee, "We were shocked at how perfect everything was." Everything from Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor's vaudeville suits from "Singin' in the Rain" to Marlon Brando's uniforms in "Mutiny on the Bounty," Audrey Hepburn's gown from "My Fair Lady," Katherine Hepburn's from "Mary Queen of Scots," and Marilyn Monroe's iconic white dress from "The Seven Year Itch," displayed next to the photograph that froze it in our memory as she famously stepped over a subway grate and tried to maintain some modesty. There is Grace Kelley's pink appliquéd dress and Cary Grant's sports coat, come to life as they picnicked on fried chicken in "To Catch a Thief." Even one of Austin Powers' 60's suits made the cut. All the greats are there: Hepburn (Kate and Audrey), Kelly (Gene and Grace), Donald O'Connor, Barbra Streisand, Bette Davis, Greta Garbo, Rudolph Valentino, la Liz, Brando.

Joanne Paull let her daughter Elizabeth miss a day of school ("They were cleaning out their desks, so I decided it was okay") to come and view the collection with her mom Holly Margulies in tow. It was as worthy an experience as any museum had to offer.

Erica Enders, who works with Profiles in History, the auction house Reynolds chose to sell the collection, says she has met the actress several times. "She's got a sad face," she said. "This is hard for her." No doubt. My condolences to Debbie.

In my opinion, she deserves not only a museum, but her own special Oscar for trying so hard to preserve Hollywood's history.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 12:06 PM | Permalink

Tim Burton's major retrospective of his art and film work was a big hit at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The exhibition opens Sunday in the Resnick Pavillion at LACMA. Included are more than 700 drawings, paintings, photos, film and video works, puppets, storyboards, costumes and other "cinematic ephemera." The show is organized in three sections "each in relation to Burbank, the city in which he was raised."

Burton will be at the museum on Saturday from noon to 2 p.m. signing the catalog. Tickets for the exhibition are $20 each. LACMA's Unframed blog has a video interview with Burton's high school art teacher.

Selected images from the show, provided by LACMA. The bottom photo is by Sean Roderick.

Posted by Judy Graeme at 10:25 PM | Permalink

Shawn Gannon and women. Photo: Ken Friedman

What a weekend for dance: Lucinda Childs and Mark Morris back-to-back! The old avant-garde and the ever-new Baroque. Both brought their signature wares to town, to profoundly different effect.

Morris, you may remember, was in the money 23 years ago. Or rather, in Brussels' Monnaie Theatre, where its impresario Gérard Mortier offered to his newly installed dance director "the biggest thing you want to do."

Continue reading "Dance reviews: Lucinda Childs and Mark Morris" »

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 12:07 AM | Permalink

If last week's royal wedding has left you wanting more things British, check out the Huntington Library's exhibit Revisiting the Regency: England, 1811-1820.

The Regency period, named for the decade in which the "extravagant, emotional, and self-indulgent" Prince of Wales (later George IV) ruled in place of his mentally disabled father King George III, was an era of expansion in technology, media, arts, and architecture. It was also a time of war and rising unemployment.

Museum visitors who are Jane Austen devotees can see a first edition of "Pride & Prejudice" from 1813. The Prince Regent was a fan of Austen, insisting she dedicate her novel "Emma" to him. Architect John Nash, who spent the bulk of his career working for the Prince, built the Royal Pavilion at Brighton and remade London's West End. He was responsible for the planning of a good deal of what is now contemporary central London. The exhibit includes an image of the Pavilion's "Music Room" from 1826.

Also on view is a manuscript fragment of the score from "King Stephen" by Ludwig van Beethoven. The composer was extremely popular in Regency England. His iconic 9th Symphony was commissioned by the Philharmonic Society of London in 1817. There were developments in fashion with the introduction of "modern" men's clothing and the early version of today's business suit. Women favored the "empire" silhouette.

Curator Mary Robertson and exhibit designer Lauren Tawa want viewers to feel the extravagance of the era. They painted the gallery walls a shade of bright red that was widely used in stately English homes of that period. They also hung the objects in a scaled-down version of the floor-to-ceiling "salon style" to showcase the abundance of materials, including drawings, manuscripts, and rare books. All come from the Huntington's collection.

