Fear Grounds at the Fair Grounds – Ventura Nights

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If you’re ready for some Halloween fun by the sea – and don’t mind a bit of a drive from Los Angeles, Fear Grounds at Surfer’s Point Live on the Ventura Fair Grounds should fit the bill. Open Friday-Saturday for the next three weekends, and from Tuesday, October 26th through Sunday October 31st, this lower key, three-maze haunting event is a nice alternative to Halloween Horror Nights at Universal or Knott’s Scary Farm this year.

Produced by haunt-creating pro Edward Marks, the event features the Terror Trail, The Fright Train, and The Cage. There is also a beer garden with other alcoholic beverages called The Dead End, a food stand, and copious picnic tables decorated with oversize pumpkins. Scareactors and other entertainers, such as a stilt walker or two, and spooky femme fatales twirling colorful hula hoops, traverse the area.

Once inside the main gates, The Terror Trail is the most elaborate and satisfying scare, an approximately mile-long journey past a variety of set pieces and talented scareactors as witches, evil clowns, demented killers, ghosts and the like. From bloody wrecks to covens and monsters, there’s something new popping out of the dark around every corner.

The Fright Train is a smaller attraction in which guests ride the dusty backroads of the fairgrounds in a tram, heading past a variety of scares, lit-up Halloween decor, and best of all, passing through a bevy of chain-saw wielding evil doers and into a warehouse from which suspended cocoons containing dismembered bodies hang.

The Cage leads guests through a contained series of metal fencing winding inward, as dark monsters prowl through the chain links and bars, waiting to rattle nerves and torment the unwary.

All three are completely outdoors, well distanced, and thoughtfully laid out for pandemic times.

Marks says “Growing up in California, Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays…guests [will] test their fears at this one-of-a-kind beachside journey…”

Fear Grounds at the fairgrounds is located at 10 W. Harbor Blvd. in Ventura; for tickets and more info visit https://www.surferspointlive.com/fear-grounds.

  • Genie Davis, photos by Genie Davis and Jack Burke

A Bright New Light from Linda Sue Price with Safe in the Light

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What could be better than a drive-up or walk-by art exhibition of lustrous abstract neon? Linda Sue Price offers a lush, vibrant, and yes, lit-up experience in her new show, Safe in the Light, opening today, Saturday March 6th, at Loiter Galleries in Long Beach.

The gallery notes that after months of storefront closures and darkness due to the pandemic, gallerists felt it was “now time” to make the city’s 4th Street promenade shine with this pop-up exhibition located at The Streets shopping center.

Price’s new exhibition opens at 6:30 p.m. tonight, with an outdoor look at the art; it will be on display and clearly visible from the windows of the gallery until April 17th.

The exhibition marks a grand reopening of the galleries’ space. Price was chosen for the reopening because, “her work’s dual focus on light and positivity felt right for the moment,” the gallery states. It’s neon nature also lends itself to outside viewing by passersby, making it perfectly COVID-19 safe, as well as uplifting.

Jesse

Price says “The work in this show trends toward bright light because it is exhibiting in daylight,” she notes, when describing what makes this particular body of work different from others of her highly textural, sinuously-shaped neon art.

Rose

“I was invited to this show because the curators wanted to focus on light and positivity. Two pieces Rose, and Jesse, honor people who encouraged me to be me and also celebrated the energy of abstract art,” she explains.

Energy is certainly a quality that her work is infused with. It is the transcendent quality of her medium itself, her choice of color, her use of curves and shadows. The supple quality of her bending evokes movement and fluidity, providing the viewer with a synthesis of light, color, and captured motion. Her ability to exude light as a kind of life-force permeates the consciousness, inspiring an inward energy and awakening in the viewer.

Seeds

Echoing the passion and connectivity of all great abstract art, Price paints with her tubing in intense and visceral strokes.

Turn Left

Like many artists during pandemic times, she relates that the pandemic itself has of course influenced her work and impacted her personally. “I changed my focus from art making to gardening. While I continued to practice my bending skills, my creativity was channeled into figuring out how to successfully grow healthy vegetable plants. I recently grew my first winter garden. The journey continues. I am now using seeds to grow some of my plants rather than purchase them from a nursery.”

Unsurprisingly, her interest in gardening has also influenced the literal and figurative growth of her artwork. “My current project is to create invented herbs that will encourage the appreciation of women with opinions, and the sipping of two other invented herbs that will encourage support democracy…and the list goes on.”

Curves Ahead

In short, her neon continues to bloom and grow, just like her garden. And viewers can experience it live in Long Beach, starting tonight.

Loiter Galleries is located at 180 E. 4th Street windows in Long Beach; opening outdoors, live Saturday March 6th and on Instagram Live at Loiter Galleries.

