TALE OF THREE ARCHITECTS IN LA JOLLA

“Venturi, Rauch and Scott Brown: A Generation of Architecture” surveys the work of a renowned architecture and design firm, at the La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, Saturday through Aug. 3.

Originated by the Krannert Art Museum at the University of Illinois, the exhibition consists primarily of drawings. The La Jolla Museum has added furniture, dinnerware and photographs documenting some recently completed buildings.

The firm’s achievements--largely determined by the complementary talents of its three partners: Robert Venturi, John Rauch and Denise Scott Brown--encompass architecture, city planning, urban design, furniture, interiors, graphics and exhibition design.

Robert Venturi’s 1966 book, “Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture,” is regarded as a seminal text in architectural theory. The firm is known for structures that fit their settings and for ornamentation integrating historical motifs with contemporary materials.

Major public commissions include the Laguna Gloria Museum, Austin, Tex.; the Seattle Art Museum; the Guild House and Franklin Court in Philadelphia, and the renovation and expansion of the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College. Recently the firm was commissioned to design an addition to the National Gallery in London.

Venturi will conduct a free, informal discussion on Friday at 2 p.m. in the International Center at UC San Diego. He will also give a talk in conjunction with the exhibition, Friday at 7 p.m. in the museum’s Sherwoood Auditorium. General admission is $2, students $1.

A new video installation and related drawings by Francesc Torres is concurrently on view at the La Jolla museum. Torres’ commissioned installation, “The Dictatorship of Swiftness,” reveals results of his investigations on the sociopolitical aspects of violence and human aggression.

Information: (619) 454-3541.

“New Video: Japan” closes next Sunday at the Long Beach Museum of Art. The program, consisting of 23 video works by Japanese artists, is part of the museum’s annual “In View Of” series, showcasing cross-cultural manifestations of contemporary video art.

The traveling show was co-organized by the American Federation of Art and the Museum of Modern Art. MOMA assistant curator Barbara London selected the works as a sequel to the first survey of Japanese video titled “Video From Tokyo to Fukui to Kyoto,” which toured the United States in 1979.

Independent video has been adopted as an important expressive medium by artists in Japan during the past 15 years. Their works often reflect contrasts inherent in Japanese culture: a simultaneous desire to excel in advanced technology, which brings about drastic changes in life style, and to maintain strong traditions.

The varied exhibition includes a surreal vision of computer-generated processing devices, documentaries and an electronic ode to the beauty of nature.

An illustrated catalogue with essay and screening notes by curator Barbara London accompanies the exhibition.

Cityscape Foto Gallery in Pasadena is showing one of five portfolios of images by 39 noted Mexican photographers donated to aid the victims of Mexico’s 1985 earthquake.

Funds will be used to rebuild destroyed schools in Mexico City. Information: (818) 796-2036.

The City of Burbank, feeling much maligned by Johnny Carson and “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In” comments about “beautiful downtown Burbank,” is intent on improving its image. One of the remedies initiated by the Cultural Arts Committee of the Burbank Chamber of Commerce is a poster contest titled “Image ‘86,” a symbol of the committee’s intention to “help develop a positive climate for cultural activities and help improve its self-image.”

To obtain entry forms describing contest conditions, call (818) 846-3111 or write the Burbank Chamber of Commerce, 200 W. Magnolia Blvd., Burbank 91502.

Another request for art submissions comes from the Palos Verdes Art Center, which is seeking entrants for its “1986 Annual Juried Membership All-Media Exhibition” scheduled at the art center June 7 to July 5.

Curator and art critic Robert McDonald will be sole juror. Entries selected will vie for a total of $1,800 in prize money. Call (213) 541-2479 to obtain a prospectus.

HONORS, AWARDS AND ACQUISITIONS: Artist/photographer/educator Darryl Curran is the 1986 recipient of the California Museum of Photography Members’ Award, given annually by the UC Riverside institution for outstanding contributions and achievements in the field of photography.

Curran, a 50-year-old Los Angeles photographer, established the creative photography program at Cal State University Fullerton in 1967 and has taught there ever since. He also teaches at UCLA Extension and has conducted photography workshops throughout the nation. He was a founding member of the Los Angeles Center for Photographic Studies and served on its board of trustees for seven years, including three as president. He won the John D. Phelan award in Literature and Art in 1971 and a Photographer’s Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1980.

California artists Gwynn Murrill and Terry Allen were awarded Guggenheim Fellowships this year. Their names were inadvertently omitted from an earlier notice in this column naming only the CalArts faculty members so honored.

The State Museum of New Jersey has acquired two works by the late Charles White: a drawing, “Frederick Douglass Breaking Thro,” and a lithograph titled “John Brown.” White’s son, C. Ian White, has received the San Francisco Art Institute’s Sobel Award for student artists, which carries a stipend of $3,000.

An exhibition of 52 prints produced by the Atelier program of Self-Help Graphics is at the Trans America Center Gallery.

Frank Romero, Gilbert Lujan, Gronk, Glenna Boltuch, Alonzo Davis, Diane Gamboa, Margaret Garcia and Robert Delgado and among artists whose works are included.

The Atelier program was founded in 1983 at the East Los Angeles arts center to give artists an opportunity to produce limited edition works in serigraphy.