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10 February - 8 May, 2005
A WALK TO REMEMBER
Organized by Jens Hoffmann
Opening reception: Wednesday 9 February, 2005 7-9 pm
Tuesday
8 February 2005 at 7pm
Panel discussion with Jens Hoffmann and artists from
"
A Walk to Remember."
John Baldessari, Jennifer
Bornstein, Meg Cranston, Morgan Fisher, Evan Holloway, Paul McCarthy,
Rubén Ortiz Torres, Allen Ruppersberg, and Eric Wesley.
“For the perfect flâneur,
for the passionate spectator, it is an immense joy to set up house
in the middle of the multitude, amid the ebb and flow of movement,
in the midst of the fugitive and the infinite.”
- Charles Baudelaire
A Walk to Remember is an
exhibition that invites a group of Los Angeles based artists to conceive
and carry out guided tours through neighborhoods and areas of the
city with which they have a particular relationship or affinity and
that deal specifically with the rich cultural history of the city.
The exhibition relates to
Walter Benjamin’s concept of the flâneur as a figure
who derives pleasure from the hustle and bustle of the city streets,
who moves purposelessly among the urban crowd with the eye of an
artist: a spectator of contemporary life and urban scenes. Yet, A
Walk To Remember diverts from Benjamin’s idea when it examines
a specific European phenomenon of the early 20th century: the postmodern
condition of Los Angeles in which walking is clearly a thing of the
past. In addition, in giving each walk a purpose and in trying to
bring various locations and social and cultural relations of the
city to the audience the exhibition reaches beyond what Benjamin
described as an “aimless affair.”
Members of the audience
taking part in a walk will each be given a disposable camera to document
their individual impressions of the artists’ walks from their
distinct perspectives. The cameras will be collected at the end of
a walk and the developed photographs will be presented inside the
gallery space along with maps of the city outlining the different
routes. A small brochure including descriptions and maps of all the
walks will be available enabling the audience to realize the tours
themselves, should they wish.
The Walks:
JOHN BALDESSARI
For John Baldessari’s walk each member of the audience is asked to photograph
all intersection street signs from his studio at Bay and Main Streets in Santa
Monica to his second studio on 6th Street and Vernon Ave. in Venice Beach.
The artist will provide a map of the exact route.
Dates: 18 February 2005, 11:00 am
27 March 2005, 11:00 am
JENNIFER BORNSTEIN
The walk of Jennifer Bornstein is based on the artist’s fascination for
Griffith Park in North Hollywood, which the artist has described as her “studio.” Bornstein
will introduce the audience to the history of Griffith Park and lead a tour
through the park that will mimic the regular nature walks one can take in the
park.
Dates: 12 March 2005, 3:00 pm
3 April 2005, 3:00 pm
MEG CRANSTON
Meg Cranston will take the audience to Sherman Indian High School in Riverside.
The Sherman Indian High School is one of three remaining off reservation
Indian boarding schools in the United States. The students at the school
come from many different tribes and from all over the United States. The
school has a rich (sometimes tragic) history which Cranston will relate
to the lesser-known parts of Los Angeles’ urban Indian history.
Dates:
15 April 2005, time TBA
16 April 2005, time TBA
MORGAN FISHER
Morgan Fisher’s walk will connect two places in Santa Monica where he
has lived for a total of more than 20 years. Along the way, the walk takes
a digression to visit the site of a house where a friend of the artist lived,
then follows the path that he took each morning to buy a newspaper, and ends
with a visit to the former location of an art gallery that helped Fisher to
enter the Los Angeles art world. The walk illustrates the cliché that
in Los Angeles buildings are liable to disappear. The first place where the
artist lived was torn down and replaced by apartment buildings. The second
place, although still standing, will doubtless be torn down and replaced with
condominiums. The house where his friend lived is already gone.
Dates: 16 February 2005, 3:00 pm
27 February 2005, 3:00 pm
EVAN HOLLOWAY
The walk of Evan Holloway starts at his studio and finishes at the subway station
at 7th and Alvarado. The walk includes a great deal of information about
Los Angeles’ history. Large Victorian style homes, the only evidence
of this neighborhood's once glamorous past, form a perverse backdrop to
the most degraded and sad prostitution market in LA. Pedestrians are regularly
offered opportunities to purchase fake IDs, illicit subway tokens, black
market cigarettes, and various illegal intoxicants. The walk will stop
on the way at LA’s oldest deli to enjoy what is widely regarded as
the finest pastrami sandwich in the region.
Dates: 13 February 2005, 11:00 am
19 March 2005, 11:00 am
PAUL MCCARTHY
Paul McCarthy’s walk proposes defining the parameters of a walk that
could then be "performed" by anyone who cares to do so. The artist
is interested in the idea of walking the same route a number of times and how
one sees things differently as they become familiar. For McCarthy ‘s
walk the audience will not need to come together as a group but can simply
devise a walk for themselves that they will then walk at least ten times. The
start and finish for the walk should be Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions
on Hollywood Boulevard.
Dates: On going
RUBÉN
ORTIZ TORRES
In Rubén Ortiz Torres walk we will visit and experience “El Pedorrero” (The
Farter) on Whittier Boulevard in the core of East Los Angeles. This muffler
shop is also a museum that holds a collection of a “million” items.
Its founder and director, Bill Al Capone Mufflers, describes it as a corporation
while also functioning as a laboratory and an architectural marvel. At “El
Pedorrero” Bill customizes cars, invents new 3D chessboards and self-standing
ice cream cones while at the same time developing his own life philosophy.
Dates: 10 February 2005, 12:00 pm
10 March 2005, 12:00 pm
ALLEN RUPPERSBERG
Allen Ruppersberg’s walk will be a personal WHATEVER BECAME OF tour looking
for glimpses of what was and still partially is. The axis of the tour will
be a visit to some of the major sites that figure in his particular history.
By looking to compare the What’s Here to the What’s Gone, exclaiming
to each other “Yes, that is the same!” or “No, it’s
lost forever,” the artist hopes the tour can find and enlarge the details
of the art and the life that once existed there.
Dates: 23 April 2005, 11:00 am
ERIC WESLEY
Eric Wesley will do a guided walk through a particular section of Griffith
Park. The walk will start at the base of the park near Los Feliz and extend
upward, to a peak in the park. It will be a nighttime hike through the
dark wilderness accompanied by the telling of ghost stories based on the
rumor
that the property which is now Griffith Park was donated to the city by
Griffith J. Griffth near the turn of the century as a bribe to get him
off attempted murder charges (he shot his wife in the head).
Dates: 25 February 2005, 8:30 PM
6 March 2005, 8:30 PM
To
sign up for the walks, please call 323.957.1777 x12. As space
is very limite, tickets must be purchased in advance: $20 / $15
for LACE members and students with valid ID.
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