Today, December 1st, is Day With(out) Art, a national day of action and mourning organized by Visual AIDS with arts organizations and institutions in response to the AIDS pandemic. It is also World AIDS Day, an international day dedicated to raising awareness of the disease.
Every year since 2010, Visual AIDS has commissioned a video program that is then shown at various venues around the world. The short films presented this year consider the impact of HIV and AIDS beyond the United States.
Things to do in Los Angeles this weekend (11/29-12/1/19)-
Friday
Justus Proffit is playing a free show at the Monty Bar to celebrate the release of his new EP Return to Zero- with additional performances by The Freakees, Macko, and Laundry Boys
Bob Baker Marionette Theater is celebrating its Grand Opening at its new location in Highland Park with a day of free puppet shows on the hour starting at 11am, celebrating the six decades of the theater. Additional exhibits, activities, and more will occur throughout the day, with historic Bob Baker photography and a virtual reality Bob Baker experience next door at MorYork. At 7:30pm is the ticketed event, Rise of the Harlequins! The BBMT Season Kickoff, which includes behind the scenes videos, a puppet show, a party with a DJ and cake and more.
Zebulon is hosting a free screening of the 1970 Czechoslovak New Wave film Valerie and Her Week of Wonders followed by a dance party
Rhondavous, a one night festival, is taking place at Catch One with 14 DJs, 4 rooms and 2 floors + they are having a Black Friday sale on tickets.
Kah-Lo and Kennedi are opening for Bea Miller at the Fonda Theatre
Saturday and Sunday
Jackalope is having a free Underground Art Fair at Grand Central Market, a chance to buy unique goods from independent makers
Sunday
Hammer Museum and MOCA are partnering with Visual Aids for the 30th Annual Day With(out) Art. This year the program is STILL BEGINNING featuring seven newly commissioned videos responding to the ongoing HIV/AIDS epidemic by Shanti Avirgan, Nguyen Tan Hoang, Carl George, Viva Ruiz, Iman Shervington, Jack Waters/Victor F.M. Torres, and Derrick Woods-Morrow (free).
The Broad will be presenting a screening of artist and filmmaker Isaac Julien’s short video, This is Not an AIDS Advertisement (1987, Super 8 transferred to video, 10 min), hosted and co-organized by West Hollywood’s poet laureate, Steven Reigns. Following the screening, Reigns, along with author Meliza Bañales aka Missy Fuego, award-winning author Bernard Cooper, and writer, musician, and choreographer Brontez Purnell, will speak to how HIV and AIDS have impacted their lives personally, and present examples of their own work. (free)
Fowler Museum is screening How to Survive a Plague, having two dance performances, and more for World AIDS Day. This is in addition to the weekly storytelling performances that are part of their exhibition Through Positive Eyes
The Hollywood Christmas Parade is taking over Hollywood Blvd with balloons, floats, marching bands, performers, and more (free)
Craft Contemporary is having a Holiday Marketplace and admission to the museum is free
Feels are playing at Resident with Reckling and Slaughterhouse
Dynasty Handbag’s Weirdo Night is happening at Zebulon with performances by artist Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs, Charles Galin, Melanie Magenta and more tba
Things to do in Los Angeles this weekend (11/29-12/2/18)-
Thursday
Tennis System are opening for El Ten Eleven at the Teragram Ballroom
LACMA is hosting a free screening of the 1949 film Caught, featuring a character based on Howard Hughes. The event includes a post screening conversation with Karina Longworth and Edgar Wright, and a book signing of Seduction: Sex, Lies and Stardom in Howard Hughes’s Hollywood
Union Station is having its Annual Tree Lighting and Cocoa Concert (free and indoors due to the rain)
California hip-hop collective BROCKHAMPTON are performing at the Shrine Expo Hall
Molly Nilsson is playing at Zebulon with Patience and Paige Emery opening
Starting today and running until Sunday at The Theatre at Ace Hotel is HYPERSPECTIVE, a “free immersive film festival experience” in a 360 degree dome theater that include short and long-format immersive films
Spendtime Palace are playing with Pinky Pinky and The Brazen Youth at the Bootleg Theater
Doe Paoro and Springtime Carnivore are playing at the Lodge Room
Death Valley Girls are playing at The Echo with Salt Lick, Secret Stare and Adult Parts opening
Saturday
For Day With(out) Art 2018,Hammer Museum will be screening the hour long video program Alternate Endings, Activist Risings which highlights the impact of art in AIDS activism through short videos commissioned from community organizations and collectives
Justus Proffit and Jay Som will be performing songs from their recent collaboration at the Moroccan Lounge with Fime and Nikolas Escudero opening
Grand Central Market is hosting it’s Fifth Annual Holiday Marketplace (also on Sunday)
Union Station is also having a holiday marketplace which includes a performance by The Bob Baker Marionette Theater
