Mary Blair, the woman artist who inspired Disney’s “Nine Old Men” 1
At last night’s panel discussion of Walt Disney’s animated classic, “Peter Pan” (1953) (the new blu-ray version is now playing at Hollywood’s El Capitan Theatre), we learned about the film’s core group of animators. Walt Disney jokingly referred to this crew not as “Pan-imators,” but rather as his “Nine Old Men.” The expression puns on ...
Claire Falkenstein book talk at Jack Rutberg Fine Arts
Mar
14
2012
Claire Falkenstein: An Expansive Universe, a major survey of the late California multimedia artist’s work now on at Jack Rutberg Fine Arts in Los Angeles, coincides with the release of the newly published, comprehensive book on the artist’s work and life, Claire Falkenstein. The Falkenstein material is paired at Rutberg’s with work of another ...
Meeting Art Laboe, L.A.’s pioneering rock ‘n roll deejay
We enjoyed meeting the amazing Los Angeles radio legend, Art Laboe, Wednesday night at the Grammy Museum downtown. Laboe’s a pioneer in many ways — issuing the first-ever record compilations and coining the expression “Oldies But Goodies.” The deejay is very much alive and kicking; though in his eighties, he was in great shape cruising ...
Santa Barbara bound
Feb
3
2012
Heading to Santa Barbara for a writer’s retreat, we are delighted that our visit to the Pearl on the Pacific coincides with the opening of a “golden oldies” show at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. I like gruesome cowboy art like the Frederick Remington canvas at left. [click on it for detail] The show, ...
Amiri Baraka visits Los Angeles, raps about art
Jan
17
2012
It was inspiring to eavesdrop on Amiri Baraka, the poet, playwright, essayist, intellectual, and political activist, as he swapped kitchen table banter about life and art with his daughter, the academic and curator, Dr. Kellie Jones. The tête-à-tête took place before an SRO audience at the Hammer’s Billy Wilder Theater. It was the closing day ...
Spend a sexy evening at an Eagle Rock motel …
Jan
12
2012
… if your idea of a sexy evening is hopping, like a cockroach, between motel rooms, while listening to cool experimental music. Sounds good to me. The Welcome Inn Time Machine — series of free micro concerts in motel rooms that explore the history of local experimental music is part of the Pacific Standard Time ...
Julius Shulman’s 1936 shot of Griffith Observatory — and beyond
The other evening, touring the Pacific Standard show at the L.A. Municipal Gallery on Olive Hill, I was caught off guard by a four-inch square print of this precious, heroic Julius Shulman photograph dating from 1936. It almost made me cry: the two caps, shape of building [it was then only years old], hills and ...
Experimental films by Topanga Canyon creatives @ Los Angeles Filmforum
An upcoming program at Los Angeles Filmforum — screening experimental and avant-garde film and video art, documentaries, and experimental animation — captures my interest. It’s the ninth installment of Filmforum director Adam Hyman’s extensive and rigorous 24-program exhibition of experimental films made in L.A. between 1945 and 1980. This survey fits neatly into the time ...
WeeGee shoots “Newark with palm trees” — Los Angeles
Nov
26
2011
arts·meme visual arts correspondent, Liz Goldner, contributes this review. “Naked Hollywood: Weegee in Los Angeles,” at the Museum of Contemporary Art (part of the Pacific Standard Time initiative), brings out of near oblivion 200 photographic artworks and a few films, from the late 1940s through the 60s, by and of tabloid photographer, “Weegee” (real name, ...
“LA Rebellion” filmmakers featured at UCLA Film & Television Archive series
Nov
18
2011
They came from Watts. They came from New York City. They came from throughout America or crossed an ocean from Africa. At a unique time and place in American history, a critical mass of filmmakers of African descent came to the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television to make movies and produced a rich, ...