3 Art Museums, SCR Plan AIDS Awareness Programs

Four cultural institutions in Orange County will join with their compatriots around the nation Saturday to observe “A Day Without Art” as part of the second annual Worldwide AIDS Awareness Day being sponsored by the World Health Organization.

* The Newport Harbor Art Museum will offer free admission, information on HIV infection and two special programs, sponsored by Robert Tyler and museum trustee Eugene White. At 11 a.m. Michael Kearns and Dale Raoul will perform “Forget Me Not: A Collection of AIDS Letters,” correspondence between people with AIDS and their friends and family members. The theater piece was created by James Carroll Pickett, directed by Libby Appel and produced by Artists Confronting AIDS.

At 1 p.m., there will be an audio presentation of “AIDS/US II, a theater piece performed by people whose lives have been affected by AIDS. Also produced by Artists Confronting AIDS, the presentation comes courtesy of KPFK Pacifica Radio, Los Angeles. Information: (714) 759-1122.

* The Fullerton Museum Center will darken its West gallery, collect donations from museum visitors for AIDS service organizations in Orange County and supply information on AIDS and AIDS services.

At 11 p.m., performance artists Randy Pesqueira, Reggie Zachary and Michael Carr will offer “Eleventh Hour Reflections on HIV Relations,” a free event sponsored by the Orange County Coalition for Freedom of Expression. Doors open at 10:30 p.m. Information: (714) 738-6545.

* The Laguna Art Museum will supply information on AIDS (provided by the Laguna Beach AIDS Task Force and the Laguna Beach Arts Commission) and display handmade quilts dedicated by friends and family to local residents who have died of complications of AIDS. Two of the quilts, enriched with memorabilia and photographs of the deceased, are coffin-shaped; the third is a massive 12-by-12-foot piece made of panels dedicated to four people. The project, sponsored by the national Names Project, was coordinated by Laguna Shanti in Laguna Beach. Information: (714) 494-6531.

In addition, 200 artist-designed “A Day Without Art” posters will be hung outside, in the streets of Laguna Beach’s main business district.

* South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa has scheduled a benefit reading of Susan Sontag’s “The Way We Live Now” at 6 p.m. on its Second Stage. Donations at the door will go to the AIDS Services Foundation of Orange County.

Sontag’s work, which first appeared as a short story in The New Yorker, has been adapted for the stage by Edward Parone. It focuses on a group of friends who learn that one of them has contracted AIDS. Information: (714) 957-4033.