SoCal Minds

Scribbles on a few notable matters for the weekend

From Loyola Marymount, the Japanese American National Museum, Zocalo & the Huntington

Because some domestic chores look as if they'll take more effort than expected, an abbreviated spin through the intellectual ferment around the Southland for today and into the weekend doings. But some stuff worth taking a look at:

• In Westchester, the disccussions of the university's 20-year master plan draws a crowd estimated at 350; how will the school burgeon at the same time it acts as a good neighbor, of course, is a key concern, as parties look to the future and worry about growth, traffic, pollution, digital signage, buffer zones and other important matters. 

• In Little Tokyo on Saturday afternoon, documentary film makers will show off their bio-pic that should prove greatly enlightening about a familar, comedic face from television and movies. The sardonic humor of veteran star Jack Soo, appreciated for his work in everything from 'Flower Drum Song' to 'Barney Miller' and 'Monk,' may have kept wider audiences from learning his fascinating life story, including his Japanese -- not Chinese -- ancestry. There's more, of course, on this path-breaking actor and his refusal to play to harmful ethnic stereotypes at the 'You Don't Know Jack' documentary site.   

• And if other diversions still are called for, there is, of course, a premiere of 'Countdown to Zero,' a powerful new film tracking the history and potential harm of nuclear weapons; the Zocalo-KCRW sponsored screening is free but reservations are required. And, of course, the folks in San Marino show off from their collections starting Sunday 'British Landscape Prints.'

Generous donors shower millions on area institutions

From the Huntington, Harvey Mudd & Cal Poly Pomona

The lights don't go on for free at the intellectual institutions across the region, so students, researchers and members of the general public have cause to celebrate that donors have shown such generosity in recent days with the folks in San Marino, of course, capturing the big headline of the moment.

 That's because they have reported that their six-year fund-raising campaign, which had a goal of $175 million, has all but ended and brought in an unexpected $240 million  with gifts still getting tallied and the official close of the books on Wednesday. Outreach to new, varied and different donors -- the Chinese American community, for example -- boosted giving, as did the receipt not just of cash, pledges and an increase in the institutional endowment but also significant, sizable collections and valuable displayable items.

Besides reeling in major donors, the institution also recently received a smaller, fishy present from Disneyland in Anaheim: 250 koi, valuable creatures that needed to be relocated and saved from a hotel pond.

In Claremont, meantime, the Mudders are saying many thanks for a $1 million donation to their Global Clinic program from some grateful, late parents who appreciated how their son put in practice all he learned while helping and working with others from spots in Central and South America, Asia and Europe.

And lastly, in Pomona, the business administration and hospitality management folks are appreciating the $2 million pledged by a prominent alum , who said he felt the need to give back to his onetime school not only for the education he received but also because it was the place where he met his wife.

A fast week ahead for fans of writing, music, dance

From ALOUD, UCLA, CalArts & the Huntington

Think Richard Russo (Empire Falls, Nobody's Fool) on writing. Or Mischa and Merce on dance. Or how about Richard Wagner once and a second time or Huang Ruo on music? Best part of three-day weekends is how they accelerate the work week. So get to the seeing and planning, as Russo's appearance downtown and the first of two Westwide, Ring-related Wagner programs will be this afternoon and tonight. Tickets for a Baryshnikov benefit performance downtown Monday for the Merce Cunningham foundation and REDCAT are going fast. And with a balmy weekend already in the forecast ahead, might be a perfect reason to get to San Marino to see Huang Ruo, an up and coming composer who blends classical, contemporary, Eastern and Western musical traditions.  

Photos: Cunningham, Baryshnikov, l, in 1999 /Robert Whitman; Huang Ruo, r

Stinks in Bucharest, San Marino; a whiff of Little Tokyo fun

From CalArts, the Japanese American National Museum & the Huntington

It's supposed to be a balmy, sunny holiday weekend in Southern California and if the weather alone doesn't provide the pleasure of living in this spot on the planet, well, you could be in Bucharest...

