News

counter/cartographies: you are here: the journal of creative geography

you are here is an annual publication by graduate students in the
School of Geography, Development, and Environment (SGDE) at
the University of Arizona that explores geographic themes through
poetry, creative writing, maps, photographs, visual and sound art,
film, performance, and other imaginable genres.

The Sep 18, 2023 counter/cartographies includes Nickel’s Yestermorrow: Llano’s Obvious Answers to Impossible Futures under countermapping & storywork situated beside creative works challenging dominant imaginaries, representations & practices of space with contributors from around the globe.

Read it for free or purchase a print copy (https://sites.google.com/view/edenkinkaid/creative-works/countercartographies)

The Los Angeles Press: Volume Nine / Gold

V9 the theme is gold — sky sand mountain vision history place longing — what is gold!? Available to order at thelosangelespress.com

Launch readings at —

Westside
Nov 11, 2023 at 5pm
The Village Well in Culver City

Eastside
Nov 29, 2023 at 7pm
North Figueroa Bookshop in Highland Park

With features from Kendalle Getty Raffi Wartanian Anthony Portantino Rachel Berkowitz Phillip T. Nails Kent Leatham Maryam Hosseinzadeh Christina Cha Hannah Olabosibe Eko Tom Laichas Nikki Ochoa Cassandra Dallett Jennifer Lewis Eddi Salado Kar Johnson Hank Henderson Natasha Dennerstein rachel leigh Larissa Nickel Kelliane Parker Natalie Marino Zachary Bos Corrinne Bollendorf Kyle Kouri & Brady Jackson Kristofer Heng John Andrew John Andrew Fredrick Tracy Artson Erin Meehan Iván Salinas Donato Martinez Kim Dower Maura Rosner on Mirza Hamid Katja Grober Jonathon Rios Zohreh Zadbood jen Cheng Chris Kessler Sola Saar Diosa Xochiquetzalcoatl

Art and Community Engagement Panel Discussion

Tuesday, November 4, 2021
6 pm PST via Zoom
Hosted by the Lancaster Museum of Art and History:
Free
Moderated by artist Kristine Schomaker, this panel discussion on Art and Community Engagement with artists with Nathaniel Cas Ancheta, Dani Dodge, and Larissa Nickel is held in conjunction with Kristine Schomaker’s “Perceive Me” on view through December 12th at MOAH:CEDAR.

Looking Glass Exhibition at The Antelope Valley Art Gallery

Tuesday, April 20-May 2021
38198 10th St E, Palmdale, CA 93550
Drive or walk by event: Free

Antelope Valley Looking Glass window exhibition features six new window displays by Stephen P. James, Alex Wences Lao, Larissa Nickel, Aizyaht, Rodney L. Johnson, and Edwin Vasquez plus three in-gallery music performances and livestream:  https://vimeo.com/53983441

Curated by We Are Community Arts:
http://wacartsav.org/

Art in Residence Open Forum #5: Larissa Nickel in Dialogue with Dave Martin

Sunday, April 11, 2021, 5:00 PM PDT
Online event:
Free

“Museum is my medium”

– Larissa Nickel explores an expansive set of ideas around the museum as an institution and as a medium for creative manipulation. In this talk, she and Dave Martin consider a particular High Desert town as a case study for her post-human approach to these concepts. The talk will move toward opening up new possibilities for the display and dissemination of artists’ work.

High Beams #2

Saturday, October 31, 2020, 7-10 pm
Gallery ALSO:
3754 N. Mission Rd., Los Angeles

High Beams, a curated collection of mostly Bendix Building art spaces will create a walk-through exhibition in the Gallery ALSO parking lot Halloween night. Among the exhibits will be a spooky mini golf course, coffins filled with the debris of 2020, and haunting projections. Prizes will be given out to the best costumes that enforce social distancing.

Participants: Ismael de Anda III, Rachel Apthorp, Carl Baratta, Michael Castañeda, Coby Cerna, Carly Chubak, Sean Cully, Tirsa Delate, Tom Dunn, Dominick Garritano, Lesya Godfrey , Linus Gruszewski, Matt Haywood, Ibuki Kuramochi, Kim Marra, Easton Miller, Oliver Mayhall, Lauren Moradi, Hagop Najarian, Larissa Nickel, Sean Noyce, Alaïa Parhizi, Max Presneill, Alyssa Rogers, Adrienne Sacks, Katie Shanks, Katya Usvitsky, Josh Vasquez, Cheyann Washington, and Surge Witron.

USC Heal Program: Artist and Researcher 4

What happens when you pair Los Angeles’s most creative artists with Keck School of Medicine’s world-class researchers? The Artist and Researcher exhibit series highlights the parallel processes of scientific curiosity and artistic inquiry with the aim of making complex research more understandable to the general viewing public. Each artist learns about the work of his or her researcher through dialogue and/or lab visits, and creates a visual language to make the science more accessible. Over the past four years, the Artist and Researcher exhibits have paired 47 teams with stunning results.

Due to COVID 19, the Hoyt Gallery is currently closed. The exhibition is online and available to be viewed by visiting: https://sites.usc.edu/heal/hoyt-gallery/artist-and-researcher-4/

Artist and Researcher 4 participants: Yeu Q Nguyen & Mariam Davtyan, PhD, MPH & Toni Frederick, PhD, MSPH; Kristine Augustyn & Eric J. Kezirian, MD, MPH; Ching Ching Cheng & Raymond L. Goldsworthy, PhD; Ester Petschar & W. Martin Kast, PhD; Karen Ruth Karlsson & Evanthia Roussos Torres, MD, PhD; Billy Pacak & Leonardo Morsut, MD, PhD; Cathy Immordino & Zhanghua Chen, PhD; Rebecca Niederlander & Axel Montagne, PhD; Larissa Nickel & Shuwan Liu, PhD Candidate; Susan Price & Yuli Talyansky, PhD Candidate; Ella Mikayelyan & Sheila Pakdaman, MS, PhD Student Research Assistant; Lisa Lesniak & Ya-Wen Chen, MD; Ted Meyer, Curator

MAIDEN LA 4

MAIDEN LA is an inclusive network of art related happenings throughout Los Angeles County taking place September 1-20, 2020. Despite the pandemic, over 75 Los Angeles artists, collectives, curators, and organizations have delivered an exciting array of projects both live and online, interactive and socially distanced. This year’s survey boasts an impressive and thoughtful lineup utilizing parks, garages, front lawns, fences, rivers, and virtual spaces. There are scavenger hunts, window installations, drive-through sculpture parks and drive-by projections from the beach all the way to the Antelope Valley.

