Cali Dewitt and Jenna Thornhill are basically the perfect couple. When they’re not busy with their respective publishing baron and rock star careers, they somehow find time to publish dreamy glimpses of their adventurous lives in the digital pages of DeWitt’s blog.
Cali and Jenna’s distinct personalities fuse together into an aura of immediate magnetism, crippling humor and totally next-level creativity that shines like a radioactive cockroach in these candid, arresting photographs. The surge of a show at The Smell, the trash-strewn beauty of L.A.’s silent streets, an intimate afternoon moment spent amongst friends– they’re all rendered powerfully real in a sea of glorious grain. No other photographers capture the texture of contemporary Los Angeles quite like Cali and Jenna.
Space 15 Twenty has been killing it lately! The L.A. event/retail space that hosted our super fun Where the Wild Things Arephoto exhibit and pop-up shop in September has since brought David Kramer’s mind-blowing video art show, Main Street, to glorious fruition, presented a free Girls concert last weekend, and are about to open a fantastical exhibition of DIY fashion designer Susan Cianciolo’s work, called Mountains and Flowers. On top of that, the opening of Mountains and Flowers this Saturday will also feature the debut solo performance of the ethereal Aska.
You loved her as the leader of Moonrats, David Scott Stone’s counterpart in AsDSSka, and an Aaron Rose co-conspirator in The Sads– and now you get to experience the pure, unfettered Aska. With a voice like a sunbeam melting a glacier, you’ll feel like an owl being cooed to sleep by its mother. Check out a cozy acoustic performance by Aska below, and don’t miss her first live show tomorrow at 4pm!
Leaping lizards! There are so many rad artists– luminaries, really– involved in the latest gallery show at L.A.’s primo promenade, Space 15 Twenty, I don’t even know where to start. Curated by Family founder David Kramer, Main Street is an exhibition of fresh video and animation from Miranda July, Jacob Ciocci, and Andrew Jeffrey Wright, to name just three. The exhibition, which opens Saturday, October 24th at 7pm, will also be released as a DVD designed by Grammy nominee Brian Roettinger. Always a perfectionist, Kramer tells us how he plans to transcend the confines of a gallery screening: “We’re building a giant box/cinema in the middle of the gallery with benches for viewing!”
The videos range from the psychedelically patterned color abstractions of Andrew Jeffrey Wright and Kris Moyes, to the documentary-style mountain biking travelogue of Andrew Sutherland. Miranda July’s meditation on tribal drumming, and Peter Sutherland’s re-enactment of a dream where teenagers wreak havoc on NYC, their minds controlled by a diabolical, smoking stone. Jacob Ciocci of Paper Rad defaces youtube videos of bedroom freak dancers with his brightly distinctive animations, while Melanie Bonajo records a deadpan conversation between two women with household items tied to their every limb. Lori D.’s cartoons focus on leering men, while Lucky Dragons focus on flower gardens.
Opening night features: Dunes (Live show)
DJs: Rob Barber (High Places) and Brian Roettinger
Check it out this weekend if you’re in L.A., and keep your eyes peeled for more info on the DVD!
Spike has been hard at work on a top secret robot-related short film. When Dallas and I visited the set, the first person we bumped into was Family owner David Kramer (more on Kramer in Lance Bang’s doc Family Portrait), furiously memorizing a verse of lyrics inscribed on his palm in a parking lot beneath the freeway. Kramer, a non-musician who had joined the project only one day earlier, was preparing to play the lead singer in a fake band called The Lost Trees, alongside the members of Moonrats.
Miranda July showed up and the four of us made our way through the vast maze of a fantastically decaying abandoned building to the room where Spike was setting up The Lost Trees’ big show. Waiting for the shoot to begin in earnest, Dallas and I decided to explore the building’s musty labyrinthine corridors. Scattered remnants left over from other Hollywood productions blurred unsettlingly with authentic artifacts from the location’s functional former life as a ballroom hall/radio station.
After conquering the rooftop with its epic vistas and then descending to the depths of the building’s eerily Saw-esque basement, we returned to the set and found “The Rec Center” now occupied by a couple of radical robots adrift in a roaring sea of extras feigning their fandom for The Lost Trees. Check out the photos above to see David Kramer embracing his inner rock star, Spike and Miranda talking shop, weird finds from our backstage explorations, and Lance Bangs shooting documentary footage in his trademark visor.
Keep an eye out for the short’s premiere in November and the unveiling of Spike’s new robotic stars!
Lately, it seems like all the rad creative people and places in L.A. have become closely intertwined, like a cat’s cradle of overlapping awesomeness. Sure, an extensively detailed flow chart might help you get the picture– or you could just watch this astute new documentary from Lance Bangs! Family Portrait centers on the bookstore Family and spider-webs outward from there, touching on some of our favorite places in Los Angeles, like The Smell, Hope Gallery, and Ooga Booga, as well as the people who make those places great. Watch the rest of Family Portrait after the jump.
Part 1: An intro to Family Bookstore, the crazy range of items they stock, and the origin of the store’s name.
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