Julia Barajas
is following the impact of President Trump's immigration policies on Southern California communities.
Published January 3, 2025 2:46 PM
"Untitled (friend)" 2023, one of the pieces Libbi Ponce submitted for this year's GLAMFA. She found the fossilized lizard in her truck during a residency in Nebraska.
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LVL3
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Cal State Long Beach will soon host a free art show, with work by graduate students from Cal State, UC, and private campuses across Greater L.A.
Why it matters: Now in its 20th year, the Greater L.A. Master of Fine Arts exhibition (GLAMFA) gives students a chance to showcase their work and bond with students and art goers across the region. It also grants visitors a chance to expand their understanding of what art can be.
Opening night: To launch the exhibition, there will be a reception and experimental music performance on Saturday, Jan. 18, from 4 to 7 p.m.
Good to know: The show is free and open to the public, but visitors do have to pay for parking.
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.
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It started as a refuge for excluded art students. Now this show is celebrating 20 years
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 excludedCSU 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.
GLAMFA at Cal State Long Beach
Location: CSULB Art Gallery Complex, between Fine Arts Building 3 and Fine Arts Building 4, near the Campus Art Store (1250 N. Bellflower Blvd., Long Beach, CA 90840).
Dates: Jan. 18 - 29, 2025 (The galleries will be closed on Jan. 20 in observance of MLK Day.)
Time: Monday – Friday, noon to 5 p.m.
Admission: Free and open to the public
Parking: Ranges from $6 – $15 (depending on the day of the week and length of visit) in lots E7, E8, and G15.
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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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.”
Believe it or not, cooler temperatures are on the horizon as the tropical moisture brought on by Torpical Storm Marie exits the region.
Why now: According to the National Weather Service, a trough pattern is coming in to push away the upper level ridge that’s been creating warmer temperatures and trapping tropical moisture (hence the muggy feeling). NWS says the new system will allow for more onshore air flow and even the return of the marine layer tonight through the weekend for most coastal areas.
The forecast: Today, we’re looking at highs from 79 to 84 degrees at L.A. County beaches and 89 to 94 degrees for the inland coast. In the valleys, temperatures will reach 92 to 99 degrees. Ventura County areas will see highs from 89 to 98 degrees inland and 83 to 88 degrees closer to the coast.
In Orange County, temperatures along the coast will range from 80 to 90 degrees and 87 to 94 degrees more inland. The Inland Empire is still going to be pretty warm, with highs from 93 to 101 degrees.
Looking ahead: Come Saturday, temperatures will continue to drop another 4 to 8 degrees. By Sunday, we’re looking at highs in the 70s along the coast, and mid 80s for the inland areas and valleys. That trend should continue until at least Tuesday.
Michael Sonekh unloads a tray of baked goods at Baked T'Shuvah, which gets hundreds of orders ahead of the Jewish high holidays.
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Topline:
At Beit T’Shuvah, a unique Jewish institution on the border of L.A. and Culver City that provides treatment to people recovering from addiction, residents also help with a bakery operation that churns out delicious challah and babka. With the arrival of the Jewish High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, they're now entering their busiest time of year.
Learning to bake on the path to 'return': Beit T’Shuvah's Hebrew name can be translated as "House of Return." According to Head Community Rabbi Igael Gurin-Malous, who leads weekly services, the concept of “return” informs the process of addiction recovery. “When someone is interested in changing, and becoming better, and growing, and contributing to society — there's no greater force,” Gurin-Malous said.
Fueling the High Holidays and addiction treatment: The treatment center's baked goods spinoff is called Baked T’Shuvah. The bakery's website says, “Our challah is addictive. Trust us, we understand addiction.” The bakery receives hundreds of orders in anticipation of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year that starts on Friday evening. The profits go right back into the addiction treatment program, leaders said.
Read on... to learn what else participants have discovered through the program.
About a week before Rosh Hashanah — the Jewish New Year, which starts Friday evening — a group of youngish, hairnet-wearing adults were hunched over metal tables, spreading Nutella, sprinkling chocolate chips and slathering other gooey yumminess onto long, glistening slabs of dough.
“I’ve tried some of the best babka,” said baking instructor Jackie Elkins, referring to the Ashkenazi dessert bread. “From New York, everywhere — I’ve tried it.”
But Elkins, 64, stopped before finishing the thought. Someone completed it for her: “Not as good [as ours].”
Elkins nodded.
This babka filling was taking place at Beit T’Shuvah, a unique Jewish institution on the border of L.A. and Culver City that provides substance and addiction recovery, while also running a bakery operation that helps fund treatment.
‘We understand addiction’
The nonprofit’s Hebrew name can be translated as “House of Return.” Other than one Chabad outpatient facility, also in L.A., Jewish-based recovery institutions aren’t really a thing, said Zac Jones, Beit T’Shuvah’s executive director.
