HAPPY HOLIDAYS

several things i learned from collecting art, at 85 years: don't spend too much time partying / keep your nose to the grindstone / if you want a good lesson in history, go to museums, but if you want to see what is new, go to all the galleries and art fairs / put your career before your personal life, even if it means you are an unbalanced workaholic / spend 50 percent of your time networking / trade with artists / if you are an artist, survive. live in your studio. don't pay rent / collect art that cancels out the rest of the world / appreciate the new and that which you don't immediately understand / help the poor / allow yourself to change your mind whenever you feel like it, but be consistent and have integrity / do what you say / live simply and simplify your life/ devote yourself to only a few things / talent is what comes easiest to you / allow yourself to evolve and grow / change is good / stay active and in the discourse / kill your television / live proudly and with your feet on the ground / wishing all my readers a happy holiday and a wonderful new year in 2013.  peace & joy / fight on. yours truly, diana zlotnick

LIVING WITH ART

An installation in my upstairs office, which is an amalgamation of 

various works put together. This is what living with art means to me. 

ORLANDO AT McCARTHUR PARK

Meet Orlando, my collections registrar and ghostwriter, who is himself an artist and a filmmaker, standing in front of a George Herms sculpture, in LA's McArthur Park. George is a great inspiration to young artists like him. A long time ago, the city of Santa Monica forcibly removed some of George's beautiful public sculptures, so it is both a wonder and a privilege that there is still one to be seen. Unfortunately, there is no plaque near this sculpture, so you'd have to be an expert in West Coast art history to recognize it as a George Herms. Luckily, Orlando is, and he pointed me right to it. Someday I hope the City of LA will place a plaque on this special work, which is a testament to the history of west coast assemblage, nostalgia, and one of the great masters. 

JONI GORDON, 1975 - 2012

My friend and fellow-collector Joni Gordon, Director of Newspace Gallery, passed away on September 11, 2012. She was a collector, dealer, and supporter of emerging artists. Joni: we will miss you. Condolences to Monte, her spouse of 54 years. 

ATTENTION: EMERGING ARTISTS

Because this newsletter has always been at your service, and because I know it is hard to find support and space for your work today, I point you all to this recent list of the Top 20 Art Residencies in the US, published this year by Art Info. Deadlines are always coming up. Good luck and be productive. 

http://www.artinfo.com/news/story/763138/a-guide-to-20-top-artist-residencies-and-retreats-across-the-united-states

On that note, I wanted to mention something I learned about Agnes Martin, who I think is an artist whose self-discipline and devotion is a great example for artists working in their studios today. Agnes Martin worked tirelessly in her studio, taking breaks to walk to the park, where she recollected her thoughts, wrote, and ate lunch, only to return to her studio to work again. She was adamant about being able to work alone in her studio, and without help. The dimensions of her work were determined by her own size and strength as a woman. She did not paint on canvases that were too large or too heavy for her to carry and move on her own. As she became older, her painting surfaces became smaller and she drew on graph paper the size of a notebook. 

Michael Ned Holte mentioned this. Congratulations, Michael: I just heard you were chosen as a curator for the upcoming LA Biennial at the Hammer Museum, in 2014. I am glad there is hope for experimental artists getting their work out there, and I know you are devoted to critical, yet kooky work.

NoTA - Fall 2012

Please note: The newsletter is now a quarterly publication that is distributed via post-mail and in person, and is also consistently available online on this blog, with additional content. Readers: feel free to email me with comments, questions, and your own news. See you at the galleries... 

THE STATE OF AFFAIRS IN THE CURRENT L.A. ART WORLD

An extreme homogeneity in the various "departments" of the art world have revealed themselves. For our purposes, let us divide these "departments" into five categories: collectors, museums, curators, galleries, and artists. Together these institutions are facing radical shifts that are changing how art is understood. However, in dire economic times like ours the art that is being recognized and touted as art is safe, easily understood, generally accessible, and already contextualized. 