DEHSART Eco-WunderkammerClearly undaunted by the challenge of presenting work while abiding by Covid-19 guidelines, the Los Angeles art community continues to thrive and push and forge ahead. For the complete calendar of events visit the Maiden LA website where you can search for projects based on neighborhood, venue information or project type including DEHSART–a discard studies and eco-art initiative–creating an Eco-Wunderkammer exhibition and archive.

LAWN ORNAMENTS IN MY BACKYARD

Lawn Ornaments in My Back Yard (LOIMBY) is an amorphous and roving installation presented by artist-run initiatives MAIDEN LA, Monte Vista Projects, and Typical Office. LOIMBY is a public art installation including original lawn ornaments by 48 participating artists and collectives. LOIMBY is a play on the idea of NIMBY versus YIMBY (anagrams for Yes/No In My Backyard) which refers to residential controversy around land use, development, housing and homelessness. The whimsical smorgasbord of sculptures provided by LOIMBY allows the viewer to consider the use and value of public, private and virtual spaces.

Originally conceived as an outdoor installation for the lawns of Angel’s Gate Park, due to the pandemic LOIMBY will take place live for High Beams and online at Other Places art fair (OPaf), both part of Maiden LA 2020.

Other Places art fair (OPaf), is an alternative art fair for unconventional art initiatives, launching online September 19 this year and running through October 31, 2020. OPaf represents the growing movement of art spaces fluid in definition and bonded by an intention to operate in other places outside traditional contemporary art systems. OPaf 2020 features forty three art project spaces from the United States and Mexico in an alternative art fair structure designed specifically for these unconventional projects.

HIGH BEAMS #1

High Beams at the Bendix BuildingHigh Beams, a curated collection of Bendix Building art spaces will create a drive-through art show on the parking lot across from the building on Sept. 5, 2020. The one-night-only outdoor exhibition on the parking lot roof at 401 E. 12th St. will allow people to physically see art from the safety and comfort of their cars. Among the art that will be shown are a collection of more than two dozen lawn ornaments, lighted sculptures, furniture covered in plush animal toy fur, unscripted performance art, videos and art that recreates the idea of the traffic cone.

The first of a series of ongoing alternative exhibitions organized by a curatorial group of Bendix Building artists that includes Carl Baratta, Katya Usvitsky (TSALA); Debra Broz, Emily Blythe Jones (MVP); Molly Schulman (MVP and Maiden LA); Dani Dodge, Alanna Marcelletti, Sean Noyce, Max Presneill (Durden and Ray).

Participants: Artists Formerly Known as Women, Janna Avner, Carl Baratta, Andrea Bersaglieri, BRD, Debra Broz, Andrea Castillo, Laura Darlington, Jillian Frederick, Erin Fussell, Lesla Godfrey, Richelle Gribble, Jamie Hamilton, Chris Hanke, Hannah Hughes, Mary-Linn Hughes, Brian Thomas Jones, Matthew Kerkhof, Knowhow Shop LLC, Karah Lain, Piper Mavis, Easton Miller, Hagop Najarian, Toban Nichols, Larissa Nickel, Dakota Noot, Jordynn Nusz, OneHouse Arts, Jennie E. Park, Laura Paul, Iris Peretz, Ashton Phillips, Mary Anna Pomonis and Justin Stadel, Jeremy Quinn, Michael Rippens, Christina Shurts, Kate Sikorski, Beverly Siu, Christopher Ulivo, Sara Velas, Juan Villarreal, Surge Witrön, and HK Zamani.

Museum Adjacent Plays Itself

Museum Adjacent mock up by Sharon LevyArt collective Museum Adjacent is temporarily installing artwork outside of and adjacent to Los Angeles museum institutions. The project is an exercise in determining the role of the under-recognized artist within the Los Angeles art world. By placing their work outside of the most visually recognized emblems of the Los Angeles art scene, the collective makes a place for themselves within the greater conversation; it allows the artists’ agency to determine their place within a system that can so often deny inclusion. The project will be hosted on Museum Adjacent’s website September 1-20, 2020 for the duration of Maiden LA.

The Journal of Aesthetics and Protest Issue #11: Culture Beside Itself

The Journal of Aesthetics and Protest Issue #11 Newsletter Project is a compendium of autonomously edited and distributed newsletters on antifascist or avant garde practice. Museum Adjacent (Los Angeles) newsletter authors- Larissa Nickel and Leslie Foster, appear with content contributions from the Museum Adjacent collective which includes text and images from the Torrance Art Museum Forum residency and collective formation.

Co-edited by Marc Allen Herbst, Robby Herbst​, Amber Hickey​, Claudia Firth, the issue features 19 newsletters with their own attentions to place, power and aesthetics, it also has a few amazing essays including:

-Nick Thoburn’s work on the “communist object” of the newsletter
-Out of the Woods on Ecofascism (in relation to the situation of this issue)
-Hammam Aldouri on the false liberal universalism of the Art World (via that MOCA/Marina Abramovic blow-up)
– Tools for Action on non-fascist spectacle.

The Los Angeles Press, Volume Four: dis+placement

The Los Angeles Press, a Print and Online Publishing House & Imprint introduced by The Los Angeles Review of Books and the LARB/USC Publishing Cohort, is devoted to community engagement, and to the pursuit of social, economic, and environmental justice. Committed to uplifting and focusing on Voices Yet Heard, including Women, POC, LGBTQ+, and traditionally under-represented and marginalized artists and writers, the Los Angeles Press publishes the best in emerging art, literature, and political discourse, from Southern California and the West.

Featured in the Volume Four issue are visual artists: Malado Francine Baldwin, Meg Flores, Larissa Nickel, Senantha Norris, and Kirslyn Schell Smith, and poets – Jeremias Leonel Estrada translated by Brian Sonia Wallace, Jennie Gaborno, Sea Glassman, Elyse Hart, Rachel Leigh, Chelsea Rector, Kristen Simental, Sally Stevens, and Mackenzie Studebaker read by Bernadette McComish.

Adjacent, Adjacent at the Torrance Art Museum

Exhibition: December 7 – 21, 2019
Opening Reception: Saturday, December 7, 2019 from 6-9 pm
Artist Walkthrough: Saturday, December 14, 2019 from 1-3 pm
Closing Event: Saturday, December 21, 2019 from 1-3 pm

Adjacent, Adjacent is a reflection on relationships between the participants of the FORUM 2019, some of whom will carry forward beyond the exhibition as the art collective Museum Adjacent. The exhibition provokes the artists to consider where they are (both in location and career trajectory) and how that relates to what they make. The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue designed, written, and produced by FORUM 2019 participants.

