Round-up for March 12, 2011

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Around L.A.: Cause for Creativity: The Alchemy of Grooming SMMoA (Santa Monica) 2–5pm In partnership with the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, SMMoA presents a workshop teaching you to make your…

Around L.A.:

Cause for Creativity: The Alchemy of Grooming
SMMoA (Santa Monica)
2–5pm
In partnership with the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, SMMoA presents a workshop teaching you to make your own safe and natural grooming products and packaging. A screening of the animated short, The Story of Cosmetics will get participants resolving to get rid of toxins, make art, and make a difference. Admission $5; free for SMMoA members.
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Human Nature: Contemporary Art from the Collection and Vija Celmins: Television and Disaster 1964–1966
LACMA (Mid-Wilshire)
11am–8pm
The opening day of two new exhibitions at LACMA. Human Nature: Contemporary Art from the Collection draws its title from a work by artist Bruce Nauman and features the most extensive presentation of the museum’s permanent collection of contemporary art: approximately 75 works of art in diverse media. Celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this year, the museum’s Modern and Contemporary Art Council (MCAC) has been instrumental in the acquisition of many of the works on view in this exhibition. Vija Celmins: Television and Disaster 1964–1966, features the work of Latvian-born painter Vija Celmins. Celmins, who has lived and worked primarily in New York since 1981, engages a palette focused on the gradations between black and gray, and is known as a painter of refined representational images. The works on view in this exhibition focus on Celmins’ interest in war planes, smoking guns, and other images of death and disaster, reflecting the mediated view of the first televised war.
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WEDNESDAY, MARCH 16
Exhibition Discussion: Eric Owen Moss & Audience of Objects Exhibitors
SCI-Arc (Downtown)
7pm
SCI-Arc director Eric Owen Moss discusses the Audience of Objects exhibition, currently on view at SCI-Arc, with exhibitors: Herwig Baumgartner and Scott Uriu, B+U; Hernan Diaz Alonso, Xefirotarch; Craig Hodgetts and Hsinming Fung, Hodgetts + Fung; Elena Manferdini, Atelier Manferdini; Alexis Rochas, I/O; and Marcelo Spina and Georgina Huljich, and PATTERNS. The exhibition includes six projects previously on view in the Austrian Pavilion at the 2010 Venice Architecture Biennale, with an objective to use imaginative design to communicate the prospects of architecture and urban design.
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March 17, 2011. 7-9 pm. Painted Over/Under Part 3:
Closing Reception and Panel Discussion at LACE in Hollywood
Making Place is the architecture-inspired section of a yearlong exhibition conceptualized by artist Kim Schoenstadt. Featuring Los Angeles-based architecture and design firms Predock_Frane Architects, Chee Salette Architecture Office (csao),and Florencia Pita mod and curated by Erin Cullerton, Making Place showcases two-dimensional, abstracted vignettes of the Los Angeles cityscape. As both an exercise in artful placemaking and a response to the powerful imagery of forgotten urban landscapes, Making Placeexplores the myriad ways Los Angeles has layered itself into a complex network of activity at once dense and urbanistically challenged. The exhibition further explores the impact of sprawl, developer-led density, and transportation and water access, among other concerns.
Moderated by KCRW’s Frances Anderton, the panel will feature artist Kim Schoenstadt, curator Erin Cullerton, John Frane, Hadrian Predock, Marc Salette, and Florencia Pita.
LACE (Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions)
6522 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90028
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Friday, March 18, 8:30 – 10am
Los Angeles Creative Mornings with Scott Flora, co-founder of Blik
FREE with rsvp, which opens 1 week from the event.
Blik is the leading designer and maker of innovative self-adhesive, removable surface graphics. Co-founded in 2002 by architect Scott Flora and food editor Jerinne Neils, Blik was an exploration into the concept of the “wall as canvas.” Today, through groundbreaking production methods, original design and collaboration with such brands as Threadless, Upper Playground, Nintendo and Charles & Ray Eames, Blik is an I.D. Magazine Product Design Distinction Award Winner and participated in the esteemed Cooper-Hewitt National Design Triennial. Blik was recently named as one of Entrepreneur’s Top 100 Brilliant Companies for 2010. The full Blik product line is available online and at retailers worldwide. CreativeMornings is a monthly morning gathering of creative types. Each event includes a 20 minute lecture, followed by a 20 minute group discussion.
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Illuminated reflections
Reflecting upon their individual artistic achievements spanning more than four decades, Los Angeles–based artists Bill Aron and Victor Raphael have united to create their first collaborative works: gold and metal–leafed photographs. To accomplish these works, Raphael applies the leaf to selected areas of Aron’s photographs of Jewish and diverse cultures around the world. This process transforms the images of people, shadows, walls, and windows into unique works of art infused with light, energy, and new life. Drawing from the tradition of illuminated manuscripts as well as contemporary digital art, the photographs in Illuminated Reflections push the boundaries of traditional photography and introduce a novel hybrid art form.

