9/12: Magical Musical Lunch for the Downtown Women’s Center

The Magical Musical Lunch
benefiting The Downtown Women’s Center
September 12 from 1:00  to 4:00 pm

El Chavo Restaraunt
4441 W Sunset Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90027
(323) 664-0871
www.elchavorestaurant.com

Please come to the Magical Musical Lunch benefiting The Downtown Women’s Center next Sunday, September 12 from 1:00  to 4:00 pm.  Dick and Jane Family Orchestra are performing, along with Madame Pamita, The Queen of The Sideshow Carnival, who will also be telling fortunes! Also scheduled are special surprise guests that are so big that we can’t mention them here.

The Downtown Women’s Center provides housing and a daytime refuge for homeless women on Skid Row. From permanent housing to just a warm meal and a daily shower, this place is incredible.
100% of all proceeds for this event — absolutely no overhead–is going to the Downtown Women’s Center — no money wasted on overhead.

Special thanks to Sino Tequila, which is donating the margaritas, and El Chavo for donating the all of the food and beer and hosting the event.  (El Chavo owner Melanie Tusquellas’ mother has been doing volunteer work and donations for the Center since the 1970s when it first opened.)

Tons of fabulous raffle prizes, buffet lunch, margaritas, beer and great music are all included in the $40.00 ticket.  We realize that ‘s a lot of money in the current economic environment, but it’s for a very worthy cause and ticket are totally tax-deductible.  And if you can’t make it, please forward this on to someone you think might be able to help.

To get tickets, go to the following website.  After your purchase, you will receive a Tax ID receipt:
www.firstgiving.com/DWC-ElChavo

No Comments | Filed under Calendar Event, Dick and Jane, Dionysus bands, East Hollywood, Events, Fundraiser, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz

9/10: Mick Farren’s “Speed-Speed-Speedfreak” book release party at La Luz de Jesus

“Speed – Speed – Speedfreak: A Fast History of Amphetamine” by Mick Farren
Book release, reading, signing and story contest


Friday September 10,  6 pm – 9 pm
La Luz de Jesus Gallery
(Wacko / Soap Plant)
4633 Hollywood Blvd.,
Los Angeles CA 90027
323-666-7667
www.laluzdejesus.com
www.soapplant.com


Elvis Presley, the Hell’s Angels, Hunter S. Thompson, Truman Capote, the Beatles, Judy Garland, Hank Williams, the Manson Family, Jack Kerouac, Johnny Cash, JFK, and Adolf Hitler. All of the above were, at one time or another, to put it bluntly, speedfreaks. Speed – Speed – Speedfreak: A Fast History of Amphetamine” traces the criminal and cultural use of amphetamine and its growing use through each new and destructive cycle. The book will be printed in rounded pill capsule form, like the vaunted “black beauty” of pharmaceutical history


Photo by Wendy Phillips

Author Mick Farren is a pillar of the counterculture and one of the last Bohemians standing. He is the author of close to forty books both fiction and otherwise and has released some 20 albums. His lyrics have been performed by Hawkwind, Motorhead, Metallica, Brother Wayne Kramer and others. The exhaustive research on “Speed – Speed – Speedfreak: A Fast History of Amphetamine” was helped by his own youthful taste for what was laughingly called the devil’s dandruff. For the reading part of the fun, he will be accompanied by master guitarist Andy Colquhoun.

Attendees are encouraged to come up to the microphone and share their favorite stories and tales involving amphetamines: real, imagined, personal, anecdotal, second-hand, historical, nightmarish and/or cautionary. While no one involved in this event advocates the use of narcotics, we recognize their pervasiveness–at a time when an estimated 40% of Montana’s youth is on speed, for instance, it is blatantly apparent that a great number of adults have either taken speed or know someone who has. Prizes will be awarded for the most popular stories told!

