The Brief

World Cup fans usually know exactly who they’re rooting for.

Ask around Los Angeles ahead of Thursday’s match between Mexico and South Korea, though, and you’ll find plenty of fans who would be perfectly happy if neither side won.

“I think we should just tie because I think that would be the most peaceful option,” said Edmund Kim, 27, who attended South Korea’s opening match watch party in Koreatown with his girlfriend, Ruth Perez.

Perez, 25, shrugged at the question about picking a side. 

“Any result would be a good result, honestly,” she said. “I just love the support amongst each other.”

The two countries will meet Thursday in one of the most anticipated group stage matches of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. In LA, the matchup is drawing excitement — and more than a few mixed loyalties.

Carlos Martinez has no interest in picking a side. Growing up in the San Gabriel Valley, he said he was surrounded by Asian friends and developed a love for Korean food.

He’d rather not see Mexico beat South Korea at all.

“I want us to both get points and for both of us to pass on to the next stage,” the 28-year-old said last week at the watch party in Koreatown.

Some of that goodwill is simply a product of life in L.A. As Kim puts it, the two communities are “right here living with each other so there’s no way to not support each other.”

But the relationship also has a soccer origin story.

If South Korea’s World Cup opener needed drama, it got it — and fans in Koreatown matched the moment.

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Gary Coronado

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The LA Local

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In 2018, when South Korea defeated Germany 2-0 in the final match of the group stage, the upset helped send Mexico into the knockout rounds. Mexican fans responded by flooding social media with messages of gratitude, gathering outside the South Korean embassy and chanting, “Coreano, hermano, ya eres mexicano” — “Korean brother, you are already Mexican.”

Daniel Hong remembers that moment like it was yesterday.  

Hong, 49, lives in Brownsville, Texas, but regularly travels to L.A. to buy merchandise for his store. On the day of the match, he was shopping at a wholesale warehouse in L.A. when South Korea scored.

“The first goal happens, and the screams from the warehouse could be heard from inside the showroom,” he recalled. “Second goal scored and pandemonium. The game finishes and everyone is losing their minds.”

Throughout the night, strangers offered Hong free food, drinks and repeated declarations of affection for South Korea.

“It was such an amazing feeling to see strangers rejoicing together as if we were all family,” he said. “Celebrations lasted throughout the night in Koreatown from what I could tell from my hotel room.”

When asked whether he’d support Mexico if South Korea were knocked out first, Hong — whose son is half-Mexican — didn’t hesitate.

“That would be a hard yes,” he said.

Daniel Chung, 40, one of the founders of Tigers Supporters Group, an LAFC supporters group based in Koreatown, joked that he’ll be “chasing my shots of tequila with soju” while supporting both teams Thursday night. 

“Either way, win or lose, we support each other and lift each other up,” he said. 

The upcoming match also arrives at a moment when connections between the two countries extend well beyond soccer.

Mexico is one of the largest markets for Korean pop music in the world. According to Spotify, more than 14 million K-pop listeners are based in Mexico, making it the fifth-largest market globally and the largest in the Spanish-speaking world.

Biannis Angeles, who said he loves K-pop and Korean food, counts BTS among his favorite groups. The South Korean boy band is expected to headline the World Cup final halftime show alongside Madonna and Shakira.

Angeles, 27, is hoping neither side leaves disappointed.

At South Korea’s opening match watch party against Czechia last week, green Mexico jerseys popped out among the sea of red jerseys in the crowd at Liberty Park.

Venus Meza, a 28-year-old Koreatown resident, supports both teams in some way because of how things shook out in 2018. 

“Obviously I’ll root a little bit more for Team Mexico, but if Korea wins, I’ll also be happy with that too,” she said. 

For Leo Hernandez, an LA soccer creator known online as “El Soccer Guy,” the conflict comes down to one player: Son Heung-min. 

Hernandez, who has attended LAFC matches since the club’s inaugural season, said many Mexican fans first embraced the South Korea star after the 2018 World Cup and have continued to admire him for the way he carries himself on and off the field.

“He’s a player you just can’t hate no matter what,” said Hernandez, 35. “Also because of how he’s here now, I think it really connected us to other South Koreans and the culture.”

Despite what’s at stake, Hernandez said Thursday’s match feels more like a friendly than a rivalry.

“It’s going to be hard for me to see Sonny play against my country,” he said.

