Before ethnocentric white folks with Manifest Destiny fever claimed the land for their own, the Acjachemen Nation were Orange County’s native citizens. Join cultural storyteller, award-winning indigenous educator and Acjachemen descendant Jacque Tahuka Nunez on the first Sunday and/or second Saturday each month for “Journeys to the Past: Celebrating California’s First People.” This multi-sensory exhibition […]
Arts & Culture
Mission San Juan Capistrano Hosts Native American Storytelling Twice Monthly
John Reed Puts Shakespeare in a Blender and an Anti-War Statement Results
When mistakes are made in the wild, wacky world of journalism, it’s usually always the writer’s fault (sometimes, it’s an error by an editor; but we’re not supposed to talk about that). But in THIS case, it’s absolutely someone else’s fault: that of John Reed, whose play All The World’s a Grave: a […]
A New OC-Centric Play Proves That Shakespeare Isn’t Dead Yet
Some 450 years after his death, William Shakespeare still won’t shut up. Case in point: Two new plays currently receiving their debut productions in Orange County wouldn’t exist but for Shakespearean inspiration. Darren Andrew Nash’s Allegory of the Cave, part of the eighth-annual OC-Centric new-play festival, leans on the literary spirit of Shakespeare’s ill-fated Ophelia […]
RIP, Queen Aretha: Exhibit A for Proof of the Human Soul
For a nation that fought a bloody war of independence to toss the notion of royalty onto the trash heap of history, we sure do love royals. Consider our British friends: Most of the Brits I know regard their royal family as inbred, blood-engorged ticks sucking on their necks, while we here fawn over the […]
Now See This: Cinema Twain @Brea Improv
Val Kilmer has a long acting resume of impressive credentials. To many people, he is the quintessential Doc Holliday, Jim Morrison, Moses, etc. But for his current performance, he presents himself in the persona of non other than Mark Twain for an evening of comedy! Cinema Twain is a film, which features Kilmer in the […]
Radical Grace in “Women Making Waves” Exhibit at SHACC
Four phenomenal athletes are profiled in Surfing Heritage and Culture Center’s (SHACC) exhibit “Women Making Waves.” Their prowess on the fiercest waves is only part of what makes these surfers legendary. Fearlessness in life, challenging the status quo, and taking action to overcome hurdles for others as well as themselves make them role models and […]
How Will Anaheim’s Spat With Disney Over Subsidies Affect November’s Elections?
Construction plans on a new upscale hotel at the west end of Downtown Disney came to a screeching halt last week over disputed tax breaks. The Disneyland Resort sought to begin building its proposed eight-story, 700-room luxury lodge after appearing before the Anaheim planning commission today. The Mouse can still get things started, but opted to […]
Fourth Element Gallery’s ‘Florabau’ Is an Eerie Rumination on California’s Current Eco-Nightmare
It isn’t always clear what Jane Bauman’s intent is in the current exhibition of some of her recent work at Fourth Element Gallery in Santa Ana. The painter has been working her craft for enough years that you can be sure that it’s there, so plan on spending some time with the work to parse […]
A Sanctuary of Old California Art Closes After 20 Years
Lost amid the industrial buildings and automotive businesses that line Artesia Boulevard in Bellflower is a preserved California and Western America art sanctuary. Inside, the aroma of old books, natural musk (not the stuff modern-day hippies wear) creates a familiar feeling of home. Wood panels hug the walls while tan shag carpet cushions your feet. […]
UC Irvine’s Thuy Vo Dang is the Newest Member of the John Wayne Airport Arts Commission
Thuy Vo Dang is the curator of the UC Irvine Libraries’ Southeast Asian Archive, co-author of the 2015 book Vietnamese in Orange County, and, as of today, the newest member of the John Wayne Airport Arts Commission. We recently spoke about her interest and experience in the arts, her goals for airport arts commission, and […]
Sega’s Irvine-Based Localization Team Brings Japanese Culture to the Gaming World
Thanks to household names like Nintendo and Sony, Japan’s influence on video games is hard to overstate. In the 35 years since the Nintendo Entertainment System released, gamers all over the world have enjoyed the fruits of Japan’s labor, but it’s only been in the last few years that Japanese games designed for a Japanese […]
