It’s possible to enjoy dark and edgy L.A., yet still be a geek for corny Americana such as county fairs, July 4 parades, and the 38th Annual Festival of the Kite on Redondo Beach. I’m a testament to this fact, and was there yesterday at the  to enjoy the aerial festivities.

It was a beautiful day, it was winter, we were on the beach, surrounded by hundreds of colorful kites. And the L.A. skyline was comfortably close by.

More photos, after the jump

LAANE cause logo

Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE) is the group spear heading the protest of the small neighborhood style grocery store that Walmart wants to open.  I am familiar with the market as I have seen them in Las Vegas where they have been for a couple of years.  The groc to a degree is similar to Fresh and Easy or Trader Joe’s in size and marketing.

LAANE takes exception to the store on several levels.  First is that the city and its residents can’t afford to subsidize benefits for their employees.  Why?  Because they alleged, and Walmart certainly has been held to scrutiny on this in the past, for paying wages that are so low that their employees qualify for medi-cal, food stamps and similar welfare.  Certainly Walmart hasn’t been accused of paying a living wage nor employing for enough hours to have their employees to be benefit eligible.

Deets: Thursday, March 8, at 1pm., Department of Public Social Services, on 2415 W. Sixth St. Los Angeles, CA 90057  MAP HERE.

Full press release after the jump. Read the rest of this entry →

In the waning months of the last year of the last century spent toiling as the editor of a weekly newspaper in Pasadena a press packet landed on my desk detailing an exhibit at the Mendenhall Gallery and from it I discovered and become enthralled with the art of Richard Bunkall, a resident of the city and long-time instructor at Arts Center College of Design.

Little more than a week later, at the age of 45, Bunkall died after a five-year struggle with Lou Gehrig’s disease. In shock as I read the perfunctory obituary in the Pasadena Star-News, I mourned his passing somewhat selfishly in that I’d just found his heroic art. As such I wanted both to know more and share that with my readers, and thanks to the grace of his widow Sally during what had to be such a difficult time, she allowed myself and writer Kathleen August to intrude upon the Bunkall home, and access his studio, where he created his amazing works, and where surrounded by family and friends he passed in May 1999.

It was a deeply emotional experience and privilege, to say the least.

Q&A: Curator Peter Frank (center) is flanked by artists Kenton Nelson (left) and Ray Turner (right) as they discuss Bunkall's life and his art.

It was equally emotional to visit the Pasadena Museum of California Art (PMCA) last night for a standing-room-only event surrounded by some of his most profound and moving creations, to remember the man and his art and to celebrate the launch of a new book devoted to both, the first publication of the artist’s remarkable 25-year career as a painter and sculptor.

If this is your first time hearing about Richard Bunkall or it’s been a long time since you last thought about him, I’d encourage you to make a trip out to the PMCA to introduce or reacquaint yourself with his remarkable imagery before the exhibit, “Richard Bunkall: A Portrait” closes April 22.

Where: Pasadena Museum of California Art, 490 E. Union Street, Pasadena, 91101
When: Wednesday – Sunday, 12 – 5 p.m., through April 22.
Cost: $7 adults; $5 seniors and students; free the first Friday of the month

Do these go with that ear I found?

As I and a cohort wandered through a posh new townhouse block near the beach the other night, my gaze was drawn to a semicircular pink and white object sitting in the dirt amidst the well-manicured plantings. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be a set of dentures (I’m guessing the term is “uppers”). Being a movie geek and having a vivid imagination, I immediately thought of the ear found on the ground at the beginning of “Blue Velvet“, and wondered what sordid events may have led to this deposit. I doubt that it is a deliberate form of fertilizer. Anyone care to speculate with me? Do you think it had something to do with Heineken?

Winners have been selected and notified via email. Thank you for your comments!

It’s hard to remember when I was last affected by a film as much as I have been by Wim Wenders’ Academy Award nominated 3D documentary Pina. I’ve seen it in the theater three times and love it more each time.

PINA is a feature-length dance film in 3D with the ensemble of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, featuring the unique and inspiring art of the great German choreographer, who died in the summer of 2009.

PINA is a film for Pina Bausch by Wim Wenders.

He takes the audience on a sensual, visually stunning journey of discovery into a new dimension: straight onto the stage with the legendary Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch ensemble, he follows the dancers out of the theatre into the city and the surrounding areas of Wuppertal – the place, which for 35 years was the home and centre for Pina Bausch’s creativity.

Pina is going to being showing at the fabulous Downtown Independent starting Friday, March 2nd through Thursday, March 8th. Blogging LA has FIVE (5) PAIRS OF TICKETS TO GIVE AWAY TO THE SCREENING OF YOUR CHOICE AT THE DOWNTOWN INDEPENDENT.

Leave a comment by 12pm on Thursday, March 1st stating why you would like to see Pina. Five winners will be selected and notified by email.