Hernandez said he’d celebrate a Mexican goal, but would still hate to see Son on the losing end.

“I don’t want him to lose, but I wouldn’t want him to win. I have loyalty to both, especially because of Sonny,” he said. 

Paul Kim of the Los Angeles Korean Festival Foundation, a co-host of the watch party at Seoul International Park in Koreatown, expects Thursday’s match to draw one of the largest crowds of the tournament.

“I hope people understand it’s just a game,” Kim said, “but these two communities work together well, respect each other well in this city and neighborhood. It means a lot.”

The post Ahead of Mexico vs. South Korea match, some LA fans are rooting for a tie appeared first on LA Local.

It’s a big long weekend — Father’s Day, Juneteenth, the Art Parade, the World Cup and so much more. Narrowing the list for this weekend was tough!

Music-wise, there are a lot of big celebrations going on. On Friday, there’s Chance the Rapper’s Juneteenth extravaganza at the Hollywood Bowl and superstar DJ Chris Lake at L.A. State Historic Park (he’ll be there Saturday as well). Also on Saturday, there’s the official Opening Night at the Bowl with Halle Bailey, Darren Criss and more; the L.A. Block Party at Pershing Square Park with Keyshia Cole, Twista, Petey Pablo, Juelz Santana and Nivea; Red Bull Midsummer with TOKiMONSTA and many more at the Hollywood Roosevelt; and Sports Raves for All Ages at the Broad with Peanut Butter Wolf and Lucha VaVoom. Plus, the annual Venice Fest is back in Mar Vista on Saturday with multiple music stages.

Finally, the celebratory weekend wraps Sunday at the Hollywood Bowl with Reggae Night 24, featuring Ziggy Marley, Zuri Marley and Burning Spear.

Elsewhere on LAist, you can grab a ticket for Cookbook Live with La Copine’s Nikki Hill and Claire Wadsworth next Thursday, meet the artist making World Cup players out of gum wrappers and find the best eats for under $15 in Little Saigon.

Events

Smorgasburg 10-Year Anniversary

Sunday, June 21, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The Row
777 South Alameda St., Downtown L.A.
COST: FREE; MORE INFO

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Courtesy Peridot Photos

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Celebrate Dad with all his favorite L.A. treats at the 10th anniversary of Smorgasburg celebration. Get a taste of favorites from vendors like The Base, Shrimp Daddy, Bub and Grandma's, Carnitas El Momo, Ramen Burger and more. Plus, check out food specials, collabs, live music and an “I Love Micheladas” menu!

CAAM Juneteenth Events

Friday to Sunday, June 19 to 21
California African American Museum 
600 State Drive, Expo Park 
COST: FREE; MORE INFO 

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CAAM

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Courtesy Sutton Comms

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From a family scavenger hunt on Friday to a dance party on Saturday to a sound bath and yoga meditation on Sunday, Juneteenth comes alive at the California African American Museum. I just went last week to check out the Willie Birch and Gordon Parks exhibits — both are well worth seeing, and the space is a light-filled sanctuary from the busyness of everything else happening in Expo Park with the FIFA Fan Fest.

LACMA Art Parade

Saturday, June 20, 6 p.m. 
LACMA
5905 Wilshire Blvd., Miracle Mile 
COST: FREE; MORE INFO 

The weekend’s marquee event is a massive art parade to welcome the new LACMA Geffen Galleries on their official opening weekend, highlighting dozens of local artists hand-selected to participate. The parade and block party will run down Museum Mile and promise to be a moveable feast of art projects, performances, music and more in the spirit of the original art parades, envisioned by gallerist Jeffrey Deitch and held in NYC 20 years ago.

Juneteenth Improv Extravaganza

Friday, June 19, 7 p.m.
UCB Franklin 
5919 Franklin Ave., Hollywood 
COST: $10; MORE INFO

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Courtesy Friday Block Party

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Kick off your holiday weekend with some laughs at UCB. Hosted by Sean Williams and Itanza Saraz, the Juneteenth-themed show features comedians Jacquis Neal, Nnamdi Ngwe, Monique Moses, Toni Adeyemi, Courtney Theophin and many, many more. Can’t make it out to Hollywood? You can also livestream the show.

