By Design, School Children Do the Work to Complete Artist’s Project

Children at Norwood Elementary School in the Pico-Union District have their hands full these days--with the paintbrushes they’re using to complete French artist Bernard Heloua’s mural designs.

Heloua, a Paris-based architect, has worked with several classes at the predominantly Latino school to create murals on seven school walls, as well as fences, pavement, roof edges and other surfaces. The murals depict American Indian and pre-Columbian elements such as deer, pyramids and eagles.

“I was the architect and prepared the colors, but the kids are doing most of the painting,” said Heloua, who has spent a month at the school working on the most central designs, but will soon return to Paris.

Before leaving, however, he will give the children explicit instructions for a few final designs, including a blueprint for a huge version of the school’s logo in the center of the playground.

“When I am gone, the children will continue, and that’s the best part,” said Heloua, whose project is part of the Social and Public Art Resource Center’s “Great Walls Unlimited” mural program, funded by the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department.

Heloua was originally scheduled to paint only one mural, a globe-like depiction of land and sea masses, which upon closer inspection is actually the stoic face of an American Indian.

But the artist accepted the commission without seeing the site, where the mural is on the dark back wall of the school’s cafeteria.

“When I painted that first mural, I found it so hidden and alone, that I thought it wouldn’t change anything,” said Heloua. “So I suggested to paint everything and they agreed.”

GALLERIES: Karl Bornstein will leave Santa Monica’s Shea & Bornstein Gallery in September to concentrate on his print business, Mirage Editions, and to focus on the management of private art collections. Pat Shea, who joined what was originally Bornstein Gallery as a partner in May, 1991, will take over sole management of Patricia Shea Gallery, which will open Sept. 11 with shows by David Humphrey and Robert Cavalina. “Karl and I had basically reorganized (the gallery’s list of artists) when I arrived, so the stable will stay the same, although I will be adding more people from L.A. and New York,” said Shea, who ran a New York gallery before coming to Los Angeles.

David Walker, former co-owner of the defunct Walker and Walker Gallery in Santa Monica, is back on the local art scene, having curated “Feminine Ascension,” a group show including Linda Stark, Holly Crawford and Pegan Brooke. The show is on view through Aug. 29 at the Ventura Arts Council’s Momentum Gallery.

DEPARTING: Holly Barnet-Sanchez has resigned as the first resident curator at the Mexican Museum in San Francisco, a post she had held since January, 1991. Barnet-Sanchez, who added works to the museum’s collection by Los Angeles Chicano artists including Gronk, Patssi Valdez and John Valadez, will return to Southern California to complete her doctorate in art history at UCLA. Prior to her stint at the Mexican Museum, Barnet-Sanchez was the co-coordinator of the mammoth exhibition “Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation, 1965-1985,” which premiered at UCLA in 1990.

Barnet-Sanchez’s final exhibition at the Mexican Museum, “Pasion Por Frida,” features more than 500 artworks, photographs and memorabilia detailing Frida Kahlo’s life, work and influence on other artists. The show premiered last year at the Museo Estudio Diego Rivera in Mexico City, but Barnet-Sanchez augmented it in San Francisco with a selection of works by contemporary artists--including Rupert Garcia, Juana Alicia and Ester Hernandez--who have paid homage to Kahlo in their own works. The show is on view through Sept. 13. Information: (415) 202-9706.

EVENTS: A publication party and reading for “The Verdict and the Violence,” a special issue of High Performance magazine dealing with responses to the Los Angeles riots, will be held Friday at 8 p.m. at the Midnight Special Cultural Center, 1318 3rd St., in Santa Monica. The issue, which was guest-edited by poet Wanda Coleman, includes a compact disc featuring music, spoken word and audio art by more than 20 L.A. artists. Information: (310) 315-9383.

Beyond Baroque hosts the Big Book Sale Auction at 8 p.m. on Friday. Auction items include custom-made bookmarks, ephemera and collectibles by contemporary artists including Mike Kelley, Karen Finley and Bruce Yonemoto. Admission is $15 and includes a barbecue. The Venice art center continues its fund-raiser on Saturday and Sunday with a Big Book Sale from 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Information: (310) 822-3006.

Artist Elliot Pinkney and curator and community activist Cecil Wilson will lead a tour of South-Central Los Angeles murals by artists including Richard Wyatt and Charles White, on Saturday beginning at 9 a.m. The cost is $20. Reservations: (310) 822-9560.

GRANTS: The California Community Foundation has reorganized its arts funding on a trial basis for the 1992-93 fiscal year. The foundation’s Board of Governors previously voted on quarterly grants in which arts organizations competed with health, education and other groups. This year, however, the foundation will earmark a specific amount for the arts and appoint a multidisciplinary peer panel to judge applications. The application deadline is March 23 and grants are expected to range from $5,000 to $25,000 each. The reorganization will not affect the Brody Arts Fund or the J. Paul Getty Trust Fund for the Visual Arts, which are also administered by the California Community Foundation.

MORE DEADLINES: Entries for “Focus on L.A. Artists,” a juried exhibition at the Jewish Federation Council’s Pauline Hirsh Gallery, will be accepted and judged on Sept. 1. Jurors are gallery owners Pat Shea and Marti Koplin, and Barbara Gilbert, curator of the Hebrew Union College Skirball Museum. The exhibition will be held Sept. 13 to Dec. 2. Cash awards will be given. Information: (213) 852-1234, ext. 2955 or 2117.