“It’s like part Jewish summer camp, part residential treatment center, part school for living,” said Jones, himself a former resident. He noted that being Jewish isn’t required to get one of the approximately 140 beds in the facility.
Beit T’Shuvah’s baked goods spinoff is called Baked T’Shuvah. The bakery’s website says, “Our challah is addictive. Trust us, we understand addiction.”
According to Head Community Rabbi Igael Gurin-Malous, who leads weekly services, the concept of “return” embedded in the word t’shuvah informs the process of addiction recovery.
“When someone is interested in changing, and becoming better, and growing, and contributing to society — there's no greater force,” Gurin-Malous said.
Braiding challah and creating community
As the bakers filled in their babka or braided their challah (a traditional Jewish Shabbat and holiday bread), a large TV fixed to the wall flashed statements such as “You Matter!” before changing to display a weekly schedule of liturgical events and daily to-dos.
Program staff said these tasks ensure everyone stays on top of their communal responsibilities, an important part of recovery.
Elkins, the baking instructor, started the program in 2017. On the surface, it’s a vocational training program. Residents in the addiction recovery program can join the bakery as interns. They learn professional baking and business skills designed to help them land on their feet upon release.
Jones, the recovery center’s director, said the baking classes also teach “life building” and help patients learn to “master your environment.”
For Elkins, who grew up in L.A., this endeavor has become a lifeline for family members. Her son Bradley went through Beit T’Shuva and recently celebrated 10 years of sobriety. He’s now the facility’s director of community care. Elkins’ brother and nephew were also residents. Three of her five siblings have struggled with addiction.
The bakery’s busiest time of year
Elkins currently works with three interns and one employee. Interns must commit to six months to ensure they can turn out a consistently dependable product.
During the High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the bakery receives hundreds of orders. Elkins said that after paying her employees and covering expenses, the profits go right back into the addiction treatment program.
Their challah comes in many varieties, including churro, za’atar (a Middle Eastern spice blend), everything (like the bagel), jalapeño cheddar, chocolate, raisin and salted caramel. Their babka comes in chocolate hazelnut and bear claw flavors.
Jackie Elkins oversees bakery operations at Baked T'Shuvah. She initially got involved when her son entered the center's addiction treatment program.
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Elkins didn’t start out as a professional baker. But she said she has always loved to cook. When her son Bradley was a resident, she approached facility founder Harriet Rossetto and said she wanted to give back.
Elkins noticed the facility imported all its challah. She said maybe she could bring in some mixers and teach residents how to make it. She got the go-ahead and the group grew quickly. After six months, Elkins said, they no longer needed to buy outside challah.
How the bakery’s leader leveled up her challah game
Like many Angelenos stuck at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, Elkins spent lockdown improving her baking skills. That’s when she first connected with Mahsa Golabi, a veteran baker who was in the process of leaving Bub & Grandma’s, the famed restaurant and bakery whose breads permeate the L.A. restaurant scene.
“I had her over my house for like three months,” Elkins said. “We got everything down to the science, all the proportions, butter versus dairy versus nondairy, how to set everything up, how to make sure everything was exactly the same every time.”
“It was Bashert,” Elkins said, using the Yiddish word for “meant to be.”
Getting sober and reconnecting with Judaism
Michael Sonekh, 29, is Elkins’ newest intern. He was a biology major at UC Berkeley before he first fell into addiction. The son of Iranian Jewish refugees, Sonekh grew up attending an Orthodox Jewish day school in L.A. But it was “pretty rough,” he said, due to “being queer,” among other things.
In adulthood, Sonekh decided it was time to seek professional help for his addiction issues. He said choosing to enter Beit T’Shuvah helped him not only with his substance use problems but also with the lingering resentment he felt toward Judaism.
“I was like, ‘This is something I'm probably gonna have to deal with,’” Sonekh said.
He gave Baked T’Shuvah a shot after the facility’s leaders suggested he “try new things.” He said the precision he learned in undergraduate lab work has come in handy.
“The vast majority of days here, it almost never feels like work,” Sonekh said.
Bakers look forward to ‘kadima’
When he gets kadima’ed, the facility’s Hebrew term for being released, Sonekh said he plans to continue studying at USC for a master’s degree in stem cell biology and regenerative medicine. He said he’s still considering whether to continue with more schooling after that.
Sonekh said his experience at Beit T’Shuvah made him believe he could one day start a business of some kind.
A baker presents a braided challah ready to be baked.
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Elkins, the bakery director, said participants discover many things through the program. Some end up “even finding a spouse here,” Elkins said. Her son Bradley did.
She pulled out her phone to show off a picture of a blond toddler: “Our first grandson.”
