The Brief

Promising a wide range of media and styles, Cal State Long Beach will host its 20th annual art show later this month, spotlighting the region’s next generation of artists.

The Greater L.A. Master of Fine Arts exhibition, popularly known as GLAMFA, will feature work by about 40 graduate students and recent alumni from local Cal State and UC campuses, as well as private schools.

Alberto Lule, who earned his MFA in 2024, has had his heart set on taking part in the show ever since he began his program at UC Irvine. For him, the only thing more exciting than being selected is seeing what his peers have cooked up.

“We come into spaces, we come into museums kind of expecting certain things now,” he said. “With GLAMFA, expect the unexpected.”

For a layperson or aspiring artist, Lule added, the exhibition is an opportunity to expand their understanding of what art can be: “Some video or installation is just gonna make you, like, think.”

Why GLAMFA matters

Emily Berl, one of this year’s co-organizers, said the event was born after another school held a similar one that excluded CSU students.

“We’re making the show we think should have happened,” she said.

Berl is an MFA student at Cal State Long Beach, focusing on photography and painting. On top of giving participants a chance to showcase their art, she said, GLAMFA provides a space for them to network.

“When school’s over and we’re out of our bubble of the institution, this is our community,” Berl said. “And so, it’s really important to continue the tradition and [help] foster these relationships.”

Libbi Ponce just completed her first quarter at UCLA, where she’s working toward an MFA in sculpture. Ponce was born and raised in Tampa and came to L.A. after completing multiple residencies. She’s “looking to connect with other artists who are also trying to make pivotal changes in their practice and career,” as well as potential art collectors.

For students, by students

GLAMFA is about “creating our own opportunities,” said co-organizer Marrin Goodall, another Cal State Long Beach student, working in sculpture.

The show is run by students, Goodall noted. GLAMFA exhibitors are chosen by a panel of their peers, who don’t know what school each submission comes from.

“We're leveling the playing field,” Goodall said. “We have the power to push different themes and conversations that we find important, rather than having things being chosen and curated and juried by others.”

"halo ring" | steel, hardware, enamel 2023

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Courtesy Libbi Ponce

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Bemis Center For Contemporary Arts

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For students like Berl and Goodall, putting the exhibition together also offers a chance to build other industry skills.

When it comes to success in the art world, Goodall added, “curation is a big part of it — putting on shows and figuring out how to show your work and other people's work and sort of thinking about the wider conversation that's happening at the time.”

A taste of this year’s GLAMFA

The five galleries in this year’s exhibition will feature photographs, sculptures, paintings and video, the organizers said.

“We've got large-scale installations,” Goodall added. “And we've got the teeniest, tiniest little pieces that you would miss if we didn’t point them out.”

INVESTIGATION #29 (On Customized Pedestal) 72” X 36” 2024. Lule used fluorescent forensic fingerprint powder on acrylic glass for the piece. In the front of the artwork lies construction materials gathered from West Adams.

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Courtesy Alberto Lule

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Hiroshi Clark

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As far as themes go, they told LAist, this year’s GLAMFA kept it pretty open.

“There's levity to the show,” Berl said, “but there is also a seriousness. I think the artists are really responding to the world.”

This includes a piece by Lule titled “INVESTIGATION #29,” which draws on his experience getting dusted for fingerprints before he was incarcerated. The artwork speaks to the gentrification of the artist’s West Adams neighborhood.

“There's so much going on,” Goodall said. “We’re proud to provide space for those hard conversations.”

The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration must continue providing gender-affirming care to transgender inmates in federal prisons.

The decision, in an emergency appeal, maintains a lower court's injunction on a federal Bureau of Prisons' policy that would terminate hormone therapy and other treatments for trans inmates.

The order offered no explanation behind the decision. It simply read, "The application for stay presented to The Chief Justice and by him referred to the Court is denied."

It also said Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito would side with the Trump administration and would grant the application for stay.

A federal district judge barred the BOP from implementing its policy this summer.

A second court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, also rejected the administration's request to pause U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth's order.

That's when U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer asked the Supreme Court to intervene.

As the federal judge's injunction remains in place, the legal battle over the policy continues.

Li Nowlin-Sohl, senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union and a lawyer involved in this case, said the organization believes there are more than 2,000 people in BOP custody who identify as transgender. (The BOP stopped publishing data reflecting transgender inmates after Trump took office in 2025. It only records male or female individuals incarcerated in the federal system.)

Kingdom v. Trump represents 1,000 inmates who have a gender dysphoria diagnosis, Nowlin-Sohl explained. Of those, the ACLU believes there are about 800 who have been prescribed hormone therapy and many who are also receiving social transition accommodations, Nowlin-Sohl said.

In its request for an emergency stay on the earlier rulings, the Trump administration argued that providing this care poses several risks, including for recipients of this specialized care, who it argued would become "targets for attacks." They also said that it raises "fairness concerns" as it would "breed resentment" with other inmates.

Access to gender-affirming care is considered medically necessary to treat gender dysphoria, a medical term used to describe the deep discomfort caused by a mismatch between a person's assigned sex at birth and their gender identity. Without it, individuals can struggle severely with mental health issues such as heightened anxiety and depression, with some turning to self-harm and suicide.

Gender-affirming care can include "...hormone therapy, and gender-affirming surgeries among others," according to the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. (In its filings, the Trump administration questioned WPATH's standards of care, which were developed by experts in transgender health and used by organizations across the world.)

Some people who are transgender may require hormone therapy and gender-affirming surgeries; others may not require any of these interventions.

The BOP has treated people diagnosed with gender dysphoria since at least 1992, the ACLU said in response to the government's filings to the Supreme Court.

"Had BOP's doctors found this treatment unhelpful or harmful to patients or had the agency found that the treatment compromised security, surely BOP would have mentioned it in the administrative record," the ACLU wrote.

This is a "glaring omission" and appears to indicate that the government's arguments now are simply "contrived," the ACLU continued.

NPR previously covered the impact of the loss of hormone treatments on people who are incarcerated. One woman said she experienced severe physical and mental anguish when she lost access to hormone treatments.

The Supreme Court's decision is at odds with other rulings that support the Trump administration's anti-trans policy agenda.

Last June, the court ruled that states can ban transgender girls from participating in sports at publicly funded schools. And in 2025, the court upheld state laws that make it illegal for doctors and other health professionals to provide gender-affirming care for minors.

In one of his first executive orders of his second term, President Trump targeted the trans community with a declaration that his administration recognizes just two sexes, male and female. This order has been the basis for a host of anti-trans policies throughout the administration.

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