“Speed – Speed – Speedfreak: A Fast History of Amphetamine” by Mick Farren – Die cut paperback, 175 pages 8.4 x 4.3 x 0.4 inches, published by Feral House, www.feralhouse.com, English, ISBN 13: 978-1932595826



No Comments | Filed under '77 Punk Legends, Book reading, Calendar Event, Contest, Events, Free Event, Free booze, Hollywood, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz, Stuff We Like

9/9: Brian McCarty “Art Toys” book release and signing party at La Luz de Jesus

Brian McCarty “Art Toys”
Book release and signing party

Featuring DJ Aubrey

Thursday, Sept. 9th, 6-9PM

La Luz de Jesus Gallery
(Wacko / Soap Plant)
4633 Hollywood Blvd.,
Los Angeles CA 90027
323-666-7667
www.laluzdejesus.com
www.soapplant.com

Make no mistake about it: the art world, the traditional art world is over. – Douglas Rushkoff

ART-TOYS is a massive collection of Brian McCarty’s meticulously composed photographs that uniquely chronicle the Art-Toy movement. For six years, McCarty worked alongside a host of international artists, photographing their toy characters in actual locations ranging from the Grand Canyon to Times Square. The resulting photos are sometimes dark, often funny, and always hinting at a deeper story. The moments that McCarty manufactures in front of the camera feel real, as if he’s simply documenting the day-to-day lives of toys.

Each of the over 100 photographs stand alone on a page, allowing viewers an unfettered look at the world from McCarty’s toy-based perspective. An extensive behind the scenes section is included at the back of the book, providing a narrative glimpse at McCarty’s methods and the artists with whom he collaborates. Snapshots taken on set reveal the brilliantly simple techniques behind some of his most magical and iconic images.

Because the toys that McCarty photographs are simultaneously art objects and consumer goods, many of his images were created to serve both creative and commercial goals. As such, they provide a unique perspective on the art and commerce of the Designer Toy / Urban Vinyl movement. A number of books have explored the content of the Art-Toy movement before, but this is the only collection that captures the energy and the attitude of a new era in Pop Art from the perspective of a fellow artist.

Artists with toy work included: Alex Pardee, Amanda Visell, Andrew Bell, Ashley Wood, Attaboy, Bob Dob, Brandt Peters, Craig Anthony Perkins, Frank Kozik, FriendsWithYou, Gama-Go, Gary Baseman, Greg “Craola” Simkins, James Jarvis, Jeremy Fish, Jermaine Rogers, Joe Ledbetter, Kathie Olivas, Lili Chin, Luke Chueh, Mario “MARS-1” Martinez, Mark Mothersbaugh, Mark Nagata, Mark Ryden, Meredith Dittmar, Michelle Valigura, mr clement, Noferin, Patrick Ma, Ralph Cosentino, Roy Miles, Sam Flores, Santa Inoue, Sara Antoinette Martin, Sebastien Roux, Sergey Safonov, Scott Musgrove, Scott Tolleson, Simone Legno, Tim Biskup, Wilfrid Wood, Yoskay Yamamoto, and others.

The special, limited edition of ART-TOYS features an alternate cover free of text, packaged in a vinyl slipcase. Each book is individually numbered and signed by Brian McCarty and eighteen world-known artists whose work is showcased inside. Included are Attaboy, Gary Baseman, Tim Biskup, Hugh Brown, Luke Chueh, Lili Chin, Bob Dob, Frank Kozik, Joe Ledbetter, Patrick Ma, Mark Nagata, Craig Perkins, Mark Ryden, Greg “Craola” Simkins, Scott Tolleson, Michelle Valigura, Amanda Visell, and Yoskay Yamamoto. Mario “MARS-1″ Martinez and Sam Flores are also included in a rare number of “chase” books.

We have been living for too long in the wake of Walter Benjamin’s prescient but ultimately depressing essay, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” He correctly demonstrated how photographs of art remove works from their original contexts – the media successfully diminishing a painting’s original “aura” of context and place. Now, and thanks to the Art-Toy movement, we may actually be entering an era when a work of art’s aura is not diminished but enhanced or even *created* by the media supporting it. – Douglas Rushkoff

Hard cover, 240 Pages, 10.5″ x 9″, Published by Baby Tattoo Books, Los Angeles

Brian McCarty

Brian McCarty (mccartyphotoworks.com, brianmccarty.com) is a Memphis-born photographer currently living and working in Los Angeles. McCarty studyed at the Parsons School of Design in New York City and the Benetton-supported creative research center Fabrica in Treviso, Italy. According to McCarty, “About the time I was supposed to grow up and stop playing with toys, they transitioned into subjects for my photography.” In the twenty years since, his toy photography has been exhibited internationally and seen via commissioned projects for clients such as Rockstar Games, Cartoon Network, MTV, and Kidrobot. In addition, McCarty spent nearly four years as in-house photographer at Mattel.