Long Beach Playhouse’s The Twentieth-Century Way Brings the City’s Rainbow History Back Home
Long Beach—OC’s poor redheaded stepchild to the east (if east means west, that is), a city with no identity or economic or cultural import—does have some merits. Yes, Iowa-by-the-Sea remains as electrifying as that long-scuttled nickname would suggest, but the so-called International City sure has a lot of ships that visit. And you can ride […]
Now Go to This: “Judithe Hernandez: A Dream is the Shadow of Something Real”
Although she’s not commonly described as a surrealist, there’s a surreal, dreamy quality in Judithe Hernandez’s art that contributes an eerie, yet calm feeling upon seeing it. Hernandez, a venerated figure of the Los Angeles muralist movement in the 1970s, has presented her colorful pastel murals on paper across the world in such institutions as […]
Lost In OC: How to Spend Your Summer Non-Vacation
It’s August, and even the squirrels and coyotes are catching on that summer won’t last forever. The “Back to School Sale” signs are going up (it was always creepy and dissonant to see “Back to School Sale” right below the “Grant’s for Guns” sign on that now-shuttered Costa Mesa sporting-goods store). Next, there’ll be the […]
Satiate Your Midsummer Origami Cravings at Brea Gallery’s ‘PaperWorks Refolded’
For a case study in the possibilities of curation, consider a visit to “PaperWorks Refolded” at Brea Gallery. Director and curator Heather Bowling has made stellar choices in her artists; the show’s layout is seamless; and her interactive collage and origami pit stops allow people to effectively put what they’re seeing into practice. The sequel […]
After Two Decades of Collecting Artifacts from Disneyland, Agent Richard Kraft is Ready to ‘Let It Go’
“This was on the side of the Disneyland Hotel in the 1960s,” explains Mike Van Eaton, owner of the Van Eaton Galleries in Sherman Oaks. He gestures to a giant, red neon illuminated letter “D” that stands “12 times the size of God”– to borrow a phrase from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. What […]
“Undesirables” Exhibit in San Pedro Recalls the Bisbee Deportation of 1917
When Laurie McKenna’s mixed-media installation The Undesirables arrives in San Pedro from Bisbee, Arizona, it promises to be a much smoother ride than its historical inspiration. McKenna first debuted her exhibit in commemoration of the Bisbee Deportation of 1917’s centennial last July. Cornelius Projects, a gallery in San Pedro, welcomes the conceptual artist’s work in […]
Epic Beauty Reigns at Love Long Beach
Peace on Earth and good will toward mankind still exist; you just have to look in the right places. While many people’s lives are dominated by the dark realities of the Information Age, other people make it their goal to promote and celebrate the spirit of the continuing Age of Aquarius. This weekend, in Long […]
Atomic Ballroom Kick-Starts the Heart of Dancing in Downtown Fullerton’s Historic Williams Building
The Santa Fe train and bus lines run through the city of Fullerton like a main artery straight to the heart of downtown. Terrestrial travelers flow through the district as though clusters of white blood cells—in and out with each arrival and departure. The pulse of the few blocks that make up the historic downtown […]
New Swan and the Wayward Artist Break Free of the Bad Shakespeare Rap
Theatrically speaking, summer means Shakespeare. A lot of Shakespeare. Too much Shakespeare. And all too often over the past 20-plus years, these eyes and ears have been bored to the edge of the existential abyss by directors and actors who tackle material they can’t handle—and who look and sound awful while doing it. Which is […]
“The Art of Baja California” at Casa Romantica Cultural Center and Gardens
The works of three extraordinary living Baja California artists fit perfectly into Casa Romantica’s slender gallery. The two distinct painters—landscape master Juan Angel Castillo and folk-surrealist Esau Andrade Valencia—each take half the room, while the small-scale, erotically charged sculptures of Benito Ortega Vargas run right down the middle. The Todos Santos-based sculptor’s bronze or wood […]