Accessible art forms have predominated in the art world. Accessible work is consistently funded and institutionally encouraged precisely because it is the most easily understood, consumed, and monetized by a growing "art industry." The museum has always been in the service of history, and thus, stuck in the past. Both the Hammer and MOCA have come under scrutiny for changing the ways the museum operates, and both make excellent case studies for the shifts we shall see take shape in the coming decade. 

For a more definitive narrative of the happenings in the LA art world and the politics surrounding them, read "American Idol Meets the Museum," By Zachary Pincus-Roth in the LA Weekly (http://www.laweekly.com/2012-08-23/news/made-in-la-hammer-mohn-award/), as well as reporting by Catherine Wagley, who has a real acute eye for art-writing, reportage, and has her hand on the pulse of the LA art scene.  Also follow stories about MOCA and Eli Broad as written by Chris Boehm in the LA Times. On a final note, it would be interesting to have Los Angeles' curators, museum directors, and the art community come together to speak about the current state of affairs in an open forum. It is difficult to find transparency amidst all this gossip and conjecture. Yours truly, not excluded, of course.

The question this brings up is: How does this affect the experimental art space? A current trend in art-making has shown me that it matters less what the artist is doing and more about how every artist creates his/her own process. The emphasis is on process rather than product. The artist’s process is oftentimes more interesting than the object produced, and therefore take precedence over the material ends.  

Take Teeny-Tiny Woman, Amanda Ross Ho's exhibition currently showing at MOCA-PDC through Oct. 7,  which conflates her studio with the exhibition space. Ross-Ho integrates design elements within her specific exhibition practice in way that refutes their design "status." Ross-Ho is dealing with the notion of craft-- its gendered politic-- and its relationship to design and ornament by making sweeping conceptual moves by questioning the relationship between an exhibition wall and a studio wall, finding a new use for jewelry in art, and bridging design and concept. The punctual detail of the show is a built-in banister, which (I imagine) was painted yellow to match her other sculptures, with ribbons strewn from it similarly. This design element resonates so well with the rest of the show, and changes what might initially be considered a prosaic detail into a significant conceptual gesture, but only because Ross-Ho has created a platform upon which we can begin to understand the significance of craftwork. 

MOCA-PDC. 8687 Melrose Ave. WeHo. (310) 657-0800 Open T-F 11-5, S-S 11-6.

Here is a list of (fairly new) great experimental spaces in L.A.: 

The marquis at the Finley Gallery. Simple and subdued. 

The Finley Gallery. Andrea Longacre-White and Brendan Fowler show a "support" structure, floating beautifully in a stairwell, of this new converted pop-up space. Upon the "wall," Longacre-White's photograph of a glitchy iPad screen, reveals a webcast image of the stairwell itself. Also in the building, a reflective signage piece by respected artist Eli Langer, whose paintings were once put on trial for obscenity in Toronto. 4627 Finley Ave. Los Feliz. Irregular hours. www.thefinleygallery.com

The desk at Commonwealth&Council. Young Chung, over the shoulder, on right, with artists. 

Commonwealth&Council. Young Chung's space, which emerged from his house two years ago, serves as residency, studio spaces, and galleries for emerging artists from LA and abroad, all housed in one place! Showing until mid-September: Orlando Tirado and Margaret Haines' Billy+Jean show. Jesse Tiger (their adopted Billy the Kid babe) DJ'd at their opening and the show was the No. 1 "artsy thing to do” by  Catherine Wagley. Currently: Danielle Dean and Shaga Ariannia's "Part-time Lover." 3306 7th St. Koreatown. Open T-Sun 12-6. www.commonwealthandcouncil.com

Darin Klein and Friends. 'Zines and independently curated events. Various venues. Shows TBD. 

