AR Series LA, SD, MX:
Three expositions, in Los Angeles, San Diego, & Mexico each event was an open venue to anyone who wanted to participate, via exhibition, performance, demonstration of any kind. We provided the time and space, suggestions, as well as some of the necessary equipment. For some of the participants we scheduled a specific time and place but as a whole, many just showed up. Thus, was a very free and spontaneous series of eventseach, was a kind of show and tell of art and ideas between artists and their communities. Everyone, was encouraged to come and get creative with the space, exhibit, and perform, with almost no restrictions. We wanted to see what it is that you do, in an exchange of cultural, geographical, philosophical, political, and artistically diverse ideas and ways of life. These things shared in the context of art, through dialogue, action, and creative socialization.
1.) Beyond Baroque Literary Art Center, hosted the first of three events:
These events involved individuals and artists from San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Mexico. The Artists Resociolizations were community and cultural extensions of a project called Dot-To-Dot. Which consisted of 6 interdisciplinary artists from San Francisco and LA, traveling to Mexico, providing art instruction at schools and orphanages along the way. Individuals and artists from Los Angeles, San Diego and Mexico joined them in three collaboration/expositions in each of these three cities.
Individuals took advantage of Beyond Baroques vintage architecture. Housed in the old Venice Beach courthouse, adjacent to the old police station and jail, individuals shared their works both inside and outside the space. Artists transformed the front lawn into an interactive sculpture and installation "garden/playground" on Venice blvd. Other front lawn genres included music by the Hare Krishna's, dance, performance art, and street performers. Art was scattered around the front entrance, leaned against bushes, and scattered throughout the lawn with a sign inviting people to take a piece. One of the more independent artists assembled a video installation and projected images in an old shed around the side of the building. A process installation was built onto the stairway of S.P.A.R.C. that also gave way to performance. Squirrel meat samples were apparently being given out at a small booth in the front yard. One of the artists fabricated a copper orb and invited people to hold it and relay a fond memory. On the front porch, a performance artist was engaged in automatic typing while reading the obituaries. Mixed media works and installation filled the interior of the building both upstairs and down, as well as in-between. In the gallery we placed an 8' table in the middle of the room with an amp and mic for open readings of any kind, including lyric, speeches, manifestos, and diatribes (this also included a video installation). Smoked filled the air on the stairway as people were invited to take a cigarette with hand written text from a cig mandala (choke! they were Mexican cigarettes!). Another of the SF travelers carried a bag of bricks into and through the theater and back out again...and later up the stairs placing one brick at a time on each side of the stairway (apparently the bricks equaled her own body weight). Poets and DJs from two different cities dominated the back yard. Some projected images of their work in large-scale onto the back wall facing Venice Blvd. From experimental sound, punk rock, and blues, to theatrical monologue, hip-hop dance, and spoken word, the theater was the official performance area but had become, simply, the room with the most chairs.
2.) Sushi Performance & Visual Art, San Diego, Thursday, June 28, 2001:
Following the event at Beyond Baroque, individuals met for the second Resociolization in San Diego, hosted by Sushi Performance & Visual Art. This event, inspired even more of the unexpected. Sculpture and installations lined the approach to Sushi's entrance. Various performance/interventions ensued on the sidewalk and entering doorway. A group of people, seemingly very affected by the strange happenings, began drumming and chanting on a metal streetlight, near the front door. In the upstairs lobby, two DJ's set-up in a small corner, near the window, recording and sampling various mixes without a PA. More paintings and drawings were given away...leaning against the wall across from the box office, in a large white carrying case with a sign that said, Please Take One. In the main theater, stages, room-dividers, and tables were set-up throughout the performance space. Each area was occupied with strange simultaneous diversions. Musical performances ranged from blues and solo acoustic, to the more experimental. Many artists took advantage of the open forum and engaged themselves throughout the space. Some occupied stages, while others used the entire space and its occupants. One artist worked the room passing out his eyelash hairs placed on a mirror. People collected them with their fingertips and passed them on until they eventually made it back to the artist, who then taped the hair to the mirror and then mounted it on the wall (the mirror cracked). One of the San Francisco artists nailed a body of papayas to a strip of wood with a prefabricated stiletto fashion designer, modeled some very revealing designs on three very bashful male models. Another group of individuals, painted a mural on material they had taped to the wall. Paintings, and other mixed media works, were exhibited on tables, leaned against chairs, and hung on room dividers. Multimedia installations were set-up throughout the entire building and increased as the night progressed. Participants continued to show up, surprising us with various works including, video and slide projections. Poets, lyricists, and activists gave demonstrations and read on the open-mic provided in the dressing room. As the night had begun to fall, a small group of overdramatic enthusiasts fell as well, to the ground that is, and began to scream...transforming the entire space from the theater of the absurd to a kind of theater of cruelty. The evenings end included a parking ticket for anyone parked in the area. The ticket, however, was composed by one of the traveling SF artists, wishing fortune and goodwill (a meter maid was also a recipient of this piece).