Photographer Luther Gerlach will be at The Getty to demonstrate how to make wet plate collodion negatives, ambrotypes and tintypes (free)
Celebrate Hanukkah at Skirball Cultural Center with musical performances, workshops and storytelling
Zebulon is hosting a free screening of Elia Kazan’s film Splendor in the Grass, with an introduction to the film by Natasha Gregson Wagner (actress Natalie Wood’s daughter) and film scholar Jim Hosney
Artist Ed Templeton will be signing his new book at Arcana
CicLAvia is back and shutting down streets to traffic in Chinatown, Boyle Heights and DTLA
Things to do in Los Angeles this weekend 12/7-12/10/17)-
Thursday
MOCA Grand Avenue is screening ALTERNATE ENDINGS, RADICAL BEGINNINGS, a series of short films created for Day With(out) Art, followed by a performance by Kia LaBeija and a discussion featuring Reina Gossett and Kia LaBeija in conversation with Day With(out) Art curators Erin Christovale and Vivian Crockett. (free)
Midnight Sister is playing at The Moroccan Lounge with Cones and Duk opening
Exhibition artist Felipe Dulzaides and John Loomis, author of Revolution of Forms: Cuba’s Forgotten Art Schools, will be in conversation at LAMAG about the remarkable history and architecture of Havana’s Esculeas Nacionales de Arte (National Art Schools) (free)
Syd (from The Internet) is playing at The Novo with special guests Buddy, Malia and DJ Young 1
Friday
Alex Lahey is playing at The Echo with Dude York and Liv Slingerland opening
George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker by Miami City Ballet is at The Music Center until Sunday (12/10)
LACMA is hosting an evening with Mr. Robot creator Sam Esmail which includes a screening of Stanley Kubrick’s film The Shining
Jane’s Addiction are playing a benefit show for Rhonda’s Kiss at the Hollywood Palladium
Saturday
Self Help Graphics is having a Holiday Marketplace which will also include a series of workshops and printmaking demos, music and food
Skirball Cultural Center is hosting a Hanukkah Festival exploring the holiday through the traditions of Los Angeles’s Latin American community- with music, dance, workshops and storytelling (keep in mind this event depends on the fire crisis hopefully being contained by this time)
For the second night of KROQ’s Almost Acoustic Christmas, performers include Franz Ferdinand, The Killers, Phoenix, Weezer, Morrissey and more
Everything Is Terrible! is having a 10th Birthday Party at The Regent Theater with screenings from their found footage video collection, live puppets and costumes, and more
Today, December 1st, is Day With(out) Art, a national day of action and mourning organized by Visual AIDS with arts organizations and institutions in response to the AIDS crisis. It is also World AIDS Day, an international day dedicated to raising awareness of the disease.
In 2014, on the 25th anniversary of Day With(out) Art, Visual AIDS commissioned seven artists/collaboratives to create short videos for a program titled ALTERNATE ENDINGS, which are now available to watch online. This year Visual AIDS has created another video program –ALTERNATE ENDINGS, RADICAL BEGINNINGS, previewed above.
Curated by Erin Christovale and Vivian Crockett for Visual AIDS, the video program prioritizes Black narratives within the ongoing AIDS epidemic, commissioning seven new and innovative short videos from artists Mykki Blanco, Cheryl Dunye & Ellen Spiro, Reina Gossett, Thomas Allen Harris, Kia LaBeija, Tiona Nekkia McClodden and Brontez Purnell.
In spite of the impact of HIV/AIDS within Black communities, these stories and experiences are constantly excluded from larger artistic and historical narratives. In 2016 African Americans represented 44% of all new HIV diagnoses in the United States. Given this context, it is increasingly urgent to feature a myriad of stories that consider and represent the lives of those housed within this statistic. ALTERNATE ENDINGS, RADICAL BEGINNINGS seeks to highlight the voices of those that are marginalized within broader Black communities nationwide, including queer and trans people.
The commissioned projects include intimate meditations of young HIV positive protagonists; a consideration of community-based HIV/AIDS activism in the South; explorations of the legacies and contemporary resonances within AIDS archives; a poetic journey through New York exploring historical traces of queer and trans life, and more. Together, the videos provide a platform centering voices deeply impacted by the ongoing epidemic.
Next week on 12/7 (Thursday), MOCA Grand Avenue in Los Angeles will be screening this program followed by a performance by Kia LaBeija and a discussion featuring Reina Gossett and Kia LaBeija in conversation with Day With(out) Art curators Erin Christovale and Vivian Crockett. (this event is free)
In New York it will be screened on 12/4 (Monday) at Schomberg Center for Research in Black Culture with a post-screening discussion featuring artists Cheryl Dunye, Ellen Spiro and Thomas Allen Harris in conversation with curators Erin Christovale and Vivian Crockett. (free but make sure to register as the event at The Whitney filled up quickly)