Otherwild. Rachel Berks and Marisa Suarez-Orozco opened this Hollywood design studio and gallery in June. Monthly events. 6727 7/8 Hollywood Blvd. Hollywood. Open Wed-Sun. 11-7. www.otherwild.com

Machine Project. Who knows what Mark Allen has up his sleeve this month, but it's sure to never have been done before. Early September: Spanish ham. 1200-D N. Alvarado St. Echo Park. Open for events and by appointment. Weekends 12-5. (213) 483-8761 www.machineproject.com

Artist Curated Projects. Conceived by Eve Fowler and Lucas Michael, ACP invites an artist to curate a show, a project started several years ago as an informal salon. This month: Piru Canyon artist’s “bad drawings” are not bad at all... Alex Becerra: It's Not A Normal Office Job. Sept. 8-30. 5152 La Vista Court East Hollywood. Call for hours: (323) 333-7351 www.artistcuratedprojects.com

EXHIBITION NEWS 

Regen Projects has relocated to 6750 Santa Monica Blvd., on Highland and Santa Monica, the intersection most well-known for Hollywood's seedy underbelly and “tranny donut stop.” Regen joins Rubinstein Gallery and Redling Fine Arts. Regen Projects opens its new doors on Sept. 22, with a  group show. In Chinatown: Charlie James moves two doors down to where Javier Peres once stood. The Distance Plan, a heady show about climate change in an informal setting, at Favorite Goods, through Oct. 6. 936 1/2 Chung King Rd. Chinatown. Call for hours: (323) 488 FAVS. www.favoritegoods.com

The city of LA is promoting the attendance of art events in your own neighborhood, during the second Carmageddon, scheduled for Sept. 29-30, 2012. For details, see: www.latimes.com/culturemonster

Prism of Reality, a new art publication edited by Travis Diehl, artist and contributor to Artforum, launches Sept. 15, 4-7. 510 Bernard St. Chinatown. Copies of its first issue also for sale at: www.prismofreality.com. Also: look out for Andy Robert's beautiful lunar calendars (forthcoming), and Margaret Haines' self-published book Coco & Love With Stranger, available through New Byzantium Press. www.newbyzantium.com

Melodie Mousset: Impulsive Control. Sept. 8- Oct. 20. This young artist is well-known for putting herself on a potter's wheel and using her head as a platform upon which ceramic vessels are created, sneaking into abandoned pools for the occasional skinny-dip, and a perfect French accent. Susanne Vielmetter. 6006 W. Washington Blvd. Culver City. T-Sat 11-6. (310) 837-2117

Thomas Lawson: In The Shadow of the Beast. Sept. 8-Oct. 20. The work looks better when it breathes on big, white walls and one can see each painting at a time. David Kordansky. 3143 S. La Cienega Blvd. #A Culver City. T-Sat. 11-6. (310) 558-3030

Phyllis Green and Bessie Kunath: Odd Ghosts and Unlikely Dancers. through Sept. 30. Weekend. 4634 Hollywood Blvd. East Hollywood. Sat-Sun. 11-6.  www.weekendspace.com 

Doug Harvey in Curatorial Exchange, an experiment in art-making and curatorial practice, through Oct. 20.  Irvine Fine Arts Center. 14321 Yale Ave. Irvine. M-Th 10-9, F 10-5, Sat. 9-5. (949)724-6880.

LA Art Platform opens Sept 28 and runs until Sept. 30, 2012 at the Santa Monica Barker Hangar. http://www.artplatform-losangeles.com

MNH during a studio visit. 

Congratulations Michael Ned Holte, art critic and instructor at CalArts, for being chosen as one of the curators for the Hammer Museum's next L.A. Biennial. 

NoTA Summer 2012

Since 1972, this Newsletter has been written in the service of artists. At the time, it had become clear that something like it was needed by the Los Angeles art community. Not to mention I was taking so many phone calls and writing so many letters (on the typewriter, mind you), I figured that writing a newsletter would be the easiest way to reach as many people as possible. Over the years, I mailed it out to those that subscribed to it, handed it out “propaganda style” in person (I used to carry them around in a lunchbox). The Newsletter became a staple in the LA art scene, helping artists get attention, publicizing events, and also supporting those artists I had begun collecting in the 1960s. 

For this issue, I get back to the root of the Newsletter and write directly to artists working today. 

First, I want to stress the importance of discipline and labor. Agnes Martin went to her studio, did her work, went to the park to relax, and then went back to the studio and did her work again. It is important for artists today to remember this kind of discipline and stick to it.

