An art festival rivals a music festival, and an alien from who-knows-where learns to navigate life and Los Angeles.

5. Avocado season
While the Echo Park Rising music festival plays out in and around Echo Park, artist-curator Jonathon Hornedo’s three-day festival, called Avocados, will play out in that vicinity as well. His festival includes artists' bands, such as Joel Kyack’s Street Buddy, and performances by artists including Jennifer Juniper Stratford, who makes pseudo-spiritual TV programs. Ideally, it will be high-energy and a little unruly all the way through. 1952 Clinton St., Echo Park; Friday, Aug. 15-Sunday, Aug. 17. thehornedo@gmail.com, facebook.com/events/928862503797974.

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4. Fantasy fiction
It can take Tel Aviv–based artist Orit Raff a few months to digitally render one of her hyper-real imaginary rooms, all of which are based on scenes or sensations from literature (Jonathan Franzen's Freedom, or Henry Miller's Turn of the Screw). The resulting stately images look like photographs taken in the bedroom of a smart, semi-rebellious teenager, an eerie Victorian stairwell or the kitchen of upper-class creatives, until you get close and realize each detail really is too well-crafted to be true. 2640 S. La Cienega Blvd., Culver City; through Aug. 23. (310) 559-0166, laxart.org.

3. Don't fall in love before taking precautions
A dog barks at the start of artist Harry Dodge’s The Time Eaters, which premieres at the Hammer this week, and a guy in a tie sits curbside in the sun. The guy has just arrived on Earth (it's not clear where from) and he’s waiting for the guide who will teach him to turn on lights, avoid dog poop on sidewalks and understand trajectories of romances. As usually happens in Dodge’s work, funny and serious blur a bit. 10899 Wilshire Blvd., Wstwd.; Wednesday, Aug. 20, 7:30 p.m. (310) 443-7000, hammer.ucla.edu.

2. Try not to step on eggshells
Emilie Halpern has covered all the floors of Samuel Freeman Gallery with dark green emu eggs. This means you have to be careful where you step as you try to get close to the hole Andrew Cameron cut in the hallway wall. A rusty ring sits inside that hole and the sun shining through it backlights a photo hanging in the other room, on the wall’s opposite side. It’s as if two tourists obsessed with obscure ephemera have tried to do justice to all their favorite souvenirs. 2639 S. La Cienega Blvd., Culver City; through Aug. 23. (310) 425-8601, samuelfreeman.com. 

1. God got bored
In artist Jeffrey Vallance’s version of the Bible, God gets bored. So he instigates the Big Bang. During the first in a series of performances organized by curators Emi Fontana and Rita Gonzalez at the Church of the Epiphany, Vallance will talk about his scriptures with the church’s vicar, Tom Carey. After the talk, choreographer Julie Tolentino, who knows how to be aggressive and contemplative at the same time, will dance for 15 minutes. 2808 Altura St., Lincoln Heights; Saturday, Aug. 16, 6-7:30 p.m. (626) 277-7546, epiphany.ladiocese.org.

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