McCarty’s postmodern integration of concept and character has earned his photography a prominent position in the growing Urban Vinyl / Art-Toy movement. McCarty is featured in several books chronicling the artistic movement such as Vinyl Will Kill, Dot Dot Dash, and Toys: New Designs from the Art-Toy Revolution. McCarty’s work has earned notable praise from such places as Bizarre Magazine (July, 2010), L’Uomo Vogue (February, 2007), ABC World News(October 31st, 2006), FHM Germany (April, 2010), and XLR8R Magazine (January, 2009). In addition to his still photography work, McCarty recently co-created, produced, and art-directed an animated series based upon his photography that went into development for Nickelodeon.

Continuing to expand his work, Brian is currently developing a documentary film and photo essay on children’s experiences of war as expressed by principles of play and art therapy.

No Comments | Filed under Art, Book reading, Calendar Event, East Hollywood, Events, Free Event, Free booze, Hollywood, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz, Stuff We Like

8/6: Christopher Ulrich “Illuminator: The Royal Wedding” at La Luz de Jesus Gallery

Christopher Ulrich
“Illuminator: The Royal Wedding”

August 6 – 29, 2010
Reception for the artist: Friday, August 6, 2010, 8pm – 11pm
Print Release & Signing will precede, from 7-8 pm

La Luz de Jesus Gallery
4633 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90232
323-666-7667
info@laluzdejesus.com
www.laluzdejesus.com



Choice
Oil on canvas
36″ x 48″ in 44″ x 71.5″ frame

This is Christopher Ulrich’s second show with Billy Shire. The first was “The Fourth Enochian Key,” which debuted on June 13, 2009. This next chapter is a continuance of the “Demoneater” series recently catalogued and exhibited at the Grand Central Art Center Museum at CSUF. “Illuminator: The Royal Wedding” is the second chapter of three in Ulrich’s ongoing journey. It was on this very day 38 years ago that Ulrich was born.  Each piece in the series is designed to be its own portable temple marked and charged by the number 8. There are 16 paintings with 16 illustrated studies, 1 additional drawing, hidden, conceptual notes and 16 print editions that complete the show.

“Illuminator: The Royal Wedding” is a merger, a multi-faceted view of the crystal. Light and dark begin to dance within the circle. As the black continues it’s metamorphic process, the heat and flame of experience (and a time-crunching deadline) increase and the whitening begins. The white aspect of the alchemical process is the manifestation of a deep healing process. What happens is it gives birth to axioms.  These insights form the images, which create personalized alchemical recipes. Various figures from history -both real and imagined- have folded with cross-cultural counterparts significant to the artist. This manifested array marks the interior witnesses that revolve around the axis of the third part, that which has yet to be. All the works can be viewed simultaneously, as if they are all happening at the same time in different places and dimensions. Poetic conception is the moment in which a certain resonance rings out throughout the universe; dark beacons echoing across the depths of space and time. As the piper plays his hypnotic melodies so, too, the aspirant chooses his card. As the Promethean hare reveals nuclear magic to primates so, too, St. Margaret rises from the belly of the dragon. These moments capture a singular message. And that is an awakening with the white and black truly integrated. The red man and the white woman merge and not only give birth to the divine child but absorb its golden aura, which is the backdrop of the whole show. The entire universe spirals above, below, and within. The Royal Wedding heals all wounds, and establishes treaties amongst all houses; a rekindling of friendship; truce between enemies; the harvesting of fruits of labor; the newborn gifts between lovers; a new manifestation between father and son, god and warrior, mother, sister and friend. :Illuminator: The Royal Wedding” has revealed that there are no mistakes, no regrets and no lies. All parts of the greater whole bear witness that life is a magical process with “magic” defined as the transforming agent. The ability to make the unreal reality, to make impossibility possible, to bring a sense of inspiration, joy and insight is your birthright. We live in abundance, not scarcity. Everyone is invited to experience his or her own inner awakening by witnessing the call that the artist has truthfully labored to answer.