I realize things have changed since the 1960s, a decade I always said was the golden age of art. To be a working artist today, you must plot out at least 100 hours of work per week, every week, for work. If you are working-class that would include a 9-5 job, plus time for networking and being in the studio. When you think about that, it makes you realize just how hard life is for a working artist. 

My current thought about LA artists wanting to be superstars is that you either have it, or you don't. Artists want to be the next art-stars and curators are always trying to find the new one so they can feel like they are stars too. At the LA Biennial, viewers are made to vote for a winner. At MOCA, things seem very confused. The west coast art terrain is a different beast. Los Angeles, though sometimes frivolous, is also associated with the rigors of conceptual art, minimalism, and land art. 

It seems that these days, everyone wants to be an artist. The academies are over-populated with young people determined to be artists, even though that may not necessarily come natural to them. Celebrities insist they too are artists. The “Rebel” show closed. Another nouveau-riche gallery “nestled in the luxurious streets of Beverly Hills” opened. And so it goes...  In the 1980s and 90s, the Young British Artists as well as other “art stars” made art into a lucrative industry. This erased the utopic and revolutionary promise of art-making from before, and saturated the art scene with LOTS and LOTS of work, which has altogether confused curators, gallerists, and collectors alike.

The history of the art-star begins, perhaps, with Andy Warhol. But Andy suffered the way an emerging artist suffers. He started off as an illustrator of shoes for women’s magazines and as a window dresser for the department stores. Then, he found himself through those illustrations. His artistic practice, which included those around him, created a structure of exploitation that surged on the desire to become famous: the Factory. And that became a large part of the artwork, which influenced much of how contemporary art and performance thinks of itself. It seems that most artists working today dream of art-stardom because that is how success is measured, now more than ever. 

But when it comes to art talent-- and please excuse my simple language--the cream will always rise to the top. And even then, only some of the cream rises... no matter what anybody does. But this is just my opinion, it's not gospel.

Finally, to those of you who were included in Pacific Standard Time: congratulations, you could very well consider yourself a master. But if you think that means you can sit and be cool, you may eventually be forgotten. You need to find new venues for your continued self-expression. For example, Cardwell-Jimmerson is doing a great job exposing 1960s artists to this generation, and Pacific Standard Time made its splash (came and went... to Germany actually). It was great to see this work, but (borrowing Susan Muchnic's words): “Will we continue to see this work?”

Caren Colvin: What are you up to? 

Simone Gad: Are you here or in New York? 

Adrian de la Peña: I owe you a telephone call. 

Mel Edwards: Great to see your work at Michael Benevento, on Sunset Blvd, as part of the "Steel Life" group show. Congratulations on your upcoming show at Alexander Gray Associates, NYC. 

Howard Finster: Are you still alive? 

Kim Dingle: You made great conceptual work about smog. I still have the T-shirt. 

Jamie Martin: I have one of your works and I'd like to hear from you. 

David McDonald: I have a lot of time thinking about your work because you created an aesthetic out of error. You compose this symphony of action and line (not so much color, now that I think about it...), and form where things might be askew or off balance, a nail on one side, but not the other, a scratch here and there, a perfect smooth surface suddenly... Congratulations on the Santa Monica Artist Fellowship. 

Mary Mendoza: I think you are the prettiest pop artist around. 

Kaz Oshiro: I love having your washer and dryer. It still fools people who walk in the door. 

John Peterson: Are you doing art or are you strictly real estate?

Mindy Shapero: Though many try to imitate, there is no one else out there like you. I can't wait to hang your drawing again.

Doug Meyer: I look at your work A LOT. 

Robert Williams: I wish I had one of your paintings 

Aaron Wrinkle: I owe you a telephone call and I believe in your work. 

Andy Robert: I have been thinking about your work: by cutting out the spots from the dalmatians it neutralizes the thing, makes a rhythm that would otherwise not be there had the spots remained black. By taking the black out, you are cutting out little pieces of yourself, and it is both beautiful and conceptual. Call me when you can. 

To all other artists: I am interested in art that can move, or can be experienced in many different ways, in addition to the fact that I am able to walk around it. If your work is like this, please contact me. 