The Dark Room features Sprouts, Sown Days Ago a series of video works pertaining to the events and activities leading up to Adjacent, Adjacent: documentation from previous exhibitions, event openings, conversations between curators and artists, and clips of previous works by the artists involved in FORUM 2019.

FORUM 2019 participants include: Amoral Poem (Devion Law & Joshua Ross), Henderson Blumer, Kim Garcia, Kim Marra, Larissa Nickel, Molly Schulman, Joshua Vasquez, H. Leslie Foster II, Sharon Levy, Hagop Najarian, Dakota Noot, Christina Shurts, and Sergio Witrön.

For more information, please visit: TorranceArtMuseum.com

Museum Adjacent at Finishing Concepts

September 21st-October 18th, 2019 with an opening reception on September 21st, 2019, 7-10 pm.

Featuring artists from all disciplines, Museum Adjacent presents their first group show at the gallery at Finishing Concepts. A collective formed through Torrance Art Museum FORUM program, Museum Adjacent is a group of like minded artists working tangential to, but outside of traditional art world institutions.

Each member will present work representative of their practice, highlighting both their collaborative efforts and distinct practices. Artists include: Henderson Blumer, Kim Garcia, Kim Marra, Larissa Nickel, Molly Schulman, Joshua Vasquez, H. Leslie Foster II, Sharon Levy, Hagop Najarian, Dakota Noot, Devion Law & Joshua Ross, Christina Shurts, and Sergio Witrön. Curated by Kim Marra.

Opulent Mobility

September 14th- October 19th, 2019 at the Arts Unbound Dora Stern Gallery, 544 Freeman Street, Orange, NJ.

The Opulent Mobility project is a groundbreaking collaborative effort to re-imagine mobility, disability and access. Wheelchairs, walkers, prosthetic limbs, crutches and other adaptive technology devices are part of our lives, but they’ve been left in the dust when it comes to custom design innovation and personalization. There are hundreds of thousands of designs for glasses, chairs and technology of other kinds. Why not adaptive technology?

The artists of Opulent Mobility 2019 are Aurora Berger, A. Laura Brody, Becca Cerra, Yaron Dotan, David Isakson, Jewel Lin, Cheryl Nickel, Larissa Nickel, Penny Richards, Annelies Slabbynck, Dianna Temple, Emily Tironi, and Jenni-Juulia Wallinheimo-Heimonen. Curated by A. Laura Brody and Anthony Tusler. Accessibility notes for the visual and hearing impaired: text and audio descriptions of each artwork will be provided.

Generational Aesthetics

Exploring how artists of different generations define and challenge formal and conceptual ideas in their practice, Generational Aesthetics brings together artists working in the same technical or conceptual elements to showcase how they produce completely different outcomes. Co-curated by Hagop Najarian and members of the Torrance Art Museum FORUM II cohort, the show will include an updated educational archive of artists from Yestermorrow: Llano on Saturday, August 10, 2019 from 6-9 pm at the Cerritos College Art Department.

As a continuous survey of site-specific art practice in Los Angeles, the cohort members of TAM Forum 2 have launched satellite spaces throughout the Los Angeles area in preparation for our collective museum exhibition scheduled for December 7th, 2019 at the Torrance Art Museum.

1+2=Forum

As a continuous survey of site-specific art practice in Los Angeles, the cohort members of TAM Forum 2 have launched a pilot of satellite spaces throughout the Los Angeles area. 1+2=Forum is a pop-up show at the Little Tokyo Arts Complex AMAX Gallery in collaboration with the Downtown Art Walk to display and sell postcard format paintings or smaller objects from members of the first and second TAM FORUM cohorts. Funding received from this programming will be used for the collective museum exhibition and catalogue scheduled for December 7th, 2019 at the Torrance Art Museum.

The Gathering @ Bravery Brewing

“The Gathering” celebrated a collaboration between Bravery Brewing in partnership with Sagebrush Cafe and Art Gallery. It embraced appreciation for the artistic side of the Antelope Valley with an exhibition of local artists, live music from Black Eye Affair and My Sistine Chapel, and Open Mic with Chelle Marie. The special release of an amber colored German Lager, traditionally served in the month of May, is infused with Rooibos red tea from Africa with notes of oak & vanilla. Curated by Brian Avery.

Torrance Art Museum FORUM 2019

TAM FORUM 2019 is a 10-month mentorship residency for artists, curators, gallerists, and writers culminating with a December exhibition at the Torrance Art Museum. In its second year, FORUM 2019 participants include: Henderson Blumer, Kim Garcia, Kim Marra, Larissa Nickel, Jen Vanegas Rocha, Molly Schulman, Joshua Vasquez, H. Leslie Foster II, Sharon Levy, Hagop Najarian, Dakota Noot, Devion Law & Joshua Ross, Christina Shurts, and Sergio Witrön.

FORUM: noun: forum; plural noun: forums; plural noun: fora
1. a place, meeting, or medium where ideas and views on a particular issue can be exchanged.

Maiden LA: Yestermorrow: Llano A Feminist Geography of Place

The rural Los Angeles County desert region of Llano, California has historically been defined by innovative people willing to explore and define a new sense of place. Yestermorrow: Llano introduces the past, present, and futures of Llano including its relationship to the Antelope Valley, Los Angeles, California, and their own—yestermorrows.

Yestermorrow: Llano- A Feminist Geography of Place is a third space project without traditional spatial forms intended to research and discover place through feminist digital and sensory engagement. Llano is a geographic place in the Los Angeles county high desert region, however visitors are participating in this project through digital embodiment and not physical access which is situated on private lands, and not open to the public.

Maiden LA is an inclusive and expansive county-wide survey of art happenings that in encouraging the use of alternative spaces, considers the city as a platform for generative discourse and exchange. Maiden LA is an egalitarian program aiming to dissolve hierarchies by including artists, collectives, curators, galleries, museums, et cetera. Maiden LA‘s relevance is amplified in today’s political climate, as our ethos is one that eschews corporate backing and is accessible to artists who find it difficult to navigate the art world’s various social and fiscal constructs.

Hot Off the Presses: Yestermorrow: Llano

The Antelope Valley Artist Outpost continues with the release of Yestermorrow: Llano—An Artist’s Field Guide to Llano, California.

Artist Larissa Nickel explores the rich cultural history of Llano through her project Yestermorrow: Llano that includes a digital PDF publication with map, photography, graphic design, renderings, and links to resources on Llano.

Nickel also created a print collateral piece featuring her wallpaper design based on the Crows of Pearblossom written by Aldous Huxley when he lived in Llano, and New Llano Utopography which is an architectural speculative design game based on Alice Constance Austin’s feminist city plan for Llano del Rio.

