Shana Nys Dambrot
Kick it with the cool cats at the 10th anniversary Cat Art Show, a book launch about finding identity among community, new dance projects, post-carceral theater-making, prison yard dance-making, movement-based mark-making, radical peace, photographic memory, visualizing meditative paintings, an opera company’s interstellar film, a group show about the deep blue sea, progressive chamber music, intergenerational epic as theatrical trilogy.
Linda Ravenswood
Thursday, January 18
Linda Ravenswood presents A Poem is a House at Skylight Books. Los Feliz native and Oxford Prize-winning poet and performance artist Linda Ravenswood presents the launch of a new collection of poems, with special guests Senator Anthony Portantino, Kendalle Getty, Sola Saar, Arthur Kayzakian, West Hollywood City Poet Laureate Brian Sonia Wallace, and more. Wallace writes that Ravenswood’s book serves to, “remind you that you are history, embodied, a living tapestry of everyone who ever was and all they said and forgot and cherished.” 1818 N. Vermont Ave., Los Feliz; Thursday, January 18, 7pm; free; skylightbooks.com.
Britt Ehringer at Cat Art Show
Friday, January 19
Cat Art Show 10th Anniversary at Wallis Annenberg PetSpace. Cat Art Show, the world’s most popular art exhibition dedicated to the feline form, returns. Presented by CatCon, Cat Art Show features more than 50 established and emerging artists, including Annie Montgomerie, Britt Ehringer, Cleon Peterson, Eric Haze, Natalia Fabia, and Yusuke Hanai, and more, working in diverse, eclectic, and innovative mediums including painting, digital, sculpture, jewelry, and mixed media. 2005 Bluff Creek Dr, Playa Vista; Friday-Sunday, January 19-21, 11am-5pm; free w/ rsvp; catartshow.com.
LA Dance Project, LAUNCH:LA 2024
L.A. Dance Project presents: LAUNCH:LA 2024 featuring JA Collective and Jamal Kamau White. LADP’s residency program supports Los Angeles-based emerging artists in the creation and presentation of original work, and the latest residents were chosen for their bold interdisciplinary approach to movement and collaboration. Dance artists JA Collective (Jordan Johnson and Aidan Carberry) and Jamal Kamau White will be creating new work at LADP’s studio space for the month of January, before premiering the results this weekend. 2245 E. Washington Blvd., downtown; Friday-Sunday, January 19-21; $15-$20; ladanceproject.org.
(Im)migrants of the State at The Actors’ Gang
(Im)migrants of the State at The Actors’ Gang. With 240 years of combined incarceration, an ensemble cast of Prison Project alumni have found their way to freedom by creating an emotional, hilarious, and thought-provoking play inspired by real-life experiences. This the raw journey of fourteen Californians navigating life before, during, and after incarceration is created by Jeremie Loncka, Richard Loya, & Members of The Actors’ Gang Alumni Advocacy Project; Directed by Jeremie Loncka and Richard Loya. 9070 Venice Blvd., Culver City; Friday-Saturday, 8pm, Sunday, 2pm, January 19-28 (Post-show BBQ Reception Fundraiser on Sunday, January 21); $25-$35; theactorsgang.com.
Selcouth Dance Theater
Selcouth Dance Theater presents MARK at Highways. A performance about individual and collective power and the possibilities that arise from each action small or large, inspired by scientific theories of motion to explore connection through interactions of bodies. Informed by street dance vocabularies, everyday gestures and contemporary dance perspectives, MARK explores the power of connection, the limitations that we bring to ourselves and the solutions that we can find together. Our choices leave marks, setting actions into motion. What MARKs do we carry? What MARKs do we leave behind? 1651 18th St., Santa Monica; Friday-Saturday, January 19-20, 8pm; $20-$25; highwaysperformance.org.
Shepard Fairey at ReflectSpace
Saturday, January 20
Shepard Fairey: Peace is Radical at ReflectSpace Gallery. A timely exhibition features works addressing a range of topics, including the importance of democracy, race and gender equality, environmental justice, and most of all, peace and harmony. Screen-printing is a versatile graphic medium that can be used to produce high-end art, or multitudes of prints that can be disseminated liberally. Fairey uses screen printing in both ways and finds it to be an incredibly empowering and democratic medium; and a special section in the exhibition will display selected screens he has used to print his art. Glendale Central Library, 222 E. Harvard St., Glendale; Opening reception: Saturday, January 20, 6:30-8:30pm; On view through April 14; free; reflectspace.org.
Jose Dávila at Sean Kelly Gallery
Jose Dávila: Photographic Memory at Sean Kelly Gallery. In a series of Dávila’s signature cut-out works, which reference Richard Prince’s infamous solo exhibition at LACMA in 2018, the exhibition features large-scale photographic works in which Dávila has removed the main figure of Prince’s influential Untitled (cowboy) series. Challenging conventional connotations and limitations of photography in today’s image driven society, Dávila’s cut-outs interrogate originality, appropriation, and the truth behind an image. 1357 N. Highland Ave., Hollywood; Opening reception: Saturday, January 20, 5-7pm; On view through March 9; free; skny.com.
