Great God Pan

It guy Darin Klein has curated a handsome show entitled The Rainbow Goblins that opens this Thursday in Hollywood.

"In Count Ul de Rico’s 1978 children’s book The Rainbow Goblins, the symbolism of the plight of the rainbow becomes a parable for corporate greed, ecological degradation and cultural commodification," Klein tells us. "Inspired by this modern fairytale, where a meadow of wildflowers use their collective power to defeat the cruel plot of the eponymous goblins, this group exhibition re-imagines the rainbow as a celebration of the diversity and individuality of the artistic community and highlights the power of that voice to call for and instigate resistance."

May 31 – July 15, 2007
Reception May 31, 6-9pm
With DJ Jeff Stallings from San Francisco
and a performance by mecca vazie andrews

Advocate Gallery
1125 N. McCadden Place
Los Angeles, Calif. 90038

Featuring the work of Adam J. Ansell, Erik Bluhm, BODEGA VENDETTA & PRVT DNCR, Nao Bustamante, Young Chung, Roy Colmer, Zackary Drucker, David Larsen, Matt Lipps, Jason Mecier, Lucas Michael, Max Miller, Amir Nikrava, Coco Peru, Terri Phillips, Aaron Plant, Steven Reigns, robbinschilds & A.L. Steiner, Christopher Russell, Ami Tallman, Jo-ey Tang, Aiyana Udessen, and Jim Winters.

Also at the Advocate Gallery, Landscapes by our friends from down San Diego way, Julia Dzwonkonski and Kye Potter.

“We've been painting greyscale rainbows into amateur landscape paintings for six years. We always try to paint the rainbow so that it compliments the scene and brings out the color and the life in these paintings.”

Posted by Erik at 01:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Semiotext(e) presents: Gilles Deleuze “ from A to Z. ”

From A to Z is a series of 24 screenings based on a filmed interview between Gilles Deleuze and Claire Parnet. Each screening shows one letter from the 8 hour long interview and groups other films around each theme presented by Deleuze, from "A as in Animal" to "Z as in Zigzag."

Sunday, May 27th, 2007, 8:30 pm at the Mandrake Bar 2692 S. La Cienega Blvd. Los Angeles.

Screening Number Seven: "G as in Gauche [Left]" will feature Pierre André Boutang: Gilles Deleuze/Claire Parnet: From A to Z: “G as in Gauche (1988), Alain Resnais: Guernica (1950), Harry Smith: Early Abstractions 7 (1957), Le Corbusier; Iannis Xenakis; Edgard Varèse: Poème électronique (1958), Stan Brakhage: Black Ice (1994), Don Como: Aliens From Spaceship Earth [Excerpt on Father Yod and the Source Family] (1977), Amon Düül II: All The Years Round (1975), and Pierre Clementi: Visa de Censure X (1967-1975)

Poster by me!

Posted by Erik at 09:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Come on by the Mandrake this Thursday where your bros Flo and Erik will be playing records of everything from the Misty Wizards and Mellow Candle to Popol Vuh and October Country. If you dig cult worship, earth music, medieval europop and water brother vibes from the '60s and '70s, then let it happen! Plus, vintage longhair surf flix fer yer eyeballs!

Thursday May 24th from 9ish PM 'till Midnight
Mandrake Bar
2692 S. La Cienega Blvd. Los Angeles, Calif. 90034
between Venice Blvd. and Washington Blvd.

Posted by Erik at 02:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There are a lot of emails going around complaining about the rising cost of gas. People are suggesting that not buying gas on certain days or not patronizing certain gas companies will lower the prices. Maybe it will, but not for long. The issue is not that gas is too expensive. The issue is that we're all too reliant on something that is both limited and destructive. The sooner we address our dependence and put quality of life before convenience, the sooner we'll be free from the whims of corporations like these. Gas prices will continue to rise as supplies dwindle and demand increases. At some point we'll have to awaken to the fact that 600 million cars burning oil is a folly we cannot afford. Then maybe people will start taking public transportation, bicycling or walking to work. Maybe someone will even seriously start developing and marketing engines that run on something that doesn't poison the air when it burns. Of course all this change will not happen over night. For now, we can try to carpool more, walk to places in your neighborhood, run errands with friends. Let's drive alone only when there's no other option. Stopping buying the oil companies' product IS the right idea, but not just because it's too expensive, but because it's bad for the earth, it's bad for you, and it's going to be bad for your children and theirs.