This show should satisfy even the most scholarly of Los Angeles Anglophiles — and give fans of British history and culture lots to think about until Kate and William come to town in July.

"Revisiting the Regency: England, 1811-1820" through August 1, 2011 at the Huntington Library in San Marino. Photos courtesy of the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens

Posted by Judy Graeme at 8:38 PM | Permalink

There's the world, says choreographer Barak Marshall, with all its social inequities, hard-scrabble struggles and heartless contradictions. And then there's a person's heritage - a dual one in the case of this native Angeleno whose mother is the former Yemeni star of Inbal Dance Theater and whose father hails from the Bronx.

In "Monger," the piece danced by Marshall's Israeli troupe at UCLA's Royce Hall, we find them both - societal vagaries and his own cultural heritage - framed in the dark downstairs quarters of humbled, obedient servants answering their mistress's bell.

We hear her clicking footsteps through the floor boards and a leak dripping from the interior plumbing - all of it fearsome and ominous. We hear those solemn, ting-a-ling attention calls, followed by the employer's amplified voice delivering orders. We see the listeners below gather like frightened prisoners as one of them replies to those orders and apologizes for any infraction previously committed.

But all hell breaks loose after the duties are fulfilled. No longer supplicants, these workers show their raging side; through hyperkinetic, in-your-face movement, they spill aggression in forcefully rhythmic low squats and pungently pithy gestures plotted as a convulsive step-per-beat -- all set to a raucous sound score pieced together from Middle Eastern rock and Klezmer bacchanales. At intervals it stops to embrace American pop ballads and '50s swing, and, yes, even Handel and Verdi.

Because, after all, there is a lyrical component to life, even in the worst of circumstances. For that, Marshall turns to an aptly balletic "Traviata" excerpt, in this case, the terminally tubercular Violetta sadly reciting Alfredo's love letter to her. (Remember, she is of the underclass as well, a courtesan who would bring dishonor to a "good" family, so the episode is thematically akin).

And then there's the curious sleight-of-hand image he constructs of three women clutching their babies, born in the backstairs, away from public view. Also, there's the outright comic cross-dressing vignette that brilliantly makes two seated men into three figures, one of them a woman. Interspersed are choice tidbits like commercials for Manischewitz as delivered on NPR's Yiddish Radio Project and spoken with laughably perfect English diction.

No doubt, the choreographer boasts endless sources of material that inspire him, though, possibly, he might want to limit his palette somewhat.

And while the work may not boast the nuanced stratification seen in Bob Altman's "Gosford Park" or the grim sado-masochism of Jean Genet's "The Maids" (both cited in the program notes as its basis) there's a huge inventory here of vulnerability, helplessness, and finally revolt.

Still, it's subterranean anger that has a field day in "Monger," which in the spirit of fish-sellers and war-makers, is no subtle business. Brutish, it curiously resembles an aspect of Israeli culture: argumentative, unafraid of loud debate. The national reputation is built on this stuff, as with the Israeli Philharmonic, for example, that marvelously irascible band of players.

"Monger" shows a tender nostalgia, though, as it ends. The ballad "Close Your Eyes," led us out the door, with a golden-oldie male voice poised in the air, gently floating above all that had preceded it.

[* Update: Also posted at LA Opus.]

Donna Perlmutter is an award-winning critic, journalist and author. Formerly the chief music/dance critic for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner, she contributes to the Los Angeles Times and other publications.

Photo: Gadi Dagon

Posted by Donna Perlmutter at 9:55 PM | Permalink

David Smith, considered the greatest American sculptor of the 20th century, is the subject of a new exhibit opening April 3 at LACMA's Resnick Pavilion. That's almost poignant. He died in a car accident in 1965 (at the age of 59) during the planning of a major exhibit for the new Los Angeles County Museum of Art, which opened on Wilshire Boulevard that year. Thursday is the 46th anniversary of LACMA's debut.

David Smith: Cubes and Anarchy is the first West Coast exhibition of his work since then.

