In 1981, the exhibition “Multicultural Focus” was mounted at Los Angeles Municipal Gallery Barnsdall Park where Josine Starrels was Gallery Director. The exhibition was organized by Sheila Pinkel for the Los Angeles Center For Photographic Studies and curated by 12 artist/curators in the Los Angeles area, three each from the Asian, Black, Latino, and White communities, The show was one of two exhibitions selected to celebrate the Los Angeles Bicentennial, and it was the first cross‐cultural exhibition of photography in the Los Angeles area. Suzanne Muchnic, called it “the best contemporary show (of photography) of the year,” Los Angeles Times: Dec. 27, 1981.

“Refocus: Multicultural Focus” will include current work by 19 of the original artists in the exhibition. A catalogue will accompany the exhibition providing images from the original show juxtaposed to contemporary work and statements by participating artists. Catalogue essays by Deborah Bright, Carla Williams and Paul Von Blum will reflect the concept of and changes that have taken place in multiculturalism and photography during the last 30 years.

Participating artists are: Arden Alger, Don Anton, Stephen Axelrad, Carroll Parrott Blue, Elizabeth Bryant, Gillian Brown, Steve Berens, Dennis Callwood, Todd Gray, Robin Lasser and Adrienne Pao, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Willie Robert Middlebrook, Patrick Nagatani, Joan Salinger, Rick Tejeda‐Flores, Linda Wolf, Nancy Webber, Mihoko Yamagata and Bruce Yonemoto.

ARENA 1, 3026 Airport Ave., Santa Monica 90405. Hours are noon to 6 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday. For more information, call (310) 397-7456 or visit www.santamonicaartstudios.com.

Ray and Charles Eames photographing an early model of the exhibition "Mathematica: A World of Numbers and Beyond," 1960 / ©2011 Eames Office, LLC

You may not know it, but most people are informally aware of Charles and Bernice “Ray” Eames’ aesthetic impact on the world. In “Eames: The Architect and the Painter,” producers Jason Cohn and Bill Jersey recount the lives and creative output of the Eameses, who are best known for their modern furniture (such as the molded plywood Eames Lounge Chair and Ottoman) and their ventures into film (most notably “Powers of Ten,” where a couple is seen picnicking at regular scale, and perspective then zooms out to a view from the far universe and finally zooms back in and through to the atomic level).

The film (written by Cohn and narrated by James Franco) follows the collaborative couple’s career as it moves from furniture design and manufacturing to the postindustrial communication of ideas and information. Their work had ties to political, economic, and technological development (some of their clients were the U.S. government, furniture retailer Herman Miller, and IBM) and their work subsequently tracked the complex changes in culture. This mix of partnerships revealed an unsettling relationship between art, commerce, and culture that appeared to catch the Eameses between modern and postmodern sensibilities.

The irony in the title of the film is the fact that Ray rarely painted, even though she was highly capable (she studied under Hans Hoffman), and the fact that Charles dropped out of architecture school and was never a licensed architect. The irony in the film is how the subjects of the documentary are disturbingly tarnished by abrupt emphasis on infidelity issues and by the questioning of Charles’ authorship (former office staff members in the film claimed he took full credit for collaborative efforts). After getting to “know” the Eameses, the infidelity segment at the end of the film made me feel sorry for a neglected Ray. The issues with authorship similarly followed the film’s building up of the Eameses in a very positive light, and then unexpectedly tearing them down by unraveling the documentary’s carefully crafted personas.

The infusing of these negative aspects into the film was troubling, especially if they were inserted for dramatic subjectivity in the documentary format. It was disturbing to see the film’s subjects besmirched after presenting them in such a delicately admirable way. It could possibly be that the Eameses had been rendered too likable for their flaws to be exposed, but for the first film to be made about them since their deaths (Charles in 1978 and Ray in 1988), I think the positive aspects of their lives would be more appropriate for a lasting, historical preservation of their significance. After all, this film seems to fulfill a need to solidify their influence and positive accomplishments in the historical record, not their shortcomings.

“Eames: The Architect and the Painter” presents a documentary that reveals the limitations of imposing a (cinematic) form upon a collaborative couple who were endlessly dynamic and complex. By trying to compress a chaotic expanse of creative output into a tidy historical narrative, the resulting message regarding Charles and Ray can be appropriately ambiguous and disconnected. The chronicled accelerating change in their work’s media and messages captures the disjointed, experimental approach of the Eameses, which is interestingly mirrored by the splintering and clouding of the film’s message as it tries to contain the voluminous chaos of their production. Like “Powers of Ten,” the film tries to view something dauntingly large and diverse; unlike “Powers of Ten,” the film doesn’t maintain a distinct, linear progression and becomes unfocused by a diffused detail overload.