That's where an artist-scholar who splits her time between LA and Vienna discovered that a few influential Bulgarians may be a tad behind modern thinking, as they banned her work at the Bucharest Bienale. Maybe that could become its own bizarre badge of honor?  And, no, as can be seen from the image at left, Kaucyila Brooke's art, though provocatively titled, wouldn't raise the fussiest of eyebrows in Los Angeles where saucier views assault the senses on any street at any moment. Hah! 

As long as we're on the topics of making a stink, the folks in San Marino are stirring the pot yet again as the son of the son of ol' smelly, they say, soon will bloom. Say what? Though it's a little inexplicable the popularity of the supposedly rare phenomenon, yet another amorphophallus titanum, aka corpse flowers, is shooting up and ready to make its odiferous opening in the next bit. For those smitten by this botantical bounty, well, there's an online spot to follow the stinky plant and its flowering, blow by blow. Phew.

So we leave you with a more pleasant thought and smelling like a rose, the folks over in Little Tokyo will be celebrating their Asian Pacific Islander and Native American Heritage Festival starting at 11 on Saturday. There will be movies, lectures, exhibits and the museum says it will admit one and all on a 'pay what you can' basis. Donate lots, eh?

On tap: a JPL open house, a big plant sale, a kids' fest

From Caltech, JPL, the Hungtington & JACCC

Just a quick note for those who are fans of rocket science and more, there's a special chance to see the innards of an internationally renowned research center as the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory conducts a weekend open house up in LaCanada-Flintridge. The free program, with many of the scientists and engineers scheduled to be on hand, carries a cautionary note about the common sense stuff that the public isn't supposed to drag along when they're guests at the facility, including booze, drugs weapons and skateboards. Guess it's a sign of the times. Meantime, this could be a bright, sunny weekend for those backyard fans, whether they take pleasure in seeing California landscapes or getting into the dirt and creating them by buying some of the thousands of rare, unusual plants at the 36th annual sale at the gardens in San Marino. And for those who can't resist and want to celebrate the kawai kodomo, well, it should be pretty perfect for the 27th annual Children's Day fest in Little Tokyo.

   

A focus on EthnoLA, Jews on vinyl, Bukowski

From UCLA, the Skirball & the Huntington

While they take on the global research that keeps them at the world-class fore, it's also great to see that institutions in the region also aren't skimping on the attention to materials and topics that are distinctly LA and worth a lot of attention just for that reason. Here's a trio of developments that prove the point:

• In Westwood at 7 tonight, in a free, public screening for which space is limited and reservations are required, the Bruins will keep highlighting the 40th anniversary of their ethnic studies programs by displaying films by students in the Center for EthnoCommuncations. The works delve into the lives of: multi-ethnic skateboarders in Long Beach; bus riders, their union and their elder organizer Granny Kim; and the struggles of South Asian motel owners in South Central and Latino truck drivers at the Port of LA.

Click here for more info, free ticket info on tonight's EthnoLA program

 On the Westside, there will be a curators' talk and the opening of an exhibition that tracked through musty garages, dusty attics and little plumbed archives in search of rare contemporary artifacts that speak in sometimes scratchy but powerful fashion about the lives of Jews in America, circa 1940 to 1980. Trojan scholar Josh Kun and cyber music expert Courtney Holt on Tuesday night will describe how they collected and curated the materials that make up 'Jews on Vinyl,' an exhibit that opens to the public on Wednesday. The exhibit features a 1950s-style living room with listening stations where audience members can take in Jewish recordings, many no longer available in any format, that provide a soundtrack of changing lives and sounds, from sacred music to the pop triumvirate of Neil Diamond, Barbra Streisand and Barry Manilow. And check out the accompanying album art, such as for the 1962 Roulette recording by the Barry Sisters (shown at left). 

A quest to find soundtrack of Jewish life in America, 1940-1980

'Jews on Vinyl' opens on Wednesday 

In San Marino, lots more attention will be paid to it when the exhibit actually goes up. But the mere mention that this fall there will be a big display on author Charles Bukowski already has no doubt stirred the denizens of not just cloistered libraries but also those who frequent dark, noisy bars late into the LA night. His fans will have plenty of time to howl at the moon and otherwise carry on while waiting for this October show of his papers, first editions of his works, archival photographs and memorabilia, as well as copies of magazines and other publications that carried his words. Items to be displayed will be provided by Linda Lee Bukowski as well as the library's collection of Bukowski papers, donated by Mrs. B.

