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Courtesy of 826LA
Courtesy of 826LA BENEFIT*
The literacy and writing nonprofit 826LA East (in Echo Park), is hosting the book release party for the student-written, “Thanks and Good Luck Running the Country: Kids' Letters to President Obama.” On hand to join the celebration will be author and 826 National cofounder Dave Eggers tonight at 7:30 p.m. The LA-based authors will be reading, discussing and signing copies of the book. Come to hear gems of advice like this one for our new president: “When you are president, don't eat junk food. Junk food makes you fat. Your family shouldn't eat junk food, either, because it is not healthy. Obama, you rock.” To pre-order your copy and secure a seat at the event visit 826la.org. Ghettogloss presents a group show by members of the Drawing Club, featuring work by : Ray Caughron, Matthew Gray, Silas Hite, Emily Hillburg, Annie Hsu, Patrick Whitehorn and more. The opening cocktail reception is tonight from 8 pm to midnight. The show runs through Feb. 11.
FILM
Last week we mentioned that the Aero was holding a Hitchcock retrospective. Now while the other titles in the series are well known, tonight’s double feature films aren’t. Up first at 7:30 pm is I Confess, 1953. “Montgomery Clift plays a priest who undergoes a crisis of faith when he hears a murderer's confession; as the film progresses, he takes on the man's guilt as his own, both literally (as police wrongly suspect him of the murder) and psychologically.” That’s followed by 1950’s Stage Fright, where Jane Wyman is a struggling actress who helps hide fellow student Richard Todd when he's accused of killing his lover's husband.”
TALK
Zócalo presents Yale law school professor and author Amy Chua in a program titled, “The Rise and Fall of Hyperpowers.” Forget superpowers. That’s so like 20th century. “Hyperpowers are what count, dominating not just their part of the world but the entire breadth of it with their military might and cultural range. The U.S. is the seventh hyperpower in history, by Chua’s count, and its status is precarious.” Not only are China and Europe increasing their influence and power, but the U.S. is also weathering difficult wars and a sobering financial crisis. The program begins tonight at 7:30 pm at the Actors’ Gang Theater.
ART TALK
Ken Jacobson, photographic art dealer, discusses technical and aesthetic history of photography in “A Love Affair with the East: Orientalist Photography in the Middle East and North Africa, 1839-1925.” He discusses camera imagery during its first 75 years in the Middle East and North Africa - called "The Orient" at that time. “Striking examples of both documentary and more fanciful visions of the Orient—taken by foreign and indigenous photographers and largely sourced from the special collections of the Getty Research Institute—aid in the exploration of both traditional and postcolonial methods of analyzing these images.” The lecture begins today at 3 pm at the Getty Center’s Museum Lecture Hall.
ART+MUSIC
The Heard of Elephants Art/Music Collective in Highland Park is a group of local artists and musicians. The theme of the Collective’s January installations is “Cycles,” and tonight’s show will feature performance from bands Charts and Maps, Corridor and Collisons as well as art and installations from Liz Petersen, Katherine Petersen, The Twinz, Tony Hong, Evan Cummisky and Fishbowl. The event’s tonight at 9 pm at the Unknown Theatre. Tickets are $5 and includes art raffles, a CD sampler and, um, beer.
Every two years, Desert X presents site-specific outdoor installations throughout the Coachella Valley. Two Los Angeles artists have new work on display.