Born in Indiana in 1906, Smith worked as a welder and riveter at a Studebaker auto factory while attending college. He later moved to New York City to study art and was heavily influenced by Pablo Picasso and Cubism, Italian sculptor Alberto Giacometti, and Spanish artist Joan Miró. When Smith saw images of Picasso's iron constructions in 1932 he realized that he could use his welding skill and knowledge of industrial materials for making art.

Smith, who preferred to work with steel, iron, and aluminum, has "often been presented as a counterpart to the abstract expressionist painters or as a draftsman in space." The welder from Indiana befriended many other prominent artists, including Adolph Gottlieb and Milton Avery in the 1930's and Robert Motherwell, Jackson Pollock, and Franz Kline in the 1950's.

The new exhibit was designed by Brenda Levin, more known for her work as a preservation architect. She discusses the project on LACMA's blog. "David Smith: Cubes and Anarchy" runs through July 24.

All photos by Judy Graeme

Posted by Judy Graeme at 9:46 PM | Permalink

William Henry Fox Talbot, "An Oak Tree in Winter," 1842/43

One of my college student daughter's favorite photographic subjects during her recent semester in London was trees. Trees of all shapes and sizes caught Sean's eye on outings in the city and day trips around the countryside. I first noticed when she posted pictures on Facebook from a day in Hampstead Heath. Time spent walking around the Victoria Embankment Gardens, Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace Gardens, Oxford, and even Liverpool yielded more arboreal subject matter. I wondered the cause of her attraction. She grew up in Los Angeles, and while she's been avidly using a camera for years now, she's never shown any interest in photographing trees.

Who better to invite along to view "In Focus: The Tree," the newest offering in the Getty Center's series of thematic photography exhibits. This is a small show, about 40 images, but it gives viewers a chance to see how the tree has been interpreted by a variety of photographers throughout the history of the medium. William Henry Fox Talbot's 1842/43 An Oak Tree in Winter is one of the show's earliest pieces. There are images by photographers famously associated with trees, such as Ansel Adams and Carleton Watkins, and surprises by some who are not, like Man Ray and Dorothea Lange. There are pictures which faithfully record trees in their environment, like a Henri Cartier Bresson from Brie, France , and also works like Simryn Gill's large-scale black and white close-up conceptual image of a tree trunk.

Sean gravitated to an image from London, naturally: John Jabez Edwin Mayall's 1851 daguerreotype showing a tree growing inside the Crystal Palace in Hyde Park. She saw irony in Darius Kinsey's photo of loggers trying to saw through a giant cedar, 76 feet in circumference, by hand near Seattle in 1906. Robert Adam's closeup of a blossoming tree in Utah struck her as more optimistic. I sensed that as she looked at the photographs she felt the stirrings of a bond. Maybe she was realizing that these photographers were drawn to trees in part by the need to understand and connect with what's unique about a particular location. No surprise, then, that someone who has taken trees for granted in her hometown would suddenly pay them close attention while far away in a new place for an extended period.

The exhibit — co-curated by Francoise Reynaud (photography curator at Paris' Musee Carnavalet) and Getty associate photography curator Anne Lyden — began as a research project when Reynaud was a guest scholar at the Getty in 2004. Walking through the exhibit with us a few weeks ago, Reynaud explained that she has been fascinated by trees since childhood. Especially trees standing alone in the countryside.

"I thought that they were like people looking at us, trying to send us messages that we probably wouldn't understand," she said. Reynaud collected images of trees from books and auction catalogues with the thought of someday doing a project on the subject. When she arrived at the Getty and was asked what she would like to concentrate on, Reynaud requested to explore the trees represented in the museum's photography collection. "It was like a gift — doing something I really wanted to do."

Lyden said that Reynaud "brought to light many aspects of the collection that we hadn't realized existed in our storeroom and vaults....We asked her in 2008 if she would be interested in working on an exhibit and she very graciously said yes!"