Exhibit set for October on 'Poet on the Edge'

A weekend for books, gardens, history, eccentrics

From UCLA, the Arboretum, the Huntington, Cal State Dominguez Hills & Occidental

On a weekend with promises of no rain, brisk temperatures but plenty of sunshine, here's to the ample opportunities to explore and experience what once would be an idyllic, ideal scholarly life awash with books, history, gardens and plenty of other diversions.

From Westwood to Arcadia, of course, there are the pillars and posts of the spring season: on the Westside, there will be the big Los Angeles Times Book Festival attracting tens of thousand of bibliophiles and an array of authors, including Bruin faculty; and on the eastside, there's the Los Angeles County Arboretum's annual garden show, one of the largest such outdoor events on the West Coast with plenty of plants for sale and a focus this year on environment friendly gardening. Snatch the kids' wagon and take it to both events to bring home piles of autographed tomes and lots of great new greenery to add to the lushness of the area's rain-soaked yards.

Click here for more info on the Times' 'Festival of Books'

Bruin authors at the book fest in Westwood

In Arcadia, Arboretum stagest one of the largest garden events on West Coast

The Golden State, then as it sometimes feels now, might only have been a far imagining in the farthest distance of the frontier. But for some reason, on a contemporary basis, the Revolutionary period of the nation rides triumphant this weekend in the Southland as a major exhibit opens in San Marino, examining not the 1776 American divorce from Britain as a crown colony but the crucial predecessor stirrings on the new continent as colonists, including a young soldier named George Washington (shown at right), took on French interlopers in 1754 and set a tone and tenor in the Seven Years War that would be critical for then British America and all that would follow. That New World conflict, experts say, had a huge effect on shaping not just what would become the United States but it also ended up involving and affecting many of what then were global powers. The result? Well, a key document that would spring forth from the rabble-rousing set makes a West Coast stop in a national tour and will be available for a free, public but restricted viewing Saturday. It's a historic pressing of the Declaration of Independence, printed by colonial craftsman John Dunlap just hours after Thomas Jefferson had finished his writing. This rare copy moldered behind and hid in a junky picture frame until it was discovered in a flea market and later changed hands to a Norman Lear-supported foundation that paid $8.1 million for it.

In San Marino, opening of exhibit focused on Seven Years' War, British America

In South Bay, a chance to view historic Declaration

If the clamor for getting out of the house or tackling something fun don't encompass, well, say, chowing down on entries in the annual Grilled Cheese Invitational or maybe roaming downtown to collect pointers so as to win hotel stays in an online trivia contest, well, then perhaps the thing to do is to hie over to Eagle Rock for an eccentric, eclectic, free, public event that hearkens to a time when it is said the arts and sciences weren't separated and even more weirdness than can commonly be found in zany Southern California often prevailed. Intellectual impressario Lawrence Weschler (shown at right) will be putting on his day-long cavalcade of art, film, chat, PowerPoint, music, performance and whatever else fits into the ol 'Wonder Cabinet.' Hmmm.

In Eagle Rock, a day-long cavalcade of art, science, music, performance

They're primed for another gift from Mrs. Brody

From the Huntington

In San Marino, some folks may be thrumming their fingers on elegant tables or pacing about their classy executive suites as they await the scheduled sale of the world-class art collection of the late Frances Lasker Brody, a noted philanthropist and legendary supporter and patron of the home of the Blue Boy. Brody, 93, (shown at right) who helped shape cultural life in Southern California for decades, died late last year but bequeathed part of the proceeds of the impending sale of her collection of important works by Picasso, Matisse, Giacometti, Renoir, Calder, Braque, Vuillard and others to the Huntington; her personal art collection, which will be auctioned by Christie's in May, has been valued at an estimated $150 million. Among her many contributions to area cultural life: She introduced Peter Paanakker, a Los Angeles businessman, to the Huntington and helped entrance him with the idea of its now remarkable Chinese Garden (Liu Fang Yuan) , for which he contributed $10 million.

