With the holidays and gift giving seasons upon us, some generous art shows and events are here to lend a helping hand with giveaways, affordable stuffs and comic books.
The Secret Headquarters hosts a “one night only” evening with acclaimed artist and creator of Hellboy, Mike Mignola, at their Silver Lake comic book store. In addition, “SHQ will also be offering a limited edition Mignola illustrated 3 color letterpress print made specifically for this show. The prints feature never before seen Hellboy artwork by Mike Mignola with color supervision by Dave Stewart.”
Mike Mignola Secret Headquarters
One night only: Friday, December 4th, 8-10pm
3817 W. Sunset Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90026
Post It 4
Opening reception: Saturday, December 5th, 6:30-10pm
GR2
2062 Sawtelle Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90025
Show runs from December 5 through January 10, 2010
Deck the Halls
Opening reception: Saturday, December 5th, 7pm-12am
Exhibit A Gallery
1086 South Fairfax Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90019
And finally for the New Yorkers who love the funny books, the Brooklyn Comics and Graphic Novel Festival is doing it’s indie thing at Our Lady of Consolation Church. In Williamsburg or course.
One of the funnest parts about putting together these weekend event lists is coming up with an appropriate title using the words from said events. As seen above, this weekend’s happenings has churned out the perfect storm of words. From partying with porn stars to making art with nuns, Los Angeles has a lot going for it under our overcast skies, including our beloved Lakers winning it all in Orlando this Sunday!
Get your porn on all weekend long as Erotica LA 2009 sexys up the LA Convention Center with pornstars galore and the 40,000 estimated attendees who masturbate to them.
Erotica LA 2009LA Convention Center
June 12-14, 2009
Friday 4:00-11:00 PM, Saturday 11:00 AM-11:00 PM, and Sunday 11:00 AM-6:00 PM
1201 South Figueroa Street
Los Angeles, CA 90015
Tickets and day passes are on-sale now.
Real Life presented by Bob OdenkirkSilent Movie Theater
Friday June 12th, 8:00pm
611 N. Fairfax Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90036
The celebration of Sister Corita’s art and inspiring spirit just keeps on going as a modern day happening happens at the Corita Art Center in Hollywood. Complete with silk-screening, banner and flag making, music, food, a procession with pipes, the day’s festivities also include the release of the 2nd edition of Jan Steward’sLearning By Heart. Corita is definitely alive and well.
Corita Art Center
Saturday June 13th, from 1-5pm
5515 Franklin Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90028 (NW corner of Franklin and Western)
939 Chung King Rd. Los Angeles, CA 90012
Show runs from June 13 through July 8, 2009
Mark A. Rodriguez brings a variety of medias with his architectural constructions to Echo Park’s Hope Gallery with Roman Title IV Plain Jane.
Mark A. Rodriguez-Roman Title IV Plain JaneHope Gallery
Opening Reception: Saturday June 13th, 7-10pm
1547 Echo Park Ave. Echo Park, CA 90026
Show runs from June 13 through July 12, 2009
Childlike pop-art illustrations meet vector based computer art when J. Otto Seibold comes to Giant Robot’s GR2 on Sawtelle with his Jottobots.
J. Otto Seibold-JottobotsGR2
Opening reception: Saturday, June 13th, 6:30 -10:00pm
2062 Sawtelle Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90025
Show runs from June 13 through July 8, 2009
And finally, end the weekend laughing with a tribute to unorthodox cult comedian Mitch Hedberg at The Silent Movie Theater as the Cinefamily “commemorates the comic’s legacy with a screening of his TV appearances, live performances, and the pilot to his unreleased MTV reality show, The Mitch Hedberg Project. Also showing is his autobiographical 1999 feature, Los Enchiladas; directed by Hedberg, the film focuses on the humorist’s early days as a Mexican restaurant employee in the suburbs of St. Paul.”
In related news, get to know half of the N.A.S.A. duo with this video of our friend Squeak E. Clean (a.k.a. Sam Speigel a.k.a. brother of Spike Jonze a.k.a. musical mathematician) giving you a tour of the creatively infamous Crack Alley Studios:
And finally to keep N.A.S.A.’s good times rolling, “Sprit of the Apollo” record release parties will be going down this week in Los Angeles (1/27) and New York (1/29). Click the flyers below for more info and to RSVP:
THANK YOU! Thanks to all of you East and West coasters who’ve come out to support Beautiful Losers and helped spread the films message to your friends and family! With good word of mouth continuing to extend from person to person, through the web, and in print, we’ll be bringing our little film up the coast to San Francisco for another homecoming of sorts. Here’s a brief rundown of where we’ve been theatrically in the U.S. so far:
Los Angeles: At each of the 4 Q&A sessions we did on opening weekend 4 different people from the audience stood up and paid us the highest compliment, they thanked us for making this film. Come see what’s moving people! Last show is TODAY, Thursday September 4th @ 5:00, 7:30, and 10:00.
Tickets available here: Landmark Nuart Theatre
New York: The attendance of the late night showings at the IFC Center have been so strong that they extended the run for an additional 2 weeks longer than we were supposed to be in the theater. Last shows are this FRIDAY and SATURDAY September 5th+6th @ 12:25 a.m.
