L.A. WeeklyFrom a not-for-the-kids Krampus ball to cocktails inspired by the holiday season’s movies, here are the 12 best things to do in Los Angeles this week.
fri 12/6
MUSIC
An Ocean of Hypnosis
Éliane Radigue’s Occam Ocean unfolds slowly and at nearly an hour’s length, expanding and shifting in waves like its titular ocean. The ever-evolving work was inspired by a mural portraying a range of electromagnetic waves that the French composer stumbled on during a visit to the Natural History Museum of L.A. in 1973, and it will finally receive its premiere in the city of its genesis by musicians Dafne Vicente-Sandoval, Charles Curtis, Rhodri Davies and Robin Hayward, in a presentation by Black Editions and Blank Forms NYC. Radigue is a major and influential force in the field of experimental music, using feedback, electronics and synthesizers as early as the late 1960s to create hypnotizing soundscapes. Prepare to be transported. First Congregational Church of L.A., 540 S. Commonwealth Ave., Westlake; Fri., Dec. 6, 8 p.m. (800) 838-3006, facebook.com/events/
Éliane Radigue (Henry Roy)
COMEDY
Comedy with Bite and Class
As he proved when he took over Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, Trevor Noah has mastered smart comedy with attitude, tackling both pop culture and politics with his own brand of bite and class. The Emmy winner didn’t seek to fill Jon Stewart’s shoes, he brought his own new kicks. The Daily Show’s live audiences always seem to be having a blast and Noah’s new show the “Loud & Clear Tour 2019” should bring the same energy to the Staples Center. From books (his New York Times bestseller, Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood) to podcasts (On Second Thought: The Trevor Noah Podcast) to TV specials, Noah’s brand of humor ignites thoughts as it incites laughs no matter what. Staples Center, 1111 S. Figueroa St., downtown; Fri., Dec. 6, 8 p.m. (doors, 6 p.m.); $39.50-$125. axs.com/events/374751/trevor-
CULTURE
Zombie Christmas
Pop culture is still infested with zombies and at Catch One’s Zombie Fashion Show & Creature Art Exhibit, you can get up close and personal with the undead. Hosted by Tom Kirlin, creator of the annual The Pancakes & Booze Art Show, more than 50 amateur, professional and special-effects makeup artists will add a dark twist to Christmas as they transform models into full-body zombies. They’ll compete for prizes in categories as judged by you, the audience and the artists themselves. Making the evening darker will be 100-plus artists and vendors displaying and selling paintings, sculpture, mixed media, clothing, jewelry and other monster-themed merchandise, in addition to a Zombie Santa and his elves waiting for photo ops. Catch One, 4067 Pico Blvd., Arlington Heights; Fri., Dec. 6, 8 p.m.; $5-$140. (323) 737-1159, eventbrite.com. —Siran Babayan
sat 12/7
CULTURE
The Krampus Is Coming
Part costume ball, part concert and all macabre Christmas merriment, The 7th Annual Krampus Ball offers an overstuffed stocking of amusements celebrating the goat-ish demon beast who punishes bad kids. There’ll be a Krampus Run outside the ballroom from 6-7 p.m., Krampus-inspired vendors, food and drink, and a monster of a music line-up including Medieval musician/dancer troupe Tottendanse, Krampus-themed Rammstein tribute band Krammpstein, furry, fun polka party band Hammerstein Band and L.A.’s theatrical metalers Rosemary’s Billygoat, all emceed as usual by Oktoberfest’s Festmaster Hans. Under 18 is OK with an adult guardian before 10 p.m., but it’s an over-18 affair after. Not really a kid event either way, so don’t bring them… unless they’ve very, very naughty. Alpine Village, 833 Torrance Blvd., Torrance; Sat., Dec. 7, 7 p.m.; $32.49. krampusball.brownpapertickets.
