ARTE: SEVENTH LETTER

Seventh Letter creates artwork for the City of Hope's Department of Pediatrics benefit. Happening today in LA at Known Gallery.

ARTE: Twitter Files PT 6 - @HuffPostLA #LARIOTS

Pretty much the story goes as you see it below! Last night at the Grammy Museum Huffington Post LA tweeted the remarks of a panel discussing the LA RIOTS 20 years later.  This all went down on the same night that Trayvon Martins family was in LA at the West Angeles Church along with Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Stevie Wonder and hundreds of others as a rally was held.

*You might remember last year we hosted Thurzday album/documentary debut. It was the T R S H (The Riot Starts Here) experience which was a concept project chronicling the events that led up to the LA RIOTS.  The album and documentary speak with people who were involved in and witnessed first hand all of the things that were bubbling around the time that led to the Rodney King beating and later the LA RIOTS. 

and my final tweet in reply was "@HuffPostLA @sashabronner @annaalmendrala glad you were tweeting tonight! Communication is key & has to stay open#LARIOTS #Trayvon"

ARTE: 2 YR RECAP

Photographer Eric Berry took some photos at our anniversary party! Special thanks to Shafiq Husayn and the Dove Society, Johnny Polygon and DJ Nattu for keeping the festivites bubbly!

 

ARTE: KNOW HOW SHOP LA

Knowhow Shop participated in our Earth Day Social with Broccoli City...they brought in the really awesome Garden Table! It was amazing having the table in the space and to learn about all the other things the guys do over at the shop. One of the photos below is a test shot of the Hammock class they are doing with SMMoA be sure to check that on Cinco de Mayo.

Knowhow Shop is a cooperative fabrication laboratory and design studio located in the Highland Park neighborhood of Los Angeles. We provide design services at all scales, as well as workspace and training for designers and enthusiasts working in furniture, art, and architectural fabrication. We provide one-on-one assistance and frequent classes on both traditional and digital fabrication open to all.

The Garden Table

ARTE: SURFING NORWEGIAN WATERS

This is seriously cool.

Protest takes you on a journey "From here to there" with 5 of their professional surfers, following them on their journey from their personal here to get there, whether it's a search for solitude and empty breaks, winning contests under pressure or simply searching for the perfect wave in imperfect locations.

Lars Musschoot travels his “here to there” through the waters from Norway to Tarifa, Spain, where he hunts down perfect surf with empty line-ups.

ARTE: Dove Society / Jimetta Rose

Jimetta Rose blessed us at the Be Beautiful Project opening by performing a few ballads, she came back with Dove Society to rock it for our 2 year anniversary/Pre Coachella kick off! We love Miss Jimetta Rose!

"my name is jimetta rose and i represent love"

ARTE: Fahamu Pecou

Atlanta based artist Fahamu Pecou is famous!  Taken from the artist website here is is statement about how and what he creates.  We included paintings of a series of magazine covers but Fahamu also works as a performance artist and a digital artist.  Having just successfully funding his kickstarter campaign for a new series If Heaven Had Heights, the artist is preparing for a show in NY and Paris to present this series.

ARTIST STATEMENT

My work can be viewed as meditations on contemporary popular culture. I began my career experimenting with practices employed in contemporary branding strategies, particularly as they pertained to hip-hop music. These experiments ultimately led me to question not only the stereotypes that drive consumerism, fame, celebrity-worship etc. but how an unspoken racial and cultural divide often influenced these factors.  I appear in my work not in an autobiographical sense, but as an allegory. My character becomes a stand-in to represent black masculinity and both the realities and fantasies projected from and onto black male bodies. I seek to challenge the expectations around black men and, to a larger extent, society in general. Adopting the traits typically associated with black men in hip hop, I extract them from their more popular associations and distort or exaggerate them by appropriating them within a fine art context. The end result is a parody on our obsession with celebrity, our exploitation of black masculinity and the divide that racial ignorance and stereotypes perpetuate. These ideas are expressed in paintings, videos and live performances. Each medium allows me to articulate various nuances around my themes and further distort the assumptions we tend to make about one another.