Yestermorrow is a platform for cultural innovation and public engagement created by Antelope Valley artist, educator, and curator Larissa Nickel. It explores feminist geography through site specific research, historical and futuristic narratives, and the museum as artistic practice to activate a heterotopian mirror space for creative intervention and discourse that encourages participatory experiences of place.

This project is supported by the Los Angeles County Arts Commission and the Antelope Valley Arts Outpost creative placemaking initiative funded by the National Endowment for the Arts and the California Arts Council with support from Metabolic Studio.

The Los Angeles Press: Volume Zero

The Los Angeles Press, a Print and Online Publishing House & Imprint introduced by The Los Angeles Review of Books and the LARB/USC Publishing Cohort, is devoted to community engagement, and to the pursuit of social, economic, and environmental justice. Committed to uplifting and focusing on Voices Yet Heard, including Women, POC, LGBTQ+, and traditionally under-represented and marginalized artists and writers, the Los Angeles Press publishes the best in emerging art, literature, and political discourse, from Southern California and the West.

Featured in the current issue Volume Zero issue are: Mikeas Sanchez, (trans. David Shook), Bernadette McComish, Ambar Osorio, Stacy Kadomasu, Ali Lange, Claressinka Anderson , Arminé Iknadossian, Marina Osthoff Magalhães, Chelsea Rector (print edition) and Larissa Nickel’s Rockhaven Sanitarium photo essay.

Yestermorrow Llano: An Artist’s Field Guide to Llano, California

Special Release Event:
Saturday, July 7th, 2018 from 10 am-noon at Blue Sky’s Bistro 12822 Pearblossom Hwy, Pearblossom, CA 93553.

The rural Los Angeles County high desert region of Llano, California has historically been defined by innovative people willing to explore and define a new sense of place. Yestermorrow Llano: An Artist’s Field Guide to Llano, California introduces the past, present, and future narratives of Llano including its relationship to the local, regional, and global contexts of place—and their own yestermorrows.

Throughout the feminist geography field guide are cultural references, historical clippings, an artist’s archive, educational prompts, and collaborative activities to activate your sensory and artistic experiences of Llano. Create perfume, form a book club, make a recipe, or discover, map, architect, and construct your looking glass connection to the high desert by envisioning a geographic imagination and aesthetic experience of place through Llano’s cultural memory, collective present, and social futures.

Visitors at this special release event can stop by the courtyard at Blue Sky’s Bistro to receive a free contemporary wallpaper design of Aldous Huxley’s Crows of Pearblossom, discover more about Llano, including its sights, sounds, tastes, and smells, and play a speculative design game of New Llano utopography to reveal the futures of your own experimental utopian communities.

Yestermorrow Llano is supported by the Los Angeles County Arts Commission and the Antelope Valley Arts Outpost creative placemaking initiative funded by the National Endowment for the Arts and the California Arts Council with support from Metabolic Studio. Outpost partners include: the Otis College of Art and Design MFA Public Practice program (Otis), the Lancaster Museum of Art and History (MOAH), the Greater Antelope Valley Economic Alliance (GAVEA), the Department of Regional Planning, and the Office of 5th District Supervisor Kathryn Barger.

Yestermorrow is a platform for cultural innovation and collective public engagement designed by Larissa Nickel to present new museological and archival perspectives to our past, present, heterotopian, and future experiences of place.

a.k.a. Public Opinion with Shana Lutker at Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects

a.k.a. Public Opinion  – is a large installation at Susan Vielmetter with Los Angeles based artist Shana Lutker and the fifth chapter of her ongoing series, Le “NEW” Monocle: The History of the Fistfights of the Surrealists. More than 300 over-sized leather gloves, each dedicated to an artist in Los Angeles, started with a call to participate in the project by asking artists to contribute a tracing of their hand. The gloves are arranged alphabetically and each artist is identified by a stamp of his or her initials. Lutker’s colorful gloves are not meant to be worn and suggest that good humor and the support of one’s peers might be powerful weapons in fights with ideological and intellectual stakes.

