Tomokazu Matsuyama was born in Japan. He moved to the US when he was around ten years old, not speaking any English, and being overwhelmed by the culture shock of 1980s Los Angeles. His artistic work is a reflection of this upbringing. Matsuyama’s paintings envision traditional Japanese imagery through the lens of American pop art, creating a unique and beautiful hybrid. He strives to portray this global melee through a conscious “appropriation” of all of his influences: cultural, artistic, and personal. Matsuyama’s unconflicted and positively ebullient works do not ask, “What am I?,” but assert, “I am everybody.” (via) [more inside]
posted by netbros on Nov 29, 2009 - 14 comments

The world's largest ball pit? 400,000 black plastic balls, one reservoir, thousands of happy goths. Other unusual things being filled with balls: the Spanish Steps, Rome, a co-worker's cube, San Francisco. (videos)
posted by Leon-arto on Jun 10, 2008 - 44 comments

Crazy 4 Cult is a new exhibit coming to Gallery 1988, the Los Angeles art gallery that hosts the annual (and always great) IAm8Bit exhibit. Just as IAm8Bit uses videogames of the 1980s as the theme for the artists, Crazy 4 Cult is using Cult movies. For fun, the exhbit poster features a huge number of movie references - can you catch them all? Via.
posted by jonson on Jul 16, 2007 - 12 comments

Yesterday, Design*Sponge added a city guide for Toronto to their small but growing list of Guides. The list also includes a Letter Press Guide, an Affordable Art Guide, a Gift Guide (2006), and guides for Brooklyn and LA.
posted by dobbs on May 12, 2007 - 9 comments

2 years ago I FPP'd FlavorPill, a company that sends out permission-based emails for books (Boldtype), music (Earplug), and fashion (the JC Report). They've since added ArtKrush (it's art, stupid! - nsfw) and Activate (world events) to their aresenal. In addition to the topic-specific mailing lists, they offer city-specific lists for London, New York, SF, LA, and Chicago. Sample issues are archived on the site.
posted by dobbs on Aug 11, 2006 - 6 comments

High Art at the Geffen Contemporary includes an LSD fountain, wow.
posted by xowie on Nov 11, 2005 - 14 comments

The Language of Saxophones At 55, L.A. musician and poet Kamau Daáood is finally beginning to acknowledge the possibility of his own place in local letters with his debut book of poetry, The Language of Saxophones, a 30-plus-year retrospective published by City Lights. Though he’s recorded a solo CD and read nationally and internationally, Daáood had never seen fit to collect his material in a book. Until now. “I never liked the idea of poetry sitting on a shelf somewhere, lost in all those book spines”.
posted by matteo on Apr 17, 2005 - 2 comments

"Hubert Selby died often. But he always came back, smiling that beautiful smile of his, and those blue eyes of his... This time he will not be back. My saints have always come from hell, and now, with his passing, there are no more saints". Selby is the author of Last Exit to Brooklyn, (tried for obscenity in England and supported by, among many others, Samuel Beckett and Anthony Burgess), Requiem For a Dream, Song of the Silent Snow. He is being eulogized in the USA and UK, but also, massively (I've just watched a fantastic TV special) in France, where he is much more popular than in his native land (Selby's death was the cover story -- plus pages 2, 3 and 4 -- in the daily Libération today -- .pdf file): Dernière sortie vers la rédemption, L'extase de la dévastation. What makes all this kind of ironic -- in a very Selbyesque way -- is that Selby himself used to say, "I started to die 36 hours before I was born..." (more inside)
posted by matteo on Apr 28, 2004 - 16 comments

Public Art in Los Angeles , including murals. The Mural Conservancy of LA. Murals in Tucson. Loyalist and republican murals in Northern Ireland. The murals of Diego Rivera (at the Diego Rivera Web Museum). the Diego Rivera Mural Project.
posted by plep on Jul 23, 2003 - 8 comments

All the Saints of the City of Angels: This website is dedicated to the exploration - at once poetic and historical - of this "spiritual geography" of Los Angeles; a road trip into the city's cultural, spiritual, and ethnic heritage via its streets which bear the names of saints.
posted by ahughey on Nov 7, 2002 - 5 comments

The Tekken Torture Tournament wires competitors into a "modified Tekken III Playstation console which converts virtual damage into a bracing, but non-lethal electric shock." (If you live in the Los Angeles area and have a high tolerance for pain, there's still time to register.)
posted by waxpancake on May 14, 2001 - 11 comments