NEWS AND OTHER THINGS TO KNOW

Please note my new blog address: www.notalosangeles.blogspot.com / LouAnne Greenwald has moved to Washington D.C. / Channa Horwitz is soon to be showing with Guy de Cointet in Germany. / Daniel LaRue Johnson, collected by me on La Cienega, was in the PST shows. / Ken Price died in February. / Doug Harvey had a show at Jancar Gallery / Orlando and Margaret Margaret’s “Billy and Jean” show at Commonwealth&Council opens August 11 / Documenta in Kassel, now / Llyn Foulkes‘ retrospective at the Hammer, in 2013

ADVANCED STYLE BLOG

I just discovered this great blog about women's fashion, after reaching 60. Selections from the blog, titled Advanced Style, were published in a book by the same name, and it's author, Ari Seth Cohen, is currently at work on a documentary about the fabulous women he has photographed on the streets of Paris, London, and New York. 


Ari: if you are ever in Los Angeles, I would like to meet you.


You can view Ari's blog here: http://advancedstyle.blogspot.com/

SPRING 2012

Throughout my life I have practiced the art of reading gestures and studying the “signs of the times.” For example, I like to watch television on mute and study the gestures and body language of the people talking. One can find out what kind of person someone is just by paying attention to the shape of their lips when they speak. I have noticed, for example, that when people are being sincere they speak using the center of their mouth, and when they are not, they speak through the sides of their mouths:

I also like to rip out interesting and strange headlines from the paper, like these: 

I have also started to document my outfits: 

Alive, well, always looking for the new. 

ART TO LOOK FORWARD TO: 

Made in LA, the first biennial of LA-based artists, will be at the Hammer June 2-Sept. 2, 2012. The show will include emerging artists like Dan Finsel, Math Bass, and Carlos Ontiveiros, and well-seasoned artists, such as Channa Horwitz and Morgan Fisher, to name but a  few. Accompanying this show will be the Venice Beach Biennale, curated by Ali Subotnick, a tongue-in-cheek informal festival or performances and art booths in Venice Beach. 

Artists Orlando Tirado and Margaret Valery playing Billy the Kidd and Jean Harlow in an adaptation of Michael McClure’s controversial play “The Beard.” The duo has been making art as the two characters for a process-oriented “scrapbook” installation at Commonwealth&Council in July 2012. Expect blonde hair on blue velvet, a raked stage, a traditional quilt made entirely out of plastic wrappers, and questions about who exactly is the ‘real you’ and the ‘real me.’ 

Commonwealth&Council. 3006 W. 7th Street #220, Koreatown. W-S 12-6, and by appointment: 213-703-9077.

Llyn Foulkes will be part of Documenta 13, in Kassel, Germany this summer, and the Hammer Museum is planning a retrospective of his work in 2013, which may travel in the US and abroad.

The Getty Center will have a survey exhibition of DYN, an art journal by Wolfgang Paalen, the first artist to use fumage in surrealism (the use of candle smoke to automatically write on paper), whose theory and art practice was highly influential to the abstract expressionist movement. DYN was first published in 1942 in Mexico City, had six issues, and was distributed throughout Europe and the US. The show is a rare opportunity to read the journal, which is a very expensive printed volume that is not readily available in most art libraries, and signifies the transition between surrealism and abstract expressionism. Also at the Getty, opening April 3, Herb Ritts: LA Style and Portraits of Renown: Photography and the Cult of Celebrity, two photography exhibitions that are about LA culture. 

The Getty Center. 1200 Getty Center Drive. Westwood. 310-440-7320. T-S 10-5:30, Sat. open until 9 pm. Free. 

CURRENT SHOWS TO SEE:

Greetings from LA: Art and Publics 1945-1980, the Getty’s Pacific Standard Time exhibition travels to the Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin. March 15-June 10, 2012. The historicizing project continues across the Atlantic and it looks like Lalaland is on the map. Even though I don’t get out much, my art does most of my traveling (23 people that I pioneered early on are in the Berlin show!). 

LA RAW: Abject Expressionism in LA 1945-1980 at the Pasadena Museum of California Art. Jan. 21- May 20, 2012. Considers a trend in post-war West Coast existentialism, including works by Rico LeBrun and Paul McCarthy. 