Artists represented in a.k.a. Public Opinion: Scoli Acosta, Nick Aguayo, Brody Albert, Andy Alexander, Mark Allen, Tom Allen, Basma Alsharif, Kevin Appel, Carmen Argote, Joshua Aster, Jason Bailer Losh, Claire Anna Baker, John Baldessari, Judie Bamber, Ray Barrie, Michaela Bathrick, Jeff Beall, Whitney Bedford, Jesse Benson, Scott Benzel, Stephen Berens, David Berezin, Ellen Birrell, Jennifer Bolande, Andrea Bowers, Kristen Bradford, Johanna Breiding, Anna Breininger, Brian Bress, Tanya Brodsky, Kaucyila Brooke, Henriëtte Brouwers, Elizabeth Bryant, Nancy Buchanan, Jedediah Caesar, Sarah Cain, Kristin Calabrese, Ingrid Calame, Joshua Callaghan, Lilli Carre, Michael Carter, Carolyn Castaño, Simion Cernica, Carol Cheh, Young Chung, Poppy Coles, Sarah Conaway, Ginny Cook, Heather Cook, Miles Coolidge, Mario Correa, Kate Costello, Eileen Cowin, Zoe Crosher, Sydney Croskery, Nathan Danilowicz, Phil Davis, Corazon Delsol, Jacci Denhartog, Travis Diehl, Eli Diner, Tomory Dodge, Michael Dopp, Robert Doran, Barbara Drucker, Dana Duff, Sean Duffy, Karen Dunbar, Sam Durant, David P Earle, Don Edler, Alyse Emdur, Nancy Evans, Kirsten Everberg, Krista Feld, Patricia Fernandez, John Finneran, Luke Fischbeck, Jaye Fishel, Nick Fisher, Peter Flaherty, Magnus Flowers, Corey Fogel, Bella Foster, Andrea Fraser, Heather Frazer-Smith, Erik Frydenborg, Victoria Fu, Amy Garofano, Bia Gayotto, Sonja Gerdes, Liz Glynn, Sayre Gomez, Valerie Green, Brigitte Nicole Grice, Katie Grinnan, Karl Haendel, Julia Haft-Candell, Mark Hagen, Yaron Hakim, Lia Halloran, Leila Hamidi, Michelle Handel, Kevin Hanley, Ross Hansen, Jenalee Harmon, Michael Hayden, Tanya Hayden, Drew Heitzler, Nick Herman, Roger Herman, Brennan Hill, EJ Hill, Yarrow Earth Hock, Julian Hoeber, Joel Holmberg, Violet Hopkins, David Horvitz, John Houck, Pearl Hsiung, Bettina Hubby, Melissa Huddleston, Hanna Hur, Bridget Jacobs, Kristin Beinner James, Chris James, Elaine Jen, Kathleen Johnson, Kysa Johnson, Matt Johnson, Vishal Jugdeo, Steve Kado, Stanya Kahn, Chris Kallmyer, William Kaminski, Farrah Karapetian, Jake Kean Mayman, Mary Kelly, Michael Kennedy Costa, Dorna Khazeni, Dwyer Kilcollin, Kathleen Kim, Soo Kim, Rebecca Kolsrud, Alice Könitz, Joey Kotting, Olga Koumoundouros, Nick Kramer, Christopher Kreiling, Jason Kunke, Natalie Labriola, Jacqueline Laurita Cortese, Mimi Lauter, Jon Leaver, Sophie Lee, Anthony Lepore, Dan Levenson, Janet Levy, Karen Liebowitz, Candice Lin, Galia Linn, Matt Lipps, Hailey Loman, Andrea Longacre White, Benjamin Lord, Shana Lutker, Lauren Mackler, Erica Mahinay, Monica Majoli, Michael Mandiberg, Marisa Mandler, Elana Mann, Elana Mann, Natalie Marie Byrne, Christina Catherine Martinez, T.Kelly Mason, Emily Mast, David Matorin, Tyler Matthew Oyer, Anna Mayer, Thomas Mcdonell, Rodney McMillian, Nick McPhail, Daniel Mendel-Black, Joshua Miller, Adam Miller, Allison Miller, Nicole Miller, Yunhee Min, Nour Mobarak, Dianna Molzan, Simone Montemurno, Rebecca Morris, Erin Morrison, Ragen Moss, Megan Mueller, Carter Mull, Warren Neidich, Davida Nemeroff, Claire Nereim, Larissa Nickel, Patrick Nickell, Jennifer Nocon, D’ette Nogle, Yann Novak, Deirdre O’Dwyer, Kathryn O’Halloran, Brian O’Donnell, Alison O’Daniel, Alex Olson, Catherine Opie, Julie Orser, Gina Osterloh, Mamiko Otsubo, Laura Owens, Carlye Packer, Rachel Paprocki, Michael Parker, Jessica Parker Valentine, Jane Parshall, Galeria Perdida, Alex Perliter, Paul Pescador, Renée Petropoulos, Gala Porras-Kim, Ali Prosch, Noam Rappaport, Sarah Rara, Heather Rasmussen, Brian Ratcliffe, Diana Relth, Isaac Resnikoff, Joanna Reynolds, Matt Rich, Marco Rios, Christy Roberts-Berkowitz, Mark Rodriguez, Mark Roeder, Rachelle Rojany, Juliana Romano, Amanda Ross-Ho, Evelena Ruether, Miljohn Ruperto, Amy Russell, Ben Russell, Robert Russell, Kathleen Ryan, Erica Ryan Stallones, Analia Saban, Stephanie Sabo, Yoshie Sakai, Connie Samaras, Lauren Satlowski, Anna Schachte, Asha Schechter, Marty Schnapf, Kim Schoen, Kim Schoenstadt, Betsy Lin Seder, Paul Sepuya, Katie Shapiro, Brian Sharp, Leslie Shows, Corrie Siegal, Matt Siegle, Susan Silton, Brook Sinkinson Withrow, Utah Snyder, Patrick Staff, Cammie Staros, A.L. Steiner, Leroy Stevens, Mateo Tannatt, Victoria Tao, Ethan Tate, Stephanie Taylor, Mungo Thomson, Clarissa Tossin, Cody Trepte, Kerry Tribe, Lia Trinka-Browner, Devon Tsuno, Jason Underhill, Tran Van Tam, Lesley Vance, Keith Vardi, Valerie Veator, Mark Verabioff, Bob Vieira, Anuradha Vikram, Shanna Waddell, Christine Wang, Margaret Wappler, RJ Ward, Dawson Weber, Dana Weiser, Daniel Wheeler, Flora Wiegmann, Brica Wilcox, Robert Wilhite, Jesse Willenbring, Karen Lee Williams, Lisa Williamson, Andrew Norman Wilson, Carlin Wing, Rosten Woo, Jonas Wood, Aaron Wrinkle, Peter Wu, Tucker Wulf, Jemima Wyman, Xin Xin, Rosha Yaghmai, Bedros Yeretzian, Jenny Yurshansky, Jody Zellen.

Recombinant Museum in the Journal of Aesthetics and Protest

The Journal of Aesthetics and Protest Issue 10 Climate Atlas centers around the concept of a non-map. It’s a non-cartography of what’s meaningful in the time of climate change. Climate Change will sensibly rearrange everything. In that way, there is no map. On the fact of a changing climate, this issue overlooks the discourse, measurements, judgments of the anthropocene, capitalocene, chuthulucene, etc. Rather, its curatorial work begins by squarely encountering the necessary reorganization of life’s relationality suggested by what will be undone and remade in this scenario. No map, only a key and points of interests. The issue contains 5 essays by Paula Cobo-GuevaraAmber HickeyMauvais TroupeBrett BloomRachel O’Reilly & Danny Butt and is available online and also for purchase in a print. The issue’s form, when folded, appears as a map, though there are none within.

Place is a Character at Rockhaven Sanitarium

The Rockhaven Sanitarium was opened in 1923 by psychiatric nurse Agnes Richards for women with “mild mental and nervous disorders.” Having worked in state run insane asylums, Richards set out to create a haven where women could be treated with dignity and grace in a beautiful and serene environment. The Friends of Rockhaven are working with artists and donors to help educate the public on the importance of Rockhaven and to help the city of Glendale restore the property, and develop a museum.

“Place is a Character” on July 15, 2017 brought together New Works from Subtle Inquiries based on research created during earlier site visits at the Rockhaven Sanitarium. Curated by Linda Ravenswood with support from the Friends of Rockhaven “Place is a Character” included works by Elisabeth Houston, Larissa Nickel, Linda Ravenswood, Chelsea Rector, and Ang Wilson. Listen to audio of interviews from the Friends courtesy of Our Prime Property.

Yestermorrow: Llano

Yestermorrow: Llano explores the history, current state and speculative future of the high desert unincorporated region of Llano, California. Curated through an artist’s lens, Yestermorrow: Llano weaves together the past tales of the Llano del Rio Cooperative Colony, a current archive of Llano artists including David Hockney, Bella Lewitzky, Gregory Ain, and Mary Ellen Mark, and the sophisticated thinking from the desert hinterlands regarding society, technology, politics, economics, and sustainability. Alternatively situated as a creative research laboratory, the cultural values and innovations from the overlooked places and narratives of sites such as Llano serve as a looking glass reflection for Los Angeles—and its own yestermorrow.