Grace
Graphite on strathmore
12″ x 17.5″ (plus 3″ matte & frame)
Also available as a proof edition lithograph  (1/16)


There is a great wedding occurring. The bride and groom could be myth and reality or science and religion. Seeming opposites come together. You have to choose: there are four paths with four different directions all going to the same place. All who attend this show will see various paths revealed.
The Universe will be drawn back to its singularity. There is no expansion without contraction. Each guest is invited to contribute and share their own gifts within the court. May the masks come off and the archetypes dance. Who knows what they will bring forth. Amen, Glory, Peace, and Triumph!

###

Contact the Gallery Director for availability and purchase info: (323) 666-7667

La Luz de Jesus Gallery is located in the Soap Plant/Wacko building, in Los Feliz at 4633 Hollywood Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90027. Gallery hours are Monday – Wednesday: 11am – 7pm, Thursday – Saturday: 11am – 9pm and Sunday 12-6pm.  For high resolution jpegs, interview requests and more information contact: Lee Joseph Publicity, leejemail@gmail.com, p (818) 848-269, f (818) 848-2699.

Comments Off | Filed under Art, Calendar Event, East Hollywood, Events, Free Event, Free booze, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz, Stuff We Like

7/17: The Bullet Mod Club turns Seven party in Hollywood

THE BULLET Mod, Soul and Garage club TURNS SEVEN YEARS OLD!

No cover charge and FREE CHAMPAGNE!

Saturday, July 17, 2010 at 9:00pm
Hollywood Studio Bar and Grill

6122 W Sunset
Los Angeles, CA (in Gower Gulch)

Bullet DJs laying down top Mod, Soul and Garage vinyl sounds!

Jackie Hoodoo
Lee Joseph
Dan Melendez
Dr. Ray
Jason Ringgold
Suzi Q

- Big dancefloor
- Booth seating
- Intelligent lighting fx
- live video mixing and projections
- Outside smoking/drinking area
- Food Service til 1030pm
- $5 Jack n Cokes / $3 Stellas before 1030pm
- FREE PARKING
- FREE ENTRY
- FREE CHAMPAGNE! (while supplies last)
- FREE ENTRY ALL NIGHT

HELP SPREAD THE WORD! INVITE YOUR FRIENDS TO THIS EVENT!
Click here for Facebook invite

Comments Off | Filed under DJ Lee, Dance Club, Drink Specials, Events, Free Event, Garage Music, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz, Mod, Soul

7/16: Kaboom! works by Picture Mechanics at La Luz

KABOOM! works by Picture Mechanics

July 14 – August 1, 2010

Opening reception, Wednesday, July 14, 6-11pm

La Luz de Jesus Gallery
4633 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90027
info@laluzdejesus.com
www.laluzdejesus.com

www.laluzdejesus.com

Preview the show here

Picture Mechanics is an artist’s collective consisting of 30 of the world’s most innovative illustrative talents. Their work is published in major publications, on book covers, ad campaigns, merchandise, civic projects and is regularly exhibited internationally. Over the years, Picture Mechanics has created group shows, products, books, and a web portal, picturemechanics.com. KABOOM! Is a collection of new work from the group. This is their first show in Los Angeles.

http://www.picturemechanics.com/index.php

Works by:
Michael Bartalos
Cathie Bleck
Juliette Borda
Calef Brown
Marc Burckhardt
Richard Downs
Ann Field
Vivienne Flesher
Geoffrey Grahn
Amy Guip
Eddie Guy
John Hersey
Jody Hewgill
Anita Kunz
Greg Mably
Mark Matcho
Adam McCauley
Joel Nakamura
Christian Northeast
Dan Page
Edel Rodriguez
Ward Schumaker
Jeffrey Smith
Katherine Streeter
Gary Taxali
Mark Ulriksen
Sam Weber
Noah Woods
——————-

Reception catering by: Silk Thai Cuisine

The show will be followed by days of events at ICON6 in L.A., more info here

Comments Off | Filed under Art, Calendar Event, East Hollywood, Events, Free Event, Free booze, Hollywood, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz, News, Stuff We Like

7/8: New Texture Book Night kicks off at La Luz de Jesus Gallery

Josh Alan Friedman
Black Cracker
Book Reading, Signing & Musical Performance

Sponsored by New Texture.
Special guest readings from authors Chris D. and Wyatt Doyle


Thursday, July 8, 2010
6-9 pm

La Luz de Jesus Gallery
4633 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90232
323-666-7667
info@laluzdejesus.com
www.laluzdejesus.com


New Texture is a Los Angeles-based arts collective-turned-publisher; our first three books will debut at in-person events across Los Angeles in July, 2010.

