Dinner Is the Works at Benefit

“Sooooo, how many paintings have you sold tonight?” Newport Harbor Art Museum director Michael Botwinick asked Mark Moore at Saturday’s supper-among-the-art at The Works Gallery in Crystal Court.

Moore blushed. “It’s not that kind of party,” answered a smiling Moore, the gallery’s affable owner-director.

And it wasn’t. There was no obvious hawking of works by California contemporary artists Peter Alexander, Chuck Arnoldi, Billy Al Bengston and Ken Price at the $150 per person splash--first in a new series of museum dinners.

But some of their pieces were on display. And better yet, the four artists were on hand, chatting with the klatch of nicely turned out guests (the invitation suggested “gallery chic”) as they sipped Laurent Perrier champagne and cruised the roomy gallery with Moore as their guide.

“I’m here because of Mark Moore--he’s been good to me lately,” confided Arnoldi, an abstract painter whose works, besides being represented in the country’s major art museums, are collected by the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tatum O’Neal and John McEnroe.

Arnoldi took the dress code to heart. He wore tailored jeans, crisp white shirt and a blazer the color of a caramel apple. His avant-garde haircut--ultra-short and every which way but loose--sported a silver-dollar-sized spot of white. “Guess I’m getting old,” he teased.

Alexander, whose works, he said, “were always involved with the specificity of light--light excites, arouses a kind of desire,” confided that billionaire Donald Bren had collected some of his pieces.

Hearing this, Arnoldi groaned. “I was supposed to do a commissioned piece for Donald Bren, went to his Bel-Air home to check out the space, and then went off to New York--didn’t do it. Biggest mistake I ever made.” (Arty in-the-knows know that Bren’s collection is one of the country’s finest.)

During dinner--ultra-tender lamb loin, soothing lingonberry sorbet--served at tables centered with blooming bulbs (courtesy of Anton Segerstrom, dinner underwriter), Moore explained that Price and Bengston were members of the Los Angeles Cool School during the late ‘50s and early ‘60s.

Alexander and Arnoldi, he said, represented the second wave of abstract painters who emerged in the early ‘70s.

“Each is extremely renown in their fields,” noted Moore, who counts all of the artists as friends. “Bengston was one of the first to break onto the international level. Alexander has grown steadily since the mid-’70s and is hot in Los Angeles now.”

Asked about his success, what makes him tick, a sassy Bengston replied: “I have a clock in my heart.”

And then: “Just lucky I guess. In reality, I just couldn’t do anything else.”

All Heart: Restaurateur David Wilhelm will open his new Kachina Grill in the Wells Fargo Center in Los Angeles with a party on Valentine’s Day. A grander opening will be staged in a few weeks. Meanwhile, look for Friday night’s do to be star-studded. Among party-goers: Mickey Rourke, Drew Barrymore, Kiefer Sutherland, Corey Feldman and Francis Ford Coppola. Word’s out a few locals will make the trek to the Bistro 201 owner’s latest culinary hot spot. . . .

St. Joseph Hospital in Orange will celebrate its new Heart Center with a gala Valentine’s Day gourmet supper on Friday at the Center Club in Costa Mesa. About 120 guests will feast on Cajun shrimp, fresh sea bass stuffed with ratatouille and nonfat yogurt with cinnamon glazed apples (all heart healthy, natch). . . .

The late Richard Flamson will be honored when the Leukemia Society of America presents his family with its annual Crystal Ball award on Feb. 22 at the Westin South Coast Plaza Hotel. . . .

Carl and Margaret Karcher will be crowned king and queen of the fifth annual Mardi Gras celebration staged by Catholic Charities of Orange County at the Anaheim Marriott on Feb. 21. Tickets are $150 each.