Yestermorrow: Llano is supported by the Los Angeles County Arts Commission and the high desert desert Antelope Valley Arts Outpost creative placemaking initiative  funded by the National Endowment for the Arts and the California Arts Council with support from Metabolic Studio. Outpost partners include: the Otis College of Art and Design MFA Public Practice program (Otis), the Lancaster Museum of Art and History (MOAH), the Greater Antelope Valley Economic Alliance (GAVEA), the Department of Regional Planning, and the Office of Supervisor Kathryn Barger.

About Yestermorrow
Yestermorrow is an artistic museological platform for cultural innovation and public engagement created by artist and curator Larissa Nickel. It explores site specific research, narratives and the museum as ephemeral space to activate heterotopias for creative intervention and discourse.

Hinterculture @ the FAR Bazaar

Hinterculture artists Larissa Nickel, Stacey Charles Spiegel, and Jones Intercable transformed a faculty office at Cerritos College into Obvious Answers to Impossible Futures which featured a special performance of No Wrong Notes No Wrong People with the Dr. Eddie “Snakepit” Edwards (Berkeley, Los Angeles, Antelope Valley) Acoustic, Electronic, and Amplisonic sounds and Steven Fiche (Antelope Valley, Los Angeles, Chicago) Formulating, Infrasonic, Catalytic-cycles for Habitat Elucidation who performed a series of live desert-to-space soundscapes from multiple points in time and technology using a variety of synthesizers, horns and percussion instruments.

About the FAR Bazaar
2017 marks the fortieth anniversary of the Foundation for Art Resources (FAR), one of the oldest non-profit arts advocacy groups in Southern California. FAR helped to produce some of the most significant alternative art events in Los Angeles. To honor this major milestone of 40 years, FAR is collaborating with Cerritos College to host its biggest FAR Bazaar event ever. Cerritos College, with the help of FAR, will transform every abandoned classroom, faculty office, and administrative space into temporary exhibition spaces, each to be guest-curated by local art collectives and alternative art spaces, as well as the graduate programs from regional universities and art schools.

January is the month for the region’s major commercial art (af)fairs, in particular the Los Angeles Art Show and Art Los Angeles Contemporary. The FAR BAZAAR, as non-commercial alternative art fair, highlights the significant contribution that art collectives, artist-run spaces, and local art schools have on the regional art scene overall. Much like the art fairs provide access to disparate commercial galleries from across the globe, the FAR BAZAAR will allow the various art communities that are physically spread far and wide across the megalopolis of Southern California to come together temporarily in one place for easy access and for productive exchange.

Participating collectives include: Adjunct Positions, Association of Hysteric Curators, Ave 50 Studio, Biomythography, Boys of Summer, Concrete Walls Projects, D-Block Projects, DH Arts Collective, Disposable Collective, Durden & Ray, Elephant, FA4 Collective, Finishing School, Hinterculture, Improvised Alchemy, JAUS Gallery, KCHUNG, LA Freewaves, Machine Project, Monte Vista Projects, Motherboy, Rough Play, SASSAS, Shed Research, Sixpack Projects, Slanguage Studios, South Bay Contemporary, Summercamp’s ProjectProject, and Tilt-Export.

Participating MFA programs include: Art Center, CalArts, Claremont Graduate University, Otis (Public Practice and Fine Arts), UC Irvine (Fine Arts and Critical/Curatorial Studies) UC Los Angeles (Design Media Arts and Fine Arts), UC Riverside, and University of Southern California.

Alternative Art Fair & Art Collective Festival at the FAR Bazaar:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1179715782075632/

Nasty Women Art Exhibition

cropped-Nasty-Women-SQUARE-LOGO.pngIn solidarity among artists who identify with being a Nasty Woman in the face of threats to roll back women’s rights, individual rights, and abortion rights, the Nasty Women Art Exhibitions originated in Queens, New York, and spread across the country. The exhibition serves as a fundraiser to support organizations defending these rights and to be a platform for organization before the Trump Presidential Inauguration in January, 2017.

AV Arts Outpost Commission

avhinterculture_nickelLarissa Nickel evaluated artist sustainability for the LA County Arts Commission and the high desert Antelope Valley Arts Outpost creative placemaking initiative that supported regional vitality through artist-driven projects. Outpost partners include: the Otis College of Art and Design MFA Public Practice program (Otis), the Lancaster Museum of Art and History (MOAH), the Greater Antelope Valley Economic Alliance (GAVEA), the Department of Regional Planning, and the Office of Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich. Managed by the Los Angeles County Arts Commission, Outpost dovetails with the development of the Antelope Valley General Plan and will inform the direction for each community. The project is funded by the National Endowment for the Arts and the California Arts Council with support from Metabolic Studio.

MAIDEN LA

MAIDEN LA, a county-wide network of LA-based ‘happenings’ taking place throughout the month of August 2016.

Nadaland_streetviewCommencing August 1, 2016, Maiden LA, in its very first iteration, will connect over 130 artists, collectives and organizations, highlighting Los Angeles as a vastly extensive and vibrant community. The incredibly diverse event list ranges from web-based projects and performances to open studios, exhibitions, and public installations, as far reaching as the Antelope Valley and San Pedro. Some artists have opened up their private residences while others have taken to the streets or parks. All events submitted by July 15th are included on a printed map and downloadable PDF, while all events submitted through July 31st will continue to be listed on the web-based directory and calendar. You can download the PDF here or visit the Maiden LA website, which offers a user-friendly and comprehensive event map and calendar. The information will also be available on Curate LA’s web-based directory and downloadable app.

Maiden LA was created and organized by two Los Angeles-based artists, Molly Schulman and Salomeh Grace. Using the Hammer Museum’s biennial as a jumping off point, Maiden LA  (a playful anagram and homophone of ‘Made in LA’) stemmed from a desire to connect LA based artists, organizations and their respective communities, while bringing attention to the number of artist run initiatives throughout the city. The collaborative duo was interested in the concept of a Los Angeles survey as being one that considered the city as a platform for generative discourse and exchange, and one that would encourage unrealized projects to take form.

Support for Maiden LA is provided by Common Field, a national network of experimental and non-commercial contemporary art spaces and projects. Maiden LA would like to thank all participants for contributing a range of compelling projects. A special thanks goes to Common FieldVelaslavasay Panorama, and Curate LA for their valued support.