Nathan Ota in Post-It Show at GR2
ART
Tiny Art, Big Crowd
Every year, the art gets more rad and the lines outside get longer at the classic gift-season tradition that is Giant Robot/GR2 Gallery’s Post-It Show. Over 400 diverse artists create mini masterpieces on these office pads, ranging in styles and mediums but working miracles in a few square inches. Curated by Giant Robot’s Eric Nakamura with artists Esther Pearl Watson and Mark Todd, the roster includes superstars and newcomers, but every piece is still just $25. Its eminently Instagrammable 15th edition opens Saturday, December 7, with a preview at 11:30 a.m. and sales starting at 2 p.m. — and the queue starting around breakfast time, because you can only buy in-person. GR2, 2062 Sawtelle Blvd., Sawtelle; Sat., Dec. 7 & 14, 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m.; free. giantrobot.com. —Shana Nys Dambrot
Camille Rose Garcia, The Cabinet of Dr. Deekay (Sympathetic Press)
sun 12/8
ART
The Tooth Hurts
There are a lot of artists today who combine pop surrealism with fantastic and morbid imagery, but the work of Camille Rose Garcia is instantly distinctive and stands out in a sea of paintings by her many imitators. The L.A. artist’s latest book, The Cabinet of Dr. Deekay, centers on that greatest of all modern horror scenarios — a trip to the dentist. A young boy named Alex wakes up from a mysterious operation and discovers that his body is being mutated and rearranged with new appendages in a bizarre scenario depicted in a series of Garcia’s illustrations, which combine beauty and strangeness in equal parts in the artist’s unique style. She discusses the new book with the Weekly’s Shana Nys Dambrot. La Luz de Jesus, 4633 Hollywood Blvd., Los Feliz; Sun., Dec. 8, 2-4 p.m.; free. (323) 666-7667, facebook.com/events/
Jesse Harrod at bowtie project (Courtesy of the artist)
ART
Weave Me a Story
Independent cultural support group Clockshop has been administering programs and public art projects on a curiously shaped piece of land northeast of downtown and L.A. River-adjacent, called the Bowtie. Its newest curated post-industrial landscape intervention is a work by fiber artist Jesse Harrod, whose Hatch installation is a site-specific weaving which drapes the disused radio tower with a fractal paracord web representing the interconnected, multivalent narratives whose invisible but powerful energy streams have passed through its network. Bowtie Project, 2780 W. Casitas Ave., Glassell Park; Sunday, December 8, 3-5 p.m. (artist-led walking tour at 4:15 p.m.); free. clockshop.org/event/hatch-
Donna Sternberg & Dancers (Scott Belding)
DANCE
Behind the Iron Curtain
If artists in general had a tough time in the Soviet Union, women artists often confronted even more extreme pressures. How women artists responded is the subject of Iron Women, a new dance work from Donna Sternberg & Dancers offered in conjunction with the Wende Museum exhibition The Medea Insurrection: Radical Women Artists Behind the Iron Curtain. During the Soviet era, some women artists designated their art as being about historical figures like Medea and Cassandra, camouflaging more subversive artistic commentary on women confronting communism and the oppressive social order. Ironically, the dance performance and the exhibition are housed in what was once a National Guard Armory and now a museum and research facility dedicated to Cold War-era European and Soviet Union artifacts and history archives. Wende Museum, 10808 Culver Blvd., Culver City; Sun., Dec. 8, 3 p.m., free. dsdancers.com/. —Ann Haskins
Matzoh Ball Soup Coups (Courtesy of Here and Now)
mon 12/9
FOOD&DRINK
Cocktails for the Holiday Season