Third Annual Compton Film Festival 

Saturday and Sunday, June 20 and 21
Compton College
1111 E. Artesia Blvd., Compton
COST: FROM $11.52; MORE INFO

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Courtesy Compton Film Festival

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Get access to conversations with producers, filmmakers and local politicians — and check out some great new films, of course — at the third annual Compton Film Festival at Compton College. The selections this year include student films, as well as animated, documentary and narrative shorts.

LA River Arts: River Solstice Festival

Sunday, June 21, 2 p.m. to 7 p.m. 
Lewis MacAdams Riverfront Park
2944 Gleneden St., Frogtown
COST: FREE; MORE INFO

Party along the river with performances from the Bob Baker Marionettes, Mary Lattimore, San Cha and Calycosa; explore tons of art from local artists; and gain a deeper understanding of the city’s relationship to our own L.A. River at the River Solstice Festival.

Gil Scott-Heron: Bluesology

Friday to Sunday, June 19 to 21
Hollywood Fringe
Hudson Theaters Main Stage
6539 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood
COST: $50; MORE INFO 

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Courtesy Hollywood Fringe

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Experience the words and music of Gil Scott-Heron in a new way with this never-the-same spoken word production that comes to the Hollywood Fringe with several iterations already under its belt, plus eight NAACP Theatre Award nominations. Featuring Scott-Heron’s daughter, Gia Scott-Heron, the show reimagines works from his 17 albums using poetry, art, music and an activist spirit.

Sip of History: Baseball and Japanese American History

Friday, June 19, 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. 
Far Bar
347 1st St., Little Tokyo
COST: $15, includes drink ticket; MORE INFO

Ohtani fever is in full bloom this summer, and you can learn about the deep history of Japan’s love affair with baseball at this drink-and-learn event with the Democracy Center at Far Bar in Little Tokyo. The program features a conversation with JANM’s Director of Collections Management & Access and Curator, Kristen Hayashi, about how baseball brought hope, unity and a sense of normalcy to Japanese Americans during World War II incarceration.

Last Remaining Seats: 9 to 5 and North by Northwest

Saturday, June 20, 1 p.m. and 7 p.m.
Million Dollar Theater
307 S. Broadway, Downtown L.A. 
COST: $25; MORE INFO

Exterior of Orpheum theatre during the 2024 Last Remaining Seats season

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LA Conservancy

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Catch the last films of the Last Remaining Seats series at the historic Million Dollar Theater on Broadway. The matinee is 9 to 5 starring Dolly Parton, and the evening pick is the Hitchcock classic North by Northwest. What a way to make a living!

Dataland, the world’s first museum dedicated to art generated with artificial intelligence, opens Saturday. Located at the Frank Gehry designed Grand LA building in downtown, it’s positioning itself among institutions like MOCA, The Broad and the Disney Concert Hall.

The inaugural exhibit, Machine Dreams: Rainforests, is a project of museum co-founder and artist Refik Anadol and his studio’s Large Nature Model (LNM), which Anadol describes as “ethically sourced image archives transforming into real-time artworks” that span five “multi-sensory” galleries.

What does that all mean exactly? And would it all be worth the lowest ticket price of $49? I attended a recent press preview to find out.

Something you should know about me is that I love art. A lot. I want artists to thrive, and I don’t want AI to threaten that. At the same time, I believe in creative freedom. Who am I to say what is or isn’t a valid tool of an artist?

So I went into the museum as a curious skeptic. And in the end, while it was an enjoyable experience, I didn’t like it.

Here’s why.

Machine Dreams: Rainforests is the inaugural exhibition at Dataland.

Gearing up: Biosensor watches, scent gadgets and shoe coverings

First, the press event felt more like a tech start-up launch than a museum opening, which made sense once learning the museum is partnered with tech giants like Google Cloud and NVIDIA.

Before going in, we were given shoe coverings, making me feel like we were entering a sterile laboratory.

Inside the lobby, a large screen wall illuminated preview images of the exhibit, framed by scrolling environmental data of different rainforests. Loud ambient music –- what I can best describe as what you would hear in a futuristic spa — permeated the space, and a similar AI-generated sound design scored the whole exhibit.

The first official room of the exhibit was the “Discovery Portal,” with more data and dazzling graphics conceptualizing the environmental data captured to feed the LNM. We were each instructed to use a QR code to unlock a box, which revealed a wearable biosensor that looked like a blank digital watch, and another device to wear around our necks that emitted various scents designed by L'Oréal Luxe.