But it seems the Eameses weren’t concise, and the entangled layering of information appeared similarly unfocused. If intentional, this defocusing not only is an effective and clever means of understanding the atmosphere created by their quirky and experimental collaboration, but it poetically captures the essence of the Eames epoch.

I struggled with the desire to see clearly organized and objective historical information, but by taking a distanced perspective after viewing the film, the blur came into focus and I was able to appreciate the Eameses in a fully personal, subjective way. The oddly convincing point of view used in this documentary conveys the unusual beauty of the Eameses’ insatiably creative, inquisitive, and progressive process, which left an enduring impact on aesthetics and design. “Eames: The Architect and the Painter” is a great chance to get to know formally, or be reacquainted with, the artists and their legacy.

“Eames: The Architect and the Painter” opened in Los Angeles in November and is available on DVD from First Run Features.

—Bryan Kent, Culture Spot LA

Guest contributor Bryan Kent is an artist working in New York City.

Image from the Juno Project at the Pasadena Museum of California Art. / Courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech

The A x S Festival 2011 runs Oct. 1 through 16, continuing the Pasadena Arts Council’s biennial celebration of Pasadena’s unique heritage as a city of art and science. The festival, focused on the theme of fire and water, features two weeks of art, dance, music, theater, performance and conversation at venues throughout the city. Plus, beginning this month, many Pasadena arts venues are participating in the Getty’s “Pacific Standard Time” creative collaboration. Art Night (Oct. 14 from 6 to 10 p.m.) is your opportunity to experience “Pacific Standard Time” and the A x S Festival for free, with free transportation between 15 participating cultural institutions.

Some of the highlights of A x S include:

“WORLDS”: Experience the art and science of our solar system in “WORLDS” at the Art Center College of Design’s Williamson Gallery. The objects and images on display include contemporary art, sculpture and large-scale installations as well as NASA spacecraft imagery, meteorites and science fiction video. Also on view are high-resolution prints of historical astronomical book sketches by Galileo, Copernicus and other astronomers — scanned and drawn from the rare-book collection at the Huntington Library. The exhibit runs Oct. 14, 2011 through Jan. 15, 2012 (opening night reception Oct. 13).

“Sunflowers in Snow”: Boston Court Performing Arts Center partners with Red Hen Press in an evening of spoken word and poetry, focusing on the theme of fire and water and featuring Garrett Hongo, Jim Tilley and Evie Shockley, on Oct. 10 at 7 p.m.

“Beneath the Surface”: Experience the mystery of the Juno spacecraft’s visit to Jupiter before it actually gets there in 2016 with Jet Propulsion Laboratory Visual Strategist Dan Good’s interactive installation at the Pasadena Museum of California Art. Oct. 16 will feature a full day of speakers and activities, as well as free admission. The exhibit runs through Jan. 8, 2012.

“Picturing the Bomb”: This exhibit at the Pasadena City College Art Gallery features photographs from the secret world of the Manhattan Project, curated by Rachel Fermi (granddaughter of physicist Enrico Fermi) and Esther Samra. Opens Oct. 5.

Among the many choices on Art Night are: Kidspace Museum’s activities with JPL Gravity Scientist Sami Asmar, the Norton Simon Museum’s “Proof: The Rise of Printmaking in Southern California,” and Armory Center for the Arts’ “Speaking in Tongues: The Art of Wallace Berman and Robert Heinecken.”

For a brief synopsis of “Pacific Standard Time,” read our recent post.

Image from the exhibit "California Design, 1930-1965: Living in a Modern Way" at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Beginning on Oct. 1, “Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A., 1945-1980” brings together more than 60 cultural institutions throughout Southern California to tell the story of the rise of the L.A. art scene and its impact on the art world. This colossal collaboration was initiated by the Getty Foundation, and the Getty Center has organized four exhibitions and an installation, along with films, lectures, panel discussions, classes and more, continuing into 2012.

Participating museums, galleries, educational institutions and other venues span L.A., Pasadena and Long Beach and extend as far as San Diego, Santa Barbara and Palm Springs. Exhibits and events cover a wide variety of artistic developments — everything from pop, post-minimalism and modernist architecture to Chicano performance art, Japanese-American design and African-American film. Important L.A. artists featured in various exhibits include John Baldessari, Judy Chicago, David Hockney, Ed Ruscha and Betye Saar. A jam-packed website provides opportunities to browse by exhibit, location, date and type of art and suggests complementary exhibits of interest as you explore.