PMoCA. 490 E. Union Street. Pasadena. W-Sun. 12-5. Admission: $7 adults, $5 students & seniors; free first Friday

Leigh Ledare, the artist, named after actress Vivian Leigh, stretches the possibilities
of the basic photographic medium by using risk and experiment. 

Leigh Ledare at The Box. March 17-April 21, 2012. Ledare plays with the notion of intimacy by granting it freedom. 

The Box Gallery. 805 Traction Ave. Dwntwn LA. W-F 12-6. 

Elad Lassry at David Kordansky. March 23-May 26, 2012. A mediation between picture, object, and the frame. 

David Kordansky Gallery. 3143 S. La Cienega Blvd. Unit A. Culver City. T-S 12-6. 323-222-1482.

It Happened at Pomona (Part III) focuses on the influence of Mowry Baden, 1969-1973, at the Pomona College Museum of Art. Mar. 10-May 13, 2012. T-Sun. 12-5

Pomona. 550 N College Ave. Claremont. 909-621-8000

Ben Sakoguchi: Paintings 1966-Present, at Cardwell-Jimmerson Gallery.  March 10-April 21, 2012. Ben was shown at Ceeje Gallery circa 1964, along with Ed Carillo and Charles Garabedian. Barbara Rose was a big fan of his work, and I collected it. Ben has been working ever since and has evolved his anti-establishment aesthetic into diaries of the US, past and present, still relevant and alive. Cardwell-Jimmerson continues to show yet to be evaluated masters from the 1960s and 1970s, some who are in my collection, like Lloyd Hamrol, Ben Sakoguchi, Michael Olodort, and Gabe Kohn (David McKee of McKee Gallery in NYC said Gabe Kohn is to wood like David Smith is to metal). I have kept their works for over 50 years because their energy kept speaking to me over the years, and they remain as alive as when I first collected them.

Cardwell-Jimmerson Gallery. 8568 Washington Blvd. Culver City. T-S 11-6 and by appointment: 310-815-1100. 

FURTHER NOTES AND OTHER NEWS: 

Aaron Wrinkle is a site-specific neo-conceptualist. His work is a testament to the emergence of a new kind of artist in the postmodern practice of art as it exists today. He integrates his ideas with the collection-- creating a sculpture or plinth, for example-- and presents this intervention as art. Here is a link to one of Aaron’s recent projects, in which he invites artists to write something about a single image. 

I went to see the Berman-Heinecken show at the Armory in Pasadena, just before it closed. Most often, I prefer solo shows because it allows me to focus on the work of a single artist, to truly attempt to understand their process. For that reason, in respects to the Berman-Heinecken show, I would have presented each artist's work in separate rooms, so as to highlight each artist's singularity. Then, perhaps, if necessary I would have created a third room which might include their work juxtaposed. I found the show merely comparative, and therefore, a dis-service to the work. Additionally, I discovered that Wallace Berman really needs an intimate space to be experienced. As I realized this, I remembered his studio, which was about 200 square feet, and crowded. I thought maybe there is a correlation between the size of the space in which a work is created and the size of the space it is eventually presented. The organization of the Armory did not lend itself to the intimacy needed for the work, and the Berman verifaxes were dwarfed by the largeness of the walls. There was one wall in particular, painted red, on which three small collages were shown. The drama of the red was a shock to the work, so much so that the design of the exhibition over-powered the work itself. The show is now closed. The catalog they created is superb. 

Las Cienegas Projects officially closed; it was one of the best art galleries in LA. 

Luis de Jesus Gallery moved to the Culver City neighborhood. Currently at Luis de Jesus, Hugo Croswaithe’s Tijuanerias, an installation and drawings inspired by everyday life, poetics, and desmadre south of the border.

Luis de Jesus. 2685 South La Cienega Blvd. Culver City.  T-S 10-6 and by appointment:  310-838-6000.

If you are looking for a great artist that is doing new things with the found object, look to Pablo Rasgado, who replicates the found object-- such as a door or a wall-- by using the original materials on canvas.