New Texture Nights kick off in Los Angeles this July, with live readings and performances by Josh Alan Friedman (Black Cracker), Chris D. (A Minute to Pray, A Second to Die) and Wyatt Doyle (Stop Requested). At most venues, Josh Alan – Czar of Atomic Acoustic Guitar – will play. (Listen to Josh Alan’s music here.)

About the books:

Black Cracker
, an autobiographical novel by Josh Alan Friedman
(Wyatt Doyle Books/New Texture, $19.95 paperback)

Josh Alan Friedman is the acclaimed author of Tell the Truth Until They Bleed and Tales of Times Square. But back in 1962, he was a first grader, at the start of a four-year odyssey as the only white boy in the last segregated school in New York. His autobiographical novel from Wyatt Doyle Books, Black Cracker, is a memoir of those years.

Challenging long-held preconceptions about race, class and character, Black Cracker boldly moves beyond mere “culture clash” into “multicultural steel-cage match.” A deeply personal, achingly funny book from a writer who has never shied from controversy, Black Cracker may be Josh Alan Friedman’s most provocative work yet.

With typically unflinching insight into the many shades of human nature, Josh Alan Friedman chronicles a childhood at the flashpoint of the Civil Rights era, spent with one foot in Long Island’s well-to-do suburbs and one in its now-forgotten poor Black shantytowns. As young Josh encounters an unforgettable cast of characters and befuddling situations ranging from bizarre to tragic to roaringly funny—and often all three—Friedman illuminates the myriad ways outside influences, both humane and insidious, color our judgment and attitudes, almost from the cradle. Black Cracker is the funniest book that will ever break your heart.

A Minute to Pray, A Second to Die: A Collection of Writing by Chris D.
(New Texture books, $24.95 paperback)

Admirers of Chris D.’s work as a musician (The Flesh Eaters, Divine Horsemen) may be unaware of his significant body of work as a poet, novelist and screenwriter. Encompassing 35 years of writing across a variety of genres and styles, A Minute to Pray, A Second to Die is a 500+ page career anthology from New Texture that corrects that oversight.

“Eclectic” can’t begin to define a compendium collecting all of his lyrics and poetry, surreal dream stories, and excerpts from several novels. Yet perhaps most revealing are the candidly autobiographical passages peppered throughout, providing personal and artistic context while nakedly detailing his struggles with personal obsessions. Sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll, sure; but also fevered poetry, religious damage, and rabid cinephilia.

A Minute to Pray, A Second to Die is an exhaustive collection of writing by one of the godfathers of Los Angeles punk rock. Deeply cathartic and intensely cinematic, writer Chris D.’s varied selections stake their claim squarely in the shadowlands between arthouse and grindhouse; 19th Century romanticism roughed up by James M. Cain, “cut up” by William S. Burroughs, and screened on a wall at a bordertown drive-in.

Stop Requested by Wyatt Doyle; illustrated by Stanley J. Zappa
(New Texture books, $14.95 paperback)

Public transportation is a great equalizer. No matter who you are or what circumstances put you there, you’re on the bus. And in Los Angeles—a city obsessed with status, image and the car you drive—when you’re on the bus, you’re really on the bus.

But just because it’s no place to meet movie stars doesn’t mean there’s any shortage of memorable characters among the lost, the delusional, the disenfranchised and the drunk. These aren’t merely people who ride the buses, they’re people you might never get to meet anywhere else.

Wyatt Doyle’s naked city stories of the other side of Tinseltown are shot through with comedy, tragedy, mystery, action, drama—even the occasional musical number. Profusely illustrated with surreal, biting images by Stanley J. Zappa, Stop Requested delivers street-level tales of bizarre encounters, faded dreams, mental illness and heavy traffic.

www.newtextureblog.blogspot.com

Comments Off | Filed under Book reading, East Hollywood, Free Event, Free booze, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz, Stuff We Like

7/2: So Ca surf artist Damian Fulton at La Luz de Jesus Gallery

Damian Fulton “Surfploytation
Robert Palacios “The Game of Life

July 2 – Aug 1, 2010
Reception for the artists, Friday July 2, 2010, 8pm – 11pm
La Luz de Jesus – Gallery I (Gallery II will be having a six-artist show- and there will be a free Independence Day BBQ in the back!)