Following its Christmas in July event, Christmas-inspired pop-up Blitzen’s gives Here and Now another merry makeover. The bar in downtown’s Arts District, which opened last year, features seasonal drinks that are a nod to both Christmas and Hanukkah — and a little Mean Girls, too — with names like You Go Glenn Cocoa (hot chocolate, rum, chartreuse, Mr. Black), Get Blitzen’d (tequila, fino, sweet vermouth, lemon, falernum, prosecco) and Put on Your Yarmulke (Monkey Shoulder, Manischewitz, grapefruit cordial, allspice dram, aquafaba, lime and bitters). The menu also offers such food specialties as poutine and latkas. If that’s not enough to make you feel festive, more themed entertainment includes Santa, carolers and a holiday puppy pageant, as well as pajama Sundays complete with boards games and screenings of Elf, Home Alone and Christmas Vacation. The owners team up with nonprofit PATH (People Assisting the Homeless), so donate a Ziploc bag with toiletries and get a free cup of punch. Here and Now, 300 S. Santa Fe Ave., Suite N, downtown; Mon.-Sat., 5 p.m.-2 a.m. & Sun., 5 p.m.-mid., through Dec. 31. (213) 262-9291, hereandnowdtla.com. —Siran Babayan
tue 12/10
ART
Got It, Flaunt It
The Getty Museum is nothing if not voracious in its collecting appetites, one legacy of the storied persona of its founder. Museum director Timothy Potts is proud of this sphere of the institution’s purview, so much so that he wants to share the new bounty ASAP. Museum Acquisitions 2019: Director’s Choice is the first in what will become an annual exhibition series highlighting the swankiest, most lovely and most rare items from the previous year’s haul. Of special note for 2019, a “recently discovered masterpiece by Renaissance master Agnolo Bronzino” as well as 14th-century European sculpture, ancient Greek and Roman works, 20th-century photography, plus drawings, manuscripts and other treasures worth bragging about. The Getty Center, 1200 Getty Center Drive, Brentwood; through March 1. getty.edu/visit/exhibitions/
Isaura Quartet (Sam Hurd Photography, courtesy of REDCAT/CalArts)
wed 12/11
MUSIC
Alchemical Reaction
“Using the vulnerability of the human voice as a connective thread,” local ensemble The Isaura String Quartet presents a selection of new music under the connective title of Hum. Each part of Laura Steenberge’s String Quartet (2014) is inspired by a different animal, whereas Nicole Lizée’s Darkness Is Not Well Lit (2016) is described as “a sonic imagining of film noir … as seen — and heard — from the vantage point of an electric fan.” The world premiere of David Rosenboom’s Quartet for the Beginning of a Time invokes “a time collapsing and a time emerging,” and another world premiere, Carmina Escobar and Sean Deyoe’s Alchemies, enacts “audiovisual potions for transmutation.” The program culminates with the West Coast premiere of Alex Temple’s Behind the Wallpaper, a song cycle that twines inventive string work with melodious vocals by charismatic art-pop singer Julia Holter. REDCAT, 631 W. Second St., downtown; Wed., Dec. 11, 8:30 p.m.; $22. (213) 237-2800, redcat.org. —Falling James
Pacific Opera Project’s La bohème (Martha Benedict)
wed 12/11
OPERA
The Tragically Hip
Pacific Opera Project’s riotous send-up of Giacomo Puccini’s tragic romantic opera La bohème, in which the assignations and manic tomfoolery of a gang of young artists are relocated from Paris to modern-day Highland Park, has become something of an annual tradition. POP artistic director Josh Shaw punches up Puccini’s sad and lovely arias with an incredibly sarcastic new libretto with an alternate title, The Hipsters. And yet, even as the cast (this time with Janet Szepei Todd portraying doomed heroine Mimi, and Orson Van Gay playing her ardent lover, Rodolfo) gambol about the Ebell Club’s intimate stage and rhapsodize about Highland Park’s churros and tacos, the opera’s timeless drama shifts from lighthearted to unexpectedly moving as the lovers realize that life is precious and all too fleeting. Highland Park Ebell Club, 131 S. Avenue 57, Highland Park; Wed., Dec. 11, 8 p.m.; Fri.-Sat., Dec. 13-14, 8 p.m.; $15-$180. (323) 739-6122, pacificoperaproject.com. —Falling James
Advertising disclosure: We may receive compensation for some of the links in our stories. Thank you for supporting LA Weekly and our advertisers.