An example of Pablo Rasgado’s canvases.

Michael Maloney has a good eye.

At Marc Selwyn, most of Kristen Morgan's pieces initially looked like old-fashioned toys, but upon closer look, they are the artist's own ceramic constructions, painted meticulously to create a new brand of appropriation and assemblage that is not necessarily stuck in the 1960s. 

Marc Selwyn Fine Art. 6222 Wilshire Blvd # 101 Los Angeles. T-S 11-6 and by appointment: 323-933-991

I went to see David McDonald's self portrait sculptures at Carter and Citizen; they are totally individualistic and highly inventive, made of materials that are rough and ready (cement, paint, bricks). Holly Meyer writes, "The work has a quality of tenderness [...} extended here in a new direction: toward a more explicit exploration of the human condition." Carter and Citizen is currently showing Eventide: Leon Benn and Whitney Hubbs. 

Carter and Citizen Gallery. 2648 La Cienega Ave. Culver City. T-S 11-6 and by appointment: 213-359-2504. 

The composition of the gallery space at Perpetual Conceptual, which closes this weekend, on April 21, 2012.

Corazon del Sol and LAND (Los Angeles Nomadic Division) present Perpetual Conceptual: Echoes of Eugenia Butler, a multi-part exhibition about the conceptual projects at the cutting-edge Eugenia Butler Gallery, 1968-1971. A woman ahead of her time, Eugenia Butler was a fearless artist, collector, and gallerist who supported the work of many avant-garde conceptualists, such as Eric Orr, George Miller, Gary Lee Byars, and Dieter Roth. Her interventions with art discourse were also conceptual art, like her project "The Kitchen Table," a series of art discussions where many new ideas were born. She was also infamous for Dieter Roth's cheese installation, which consisted of many suitcases filled with different cheeses, each suitcase to be open daily throughout the run of the show. The cheese eventually rotted (maggots emerging from inside the suitcases!), made the gallery walls expand, and was shut down early by the health department. I was there. Every Saturday, a picnic was hosted inside the gallery, and the run of the show concluded with a live seance by artist Matt Greene, along with an art bartering event at Barney’s Beanery, and other events. Corazon del Sol and LAND have really put together a conceptually strong series of exhibitions with a strong core.  

Perpetual Conceptual. 8126-8132 Santa Monica Blvd. WeHo. W-S 12-6 and by appointment: 646-620-8289.

Dieter Roth’s suitcases full of cheese, ca. 1970,
at the Eugenia Butler Gallery, led to the shut-down
of the gallery by the LA health department.

… Speaking of women ahead of their time, Betty Asher's papers were donated by Michael Asher to the Getty Research Institute (GRI). To make an appointment to view and handle the papers, contact the librarians at the GRI.

GRI. 1200 Getty Center Drive Ste. 100. Westwood. 310-440-7390, M-F 930-5 (Special Collections reading hours).

Being straight, my contact with gender-queer, transgender, and gay people is somewhat limited.  Despite my little experience, I think James Gobel, who recently showed his felt paintings of “bears” at Steve Turner, is a painter who should be considered seriously. 

Steve Turner Contemporary. 6026 Wilshire Boulevard. Los Angeles. 323-931-3721. T-S 11-6 and by appointment. 

Check out: Works by artists Melissa Lambert, Ed Ruscha, George Herms, Raymond Pettibon, and others at Beyond Baroque Art for Music’s Sake Auction. May 6, 2012. 2 pm. 

Beyond Baroque. 681 Venice Blvd. Venice. 310-822 3006. More information at www.beyondbaroque.org

The Eli Broad Museum. 'Nuff said. I heard that once the Broad Museum opens, MOCA will fall under its umbrella, i.e. when visitors buy admission to the Broad, they will be allowed entrance at MOCA's two locations. For details about the financial problems facing MOCA and Eli Broad's involvement in saving the institution, read Mike Boehm's "MOCA exits put spotlight on finances," in the LA Times, March 2, 2012. MOCA just recently published a press release reacting to Boehm’s article that claims MOCA is not in financial strife and is on the up and up.