4633 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles CA 90027
323-666-7667
info@laluzdejesus.com
www.laluzdejesus.com

Preview the entire shows here:

Damain Fulton

Robert Palacios

Damian Fulton  Surfploytation

Drop In

Damian Fulton is fascinated by the dichotomy and duality of Los Angeles seaside culture. The proximity of one of the world’s most diverse and congested cities to the Pacific coast provides fertile material for Fulton’s dark take on the California dream. Perhaps it’s in the water.

Surfploytation continues Fulton’s twisted ride down Pacific Coast Highway where Surf City is way more gritty than groovy. Car chases, girls with guns, noir nostalgia, a visual narrative that reads like conceptual art for a fictional surfploytation movie. For this show, experimentation with new materials native to his environment, balsa wood and fiberglass, skate decks, and surfboard fins, have this new work amped up to 11.

Fulton’s imaginative blend of storytelling, scrambled pop imagery, and painterly technique belie a respect for traditions of the past. Inject in his love of the ocean and urban experience and you have a distinctly original vision.

Fulton grew up land-locked in Orange County, California and painted his way through college at Cal State Fullerton doing custom art for vans, spontaneous wall murals at parties in the OC and self publishing Thrust, the Magazine of Narrative Sequential Art.

Out of college, Ocean Pacific hired him to paint surf posters and in 1982 commissioned him to create the official poster for the Op Pro Surf Contest.  His counterculture comic strips like “The Shred Brothers” running in Surfer Publications’ Snowboarder and the original extreme sports classic “Radical Rick” which rode for 15 years in BMX Plus! Magazine. Fulton has had careers working for Oglivy and Mather Advertising, Marvel Comics and has directed television spots for Pepsi, Mattel and Universal Interactive.

In 2005 on the 50th birthday of Disneyland, Fulton was commission to paint several prints commemorating the event. Fulton currently resides in Los Angeles, CA. www.damianfulton.com

_____________

Robert Palacios The Game of Life

Game of Chance

Drawing inspiration for his paintings from his childhood impressions and memories, life experiences and an American/ Latino heritage, Robert Palacios’ work is whimsical, playful and childlike with thoughtfully crafted characters. “Before beginning a painting, I sketch out my ideas. When the story is fully realized, I take those sketches and put them on canvas. At that point it’s a cerebral process; I’m thinking, concept-color-composition. When that part of my brain is satisfied, that’s when the mood comes into play and settles over me. Each painting is a vivid story of a world that I’m bringing to life. The viewer is introduced to a cast of characters and subplots often put into humorous situations that characterize as visual narratives of daily life, with a comical twist; the object being, to invite an interaction with the paintings” states Palacios

One of Palacios’ abiding inspirations is been a board game called that he played often as a child called “La Loteria” (the Mexican lottery game) which is played similarly to bingo but with a deck of cards. “The cards have numbers on them as well as wonderful, mystical, magical symbols and drawings. I still bring out that deck and peruse them for inspiration” states the artist who was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. www.robertpalacios.com

Comments Off | Filed under Art, Calendar Event, Events, Free Event, Free booze, Hollywood, La Luz de Jesus, Los Feliz, Silver Lake

A very peculiar looking logo on a vacuum cleaner spotted in Los Feliz

Last Thursday a few people migrated to El Chavo on the Los Feliz / Silver Lake border after Lina Lecaro’s “Los Angeles’s Best Dive Bars” book signing at La Luz de Jesus Gallery. On the way back to my car, parked on Sunset near the gallery, I was waiting for the light at Hillhurst to turn green when I looked in the window of a vacuum cleaner store next to the Good Luck Bar – a sparkly gold vacuum cleaner in the window caught my eye and upon further examination I noticed the machine’s  “Privilege” logo (interesting name for a vacuum cleaner) looked really familiar. Have a look for yourself. The Royal company should give Dionysus Records a vacuum!

Dionysus Records logo by Dave Stuckey was originally designed for the Big Sandy “Don’t Desert Me” single released way back when. This logo design has, and continues to appear on almost every Dionysus release since.