Given the number and range of events related to “Pacific Standard Time,” the historical overview exhibit at the Getty is a good place to start: “Pacific Standard Time: Crosscurrents in L.A. Painting and Sculpture, 1950-1970″ runs Oct. 1, 2011, through Feb. 5, 2012, concurrently with another exhibit revealing how artists at that time disseminated their work, “Greetings from L.A.: Artists and Publics, 1950-1980.”

In addition to a photography exhibit called “In Focus: Los Angeles, 1945-1980,” which will be on view Dec. 20, 2011, to May 6, 2012, visitors to the Getty can see De Wain Valentine’s “Gray Column,” a 12-foot-high column of polyester resin, and Robert Irwin’s “Black on White,” a monumental wedge of granite, through March 2012.

Image from the exhibit “California Design, 1930-1965: Living in a Modern Way” at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Monarch Bay Homes, Laguna Niguel (Outdoor Dining Terrace) (1961). Carlos Diniz Ladd & Kelsey. Screenprint 20 1/8 x 26 in. LACMA, Gift of Gilbert Ortiz and Edward Cella Art + Architecture, M.2010.76.2 Photograph © 2011 Museum Associates/LACMA.

How Hollywood’s Mae West (5 feet) looked tall: Custom platform shoes (9.5”) c. 1945-50 Description: Pepenie Custom Made, printed cotton and leather platform shoes (image courtesy of FIDM)

Austrian composer Joseph Haydn’s walking stick (c. 1800), an afternoon dress by Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel (c. 1937), Mae West’s platform heels (c. 1945-50), and the “Peacock Dress” by Alexander McQueen (commissioned by FIDM in 2010) are among the varied objects covering more than 200 years of fashion history currently on display at the FIDM Museum & Galleries. “Fabulous! Ten Years of FIDM Museum Acquisitions, 2000–2010” runs through Dec. 17 at the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in downtown Los Angeles.

The FIDM Museum collection includes a whopping 15,000 historical fashions, and this exhibit will feature 170 of them, acquired over the past 10 years. French haute couture, international contemporary designers, and mid-20th-century American designers are all represented. The accompanying 375-page catalogue features a preface by Hubert de Givenchy.

Admission is free. The museum is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. For more information, visit www.fidmmuseum.org.

The size of the canvases and the artists’ emphasis on color as an end in itself rather than a means to express emotion give the exhibit a distinct liveliness and impressiveness.

Frank Stella’s “Damascus Gate I” is so large, the Museum had difficulty getting it through the doors, and its magnificent fluorescent hues make it all the more imposing.  Kenneth Noland’s “Par Transit,” basically six bars of varying colors, creates a fascinating optical illusion.  Thomas Downing’s “Red-1966” is decoratively attractive but also impressive when one reads that Downing drew all those circles freehand.

Among the many programs free with admission is a lecture on Saturday, April 9, at 4 p.m. called “What You See Is What You See.” Given by Alison de Lima Greene, curator of contemporary art and special projects at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, the lecture takes its title from a famous Stella quote. There are also hands-on arts classes for adults. The Museum offers free admission the first Friday of every month form 6 to 9 p.m.

Norton Simon Museum, 411 W. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, http://nortonsimon.org/

Image credit:

Red-1966, 1966

Thomas Downing (American 1928-1985)

Acrylic on canvas

84 x 86 in. (213.4 x 218.4 cm)

Norton Simon Museum, Gift of Mrs. Donald Brewer

© The Estate of Thomas Downing, courtesy GARYSNYDER Project Space, New York

Hector Barrios, “Freedom Tru Art” (detail), mixed media on handkerchief and illustration board shot from behind with .45 caliber handgun (2011)

“Exit Wounds,” a collaborative, relational art project between formerly gang-involved youth of Homeboy Industries and Los Angeles artist Nancy Baker Cahill, opens with a free reception on Saturday, March 19, from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Hi-Lite Project Space in downtown Los Angeles.

According to the gallery’s website: “Works in this exhibition blend individual narrative collages with Baker Cahill’s ‘Bullet Blossoms’ series. Participants in the project tell their stories through their own photographs, original art, text and unconventional objects. Baker Cahill then shoots the works with a .45 caliber handgun. Hauntingly fragile poppy blossoms painted around the ‘exit wounds’ suggest that healing and hope can co-exist with violence and despair.”

Works will be on sale opening night and 100% of the proceeds will benefit Homeboy Industries, which has helped thousands of young people transform their lives through job training, placement assistant and work within the organization’s small businesses, including Homegirl Cafe.