Psychedelic sensory overload

We walked down a hallway and descended an escalator into what was arguably the most impressive gallery: the “Data Pavilion.” It's a large room with curved edges, and mirrored columns and ceilings.

LAist host Julia Paskin in Dataland’s Data Pavilion Gallery.

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Natalie Chudnovsky / LAist

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Evolving images inspired by rainforest data moved quickly along the walls and floors: pink-purple lightscapes merged into yellow-blue polka-dots, and gave way to watery blue ripples, with circles of light that followed my footsteps. The exhibit is designed to react to its audience and I enjoyed seeing the images shift based on everyone’s movements, as well the sweet earthy smell released by the scent neck device. The Large Nature Model generating these experiences was trained on environmental data sets, including imagery, sound and weather data from 16 different rainforests.

“ As an artist, I believe the best way of creating work is machine-human collaboration,” said Anadol, who told me that every installation in the museum will be “human-made”. For him, the benefit of using AI is in how it can supersede human capacity.

“I will never remember a half billion images, but there's an installation here that can allow me to let visitors feel connected and listen to 50 million bird songs,” said Anadol “That is impossible to do by traditional tools.”

So did the resulting experience help me connect with nature in a radical new way?

Here’s where I have to disclose that I have sensory sensitivities. And like a lot of neurodivergent people, I crave and revel in sensory stimulation but can also find it overwhelming, and even physically painful in extreme instances. It would turn out, both experiences were true for me. After some time in the “Data Pavilion,” I found it dizzying, especially to walk while looking at a fast moving image beneath you, and my colleague was even more nauseous. (We are in our 30’s, which may also have something to do with it!)

On the bright side, I thought it was the closest experience to being on a psychedelic you can get without consuming anything.

Dataland’s Data Pavilion Gallery.

Drawings, chocolates and environmental questions

Next, was the “Latent Room” which is mostly centered on interactive stations.I tested out a touch screen panel where visitors can make a drawing and then choose a nature model to interpret it into a piece of AI art.

Frankly, I had trouble using it. I did not find the interactive stations very intuitive, and maybe it's because I’m an aging millennial.

Visitors here can also choose from one of four chocolates created by Valerie Confections, based in Glendale. The one I tried was very delicious but the connection to the rest of the exhibit was lost on me.

This is where the scent started to be too much and I took it off and kind of held it at arm’s length.

At this point, I had started to wonder about the museum’s promises of creating environmentally friendly artificial intelligence, claiming the energy required to render the visuals for each visitor equals the energy used to charge a cell phone. This is based on Google Cloud’s low-CO2 compute zone which operates on carbon-free energy. Most A.I. isn’t structured this way, consuming exorbitant amounts of energy and water. But I wondered if masking all the chips and wires behind the exhibit's walls erases the fact that it does take machinery and energy to create artificial intelligence.

To Anadol, though, hiding the tech is the point:  “I didn't want to get excited about some cables and computers. It's not about truly that, but it's more about becoming part of a new art form.” 

Personally, I was hoping for something more as important as the environmental impact of AI in an exhibit about connecting to rainforests.

67 percent emotionality

The penultimate experience is called the “Infinity Room,” which was truly the most immersive animation I have seen, also the most dizzying.

You stand in a mirrored cube space, watching an eight-minute long semi-AI generated film with video-game like nature graphics, inspired by an Amazonian folktale about a glass hummingbird and wisdom tree. The story had a moral and felt like a call to action, but to what, was unclear to me based on the exhibit alone.

Dataland's Infinity Room.

The final room, called “The Sanctuary,” is where your biometric data — like your temperature, heart rate, and skin conductivity — is displayed on the wall, before transforming into a visualization of the collective visitors’ experiences, a colorful abstraction of swirling sand.

While my data was only identifiable through the initials on my biometric device, and Dataland says visitor biometrics are not saved, nor tied to a specific person, I started to feel funny about having my data recorded at all.

I was also puzzled by how my biometrics were being interpreted into engagement and emotionality (at one point, mine was displayed as 67 percent).

“The percentages are not medical or diagnostic measurements,” said a museum representative, when we followed up over email. “They are artistic interpretations generated from the visitor’s interaction with the exhibition. The system may respond to signals such as movement, duration of the visitor’s stay, and physiological patterns gathered through the wearable experience.These signals are translated into a poetic profile of the visitor’s journey through the exhibition.”

