Soft and Hard Art

Last Saturday we made the trek out to Highland Park for the North East L.A. art walk. We met up with our friends Suzette and Mark for dinner at the Good Girl Dinette and then wandered across the street to Future Studio.

Good Girl Dinette, Highland Park

Chicken Boy, the Statue of Liberty of Los Angeles, lives on the roof of Future Studio

We ALWAYS visit Future Studio, since this is the gallery our friends, Amy and Stuart own. An added plus is that Chicken Boy lives here. This month, the quilts of Ruby Nishio were on view. We saw Ruby's first solo show at Future in 2010. I must say, Ruby's work has only gotten better over the past seven years!

Ruby Nishio in 2010

Larry Blends Right In. This was my MOST favorite quilt!

Close-Up of Favorite Quilt

Quilted Potholders by Ruby Nishio

Tom, talking to Claire at Future Studio

Ruby often uses Japanese-inspired fabrics in her quilt designs. She also uses floral patterned fabrics that speak to her love of gardening. All the quilts are pieced together meticulously into intricate patterns and are then hand-quilted. It was an inspiring show! I recently found out that Ruby is in her 90s!

Mona, Jeff and Larry

Tom and Barbara

Heather and Gallery Owner, Amy

Larry and Ellen

We saw many friends at the opening and had a wonderful time.

Next stop on the Gallery Tour was Avenue 50 Studio, right next to the Metro Line train tracks. There are five rambling gallery rooms in this complex. Each room had a different show. I'd heard a piece on NPR Radio during the day about the show in the first gallery, curated by artist, Eric Almanza. The show is called "Art as Resistance: Paintings in Protest to a Trump Presidency." All five rooms and the sidewalks outside were packed! The painting that took my attention in the first gallery was "A Banquet Without Consequences" by Alex Schaefer. Read about it here. I was immediately attracted to Schaefer's depiction of Warren Buffet in the center, playing the ukulele. This reminded me of the phrase "Nero fiddled while Rome burned."

"A Banquet Without Consequences" by Alex Schaefer, Oil on Canvas, 48 x 44

In addition to other paintings and sculptures in Gallery One, there was a Trump piñata stuffed with post-it notes from protesters to his administration. Later in the evening, the Trumpster was dethroned.

Protests come spilling out along with candy!

We spent a lot of time in the subsequent galleries, including the following shows: "Animating the Archives: The Women's Building," "Herencia (Inheritance)" and the Arroyo Arts Collective Space. I spied actress, Dakota Johnson in one of the galleries. I kinneared a photo of her.

Dakota Johnson in the Women's Building Gallery at Avenue 50 Studio

It was an exhausting, but rewarding evening!