Reynaud pointed us to some of her favorites in the show, among them Eliot Porter's richly colored dye-transfer print "Juniper Tree, Arches National Monument, Utah, 1958." She takes delight in mentioning that the show's popular favorite so far seems to be William Eggleston's "Untitled, (Small Tree against Wall), 1980," which depicts a tiny, almost-bare tree struggling to survive in dirt against the backdrop of a wall.

William Eggleston, "Untitled (Small Tree against Wall), 1980

Before leaving us, Reynaud recalls a friend's experience with a neighbor's burning house and the tree growing next to it. The friend was instructed to tell the firemen, "save the tree — I can always rebuild the house!" Those words stayed with her. In the exhibit's book, Reynaud writes: "Such a desperate plea highlights the fierce attachment a person may feel for the presence and company of a tree; in fact, human identification with the tree is a recognized phenomenon....The tree has, for millennia, also been a symbol of life, and the structure of a tree's branches, leaves and roots is mirrored in other living systems."

On our way out of the exhibit, I asked Sean if she had gained any new perspective. Unaccustomed to analyzing her photographic motives, she simply said, "whenever I saw something that turned a light on in my head I took a picture. I think that with the trees I just really wanted to capture something that was naturally there." And really, when you think about it, what more reason does a traveler need to make a photograph?

In Focus: The Tree is on view at the Getty Center through July 3, 2011

Curator Lyden leads a gallery talk on the exhibition on April 7 at 2:30 p.m.

Photographs courtesy of the Getty. Click on the image to see bigger.

Posted by Judy Graeme at 1:54 PM | Permalink

Bill Cunningham at work

I have a confession to make. I'm a Bill-a-holic. I can't start the weekend without first checking out legendary photographer Bill Cunningham's column of street fashion on the New York Times website. If I miss his latest pictures for some reason, I feel like something's off, like I've misplaced some piece of vital information that is my fashion touchstone for the week.

I'm especially addicted to his "On the Street" audio slideshows. When I press play and the cool, man-about-town theme music reaches my ears, I'm transported to the streets of New York. His distinctive voice makes me happy. Former Los Angeles Times photographer Iris Schneider, who met Cunningham when she was freelancing in NYC, says you can almost hear the twinkle in his eye. "I'd say he sounds like an upper-crust leprechaun," she says. "There is an upper-crust polish straight out of Sutton Place, but he's got an infectious lilt that is totally his own."

Cunningham also chronicles New York society parties in his weekly "Evening Hours" column, but fashion is his love. A ladies' hat designer in his younger days (he's now in his 80s), Cunningham has been documenting fashion trends in New York and Paris since the mid 1960's — for Women's Wear Daily and Details Magazine as well as the Times. Not merely a reporter, Cunningham is a fashion historian and anthropologist, detailing shifting styles and eras of fashion. He photographs everyone from society matrons in Chanel to kids showing off the latest trend in t-shirts, if he thinks they're interesting. Subjects who make the cut are usually thrilled. "We all get dressed for Bill," says Vogue editor Anna Wintour, part of the sartorial royalty that respects Cunningham's fashion eye. Harold Koda, curator of the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute, is another fan.

As someone who has shot a bit of street fashion, I marvel at how easy Cunningham makes it look. Shooting street fashion is not easy. First you have to spot someone who's wearing something interesting. Then it's about getting just the right angle, in the right light, at just the right moment (and that's when your subjects are cooperating.) Cunningham has the advantage of hunting his subjects in the highly compressed geography of Manhattan. On any given day, hundreds of fashionistas parade before his camera. But Cunningham isn't interested in just the well-dressed. He's looking for men and women who think creatively with their clothing. That's the stuff that really excites him.

And get this: This 80-something photographer gets around New York's wild streets on a bicycle, day and night. He's on at least his 29th bike. The others have been stolen.

Continue reading "Getting to know Bill Cunningham" »

Posted by Judy Graeme at 12:45 AM | Permalink

Photograph by Iris Schneider

Even before Andy Warhol hung his painting of a soup can, people have pondered what is art, who is an artist, and what role do museums have in determining either. But after spending a few hours at MOCA walking through the new Dennis Hopper show, ironically titled "Double Standard" — after one of his most famous photographs — curator Julian Schnabel and MOCA director Jeffrey Deitch seem to have re-opened the debate anew and added several layers to the stew.

