viewfromaloft

July 2012 Mural Posts

"Peasant Saint" (2001)  Norma Montoya and Yamilette Montoya Duarte. Photo: Helen Ly

A round-up of my mural and street art posts at KCET.org. Bonus: Woody Guthrie talks Skid Row.

The Cardboard and Chalk of Downtown L.A.
 July 26, 2012: A series of recent pop-up street art, from chalk drawings to cardboard installations, has been designed to invoke political and social commentary.
 
A Mural Installation Isn't a Weapon of Mass Reproduction
July 24, 2012: Advocating for paint-only murals border on censorship and elitism, as well as contradict how David Siqueiros pushed technology until his passing in 1974.

'Peasant Saint' In Little Tokyo a Spiritual Mashup
July 16, 2012: A mural in Little Tokyo honors the Spanish, Jewish, American-Indian, and African-Americans that lived in the area before it became the center of Japanese American activity.

Mural Ordinance Grievances: What to Expect [UPDATED]
July 12, 2012: The mural ordinance hearing is currently under way. Here's a rundown of what to expect.

Guide: Downtown Art Walk, July 12, 2012
July 11, 2012: It's that time again.This checklist is a chance to take a look at what is happening in city core's art world.

Mural 'Replicas' Installed on the 101 Freeway
July 6, 2012: New mural replicas printed on recycled plastic and vinyl make the commute on the 101 freeway a little bit easier on the eyes.

ARTBOUND

From Lincoln Heights to Los Feliz: Woody Guthrie's Time in Los Angeles
July 17, 2012: Singer and songwriter Woody Guthrie, who would have been 100 years old last Saturday, found his writing voice in Los Angeles, specifically in Skid Row.

Guest Editorials

Muralist Judy Baca On L.A.'s Digital Divide
July 19, 2012: Muralists have embraced innovative technology to advance L.A.'s mural tradition -- but some paint-only advocates have been holding them back.

"Art of Miguel Covarrubias" opens at the California African Museum

 


 Another thing to like about J. Michael Walker's "City of Mind," now on display at the UCLA Hammer Museum, is that continues a vibrant illustrative map legacy from the Latin American avant garde movement. Miguel Covarrubias, a contemporary of Los Tres Grandes' Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, and David Alfaro Siqueiros, managed to deftly straddle fine and commercial art, including a series of mural size maps that defined people and place. Covarrubias is the subject of a new exhibition at the California African American Museum. Maria Lopez files a preview of the exhibition.

New Mural in Lincoln Heights

Haramoknga – Place Where People Gather being installed at Highland Park's GlenMary Archway. Photo by waltarrr.

OUTSIDE OF DOWNTOWN L.A: Cyclists and skateboarders bookend “Haramoknga – Place Where People Gather," a new mural at Highland Park's Historic Glen-Mary Archway created by Pola Lopez, Heriberto Luna and a team of 15 youth artists. The piece was painted on canvas, off-site, before being affixed on the 1903 archway, a former waiting station for the Pacific Electric Trolley red car Glenmary Sycamore Grove stop.The site itself was once a gathering spot for L.A.’s indigenous tribes ("Haramokngna" is Tongva for “The Place Where People Gather.")

People will gather for its unveiling Sunday, Nov. 21, at 2:30 pm.

 

“Haramoknga – Place Where People Gather" / Pola Lopez, Heriberto Luna / The GlenMary Archway (4671 Figueroa Blvd)

 

 

Saturday Night Gronk

Gronk Previews Sunday Studio from MOCA on Vimeo.

 

HE IS AHEAD OF TWO CULTURAL CURVES  by helping to establish Los Angeles's place on a national fine art platform, and daring to live in Downtown Los Angeles. Often introduced as an East L.A. artist, he is one of 140 artists being featured at MOCA's "The Artist's Museum." Also, this founding member of ASCO has also been a Downtown fixture since the 70s, roaming early galleries and punk clubs while holding court in a loft.

Not only that, Facebook posts are also an experiment in urban pop-abstracttion. Currently unfolding are his "THE COVETED NO-MOVIE AWARD."

Above, Gronk previews a day of leading museum goers in painting for a November 7th Sunday Studio event at MOCA Grand Avenue.

From 2008, Daniel Hernandez profiles ASCO.  [The Art Outlaws of East L.A.]

Garfield Auditorium To Be Named After "Stand and Deliver" Math Teacher

Hopefully by the time Garfield High School's Auditorium is rebuilt, someone will pen a new stage version of "Stand And Deliver" as a way to introduce Jaime Escalante Auditorium at Garfield High School.

Los Angeles Times reports on the LAUSD announcement that the "auditorium at the high school where famed math teacher Jaime Escalante taught for 15 years will be named in his honor."

Escalante began working at the East Los Angeles campus in 1974 and gained fame for his success in  teaching math to scores of inner city, largely minority students and helping them pass Advanced Placement calculus classes. He was portrayed by Edward James Olmos in the 1988 movie "Stand and Deliver" and was widely called the best teacher in America.

While there is a stage adaptation of "Stand And Deliver"  written by Robert Bella, Ramón Menéndez (who directed and co-wrote the 1988 film), and Tom Musca, this 1980s period piece is ready to be a musical. 

Work with me here.

An opening number with flute driven Bolivian folk music driving into post-pop-punk-Chicano rock; "Ganas" as a heavy-metal screech of empowerment,  "Absence of Value" as a ballad of identity of zero in a culture (A negative times a negative equals a positive); Jalisco maraiachis that play in the background of the family restaurant and swells to a declaration how tradition keeps a female student from learning calculus. How about comic relief with "Being Brown is a Science" or "This is East LA."

Think of how a pressure driven score can have us listen in to numbers and emotions in the minds of students during Advanced Placement exams.

It could work, and Gronk can design the set.

Jamie Escalante Obit:  Google.

Politics and Art Link

 

It was with a surprise to discover viewfromaloft is now assigned reading for a few University syallbi concentrating on Latino arts. I may have to backtrack and make sure every post about Chicano art is properly tagged (so to speak).

As it happens, I took some time over the weekend to shoot a few murals in Boyle Heights and see how the restored 1991 mural "Resurrection of the Green Planet" is holding up.

There was another reason to take fresh shots of the Ernesto de la Loza piece, located on César E. Chávez Avenue and Breed Street. The main image of the healer had a familiarity when I first saw it years ago. Now I see why. It is from photographer Graciela Iturbide's 1988 "Curacíon, Juchitán, Oaxaca."

Of course, it's Shepard Fairey's current ongoing battle with AP that has shown photography has its own copyright  protection.