  • Genie Davis; images courtesy of the artist

High Beams: Bendix Building Galleries Durden and Ray, Track 16, TSA, and more Rock Pandemic-Smart Event

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Carl Baratta

Earlier this summer, Durden and Ray offered up the fantastic We Are Here/Here We Are, a mapped exhibition which stretched all over Los Angeles with a series of online and best of all in-person drive by outdoor art exhibits. One of my favorite parts was being able to have a socially distanced visit with the artists who created some of the pieces; however, the art was fantastic. Pandemic or no pandemic, the wide-ranging exhibit of outdoor sculptures, photographs, paintings, and murals was a dazzling tour de force that embraced the spread-out grandness of Los Angeles and got me back on the road again, and finding geo-coordinates on a map.

Dani Dodge

Now, Durden and Ray joins other Bendix Building galleries — and artists from other galleries – downtown for a super cool nighttime, one-night-only drive through exhibition held on the roof of the parking garage adjacent to the gallery building. From 8 to 10 pm. on Saturday night, the themed exhibition will make you laugh and turn those High Beams on.

During the day, join the galleries in virtual exhibitions, then get in that car and head to the roof top.

The curated collection of Bendix Building art spaces drive-through art show allows viewers to see art live and in person from the safety and comfort of their cars.  

As co-organizer Carl Baratta says “Since the pandemic began, each of our spaces has been able to show art only in a limited fashion, if at all, and few people have been able to participate. We have missed our huge Bendix Building opening nights where we saw all our friends.”

While a masked group of artists were helping Dani Dodge move, the show was conceived.

The exhibition features a collection of more than two dozen lawn ornaments, lighted sculptures, furniture covered in plush animal toy fur, unscripted performance art, videos and art that recreates the idea of the traffic cone. Yes, the traffic cone isn’t a lowly orange triangle anymore.

Alanna Marcelletti and Dani Dodge

Remember, the rooftop exhibition concludes the day of virtual gallery viewing, walk-throughs, and talks. Visit the directory on the HighBeams.Art website to view virtual programming that represents the work and artists being shown at each physical location.

Attending High Beams at night, viewers will be guided through the exhibition as they enter the parking structure, drive through the exhibit, and then depart.

Saturday night’s exhibition serves as the first of a series of ongoing alternative exhibitions organized by a curatorial group of Bendix Building artists including Carl Baratta, Katya Usvitsky (TSALA); Debra Broz, Emily Blythe Jones (MVP); Molly Schulman (MVP and Maiden LA); Dani Dodge, Alanna Marcelletti, Sean Noyce, Max Presneill (Durden and Ray). 

Camilla Taylor

Participating art spaces include:

  • Durden and Ray
  • Gallery ALSO (hosted by TSALA)
  • Last Ditch
  • Maiden LA
  • Monte Vista Projects
  • Sea Farm City
  • Track 16 
  • TSALA
  • ViCA
  • 515
The garage roof now – just wait ’til tomorrow night!

Where and when: drive-through art show on the parking lot across from the building on Sept. 5, 2020. Address: rootop at 401 E. 12th St.

  • Genie Davis; photos provided by exhibition

AC Lounge is a Vacation

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Located at the AC Hotel Los Angeles South Bay in El Segundo, AC Lounge makes a terrific get- away whether you’re staying at the hotel or not.

It’s a beautiful space with a sleek modern bar, cushy indoor seating – and a fireplace – and intimate outdoor seating with fire and water features. While the look is elegant and modern, it is also comfortable, which is in no small part due to the accommodating, friendly staff.

On a chilly winter (for Los Angeles) evening, we started with two wonderful locovore cocktails. Happy Hour, which runs from 3:30 to 6:30 weekdays make these well-made drinks an even bigger treat.

We had the Immune Boost and 72 Degrees. Immune Boost is a lighter spin on a gingery drink that is often made with whiskey. Here it is Tito’s Vodka, ginger beer, grapefruit bitters, turmeric, and a seasonal citrus, making it crisper and more citrusy, while not negating the lovely combination of tastes. 72 Degrees is also vodka based, with honey, passionfruit, basil, and lime, it is slightly sweeter, but again light and refreshing.

We started our dining with a surprisingly generous portion of warm olives marinated in-house in a fragrant citrus blend. Warning: it is almost impossible to stop eating them.

The roasted mushrooms with torn herbs were delicious; the flavors rich but not heavy.

Grilled salmon with spiced lentil stew was a perfect main course: the salmon was beautifully prepared and a surprisingly large portion for a very reasonable price. The lentil base was terrific, with a bite of spice and a texture that nicely contrasted with the silky fish.

We also enjoyed an avocado, tomato, and fresh crumbled cheese bruschetta on chiobatta bread – a meal in itself.

Along with an extensive small bites menu, lunch is served in the AC Lounge space as well. Both locals and hotel guests frequent, adding to the vibe of the welcoming servers and bartender. The hotel’s design team created the space, nicely melding the clean lines of minimalism with relaxing seating and sparkling fire walls and small waterfall outside. The variety of seating options means that guests can enjoy a serene space or a lively one.

All in all, it’s a vacation from the everyday in a modern new hotel you may just be vacationing in to begin with – or it makes a perfect spot for after-work drinks and noshing, or a relaxing date night.

AC Hotel and the AC Lounge is located at 2130 Maple Ave. in El Segundo

  • Genie Davis; photos: Genie Davis