Comments Off | Filed under Dionysus Records, East Hollywood, Los Feliz, News

6/4: Fabulous Five Person art show in June at La Luz de Jesus Gallery!

Rick Araluce, JAW Cooper, Jessica Dalva, Bonni Reid, Krystopher Sapp

June 4 – 27, 2010
Reception for the artists, June 4th  8 – 11 PM

La Luz de Jesus Gallery
4633 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles CA 90027
323-666-7667
info@laluzdejesus.com
www.laluzdejesus.com

Rick Araluce  “The Poetry of Unreason

Rick Araluce makes miniature constructions. That means he makes everything himself by hand, including the boxes that contain the collections. He’s spent years inventing methods to fashion (from scratch) a turned table leg, door hardware,  a light bulb, a clock case, elaborate trim moulding, and whatever else is required to complete the illusions. Rick has created flutes less than an eighth of an inch in length, functioning miniature clocks measuring less than a quarter inch in diameter, and light switches that illuminate rooms seventeen miniature floors beneath them. No detail is sacrificed by the diminutive scale -even if those flourishes go largely unnoticed by the casual observer; however is nothing casual about the art of Rick Araluce, who makes his return to La Luz de Jesus after more than a decade abroad.

Rick Araluce website

________

JAW Cooper  “Tarnished

JAW Cooper’s series “Tarnished” explores the allure of imperfection. “I’ve created a world inhabited by the deformed, tainted, injured, and alien, where external imperfections are echos of internal struggle,  and beauty is undeniably in the eye of the beholder. Behind every flaw is a story waiting to be discovered,” states the artist. Cooper was born in England and grew up in Africa, Sweden, Ireland, various other locations throughout Europe, and California. She has always cultivated a deep curiosity for the natural world and is inspired by forms found in nature, curio cabinets, fashion photography, and nipples in general. Cooper currently lives and works as an illustrator and gallery artist in Los Angeles, California. The artist will be in attendance.

JAW Cooper website

________

Jessica Dalva  “Tie Strings Into Knots

Jessica Dalva’s new series of sculptures and oil paintings is only her second featured exhibition at La Luz de Jesus, but marks one of the most anxiously awaited series of new work from an emerging artist in recent memory. The centerpiece of “Tie Strings Into Knots” is an eerie, hanging chandelier that instills a sense of wandering for home, while illuminating a lost sense of virtue. Sometimes a lamp is just a lamp. But this is not one of those times. Dalva’s marionettes and mobiles inject their surroundings with instant nostalgia via a modern craft-esthetic rooted deeply in antiquity. The artist will be in attendance.

Jessica Dalva website

________
Bonni Reid “Gone West


“Gone West” was an expression used in the air force during wartime to describe a brother-in-arms who was shot down and killed in combat. When pilots gather, they often open meetings with a toast to those who have “gone west”. They face the west and drink to those who have died. West, in this case, refers to the place the sun sets and extinguishes; the metaphor is clear. This somehow softens the reality of death in a line of work rife with mortality. Bonni Reid has co-opted this expression ion titling her most recent body of paintings. Representing transformation, passage, and change, the title takes on an added, metaphysical tone, not unlike the Death card in a tarot deck. this exhibition features all new, never-before-seen work. Bonni Reid lives in the West End of Vancouver, British Columbia. When not brewing her own visual concoctions, she freelances as a color designer for animation productions including six seasons of Cartoon Network’s “Ed, Edd ‘n Eddy”.

Bonni Reid website

________

Krystopher Sapp  “Exoskeletal Engine


Krystopher Sapp’s mixed media assemblage is a sculptural study in discarded ephemery. His workshop is a literal hereafter for broken toys, liberated fixtures, and kippered insects. Rich dioramas of recontextualized doodads transform into a steampunk nirvana of Victorian futurism, both resplendant and refined, but with a secret tinge of horror within each dark dimension. La Luz de Jesus is proud to welcome back Krystopher Sapp for his third featured exhibition, for which he’s dialed back volume but escalated detail to produce a collection of ambitious perfection. The artist will be in attendance.

Krystopher Sapp website

Comments Off | Filed under Art, Calendar Event, East Hollywood, Events, Free Event, Free booze, Hollywood, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles area events, Los Feliz