Exhibition Discussion: Eric Owen Moss & Audience of Objects Exhibitors: “SCI-Arc director Eric Owen Moss discusses the Audience of Objects exhibition, currently on view at SCI-Arc, with exhibitors: Herwig Baumgartner and Scott Uriu, B+U; Hernan Diaz Alonso, Xefirotarch; Craig Hodgetts and Hsinming Fung, Hodgetts + Fung; Elena Manferdini, Atelier Manferdini; Alexis Rochas, I/O; and Marcelo Spina and Georgina Huljich, and PATTERNS. The exhibition includes six projects previously on view in the Austrian Pavilion at the 2010 Venice Architecture Biennale, with an objective to use imaginative design to communicate the prospects of architecture and urban design.” – SciArc. March 16, 7 p.m.

Painted Over/Under Part 3: LACE will be having a closing reception and panel discussion on the urban landscape of Los Angeles, part of the “Making Place” exhibit. “Making Place showcases two-dimensional, abstracted vignettes of the Los Angeles cityscape. As both an exercise in artful placemaking and a response to the powerful imagery of forgotten urban landscapes, Making Place explores the myriad ways Los Angeles has layered itself into a complex network of activity at once dense and urbanistically challenged. The exhibition further explores the impact of sprawl, developer-led density, and transportation and water access, among other concerns.” The panel will feature artist Kim Schoenstadt, curator Erin Cullerton, John Frane, Hadrian Predock, Marc Salette, and Florencia Pita, and will be moderated by KCRW’s own Frances Anderton. March 17, 2011. 7-9 p.m.
Get Creative with Blik: Creative Mornings, a monthly breakfast series for “creative types,” will feature Blik co-founder Scott Flora on March 18. Blik is a Venice graphic design firm now famous for its innovative wall decals. Recently, Blik was named as one of Entrepreneur’s Top 100 Brilliant Ideas for 2010. The event consists of a 20-minute lecture followed by a 20-minute discussion (and coffee, of course). March 18, 8:30 – 10:30 a.m. Free.
Cause for Creativity – The Alchemy of Grooming: Ever wonder what’s in your shampoo? Nothing good, say some studies and cosmetic purists. On Sunday, the Santa Monica Museum of Art will host a workshop on making one’s own cosmetics and packaging, called “the Alchemy of Grooming.” “A screening of the animated short, The Story of Cosmetics will get participants resolving to get rid of toxins, make art, and make a difference,” SMMOA says. Admission $5; free for SMMoA members. 2-5 p.m. March 13.

Human Nature: Contemporary Art from the Collection and Vija Celmins: Television and Disaster: LACMA is opening two exhibitionsSunday. The first, “Human Nature,” is “the most extensive presentation of the museum’s permanent collection of contemporary art – approximately 75 works of art in diverse media.” The second is a stark series by Latvian Vija Celmins, who “engages a palette focused on the gradations between black and gray, and is known as a painter of refined representational images. The works on view in this exhibition focus on Celmins’ interest in war planes, smoking guns, and other images of death and disaster, reflecting the mediated view of the first televised war.” 11 a.m.–8 p.m. March 13.