Manuela Dalle: Dancing in A-Yard, 2023 (film still)
Dancing in A-Yard at MOCA Grand Ave. In male prisons ruled by toxic masculinity, dancing is not a consideration. Yet, in the A-Yard at Lancaster State Prison, ten young men are trying to break this taboo by inviting French choreographer Dimitri Chamblas, to lead a contemporary dance class. Manuela Dalle’s film Dancing in A-Yard draws attention to this progressive initiative, deconstructing preconceived ideas surrounding prison and incarceration by exploring the spectrum of the participants’ masculinity and their collective desire for transformation both individually and as a community. A conversation with Dalle, Chamblas, Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy, director of Cal State LA’s Prison Graduation Initiative, and Dimitri De’Von, a formerly incarcerated man and one of the film’s participants follows the screening. 250 S. Grand Ave., downtown; Saturday, January 20, 3pm; free w/ rsvp; moca.org.
Wanda Koop: Ukrainian Quartet – Bridge, 2023, acrylic on canvas, 84 x 84 in (Courtesy of Night Gallery)
Wanda Koop: Objects of Interest at Night Gallery. “In the therapeutic technique of biofeedback, electrical pads are attached to patients’ skin to chart their brain activity as they respond to meditational prompts. One of these prompts entails imagining one’s body in a relaxing space, simultaneously from inside this body and from far above it. I was reminded of this technique as painter Wanda Koop described her artistic process to me this past November,” writes critic Cat Kron. “Prior to starting a large-scale painting—and after months of research during which she makes dozens of small sketches—the artist lies down and visualizes the painting as both enormous and tiny enough to hold in one’s hand…” 2050 Imperial St., downtown; Opening reception: Saturday, January 20, 5-8pm; On view through March 9; free; nightgallery.ca.
LATC
A Mexican Trilogy: An American Story at Latino Theater Company. Written by Evelina Fernández and directed by José Luis Valenzuela, this three-part play follows the Morales family through decades of the Mexican-American experience. Faith is the first play. After the Mexican Revolution, the family is faced with the challenge of retaining ancient traditions and cultural memory in the midst of social and political upheaval. (January 18-21 at East L.A. College.) Hope, part two, takes place in the 60’s as a new young president and a national crisis grip the family and the nation. (January 18-28 at L.A. Valley College.) Charity, the third and final installment, sees the world mourn the death of Pope John Paul II and the centenarian matriarch of the family visited by the ghost of her great-grandson slain in Iraq, as a newly arrived relative from Mexico takes up the story. (January 18-28 at L.A. City College.) But for this weekend only, you can attend all three plays in a single marathon afternoon. 514 S. Spring St., downtown; Saturday-Sunday, January 20-21, 2pm; $10-$50; latinotheaterco.org.
inti figgis-vizueta
Sunday, January 21
Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra presents CURRENT: [inti]mate at the Los Angeles LGBT Center. Curated by renowned composer inti figgis-vizueta, CURRENT: [inti]mate features a chamber program presented in collaboration with the Los Angeles LGBT Center and the Museum of Latin American Art. [inti]mate aims to create an inclusive and welcoming environment, where diverse communities come together in harmony, celebrating both queer and Latine musical cultures. The program features boundary-pushing music from the Latin-American diaspora, and first performs on Saturday, January 20 at MOLAA. 1125 N. McCadden Pl., Hollywood; Sunday, January 21, 7:30pm; $35-$50; laco.org.
Danielle Eubank in Above & Below
Monday, January 22
Above & Below: Views from AltaSea’s Blue Hour at CalPoly Pomona. Curated by acclaimed artist Kim Abeles, and first debuted at the Port of Los Angeles as part of AltaSea’s culture-driven public education and engagement initiatives, this exhibition addresses the connection between our community and the sea; referencing the land and sky as well as the sea’s surface and below. Human interaction is visible in all those locations, and each affects the other. Kellogg Art Gallery, 801 W. Temple Ave., Pomona; On view January 22 – March 21; free; cpp.edu.
The Industry: Star Choir, 2024 (Image: Michael Thomas)
Wednesday, January 24
The Industry: Star Choir at the Hammer Museum. In this cosmic opera by artists Malik Gaines and Alexandro Segade, a starship crew seeks refuge on the hostile planet 85K: Aurora. As the planet defends itself from the crew’s invasive presence, the humans evolve to become a part of a queerly multi-species organism that covers the entire world. Produced by The Industry, an experimental company that expands the operatic form in Los Angeles, this film chronicles Star Choir’s live premiere in fall 2023 at the historic Mt. Wilson Observatory, where an ensemble cast and orchestra performed inside the 100-inch telescope. 10899 Wilshire Blvd., Westwood; Wednesday, January 24, 7:30pm; free; hammer.ucla.edu.
The Industry: Star Choir, 2024 (Image: Michael Thomas)
Eric Haze at Cat Art Show
Lola Dupre at Cat Art Show
Annie Montgomerie at Cat Art Show
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