Free Painting

by Constance Mallinson

Constance Mallinson interviewing Larissa Nickel, artist and community activist

Full article on Radical Actions: from Teaching Artists to Social Practice- http://www.radicalactions.com/#!constance-mallinson/cbg1

Antelope Valley Art Outpost

Antelope Valley Art Outposts (Outpost) is a creative placemaking project that supports regional vitality through innovative, artist-driven projects in the LA County unincorporated communities of Littlerock and Sun Village. Outpost is a cross-sector partnership where artists work alongside residents and community stakeholders to develop projects and programs. Outpost partners include: the Otis College of Art and Design MFA Public Practice program (Otis), the Lancaster Museum of Art and History (MOAH), the Greater Antelope Valley Economic Alliance (GAVEA), the Department of Regional Planning, and the Office of Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich.

Managed by the Los Angeles County Arts Commission, Outpost dovetails with the development of the Antelope Valley General Plan and will inform the direction for each community. The project is funded by the National Endowment for the Arts and the California Arts Council with support from Metabolic Studio. Further information is available at: http://lacountyarts.org/outpost

What does a day in our community look like? REAL93543 IN A DAY is a documentary about life in the Antelope Valley, created by Antelope Valley Art Outpost artist-in-residence, Robin Rosenthal and numerous community partners. The project is an homage to the Littlerock zip code and was designed to engage residents in discussions about place through documentary filmmaking.

The City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs’ Skin Exhibition at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery

nickel_larissa_spice_rackSKIN

Opening Reception
Sunday, February 7, 2 – 5 PM

On view February 7 to April 17, 2016 at the
Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery
4800 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90027

The election of President Obama in 2008 and re-election in 2012 marked the emergence of a new period in race relations and identity politics in the United States. One in which significant advancements underscore deeper, more persistent ruptures in the skin that binds us as Americans. President Obama, from a multiracial family, represented the most potent and singular figure for the progress made by the civil rights movement, multiculturalism, and identity politics from the previous decades. Some even argued that his election marked the moment of post-racism in the country’s history. And yet, since election, numerous racialized incidents have occurred that tell a different story. The exhibition SKIN brings thirty-six artists whose work is timely and engaged in many ways with these broader debates. The gallery acts as a discursive space where these disparate conversations can have a platform, and where further productive work and reflection on these topics can proceed.

Several artists in the exhibition share an interest in the role language plays in reproducing racial hierarchies, such as Kathie Foley-Meyer, Margaret Noble, Larissa Nickel, and April Bey. Read the full exhibition statement here

Featured Artists: Geordy Zodidat Alexis, James Berson, April Bey, Maura Brewer, Ben Caldwell, Bryan Rodriguez Cambana, Audrey Chan, Christopher Christion, Holly Crawford, Ken Gonzales-Day, Fabian Debora, Cole M. James, Camella DaEun Kim, Zeal Harris, Malisa Humphrey, Farrah Karapetian, Ann Le, Nery Gabriel Lemus, Derrick Maddox, Michael Massenburg, Kathie Foley-Meyer, Larissa Nickel, Margaret Noble, Duane Paul, Linda Ravenswood, Megan Reed, Kaitlynn Redell, Bruce Richards, Sandy Rodriguez,  Daniel Rothman, Yoshie Sakai, Cauleen Smith, Gabriel Sosa, Holly Tempo, Kara Walker and Jessica Wimbley.

Free Painting

Constance Mallinson’s Free Painting at the Armory Center for the Arts concludes a nine-part, nineteen-month series exploring the expanded field of painting. Free Painting was conceived as an experiment to investigate the perception and acquisition of painting outside the current art market by which the gallery and museum system defines access to artworks. Removing money from the equation, an exhibited painting entitled “Raft” by Constance Mallinson was given away after interviews with ten selected applicants of diverse backgrounds who had submitted an online application to receive the painting for free.  Over the course of two days, Mallinson met with these individuals and conversed about what the painting meant to them as well as its possible destination. The participants included an inner-city public arts magnet teacher, an architect, an administrative judge, a breast cancer surgeon, a representative of an Iraq war veteran, a number of acclaimed Los Angeles artists, and a collector chef.

In the end, Mallinson turned over the final decision about who should receive the painting to a panel of art professionals including a critic, two art historians, a gallerist, a curator and two artists. These six individuals met to discuss the interviews and debate ideas of ownership, appreciation of the actual painting, and appropriate placement.  The exhibited video, which replaces the painting formerly on view, documents the process.

Opulent Mobility


Wheelchairs, walkers, prosthetics, crutches and other assistive technology devices are part of our lives, but they’ve been left in the dust when it comes to custom design innovation and personalization. There are hundreds of thousands of designs for glasses, chairs and technology of other kinds. Why not assistive technology? Opulent Mobility is a groundbreaking international exhibit of art, designs and inventions dealing with disability, mobility and accessibility. The show runs from September 9-19th, 2015 at California State University, Northridge.

Green Leadership Awards Finalists 2014

dehsart_commendationThe offices of Supervisor Don Knabe, Board Chairman, and William T Fujioka, Chief Executive Officer, recently sponsored a reception to honor the 2014 finalists of the County’s Green Leadership Awards (GLA). Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky and former Supervisor Yvonne Burke introduced the motion to create the annual GLA program, which recognizes outstanding achievement in protecting the environment. GLA categories and the finalists/projects were Business, Duvivier Architects, “Integrating Water/Architecture;” NonProfit, Food Forward, “Distribution of Farmers Market Produce to the Hungry;” Resident, Larissa Nickel and Karyl Newman, “DEHSART: Antelope Valley Illegal Dumping EcoArt;” and L.A. County Department, Public Social Services, “Toy Loan Recycling Initiative.”

Volley at Greene Exhibitions

Thursday, November 7, 2013 7 pm
Dear Comrade
Written and directed by CalArts faculty member Mady Schutzman, “Dear Comrade” is an experimental essay film that documents the story of Llano del Rio (1914-18), the most important non-religious communitarian experiment in western American history. Llano is offered as a site to explore the struggles, courage, frustrations, fantasies, and Sisyphean efforts of innumerable idealists who have assumed comparable struggles in spite of tremendous odds. The story is told through archival footage, surreal re-enactments, interviews with ex-colonists, local residents and historians, and the meanderings of a silent nomad through the ruins of the Llano colony in the Mojave Desert. Through the intersection of stories, a seemingly traditional documentary morphs into a montage of parallel universes, political commentary, clownery, and a palpable desire—failings and disappointments notwithstanding—to give idealism and cooperation another try. Karyl Newman, Larissa Nickel, and Cindy Rehm will present their research on the colony and join the filmmaker in a question and answer segment following the screening.

