The Valley Line: California history comes to the fore in this year’s Pageant of the Masters
I made my annual summer trek to Laguna Beach to attend the 86th annual Festival of Arts and the 85th Pageant of the Masters. I’ve been attending this event ever since I was in grade school. This year’s Pageant and art show runs through Sept. 1. Don’t miss it, it is a good one!
Carrying the theme “Under the Sun,” this year’s event truly depicts our California history, beginning with the Mission era. One segment that is ever so close to our own valley was the depiction of the Ranchos. We were certainly smack dab in the middle of those “living pictures.”
Another era that was featured in the presentation that certainly meant something special to me was the one called “The Orange Rush,” with depictions of glorious orange crate labels that were always so colorful.
I grew up in the SoCal community of Ontario, surrounded by orange trees. I could step out my front door to pick an orange for my afternoon snack. In fact, the first navel orange tree planted in Ontario was in our yard. There was a big rock with a brass plate on it commemorating the fact. Sad to say, but that historic tree has since been ripped out to make way for a new housing development.
Anyway, this year’s Pageant of the Masters is so well done under the producer-director Diane Challis Davy. This is Davy’s 23rd turn at the helm.
Asked about her inspiration for this year’s theme, Davy said she was taken by the changing light on the foothills of Saddleback Mountain one evening last year and the words “under the sun” came to her. “The phrase is from Ecclesiastes, and I think it serves us very well,” she said. “I wanted the theme to express an awareness and appreciation of the beauty of nature, to focus on artists who choose to paint in the ‘open air’ and to acknowledge how French impressionism influenced artists around the world to record their own personal reflections.”
In this new production not only did we see the development of Laguna Beach as an art colony with re-creations of some of the work of their early artists in tableaux vivants, but there was also plenty of “New Wave” action, as art and sculpture representing Laguna’s surfing culture was recreated. If you like the music of the Beach Boys, your toes will be tapping during this segment.
During intermission there was fun to be had by watching a demonstration by expert skateboard athletes. Also during intermission the audience tossed around big beach balls. It was fun to see how long the ball would stay in the air.
In the second half of the show, honor was paid to artists such as Monet, Gauguin and Sargent. Just as it has most of the years since 1936, the Pageant ends with the recreation of Da Vinci’s “The Last Supper.”
Here are some fun facts about this event: Roughly 1,200 volunteers try out to be in the show. Approximately 500 are either cast or work behind the scenes and they contribute more than 6,000 hours to the effort. The youngest cast member is 4 and the oldest cast member is an octogenarian. The first Pageant of the Masters in 1933 ran only eight days. Today the Pageant has 57 performances. The event has been rained out only three times in its history.
Each year the theme is different. I can hardly wait to know what the theme for next year is.
JANE NAPIER NEELY covers the La Cañada Flintridge social scene. Email her at jnvalleysun@aol.com with news of your special event.