ARTE: WERE 2!!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US!

Its been 2 amazing years here in LA and we could not have done it with out you!!! We look forward to presenting more exhibitions, screenings, preformances, installations, lectures and artists talks through our on going dialogue between us and our audience.  We thank you and you should thank yourselves!

We also share this special day with Elizabeth Catlett, she would have been celebrating her 97th birthday today!

ARTE: ART BREAKS IS BACK

BRAVO MTV

The first video is Mickalene Thomas who opens at the Santa Monica Museum of Art tonight! And the second video is Rashad Newsome's SWAG...which I LOVE! Both are recent works by the artists.

ARTE: GIOGO GIRLS

WERE ALL IN ON THIS ONE!

GIOGO - get in or get out

ARTE: Caine's Cardboard Arcade

Caine is a 9 year old arcade developer in East LA! Designing and building his first arcade, he understands the first rule in being an entrepreneur with a tight budget...improvise!

Today is our big day! We are celebrating 2 years of exhibiting, introducing and educating LA on contemporary art and artists from all over the globe! The little genius Caine is a perfect example of why we love LA and will continue the art conversation we've started here.

ARTE: ALIVE INSIDE

You don't have to tell me about what the power of music really is.  Just see for yourself!

musicandmemory.org

ARTE: 2 YEARS!!!!!

We can't even believe 2 years have come and gone, we have had some amazing memorable experiences in the space and its all because of you LA! We owe you everything... Join us Thursday night as we celebrate turning 2 at our Pre-Coachalla ARTE PARTY! Featuring Shafiq Husayn and the Dove Society plus other special guests!  You don't want to miss this.

ARTE: Jon Genius defines James Baldwins NIGGER

On a recent trip to Europe photographer and director Jon Genius takes a look back at James Baldwin defining what being a Black person in America means and what a NIGGER is.  James Baldwin a prominent American writer, poet and playwright created works that dealt with social issues on race and identity.  He lived most of his later life in France where he died in 1987.

ARTE: Elizabeth Catlett we Honor your Legacy

An important figure in the art world passed April 2, 2012.  The amazing Elizabeth Catlett a sculptor, a painter, printmaker and a force against social injustices.

ARTE: THE BLACK VERNACULAR

NY photographer Dwayne Rodgers has created the site The Black Vernacular to honor the ancestors.

"The Black Vernacular is a living document of the deceased, conceived by Dwayne Rodgers and co-curated with friends and the social media community. If you would like to place a photograph of a family member on this communal altar please contact diggswayne1@gmail.com. Please read an interview about this project here." 

ARTE: Chenoa Maxwell #BBP

"I’m a voyeur.  I like to watch. Or rather, I love to observe. Take in and capture the human experience- moments. Beauty, pain, their complex nature, evokes in me a desire to capture life~ 

Making my subjects their own icon. Life fascinates me. Humans inspire. Seeing is my meditation"

Chenoa Maxwell - papillionart.org/chenoa-maxwell

ARTE: Kenturah Davis #BBP

The piece directly below, "mother mother" represents two generations of women in the artists family.  Kenturah's drawing technique is quite remarkable.  For the works below Kenturah creates a grid she than stamps a letter in each box and those letters by her design are used to create the image.  In the case for "mother mother" each stamped drawing was made using the "word mother".

"mother mother" diptych stamped drawing on paper, 2008 - SOLD

"Self Portrait" stamped drawing on paper, 2010 on view and for sale in the gallery

ARTE: Be Beautiful Project video recap

Love all the beautiful people that turned out and are posting things like this! THANK U to kingjaythree

ARTE: Fine Young Cannibals

New work from mixed media painter and collagist Terence Rosemore

Fine Young Cannibals - 24 x 18 mixed media collage on paper, 2011