A museum for Velvet paintings. A fly that decapitates innocent ants in Glendale; can happen to us? Our love/hate relationship with palm trees. The big hockey game.
Chinatown's new Velveteria gallery is a velvet painting paradise
One of the newest additions to Chinatown is — yes — another art space, but it's a gallery of a different kind. The Velveteria is a museum open to the public dedicated to one thing: velvet paintings.
Originally founded in Portland, Oregon in 2005, the Velveteria opened up just last month in LA's Chinatown neighborhood. The small museum has in its collection over 3,000 velvet paintings from all over the planet, including presidential portraits, rock stars and religious figures and much more.
Kitsch is hard to avoid at the Velveteria — that much goes without saying. Though less ubiquitous than they were years ago, you can still find velvet paintings at thrift stores, swap meets and antique shops. Artists from Thailand, Mexico, the South Pacific, all paint on black velvet.
Caren Anderson and Carl Baldwin have been collecting velvet paintings for over 15 years now. When the original gallery opened in Portland, it was a hit—it even made it onto Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservations":
For $10, viewers can see over 400 different paintings. Subjects range from Elvis, John F. Kennedy, to Jesus Christ. As Baldwin says: "People who died young and tragically always end up on velvet."
There's a room devoted to black light velvet paintings, where among the nudes and landscapes you'll find heavy political work: several paintings by Vietnamese folk artists depict American soldiers as terrifying skeletons and hulking monsters.
Caring for velvet paintings is a delicate business. When most paintings arrive, Baldwin says, they're usually covered in cat hair, Baldwin says they usually use a lint roller to clean up the works.
"Probably not good for really fine velvet paintings," Baldwin adds.
The Velveteria is Located at 711 New High St, Chinatown, Los Angeles, CA 90012. Admission: $10. Hours of operation are Thursday- Sunday, 11:00am – 6:00pm or by appointment.
Hockey at Dodger Stadium: A show with everything but Yul Brynner
Saturday night, the Ducks and the Kings (literally) face off at Dodger Stadium, one of half-a-dozen outdoor hockey spectacles the NHL is planning.
More than 100,000 showed up for such a game in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and while Dodger Stadium can't fit that many people, at least 50,000 fans are still expected to attend the Kings-Ducks game. To quote an old musical, it'll be "a show with everything but Yul Brynner."
As Helene Elliott puts it in the LA Times:
A rendering ... shows many wondrous sights that will be constructed on the field — an avenue of palm trees separating a beach volleyball court in left field from a performance stage in right field, an inline skating rink near home plate, and the rink stretching across the infield."
Elliott gave us a preview of Saturday's game, and like me, she's surprised that people are so surprised that outdoor hockey is such a big success.
They've just been a chance for fans and players to go back to the days when they skated outdoors as kids. It creates a sense of nostalgia, and this huge group event. So many people go just to say that they went rather than to see the game.
But, Elliott points out, unlike most other sports, hockey doesn't translate as well on TV, and it's best to see it in person. Plus, this will be a real game, not an exhibition.
These guys aren't going to be going through the motions, and these guys aren't going to treat it like an exhibition game. I mean, both of these teams need the two points that they could get from a win out of this game.
For much more, plus my story of a heartbreaking lost hockey stick, listen to our interview.
LA's love-hate relationship with the palm tree
The palm
Is the bomb.
-- Frank McDonough, LA County Arboretum
LA's fine, the sun shines most the time,
And the feeling is laid back.
Palm trees grow, and rents are low,
But you know I keep thinkin' about
Making my way back.
-- Neil Diamond, "I Am ... I Said."
Recently, Kevin Roderick of LA Observed posted:
"This native Angeleno has finally seen one too many palm trees. Granted, it has been awhile since I have lived elsewhere. Maybe I'm overdue. But some palm trees are just out of place, and for those we're starting a photo series here I'll call Ridiculous Palm Trees."
Like this one, about which he writes, "The parking lots at Dodger Stadium have more ridiculous palm trees per square mile than just about anywhere in Los Angeles. They only stick out more when the lots are empty."
(Credit: Kevin Roderick)
And I have to grant Kevin's point that this tree isn't doing much for the parking lot. Maybe, as he told me, he's reached this palm tree tipping point because the drought is making not just the palms but the whole city look dried out.
Frank McDonough, a botanical information consultant and blogger at the LA County Arboretum & Botanic Garden, wasn't surprised by Kevin's change of heart. "I've never seen a plant about which people have been so ambivalent. People love 'em or hate 'em."
Palms are surprisingly perfect for Los Angeles. Most of them are immigrants, McDonough says, that came with the mission padres and the botanists who arrived with the orange boom, and they're photogenic. He says a palm tree is "very symmetrical, it has a column, I mean, it's just like Greek architecture."
Listen to my interview with McDonough and Roderick (who really does love many palms) for much more about the tree that, for better or worse, has become the emblem of Los Angeles.
Ant-decapitating fly found popping heads off ants in Glendale
In asphalt-covered L.A., weird, exotic and especially big bugs have a knack for catching our eye, even if it's just for a few minutes. We'll usually stop what we're doing to snap a picture of a praying mantis on our phones, or gawk at a flying beetle.
Now, according to Lisa Gonzalez of the Natural History Museum, Angelenos can keep a lookout for a certain type of fly with gruesome, parasitic tendencies.
They're called ant-decapitating flies (or ADFs for short) and recently, scientists at the Natural History Museum found them living in Glendale. Gonzalez says these flies lay their eggs inside a particular type of ant. When the egg hatches (still inside the ant) a tiny maggot starts working its way to the head of the ant. "Once it gets to a particular stage, the head of the ant actually pops off and that fly then pupates and becomes an adult fly," Gonzalez says.
Researchers at the Natural History Museum might not have come across these insects in L.A. if it weren't for a program they started in 2012 called BioSCAN. With the help of citizen scientists and the larger community, the BioSCAN program has the mission of "exploring biodiversity" in the city.
These ADFs were discovered thanks to a trap that BioSCAN organizers set up in a Glendale resident's backyard. But what about the glaring question: Can these ant-decapitating flies lay eggs in human heads?
"That's a good question that I get asked all the time," Gonzalez says. "No, they cannot."
VIDEO: What fish barotrauma is, why it's bad, and how to stop it.
Have you heard of barotrauma? It's a condition experienced by some deep water fish who rise to the surface. Marine biologist and Off-Ramp commentator Milton Love explains:
"Baro means pressure. And they have a swim bladder — a gas bladder inside their bodies in their gut cavity. The gas is under pressure. If you bring them up from 100 feet, or 200 feet, the gas expands. And it's like having a balloon inside your body."
The result isn't pretty. Especially if you're a rockfish. There are over 50 species of rockfish off the California coast--many are sold here and advertised as red snapper. Although the condition itself isn't fatal, it often means a death sentence for rockfish caught and released by sport fishermen in California. The fish has no way to get back down to depth, so they float at the surface. Inevitably, a sea bird will find and eat the unlucky rockfish.
But now the rockfish can breathe easier: Off-Ramp host John Rabe talks with Love about a cheap, simply solution for barotrauma, which affects rockfish — like snapper — caught by sport anglers. There's even a video to go with it to explain the process:
Milton Love a marine biology professor at UC Santa Barbara--and also author of two books on the subject.