Photo LA 2008

Oh boy, here comes the latest photo extravaganza: The 17th Annual International Los Angeles Photographic Art Exposition, aka Photo LA, will be taking place from Thursday, January 10 - Sunday, January 13, 2008 at Barker Hanger, Santa Monica.

Normally this is a great one stop shop for what's going on in the fine art world of photography (or at least an idea of what's selling, so...). i love to spend an afternoon just wandering the aisles and this year should be even more exciting since it'll be at Barker Hanger. Some of the artists I'm interested in checking out are:

Alex Prager




Erwin Olaf and his 'Grief' series





It would seem that plenty of people have been very influenced by Cindy Sherman. It's not a bad thing, just an observation.

I'm also loving the photographs Michael Muller (also represented by LA gallery M+B) is doing of LA:




And although these aren't photographs, Jo Ann Callis used to only do photographs and now she paints from them (a la Gerhard Richter but with more mundane subject matter--which in my mind is a plus):



So all in all I can't wait. Plus I always see something that inspires me to pick up my camera and make some of my own art.

Pacific Dining Car

I was invited out to a very nice dinner at the Pacific Dining Car on Whilshire (another location downtown) and was intrigued by the decor. Very formal and heavy but with beautiful rich fabrics. I wouldn't call it California, but then again maybe I would. Perhaps it's a Los Angeles older than I can remember. The decor is so thorough that I had the sensation that I could be anywhere, but certainly not on Wilshire.

I was exploring their website and found that they started in 1921 in a train car right when Los Angeles was beginning to boom. If you're interested in Los Angeles history (like I am) you can find a nice summary of the development of Los Angeles on their website.

Pacific Dining Car
Santa Monica
2700 Wilshire Boulevard
Santa Monica, CA 90403

Downtown Los Angeles
1310 West 6th Street
Los Angeles, CA 90017

Rumba Style

Daily Candy just tipped us all off to a wonderful resource right in our (or my) own backyard: Rumba! It's a furniture and design shop on Ocean Park in Santa Monica. You can go and browse her mid century furnishings, have tea, and chat. Owner Kimba Hills also works as a 'personal design curator' coming over to your house and reconfiguring the things you already own to make it more you! She won't make you lose stuff you love and she'll make suggestions for new pieces that would finish out the look. She also offers staging for houses on the market.

Rumba
1740 #C Ocean Park Boulevard
Santa Monica, CA 90405
t. 310.392.3103
f. 310.392.7145
rumba@rumbastyle.com