Forêt Intérieure/Interior Forest

InteriorForestForYourArt hosted a fundraiser for artist Alexandra Grant’s Interior Forest project. Tree drawings by over 100 artists were included in the preview exhibition and priced at $250.

Host committee: Janine Arbelaez, Adelaide Barbier, Nancy Berman, Leonardo Bravo, Juan Devis, Charlotte Eyerman, Jessica Fleischmann, Eugénie Frémiot, Miguel Hernandez, Marla Koosed, Bettina Korek, Isabelle Le Normand, Robert Nashak, Yann Perreau, Alma Ruiz, Roberto Sheinberg, Pilar Tompkins Rivas, and Jan Williamson

Contributing artists: Luciana Abait, Scoli Acosta, Carmen Argote, Shagha Ariannia, Deborah Aschheim, Joshua Aster, Karen Atkinson, Katie Bachler, Elena Bajo, Raul Paulino Baltazar, Juliette Bellocq, Leon Benn, Mattia Biagi, Andrea Bowers, Anita Bunn, Kristin Calabrese, Carolyn Castaño, Audrey Chan, York Chang, Angel Chen, Ross Chisholm, Helen Chung, Dorit Cypis, Wanda Decca, Sam Durant, Julia Dzwonkoski & Kye Potter, David Earle, Jonmarc Edwards, Patricia Fernandez, Cayetano Ferrer, Samantha Fields, Frances Garretson, Christiane Georgi, Chiara Giovando, Alexandra Grant, Audra Graziano, Mark Steven Greenfield, Sherin Guirguis, Nathalie Harvey, Deborah Hede, David Hendren, Roger Herman, Katie Herzog, Violet Hopkins, Jeanette Horn, Bettina Hubby, Salomón Huerta, Aska Irie, Ichiro Irie, Charles Irvin, Vishal Jugdeo, Siri Kaur, Francisco Larios, Jim Lee, Nery Gabriel Lemus, Mark Licari, Galia Linn, Kristi Lippire, Mara Lonner, Richard Louderback, Ben Love, Elana Mann, Anna Mayer, Yassi Mazandi, Rebeca Mendez, Maggie Miller, John Mills, Dave Muller, Warren Neidich, Karyl Newman, Larissa Nickel, Christine Nguyen, John David O’Brien, Alison O’Daniel, Mary Eileen O’Donnell, Christina Ondrus, Cathy Opie, Stas Orlavski, Nate Page, Laura Pardini, Renee Petropoulos, Mary Anna Pomonis, Lauralee Pope, Gala Porras Kim, Max Presneill, Cindy Rehm, Steve Roden, Jeanne Roderick, Yvette Roman, Dan Rothenberg, Trinidad Ruiz, Robert Russell, Aaron Sandnes, Amy Sarkisian, Kim Schoen, Kim Schoenstadt, Pauline Shaw, Becca Shewmake, Catherine Shores, Marie Thibeault, David Tomb, Elizabeth Tremante, Shirley Tse, Patssi Valdez, Florian Viel, Leora Wien, Sarah Williams, Peter Wu, Florian Viel, Pae White, Meital Yaniv, Jody Zellen, Alexis Zoto and many more.

Temporary Residence with Craftswoman House

llano_sept_21_13 103_smallLarissa Nickel and Craftswoman House are engaged in a Temporary Residence project dedicated to fostering a dialogue on feminist issues through projects and exhibitions. An advocate for the hidden and overlooked history of the Antelope Valley which she discovered as an employee at the Western Hotel Museum, Nickel engaged and honored the legacy of the early feminist architect of the Llano del Rio colony, Alice Constance Austin, whose 1935 book “The Next Step: How to Plan for Beauty, Comfort, and Peace with Great Savings Effected by the Reduction of Waste” articulated an artistic vision and design of life in a feminist, socialist city. Inspired by Ebenezer Howard’s garden city and the feminist influence of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Austin created designs for communal eating and day-care areas, minimized interior decorations with built in furniture to alleviate housework, and even proposed an underground railway to ferry laundry, household waste, and supplies.

In a cooperation with Nickel’s Hinterculture arts collaboration, the Craftswoman House expedition continues to encourage artists, dancers, engineers, musicians, scientists, writers, scholars, architects, performers, designers, urban planners, archaeologists, socialists, and activists to join in on the temporary residence at the Llano del Rio colony site in preparation for new works to be shared.

DEHSART Receives Grant

Nickel_Larissa_Rs_end shootDEHSART >> trashed spelled backwards << is an eco-art project that builds awareness, support and engagement to educate and transform illegal dumping activity through community action, art interventions and mapping. The project has been generously funded by a grant from the Antelope Valley Illegal Dumping Task Force, made possible by LA County Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich’s Antelope Valley Office, Waste Management, the City of Lancaster, the City of Palmdale, Lockheed Martin, and citizens like you.

Launched by Larissa Nickel and Karyl Newman, DEHSART combines prevention, awareness and outreach through artistic engagement and environmental education surrounding the issue of illegal dumping in the High Desert. Cultivating social connections, collective action, and civic empowerment our goal is to help transform our landscape through small interventions of public art that will tell a story of environmental resources and inspire change in our ecosystem.

Drugstore Beetle (Sitodrepa Paniceum) II

memory_archive_exhibitionExhibition Dates: January 28, 2013 – April 14, 2013

Drugstore Beetle II organized by David Horvitz, is offered as a part of educational programming for the exhibition organized by students of the Museum Studies Program at the University Art Museum (UAM), California State University Long Beach (CSULB). This folio of artworks will be available for viewing in CSULB’s Special Collection Library for the duration of the exhibition. Drugstore Beetle II is also a digital project, in keeping with the shift of libraries to digital archives; an archive will also be made of all of the works submitted. The digital versions of artworks will be published on the project’s website, social media outlets, and potentially displayed on video monitors in the campus library.

4<40: Four Antelope Valley Artists under Forty

6Lancaster Museum of Art and History, Lancaster, CA

The 4<40 exhibition presents the works of four artists under the age of 40 who are living and creating artwork in the Antelope Valley. The exhibition represents a sampling of the variety of traditional and new media work being created by young and emerging artists and includes artwork by Sarah Donaldson, Larissa Nickel, Nicolas Shake and Laurel Jean Siler. Vigorous and sometimes confrontational, these artists challenge the viewer to actively engage and decipher meaning. Each artist brings their formal art education and background to bear on works that represent a youthful current in the artistic output of the Antelope Valley.