For a little background on what it "used to be like" in Los Angeles, and what we might want to aim for again, read up on the city's once comprehensive public transportation system. Whether it was dismantled due to issues of cost, or the meddling of GM is irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that L.A.'s streetcars were replaced by a freeway and bus "system" which has proven to be inefficient, noisy, and extremely polluting.

Posted by Erik at 05:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not since that bearded doomsday arctic seal swam up the Tama River back in 2003 has Tokyo been so abuzz with excitement. This month's Rocket magazine, which is conventiently tucked inside the Japanese version of Tokion, features New Energy shape art right on the cover. Inside is an attractive four-page spread on the Movement, replete with some of my collages as well as dynamic movement capturings of the West Coast Encounter Group and special commentary from Kaisle Feeled (though most of it is in Japanese and you can't read it). For most of you statesiders, the mag's going to prove to be about as elusive as lil' Tama-chin was, though I'm pretty sure you can find the issue at Printed Matter in NYC.

Posted by Erik at 07:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

With all the talk about L.A.'s long-overlooked river brimming the dailies and fluttering over dinner parties, it's no wonder things are finally starting to happen. Heck, even our good friend Jay Babcock of Arthur magazine has started his own L.A. River blog. Of course modifications to the city's river are not new. It's seen everything from wanderin' grizzly bears to real Italian vineyards along its shores, and that's just in the couple hundred years anyone's been paying attention.

Back in April of 1909, the "Federated Improvement Association" proposed throwing up a dam across the river about where the 10 Freeway crosses it now. Behind this dam a lake would build up, eventually stretching all the way to Elysian Park and "kept at a depth that will permit navigation by sail boats, motor boats, canoes and other small craft." "From the top of the banks to the water's edge will be built beautiful terraces with myriads of flowers, palms, shrubbery and other greenery as artistic embellishments," reported the Los Angeles Examiner. "The banks will then compare well with the famous Hudson River."

Unfortunately the banks today are mostly cement and not all that attractive, a fact which the Friends of the L.A. River and other green-leaning folks are all too aware of. They would like to see the Army-engineered flood controls dismantled and the riverbed restored to some semblance of a natural habitat. This is a great idea, if a little baby step-ish.

For one thing, the river happens to have several freeways as it's close companions on much of its journey to the sea. If you've been down there, you'll know. . . the noise is unbearable. Never mind the exhaust fumes seeping through the chain-link fence and down into the channel. Look at the end of the Arroyo, once a beautiful channel with old oaks and meadows. . . now with a six-lane freeway jammed right up it. Throwing a couple parks alongside the gridlock just doesn't make it nature again.

You see, the L.A. River has the misfortune of running through some of the most densely populated and exploited regions of the Southland. These areas are getting crummier and more congested every day as developers throw up wretchedly designed structures for quick profit. Look around, nearly every bit of space not graced by a building is paved over so people can pilot their own personal combustion engines hither and thither. And ruthlessly assailed by architectual monstrosities like downtown's Orsini fortress, the unique combination of Old World Spanish and blandishly "modern" that makes L.A. look like L.A. is rapidly vanishing (or at least becoming hidden behind really big buildings and freeway exchanges). So an extremely made-over river? Sure it might look good off in the distance, wending its way past Home Depot, when gazing down from a desk in the US Bank tower, but down here at ground zero, L.A.'s turning butt ugly.

And of course it's only going to get worse as the population and development expands and expands unchecked. The river, pretty as it may become, will be no match for the din and discharge from the hordes of humanity that surround it. So here's an idea. Let's better the FoLAR model. How about Friends of the Corner of Figueroa and César Chávez Streets? Or Friends of that Little Scrap of Land that used to be a Vacant Lot until some Jackass built 200-units of "artists' lofts" on it? I'll bet neighborhood grassroots organizations could restore L.A. to it's original state, block by block, in just a few decades. Look for scrub brush "public areas" and oozing tar pits, unfenced and accessible by all Angelenos. Look for activists gleefully eradicating "non-native species" like "commuters" and "top producers;" dismantling McMansions and Coscos; and ripping out sprinkler systems with their bare hands with a frenzied ecological zeal. Again grizzlies will outnumber gringos. Out with the new, in with the old!

Posted by Erik at 11:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)