To see examples of works from the “Exit Wounds” project, visit: http://www.nancybakercahill.com/nancybakercahill/exit_wounds.html.

After the opening reception, the exhibition will be on view Tuesdays (3/22, 3/29, 4/5) from 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and by appointment. Hi-Lite Project Space, 533 S. Los Angeles St., Sixth Floor, LA, (213) 784-2003 or http://thehi-lite.com/.

Fat Fringe / Photo by Art Gray

In a sense, the California Design Biennial is an interactive exhibit. It encourages rethinking the quotidian and imagining a new experience of everything from dressing up (with wild designs donned by celebrities in concert) to drinking water (another environmental take on the reusable water bottle). Here’s another fun aspect of the show: Some of the items (like the water bottle and botanical perfumes) are available for purchase in the museum’s gift shop.

Architecture is curated by Frances Anderton, fashion by Rose Apodaca, graphic design by Derrick Schultz, product design by Alissa Walker, and transportation by Stewart Reed. Fat Fringe, one of the architectural projects on display, is a die-cut paper canopy that explores the latent characteristics of paper: fluffiness, volume, transparency (pictured above). The project was developed through a series of weekend workshops led by design firm Layer (Emily White and Lisa Little) and organized by the nonprofit Materials and Applications (M&A).

Plume, a couture design for Sarah Jessica Parker, is part of a striking installation of feature purses by Raven Kauffman (pictured below). It features hand-embroidery on silk organza, 1940s anthracite multi-shaped paillettes, vintage Swarovski crystals and hand-dyed and pearlized feathers of emu, burnt ostrich, burnt peacock, striped coque, and goose as well as 1930s bird of paradise feathers from antique showgirl headpieces.

Bring someone with you. You’ll have fun exploring everything from eyeglasses to the Virgin Galactic SpaceShip Two — all designed in our state and changing the world as we know it.

Plume by Raven Kauffman

Two other exhibits accompany the Design Biennial. Megan Geckler: Every move you make, every step you take is an architectural installation of flagging tape. Desire features works by six LA artists, exploring the human body, pleasure and gender in diverse ways.

Pasadena Museum of California Art, 490 E. Union St., Pasadena, (626) 568-3665, www.pmcaonline.org.

Scarred for Life was first inspired by a former dancer who’d fallen from a tree, subsequently wheelchair-bound but no less compelling.  Her reparative surgery left a long, curving scar down her back – now reproduced in shades of blue alongside her portrait.  Her back is turned to the camera, with a long blue stretch of paint crossing the scar, and she looks over her shoulder from the wheelchair.  Meyer’s exhibit features not only colorful, lively impressions of scars, but the unique stories and portraits (also Meyer’s) behind each diversion from the Platonic body ideal.  Some of the surgical scars come from chronic needs, others from the most private of emergencies: scoliosis or a lung transplant, self-mutilation or near-death experiences. Meyer’s work accomplishes his considerable goal of turning “these lasting monuments, often thought of as unsightly, into things of beauty.” Martha de Perez, the tireless curator at the Art Share Los Angeles gallery, felt that this message of positive body image and personal narrative would create a powerful gallery show for the venue.

Art Share is a nonprofit arts outreach and support center in the Downtown Arts District, with gallery, performance, classroom, and residential spaces in the converted warehouse at Fourth Place and Hewitt. The juxtaposition of threat and recovery, scars and success, in Meyer’s work can be viewed as a reflection of the organization itself, which redirects young local energy away from violence and destruction, and instead toward expression and creation. The high success rate (gauged in part by high school graduations) stems from free art, music, and dance classes, mentoring, and special programs according to students’ needs.  All of this, though, relies in part on the underpinning of a strong arts community in Los Angeles, including artists like Meyer, events like the Downtown Art Walk, and the Art Share-centered Open Studio Tour series in the Arts District.  In addition to showing his works in the gallery space at Art Share, Meyer will be helping teach one of the free art classes offered to students there.

The exhibition has also been to the National Museum of Health and Medicine, New York University’s Medical School Gallery, and the Brevard Museum of Art in Florida.  But most of the subjects in Scarred For Life are local – and several will be in attendance at the reception Friday night, along with students like Assistant Curator Enrique Lopez and Art Share’s Executive Director, Tracy Kelly.  Art Share’s gallery events tend to draw a lively crowd of artists, buyers, students, Arts District residents, and visitors from around the city and California.

Read more about Meyer at www.tedmeyer.com and www.artyourworld.com. For more information about Art Share, visit www.artsharela.org.

[Editor’s Note: The author also does free PR for the nonprofit Art Share.]