I went to the show to see Hopper's photography. And somewhere, nearly buried in the rambling exhibit, there are several hundred photographs, mounted grid-style on a couple of walls. The photography was shot over several decades beginning with the civil rights march on Selma, the early birth of pop art in Los Angeles, Hopper's moviemaking years in Hollywood and his more recent fascination with abstract street art in Venice.

After looking at those pictures, my main thought was: what an interesting life this guy had. And he had the presence of mind and artistic inclination to document every inch of it. While it would be easy to dismiss his photography as a case of being in the right place at the right time, his photographs are more than that. He had an eye for the ironies of life, a sense of humor and history, an appreciation for the struggles of the common man, and for his own fortuitous place at the corner of art and commerce. Some of his photographs moved me, made me laugh ("Is that really Jane Fonda in that bikini?") and shake my head. Lucky guy, I thought, and talented. And, apparently, very likeable. This, I think, is what got him in trouble MOCA-wise.

As museum director Jeffrey Deitch explained for the press last week, the show was rushed into production in two or three months due to Hopper's illness. (He died a few months before the show was to open). As his condition became more grave, Schnabel, a good friend, told Deitch "We've got to do this" and volunteered to curate the show. It feels as though his relationship with Hopper clouded his vision of what exactly is art. In Hopper's case this show reflects as much the fact that he was an appreciator of art, and a knowledgeable collector, than an artist himself.

The two huge pop sculptures — a 30-foot-tall "La Salsa Man" and an Esso gas station attendant — at the entrance of the show are a puzzling case in point. Hopper apparently saw the Mexican waiter towering above PCH as he was driving through Malibu and thought it was fabulous. These figures are common in the California landscape. I remember seeing that waiter myself, and thinking if I had the money I would love to buy one and put it in my backyard.

Hopper did have the money. He bought the mold and hired someone to fabricate one that he could call his own. This, in the world of pop art, would be "found art" or a "readymade." It now sits at the entrance of the exhibition, attributed, like many pieces in this show, to the Dennis Hopper collection.

Deitch said Hopper was very involved in every step of the fabrication of these pieces, even determining that the hair on the Esso man should be blonde, not brown. But if you recognize something as great, buy it and put it on display, does your name go on it as the artist? Hopper may have recognized its coolness but Salsa Man is not his creation. What is it doing in a museum show of his artistic works? If the show were a re-creation of his home, which was filled with pop art he had collected over time, I could understand it. But as a retrospective of his artwork, it feels wrong to be here, and misleading.

This kind of clouding of the waters is rampant at the show. The gallery walls are filled with huge paintings that replicate his photography. These are described in the press release as "Hopper's monumental billboard paintings from the 2000's." One wonders how and when Hopper did those? Did he project the negatives from his photos onto the canvas?

When Schnabel was asked about the technique, he clarified: Hopper hired billboard artists to create these renderings of his photographs. Those artists' names are nowhere to be found, and the assumption that Hopper created the paintings is only corrected in conversation with the curator. I'm sure that many who visit the show will think that these works were done by Hopper.

In the end, what was meant to be a tribute to Hopper has become a messy example of throwing everything on the wall to see what sticks. If Deitch and Schnabel had focused on his photography, and exhibited it so it could be appreciated as an artful and interesting document of a life well-lived, and a history of the burgeoning art scene, Hopper's friends would have given him a much more fitting tribute.

Double Standard is at the Museum of Contemporary Art until Sept. 26.

Posted by Iris Schneider at 10:02 PM | Permalink

Observing an L.A. Photographer: fifth in a series

Photographer Charles Brittin is not as revered in Los Angeles as his work deserves. In the 1950s and '60s, he documented the Los Angeles avant-garde artists like Ed Ruscha, Robert Irwin and John Altoon. Brittin's friend, the artist Wallace Berman, introduced him to the Beat culture and social life of the Ferus Gallery, a legendary exhibition space that opened in 1957 on North La Cienega.