But it was the very concept of poeticising artificial intelligence that was nagging at me the whole time.

Virtual trees and touching actual grass

After the press preview, I drove from DTLA up to the Arroyo Seco near the LAist office without much thinking. By that point, I was so overstimulated by the press tour that I just needed some peace and a little actual nature.

I sat in my car, with the window rolled down, on a quiet street, staring at the rows of trees along the narrow canyon that provides urban Pasadena with a bastion of green space.

I did get the impression Anadol and his team at Dataland are interested in critical discourse and artistic evolution, and I’m curious to see if future exhibits may more deeply explore the complexity of incorporating A.I. into art.

But as I decompressed in the quiet of the Arroyo, I wondered — if the exhibit’s purpose is to connect visitors to the natural world, what's the advantage of machine driven visualizations, as opposed to being in nature?

When asked over email, a rep replied that “nothing can replace being in nature.”

“We ask whether data can help us perceive aspects of nature that are usually invisible to human senses [...] Dataland is not an alternative to nature. It is an invitation to experience nature differently. People may leave the exhibition with a renewed desire to visit, study, listen to, or preserve the natural world.”

And seek nature, I did!

Dataland opens June 20 in Downtown Los Angeles. 

Natalie Chudnovsky contributed to the reporting of this piece.

Since last summer, when federal agents and National Guard troops descended on MacArthur Park as part of the Trump administration’s militarized mass deportation project, the site continues to make headlines as a place where crime runs rampant.

Following a recent crackdown on open-air drug sales at the park, L.A. County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said that on Labor Day he plans to have a picnic there with his family.

The beleaguered park “is going to be safe enough to have that picnic,” he promised, inviting federal agents, the LAPD, city officials and everyone else to join him.

But picnics at MacArthur Park are not a novelty.

It’s true the park grapples with organized crime and drug use. It’s also true that the site has long been a place where locals gather for recreation and to build community.

It is here, for instance, that cumbia legend Celso Piña gave a free concert to Angelenos in the historic Westlake neighborhood, just months before dying. It is here that parents push their children on swing sets and treat them to ice pops. And it is here that, virtually every day of the week, soccer lovers of all ages come together to play the beautiful game.

Police vehicles made several rounds at the park during a recent FIFA World Cup watch party.

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Jordan Rynning

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LAist

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Generations of soccer players  

José, who hails from El Salvador, has been going to pick-up games at MacArthur Park since the 80s. (He declined to share his last name because of the seemingly constant presence of law enforcement personnel in the area.)

Back then, he told LAist, the northern part of the park, where soccer players usually gather, didn’t have goal posts or artificial grass.

“We used to play in the dirt,” he said. But to him, the palm tree-lined park, with downtown L.A. in the background, has always been beautiful.

After work, José and his colleagues would leave their restaurant jobs and head to the park, where they sometimes played for several hours. José was usually a midfielder or a forward. Now that he’s in his late 60s, he mostly comes to watch others play. As the 2026 World Cup continues to unfold, José said he feels torn. He’s equally rooting for Argentina, Brazil and Portugal.

From the left: 10-year-old Max poses with members of his soccer league, including Cristofer, Skylarr and Aníbal.

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Jordan Rynning

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LAist

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MacArthur Park is also home to local youth leagues, where years-long friendships are forged. That’s how Skylarr met Aníbal.

Skylarr, a 14-year-old who prefers playing left wing, hopes Portugal will take the World Cup. He looks up to the team’s star, Cristiano Ronaldo, because the celebrated player “grew from the projects and made it out, through hard work,” he said.

Aníbal, a 13-year-old midfielder, wants France to win. “They have a stacked team,” he said in reference to Kylian Mbappé, Ousmane Dembélé, Michael Olise and other world-class talent.

The City of L.A. brought new netting for the goal posts at MacArthur Park's soccer field during a FIFA World Cup broadcast on June 15, 2026.

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Jordan Rynning

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LAist

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How to watch the tournament there

Throughout the summer, the city of Los Angeles will be hosting "Kick It In The Park" World Cup watch parties, including four at MacArthur Park.

On Monday, Angelenos gathered on the grass turf and neighboring hills to watch Saudi Arabia tie with Uruguay. Then, some stuck around for the next match. Skylarr, Aníbal and their friends practiced rainbow flicks during halftime.