CalArts show comes to Chinatown

THE LATEST crop of candidates for master of fine arts degrees from the California Institute of the Arts seems to be adhering to the classic real estate mantra “location, location, location” in the execution of its graduate exhibition. “We Want a New Object” will take over galleries, outdoor space and even a bar in the Chung King Road arts quarter of Chinatown for one week, starting Saturday.

The broad-ranging, open-subject show will feature diverse mixed media -- video art, performance pieces, paintings, photography, conceptual work, installation -- from 34 students.

Location was a large factor but not a thematic prerequisite in the show. However, artists such as Carlin Wing were inspired not only by Chinatown’s reputation as a hip and popular art enclave, but also by its earlier history. Her outdoor chalk diagram piece “Four Courts” references the multiple meanings of the term “court” -- from royalty and sports (Wing was a professional squash player) to architecture and judicial.

The latter will be suggested in the form of a live reading related to an 80-year-old California Supreme Court decision that old Chinatown be razed to make room for Union Station. “I wanted to engage with the community here and the history,” Wing says.

More recently, in the ‘90s, the Chung King Road vicinity emerged as mini hotbed for up-and-coming artists. Show curator Malik Gaines -- selected by the student-run exhibit panel -- explains that the area’s “low-key vibe in terms of commercial galleries” was set by the pioneering China Art Objects in 1999.

Gaines, an L.A.-based writer, performer and CalArts instructor, shares curatorial duties with friend-peer Christine Y. Kim, a New York curator in town on maternity leave. Beyond teaching, Gaines is connected to CalArts because he received his MFA in writing there. So he relates to taking the graduate show off the school’s somewhat remotely located Valencia campus and into an underground, yet commercial, gallery area in L.A. “You really are on a retreat with your colleagues [at CalArts] for the duration of the school year,” he says.

If location is primary, then timing is a close second. Exhibition organizer and participant Liz Glynn explains, “The show is coinciding with the opening of Art Basel Switzerland, so some of the dealers are away, but they have this gap week that we could use.”

Glynn’s piece, “In the Beginning Is the End,” refers to another aspect of the international art scene: The Getty Villa in Malibu. Part performance piece/part installation, it will open with dozens of costumed people carrying art objects, in a processional march from the Buena Vista Street Viaduct to the Acuna-Hansen Gallery. “They’ll be carrying objects, sculptures, some of which are surrogates that I’ve made to replace the objects the Getty returned to Italy. Some reference different sites along the way.” The pieces will be placed in the gallery as installations for the remainder of the group show.

Artist Munkyung Chung found her own whimsical way of referring back to art; or in this case, artists. She created handmade felt pins of her fellow CalArts students and faculty and handed them out to everyone before the opening. Her video still culmination of the pins is appropriately dubbed “I Am an Artist.”

And of course, no visit to Chinatown would be complete without at least a brief shopping excursion. This will figure into the work of student artist Daniel Pineda: “Los Angeles Chinatown Spree Display.” Glynn explains: “He’s giving everyone in the class $10 to go on a shopping spree in Chinatown, and he’ll do this big window display with whatever everyone buys.”