Philanthropist included bequest from impending auction of world-class art collection

Three takes on science: of history, fraud and fun

From Occidental, Caltech & the Huntington

Science can be serious but never stuffy stuff in Southern California, where it's the topic of some serious thinking about its potentially fradulent aspects and also where it will be dished up this weekend on  the wry, as well as by international scholars focusing on its 19th Century history.

In Eagle Rock, Bill Nye, the 'science guy' who also happens to be an engineer, author, inventor and comedian, will take on the topic, 'Our Planet Isn't What It Used to Be, So Let's Change the World!' in a free, public talk on Saturday morning at 10. No reservations are required but space will be limited for his fun, free-wheeling chat, which is part of the school's Phi Beta Kappa series. Nye, who has won multiple Emmys and is hosting three science and environment related television series, continues to work on his inventions (like the device to help people throw a baseball better) and has expanded his interests to the exploration of space.

Click here for more info on free lecture in Eagle Rock by the 'science guy' 

In San Marino, scholars from across the country and the globe will gather Friday and Saturday for a conference that explores the relationships among empires, territorial expansionism and colonialism and the rise of technology and science in the 19th Century. Reservations are required for the program and there is a small registration fee. Among the topics that experts will take on will be scrutiny of how long ocean voyages for exploration, trade and territory led to advances in cartography, astronomy, time-keeping and intellecutalism.

Click here for full 'empires, science' program, registration info

In Pasadena, an academic chief and prominent physicist with deep experience and expertise on scientific misconduct has taken up the topic in a new book with some fascinating history and lots of insight as to what constitutes research fraud. David Goodstein, the school's vice provost, the drafter of a formal policy on proper research practices, and now a co-instructor in a high-level course on science fraud, says he hopes 'On Fact and Fraud' will help lay people as well as scientists understand the complexities of scientific investigation done well -- and badly. He uses cases from the school and outside, including a scrutiny of long-standing claims that the institute's first president cooked data for his Nobel Prize-winning work (the author decides not). He cites ego, career pressure, time concerns and competitiveness as some of the causative factors that can push scientists into research wrong-doing, though the nature of the field, with its emphasis on collaboration and replication of experimental results, holds down the number of egregious cases. Goodstein previously wrote a best-seller, 'Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil.'

An investigation as to what constitutes scientific fraud

Of pow wows, antiquities, Mesoamerica, Hawaii

From CSULB, CSULA, the Huntington & the Japanese American National Museum

With the promise of a dry, sunny and increasingly warm weekend, there's lots to get out to see and learn about, including:

• In Long Beach, Native Americans will gather Saturday and Sunday for the 40th annual Pow Wow, which also will help commemorate 41 years of American Indian studies at the school, which asserts it has the oldest such scholarly program west of the Mississippi. There will be feasting, art and craft sales, dancing and competitions at the free, public event.

40th annual Long Beach Pow Wow also marks 41 years of Native American studies

Click here for more Pow Wow information

• In San Marino, scholars from across the country will gather to examine 19th Century Americans' fascination with ruins -- from Native American cultures, Egypt and Cyprus, among other spots. Why and how did the fledgling nation need its real and imagined ties with long lost civilizations and how did those earlier experiences shape contemporary U.S. life? There is a fee and registration required for the program that begins this (fri) morning and runs through Saturday. Click on the link contained in the brief blurb describing the program for the registration form and speaker list.

Session scrutinizes 19th Century Americans' fascination with ruins, antiquities 

• In East LA, experts on Mesoamerica will gather Sunday for their free, public conference at which they will take up such topics as the Maya, caves and ancient warfare, new views on Aztec human sacrifice and the ancient peoples' religious practices and gender ideologies. Refreshments will be provided and reservations are recommended.

A springtime exploration of all things Mesoamerican

• In Little Tokyo, it's worth catching up with 'Textured Lives,' an exhibit of painstakingly collected textiles that illuminate the unique connections between Japanese immigrants and their new lives in their new world -- the plantations of Hawaii. Some of the newcomers made use of their knowledge of fabric, sewing and design to create clothes to protect them in the fields, garments that melded Japanese, Portuguese and Chinese styles; others carried to their new American lives treasures of their Japanese heritage in fine kimono and other stylish clothing or textiles.

'Textured Lives' tells tale in fabric of ties between Japanese immigrants, life in Hawaii