Tickets and more info here: IFC Center
San Francisco: You’re next! San Francisco premiere this Friday, September 5th with Q&A’s following the 7:00 and 9:00 shows.
Tickets available here: Landmark Lumiere Theatre
If you have peoples up North, please pass along the info that we’ll be making our Bay Area premiere this weekend. Your help has been invaluable and very appreciated! Thank you all again for helping make Beautiful Losers such a success!
(Sneak peek of the Nike/UNDFTD billboard on La Brea and 1st St. Design by Keith Scharwath)
On Friday August 29th, Beautiful Losers makes it’s Los Angeles premiere at Landmark’s Nuart Theater. To date, the response to our little film has been overwhelmingly positive and audiences have eagerly embraced our message of inspiration and creativity with open arms. With no major film distribution company behind us, we’ve been fortunate enough to have gained the support and good will from audiences who have seen the film and have continued to spread the good word amongst friends, family, and something called the “internets”. Hopefully this grass roots approach can continue to bring our film to more and more cities as we have just added Boston to our tour which already includes San Francisco, Portland, and Chicago.
The 7:30 and 10pm shows on opening night will feature Q&A sessions with myself, Aaron Rose, and Money Mark. Tickets for the L.A. premiere and theatrical run are now on sale and can be purchased at Landmark’s website here(Make sure you’re purchasing tickets for the correct shows. Dates are listed in the pull down menu above the showtimes!)
Fresh from Tokyo, Japan after our official theatrical world premiere (much more on the Japan trip coming soon), Beautiful Losers makes it’s homecoming with the U.S. theatrical premiere on August 8th at the IFC Center in New York city. This release has been a long while coming as we’ve been on the festival road for over a year now, even capturing a documentary jury prize along the way. Select showings of this weekend’s special release will feature Q&A sessions with several artists from the film. The lineup goes as follows:
Friday, Aug.8th @ 8:20 - Aaron Rose, Steve Powers (ESPO), Chris Johanson, and Cheryl Dunn
Tickets can be bought right here. (Make sure you’re purchasing tickets for the correct shows. Dates are listed in the pull down menu above the showtimes!)
The New York theatrical release at the IFC Center will run from August 8th through the 28th before shifting to the West Coast with runs in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland, and finally end in Chicago (the film may have a longer run depending on the success of this initial roll out).
In addition to the the film’s U.S. launch, Nike Sportswear has partnered with us to give back to the people. “Make Something!!” is a series of D.I.Y. creative art-based workshops taught by some of today’s best creators aimed at inspiring and educating young people. The first set starts in New York and runs from August 8th through the 22nd and then moves to Los Angeles and goes from August 29th through September 8th. The workshops range from sign painting, photography, skateboard graphic design, toy design, filmmaking, tattoo art, footwear design and zine making. Classes will be taught by the likes of Aaron Rose, KAWS, Todd James, Tobin Yelland, Cheryl Dunn, Mike Mills, Ed Templeton, Money Mark, and yours truly to name a few. Come by my class August 30th where I’ll be teaching kids the dark arts of film editing! More on the workshops to come as they happen.
The paint is still drying and the time is almost upon us. The highly anticipated show will open tomorrow night at the Laforet Museum at 6pm! Like the sign says…
(from left to right: Harmony Korine, Mark Gonzalez, and Carlo McCormick)
On Sunday May 18th, my first full day back stateside, I was treated to a special “conversation” between filmmaker Harmony Korine and artist/skateboarder Mark Gonzalez which was later moderated by magazine editor Carlo McCormick at Tokion’s Creativity Now conference at Cooper Union in Manhattan. The two playfully started off their discussion by going through their list of “Name Poems” which are names of celebrity types dissected and reshaped to form whole new names. This exercise in adolescence started in Harmony’s Prince street apartment at the start of their long standing friendship and through the years has grown into a list of hundreds. Starting with their first foray into their new art form, Harmony recited the original name poem “Emily dicked her son” (Emily Dickinson). And from there, back and forth they went laughing with childlike pride at some of their crudest and funniest inventions which included; “Dick rides around in a van looking for dykes” (Dick Van Dyke), “Is it a kite? Harvey can’t tell” (Harvey Keitel), “Burt Reynolds wrap”, “What’s Stephen Hawking?”, and “Kirstie was raped in an alley” (Kirstie Alley) to which Mark replied, “That’s just mean.” Mean indeed, amusing yes, and the audience of students and young and old people enjoyed it all. Here’s a bit of video of the tail end of the name poetry segment:
From there Carlo McCormick joined the brouhaha and attempted to turn the conversation into a more insightful one with sincere answers. This was not easily done with the Harmony and Mark revelling in being the jokesters they are. At one point Mark completely interrupts Harmony mid-answer when he started playing his harmonica on his mic:
But not all of it was fun and games as Mark gave one of the best answers of the day when Carlo asked him how his process when making art involves leaving his errors in finished pieces, to which Mark responded (in so many words), “the mistake is part of the make.” A lesson I’ve been slow to adhere to being a perfectionist for most of my life, but a lesson I now live by as I understand the beauty in drawing outside the lines. As these two creators have been doing for most of theirs.
Thanks to the lovely Heather Seccia of Tokion for getting me and my brother in.