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The Lineage warehouse in Boyle Heights on August 31, 2026.
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The LA Local
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Topline:
Lineage Logistics sued a solar power provider and its contractor Thursday, blaming them for the fire that destroyed its cold storage facility and plagued Boyle Heights and surrounding communities with polluted, foul-smelling air for months.
The lawsuit: The company accuses Altus Power, Inc., Los Palos Street Operating, LLC, and Pearce Services of failing to address faults in the massive solar array installed on the 500,000-square-foot facility’s roof. Lineage is seeking more than $1 billion in damages, alleging negligence and breach of contract caused the fire, forced the warehouse to shut down and led to a cleanup effort that has cost more than $100 million. Los Palos, an Altus subsidiary, disputed Lineage’s claims and said that since the cold storage company was the tenant of the building they were responsible for cleanup and debris removal.
The investigation: The fire remains under investigation by the Los Angeles Fire Department, and its cause has not yet been determined. But because both the June and 2024 fires appear to have started around the facility’s roof, the solar array has been long suspected of playing a role in the blaze.
Lineage Logistics sued a solar power provider and its contractor Thursday, blaming them for the fire that destroyed its cold storage facility and plagued Boyle Heights and surrounding communities with polluted, foul-smelling air for months.
The company accuses Altus Power, Inc., Los Palos Street Operating, LLC, and Pearce Services of failing to address faults in the massive solar array installed on the 500,000-square-foot facility’s roof. Faulty electrical in that array led to a fire in 2024, and the same problems sparked the fire on June 17, Lineage claims in the suit.
“This lawsuit is about Altus and Pearce starting this fire and then being nowhere to be found when the community needed help,” said Greg Lehmkuhl, president & CEO of Lineage, in a prepared statement.
The fire remains under investigation by the Los Angeles Fire Department, and its cause has not yet been determined.
But because both the June and 2024 fires appear to have started around the facility’s roof, the solar array has been long suspected of playing a role in the blaze.
Lineage is seeking more than $1 billion in damages, alleging negligence and breach of contract caused the fire, forced the warehouse to shut down and led to a cleanup effort that has cost more than $100 million.
Los Palos, an Altus subsidiary, disputed Lineage’s claims and said that since the cold storage company was the tenant of the building, they were responsible for cleanup and debris removal.
“Lineage’s statement is riddled with misinformation in a blatant attempt to deflect blame for their role in this matter, including any damage caused by the release of substances from the warehouse, not the solar panel,” a Los Palos spokesperson said by email.
A spokesperson for Pearce also disputed Lineage’s claims and said the company would be fighting the suit in court, adding they have been cooperating with the fire department’s investigation.
“Investigation into the fire’s cause, origin, and reasons for its spread remains ongoing, and it is premature for anyone to draw conclusions,” a spokesperson for the company said by email.
The company alleges in the suit that the solar provider used substandard equipment to connect electrical lines and that equipment started the Aug. 14, 2024 fire. The company told Altus, Los Palos, and Pearce, a subsidiary of real estate giant CBRE, to fix the faulty equipment before turning the solar array back on.
Altus and Pearce knew that about 200 faulty electrical connections had been identified by May 2026, including about 10 near the area where the June fire eventually broke out, the suit claims. Lineage says it told the contractors to delay turning the system back on until they provided proof the faults were fixed, but the contractors did so anyway.
“Altus and Pearce deliberately ignored Lineage’s request, prematurely re-energized the solar array, and negligently and recklessly caused this devastating fire,” the suit reads.
Mayor Karen Bass and other elected officials have said publicly that Lineage should not rebuild its facility and continue operating in Boyle Heights. The company missed a 45-day deadline to clean up the facility imposed by Bass in August.
Lineage has since announced it had completed cleanup of the remnants of the facility on Sept. 5. The suit also suggests the company could be planning to stay in Boyle Heights, rather than simply seeking reimbursement for the fire.
The city’s Department of Building and Safety has put its plans to rebuild on hold, and South Coast Air Quality Management District has also issued multiple notices of violation over pollution from food that rotted inside the facility for months.
“This was a solar fire, not a warehouse fire,” reads a press release announcing the suit had been filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court Thursday. “Cold storage is not a risk to communities — it is an essential service that lowers food costs, expands food access and creates jobs,” it added.
Fiona Ng
is LAist's deputy managing editor and leads a team of reporters who explore food, culture, history, events and more.
Published September 10, 2026 3:58 PM
Flowers are left at the Sept. 11 Memorial and Museum in 2024, which is located on the land where the Twin Towers once stood before they were destroyed.
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Topline:
Here's a list of events in L.A. and O.C. counties on Friday and Saturday remembering 9/11.
Read on... to see when and where events are scheduled near you.