The Ferus was notable for showcasing innovative young artists who would become famous, and was the site of Andy Warhol's first solo pop art exhibition. Founded by artist Ed Kienholz and curator Walter Hopps, it was just around the corner from Barney's Beanery, where the artists and friends such as Frank Gehry and Dennis Hopper gathered to smoke, drink and talk about art.

Brittin's photographs are sure to become better appreciated now that the Getty has acquired his archives and plans to feature him in a major L.A. art retrospective. "Charles' work stands as an important record of the Los Angeles art scene in the 1960's," senior curator Frances Turpak told me.

Brittin, now 80, wears his long hair in a ponytail. His subjects have also included Venice Beach when the view was filled with oil derricks, Ocean Park before it became gentrified, and the civil rights and antiwar clashes of the '60s. As the child of an abstract expressionist painter who was active in Los Angeles then, I jumped at the chance to meet Brittin and see his photographs. We met in the Seminar Room of the Getty Research Institute and went through box after box of prints, proof sheets and negatives.

A surprise for me was seeing Brittin's photographs from the 1966 art installation called "The Peace Tower," which was conceived by the L.A. Artists Protest Committee as a response to the Vietnam War. The 58-foot steel tower, built in an empty lot on Sunset Strip, was designed by artist Mark di Suvero. It held 418 2 foot-by-2 foot paintings contributed by artists including Vija Celmins, Elaine de Kooning, Roy Lichtenstein, and Robert Motherwell. Brittin's color image of the installation appeared on the cover of Artforum magazine.

Brittin's work was also published in the Los Angeles Times, Harpers Bazaar, the New York Times, and Semina, the handmade Beat literary and art magazine created by Wallace Berman. Born in the Midwest, Brittin moved here in 1944. He lived first in the Fairfax area, where he says, "I was politically and culturally awakened." After attending high school in Pomona he enrolled at UCLA and discovered photography. He was attracted to the work of Alfred Stieglitz and Paul Strand and admired the documentary style of Robert Frank.

He moved to Venice and helped attract attention to the young painters and sculptors who were creating an exciting new art movement in Los Angeles. In the 1960's, he became involved with CORE and the Black Panthers. His growing political activism moved him to document civil rights demonstrations in Los Angeles and the South. His photo of a woman being arrested at the Los Angeles federal building in 1965 is among his images from that time in a 1999 book, "Charles Brittin," from Smart Art Press and the Craig Krull Gallery.

Later he worked for the designers Charles and Ray Eames. The 1970's saw Brittin drop off the radar. He put everything aside to deal with health issues and survived liver and kidney transplants. After an extended recovery period, he began photographing again in 1996.

Over the years, Brittin has utilized various photographic formats from 35mm to 4x5 view cameras. He has recently embraced digital technology and carries a camera with him "always." He continues to be primarily interested in photographing people. His love of the ocean and living in Santa Monica Canyon keep him close to his old haunts.

While we talk, his pleasure at having his work acquired by the Getty is palpable. His images will be included in a 2011 exhibition entitled "On The Record: Art in L.A., 1945-1980," being curated by Getty Research Institute assistant director Andrew Perchuk. Referring to the late 50's and early 60's, Perchuk says that Brittin's photographs help bring attention to this "very difficult period of art history to study. Many of these artworks no longer exist. He was a real insider to the scene. You get a sense of the personal connection he had with his subjects."

Many of his Beat friends never knew about his later work. "Until I had the privilege of reviewing Charles's work for this book, I had no idea of the range or the amount of work he'd done," Ferus gallery co-founder Walter Hopps said in the 1999 book. "Some artists are always out there pitching the goods but Charles has never done that, nor have I ever heard him complain about not getting more attention. His self-effacing modesty is, of course, key to his sensibility as an artist."

Brittin is still out there shooting Los Angeles. I can't wait to see what he comes up with next.

This is the fifth post in an occasional series about Los Angeles photographers whose subject is the city. Previous entries featured Iris Schneider, Julius Shulman, teenagers Downtown and Joyce Campbell.

All photos courtesy of the J. Paul Getty Trust

Posted by Judy Graeme at 11:03 PM | Permalink