The 2012 edition of my Watts Happening Ride took place this past picture-perfect Saturday, and it was my complete pleasure to share the following landmark people, places and events I’ve discovered there with the 28 cyclists who joined me:

1. The last residence of jazz great Jelly Roll Morton
2. The childhood home of Nobel Prize Winner Ralph Bunche
3. The location of the 1969 Black Panthers shootout
4. The Hotel Dunbar, centerpiece of the Historic Central Avenue Jazz Corridor
5. The location of the 1974 SLA shootout
6. The actual fictional location of the Sanford and Son Salvage Yard
7. The Watts Towers of Simon Rodia
8. The location of the incident setting off the 1965 Watts Riots
9. The home of Eula Love, killed by police in 1979 as a result of a past-due gas bill dispute
10. The motel where legendary singer Sam Cooke was killed
11. The flashpoint of the 1992 Los Angeles Riots
12. The location of Wrigley Field, demolished in 1966.

Unfortunately, the above annotated timelapse video abruptly ends at the third-to-last location we visited, leaving me to discover that I need to get a bigger memory card if I want to capture the entire 33-mile, six-hour tour on camera the next time — and there will be a next time. I hope you’ll join me.

The first Watts Happening Ride I organized five years ago was a simple there-and-back to Watts Towers from the Cornfield downtown, spurred on by the lamentable fact that as a native angeleno I had spent my whole life to-date never having been to the true treasure that is the amazing, inspiring and enduring work of Simon Rodia.

In its various editions since (the last one taking place in 2010), the Watts Happening Ride’s destinations have grown well beyond the iconic towers to include a variety of landmarks involving people, places and events in and around South Los Angeles.

The 2012 incarnation of the Watts Happening Ride will be departing from Silver Lake on Saturday, February 18 at 9 a.m., and will include the addition of a couple locations I’ve recently found. So if you’re not heading out of town for the long weekend and have a hankering to get your bike-riding discovery on, I hope you’ll join me.

For the latest info and any updates, the ride’s Facebook page is here.

When: February 18, gathering at 8:30 for a 9 a.m. departure
Start/Finish: Silver Lake’s Happy Foot/Sad Foot sign (northwest corner of Sunset Boulevard & Benton Way)
Distance: 32.95 miles (route map)
Pace: Casual
Terrain: Flat
Weather: In the event of rain that morning, the ride will be canceled and rescheduled to a later date.
Approximate Time: 5-6 hours
Optional Partial Ride: If doing the full route isn’t feasible, consider joining the ride at approximately 9:30 a.m. downtown on Spring Street (anywhere between 2nd & 9th streets) for the roughly 9-mile portion to the Watts Towers. The 103rd Street Blue Line station is near to the towers and can be an alternative to get you back into downtown.
Things You’ll Need (in no particular order): A functioning bicycle; $7 for the half-hour optional tour of Watts Towers; snacks and water for along the way; money for a late lunch at King Taco.

One of the things I love most about LA is the wide variety of food options available. When picking out an Indian restaurant for lunch in the West Valley, there are a range of choices: Indian buffet, lunch counter in the Sweets and Spices market, or vegetarian South Indian, to name a few. The top choice for the latter of those choices, for me, is always Woodlands Indian restaurant.

More than anything else on their menu, the Gobi Manchurian is what keeps me coming back time and time again. Read the rest of this entry →

You’re probably not like me and are able to cope with the scope of the massively collaborative and on-going Pacific Standard Time exhibitions that fall under the ambitious region-wide initiative’s banner. Me, not so much. With so many institutions involved, I suffer from something of a paralysis when trying to decide whether I should go to the Getty or the Hammer  or LACMA or wherever. Case in point: I literally became immobile when I just now went to the Pacific Standard Time website and a banner popped up that told me there are 42 events taking place right this moment of 10:28AM — and that may even include a Big Gulp Cup retrospective at my local 7-11.

A few weeks ago I did manage to brush my intimidation aside and pay a first-time visit to MOCA to see the cool exhibition of Weegee’s Hollywood period photographs, but — pardon the digression — then I wandered around the museum’s permanent exhibit and found this piece of crap stuck to the wall, which reinforced both my abject disdain for “contemporary art” and my urge to punish whoever curated it with an extended indian-burn session to the forearm of his or her choosing.

Detail from the 1938 Kirkman-Harriman map depicting Los Angeles County in 1860.

So instead of getting all wound up trying to eenie-meanie-miney-mo to which big box the next I’d go, instead I brought along my inner map geek and together we ventured yesterday to the first floor galleries of the Central Library downtown where I spent an extended segment of the afternoon marveling at the selection of kick-ass cartography displayed as part of  its “As The City Grew: Historical Maps of Los Angeles” exhibit.

