ART

Los Angeles artist Barbara Carrasco, who has been involved in a battle over her latest work “Pesticides!” that is being exhibited in New York’s Times Square, will give her views on why artists and entertainers need to become “more socially conscious” at a press conference this morning in Santa Monica. Carrasco designed a 34-second computer-animated film about pesticide use on grapes, but had to change three frames of her original piece when the owners of the Spectacolor billboard in Times Square refused to show it. “They felt the three frames were a little too harsh,” Carrasco said Thursday. The controversial frames showed children about to eat pesticide-sprayed grapes. Carrasco changed the ending to show the mother throwing the grapes away. “I was willing to alter the images because I thought the total message of the work was important,” the 34-year-old muralist and first-time animator explained. “Pesticides!” will continue to run every 20 minutes for the rest of the month on the Times Square light-board.