For four nights in September, the Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum presents the controversial one-woman play that has become a flashpoint for opposing viewpoints about Israel's presence in the Gaza strip. Susan Angelo directs Samara Frame in "My Name is Rachel Corrie,"composed from the journals, letters and emails of the 23-year-old American peace activist who died protesting the demolition of a Palestinian home in Gaza. Four performances take place on September 1, 8, 15, 22 at 8 pm in the S. Mark Taper Foundation Pavilion at Theatricum Botanicum. A moderated audience talk-back will follow each performance.

When the play premiered at the Royal Court in London, England in the spring of 2005, it played to sold-out houses and rave reviews. Despite this success, the New York Theatre Workshop put the planned U.S. premiere on hold in the face of public protests, including threats of violence. In the end, the play opened as a commercial production at the Minetta Lane Theatre in Greenwich Village in the fall of 2006, and has since seen productions throughout the U.S. and Canada.

Preview: "My Name Is Rachel Corrie" Opens in LA by Theatricum Botanicum

Monday, Feb. 02, 2009 - "Fertile Dreams," a solo exhibit by LA artist Freyda Miller, opens Sat. Feb. 7 at Art Dimensions in Westwood. Integrating assemblage, photography, and installation, Miller explores complex aspects of the maternal psyche. The evocative and vulnerable portrayal of the feminine raises issues of autonomy, stereotypes, equality and self-esteem. Fertile Dreams takes on a life of its own, dealing with primal emotions and thoughts that transcend time and place. Images of life and death emerge along with dreamlike qualities of both flight and confinement. The exhibit runs thru Mar. 21.
Full Article: Fertile Dreams - Assemblage & Photography by Freyda Miller by Green Galactic

Did you make one of those creative, poignant, angry, sublime, ironic, raging signs we have been seeing in the recent Iraq protests? Did you labor over a handmade banner at all the anti-sweatshop marches? Did you make some amazing anti-Bush sign that has only been seen by your fellow protesters?

Now is the time to show them in a museum!

This autumn, the Journal of Aesthetics and Protest is organizing an exhibition at the Craft and Folk Art Museum (CAFAM) across the street from the LA Brea Tar Pits and LACMA. The exhibition is entitled "Street Signs and Solar Ovens: social craft in LA". The exhibit highlights both protest crafts (banners, activist lock-boxes, guerilla posters, placards, puppets), crafts gone political (sweaters with slogans) and utopian technologies (solar ovens, bikes, bio-desiel cars, bike bags...)

Donate Old Protest Posters and Placards for an Art Exhibit!!! by the Journal of Aesthetics and Protest

On June 7th, 2005, Self-Help Graphics and Art, a Chicano art center with community, Chicano activist roots, was closed.  Emergency meetings, and political jockeying ensued to reopen the center, but controversy still reigns in this institution that's become "institutionalized".  Still a contested space.  Here are the stories LA-IMC has collected from the archives:

MARK VALLEN - Self Help Graphics Finished? cyberaztec, Jun 17, 2005
PROTEST CLOSURE OF CHICANO ART CENTER SHAC, Jun 19, 2005
Protest to Save Self Help Graphics Califaztlan, Jun 19, 2005
Update on Self-Help Graphics protests & mass meetings tlaloc, Jun 23, 2005
Update on Self-Help Graphics protests & mass meetings tlaloque, July 1, 2005
Attempts to Rescue Self Help Graphics & Art yubyum, Aug 16, 2005
Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) 2005 Diane Gamboa, Sep 23, 2005
Remembering Self Help Graphics & Art! Tony Nava, June 7, 2006

Farzad Kohan: featured exhibition in Los Angeles this June. Kohan's latest works may be viewed at Seyhoun Gallery from June 3 through June 9, 2006. Beginning with an artist reception on Saturday, June 3 from 6 to 9 p.m. Kohan cleverly mixes paint and found objects, forming a three-dimensional format that brings to life a series of lithe, gracefully bending figures that seem to move through space on a fluid emotionally packed journey.

"As an artist , Kohan gently speaks,"I have lived and worked on several continents, and rely on my world view to inform my inner mind. Living in Los Angeles, one of the most iconoclastic cities of all, inspires me to draw upon my self-training and motivation to constantly produce unique and personal artworks. My conceptual pieces directly communicate my thoughts and represent my lifes' perceptions"
From the newswire: FARZAD KOHAN "PENDING PERCEPTION" by Sheryl Mandel

HBO's docudrama, Walkout, about the Chicano students blowouts of the late 1960s, prompted commentary and criticism. Several were posted to the newswire. Review by Arturo P. Garcia. On the Set by Ross Plesset with David Sanchez, and a good comment to that article by Mescalero Apache. Ed Roybal Presente by 60s student organizer Rosalio Munoz. Call for Extras back when they were filming.