The 34 maps arrayed go back to the mid-1800s and offer an awesome and up-close glimpse back into our city as it was and as it became. Unlike the aforementioned contemporary bullshit I encountered, some of the maps are true and intricate works of art, and I would highly recommend paying them a visit whether you just find yourself in the library’s vicinity or are in between far better-decided visits than mine to the myriad Pacific Standard Time venues.

WHERE: Los Angeles Public Library, Central Branch, 630 W. 5th St, 90071
WHEN: Through November 4, 2012
COST: Free

I’m guilty of more than a few.  You?  I particularly like the dig about moving to the West Side…a place I barely know as there is simply no easy way to get there from where I live and there is never any parking.  There, I said it.

In the past Burbank’s given me a couple big opportunities to balk at how that city’s done bicyclists wrong. The first time was major in the mid-2000s when its council responded to resident outcry that more bikes would somehow equal more traffic and more crime and roundly rejected what had been an already approved and funded route plan connecting the LA River Bikeway with the Chandler Boulevard Bikeway. The second was a couple years ago when Burbank political and law enforcement officials overly sympathized with a noisy contingent of Chandler Bikeway pedestrians who demanded that police officers should have nothing better to do than devote their limited resources to speed-trapping and citing all of us speeddemon cyclists who imperil the pedestrians’ entitled (and in some cases: irresponsible) use of the bikeway.

But on a trip to Burbank and back by bike this week, I have nothing to say but “Bravo!” to that burg after I chanced to discover an unheralded and entirely unmarked bike/pedestrian path that was so brand-spanking new it had to have only been recently completed. Paralleling the Burbank Western Channel between Alameda Avenue and Victory Boulevard, it’s short and sweet at barely a quarter-mile in length, but it provides a serene off-street shortcut connection between the two busy thoroughfares that not only serves cyclists passing through but also the residents of the neighborhood to the north of the channel.

Here’s hoping it’s the first of more to come.

UPDATE (1.24): I received an email from Cory Wilkerson, an assistant transportation planner for Burbank, who confirmed that more indeed is to come. He wrote, “We are planning to extend the pathway to the Burbank Metrolink Station, Top Priority Project #8 in our Bike Plan. The project was funded through Metro’s Call for Project and constrcution is schedule for FY 2015.”

After the jump you can find an annotated and embiggenable Google Map screengrab of the path’s location along with two timelapse clips of rides on the segment, the first traveling from Victory to Alameda and the second coming back from Alameda to Victory.

Read the rest of this entry →

Do you remember the movie Airplane?

Remember the two gentlemen who spoke “Jive?” Remember the subtitles at the bottom that translated what they were saying? Remember whenever one of them would say a certain word, the subtitle always translated it as “Golly?”

Such fun.

It’s in this spirit I would like to remind you, one and all, that The Wu-Tang Clan Ain’t Nothin’ to Trifle With!

(And if you haven’t seen Airplane, get your golly together and watch the trifling thing.)

In Any Case, I’m giving away Tickets to see The Wu on Saturday, Jan 21st! Wanna Go?

Email your Full Legal Name as it appears on your Legal Driver’s Licence or State ID card to blacontests@gmail.com

Winners will be notified and will show said ID at the Will Call booth the night of the show to claim tickets. Protect your neck.

Wu-Tang Featuring All Original Members: RZA, GZA, Method Man, Raekwon, Ghostface Killah, Inspectah Deck, U-God and Masta Killa
Saturday January 21, 2012
Club Nokia
Los Angeles, California
Show time: 9:00pm
Door time: 8:00pm
Age: All Ages+

Step to the Wu.

Read the rest of this entry →

Runners may be distracted by the Marina Harbor views

The 13.1 Los Angeles half marathon (13.1 miles) takes place next Sunday, January 15, against “a new scenic backdrop.” The half marathon, part of the “13.1″ series of races in major U.S. cities, starts at 7 a.m. at the Venice Boardwalk (Rose Ave. intersection), winds around the Marina del Rey Harbor, and ends in Playa del Rey. Area drivers should plan accordingly.

In addition to the half marathon, there will be a separate “Karhu 5k” race along Dockweiler Beach, in which racers will compete against — insert joke here — a runner dressed as the Karhu Bear. Runners who “Beat the Bear” will win a pair of Karhu brand running shoes.

Marina Harbor with Burton Chace Park, a prime viewing location, on the far side

Good news for many area residents: the annual Marina del Rey New Year’s Eve fireworks show is a go.

After L.A. County canceled this year’s July 4 fireworks show at the Marina due to budget tightening, private interests stepped up to assist with funding to put on the New Year’s Eve display. That’s cause for a double celebration.

The fireworks show gets warmed up at 11:55 p.m., but, given the public parking and traffic challenges during Marina del Rey events, I’d plan to get there quite a bit earlier.

Was a brand spanking new Laemmle theater with seven screens. Santa delivered! Wednesday night the NoHo 7 theater, newest addition to LA’s awesome “we’re not afraid of subtitles” Laemmle chain.

Read the rest of this entry →