Jessica Koslow

Some people were born to make a certain something at a specific time in a particular place. This is true of Ian Joseph Jackson and his mural, “La Ola de Ka-yama” (“The Wave of Ka-yama”), which resides on a wall inside Edgemar Restaurant + Lounge in Santa Monica’s Frank Gehry-designed Edgemar complex.

The mural depicts mountain lion P-22 of the Santa Monica Mountains, whose story inspired conversations about the local Gabrieleño/Tongva Indigenous people and environmental issues related to native ecosystems, land stewardship and urban development. P-22’s death was the catalyst for building the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing over the U.S. 101 Hollywood/Ventura Freeway, which will link the Santa Monica Mountains to the Simi Hills and protect wildlife, flora and fauna. The 210-foot crossing is set to be the largest in the world when it opens on Dec. 2, 2026.

When Jackson first started painting, he did not intend to illustrate P-22. The wall where his mural lives is about 12 feet tall, and up until that point, he had only worked on 4- to 5-foot canvases. He asked: What was this wall seeking to express in this place at this time — when LA was going through a transformation, when he was going through a transformation? . . .

Read the entire article at The Argonaut.

This past May, Paper Work’s booth at Printed Matter’s LA Art Book Fair at the ArtCenter College of Design had a rather large presence. The art and publications company was one of the advertising sponsors of the fair, and one of its featured photographers, Estevan Oriol, who directed and appeared in the 2020 Netflix documentary “LA Originals,” about his and Mister Cartoon’s creative lives, was awarded a Certificate of Recognition by the city of Los Angeles at City Hall that same weekend.

“We had a massive art display of the photography of all the artists that we published that year,” explained Paper Work founder Michael Krim, “and it was like the big elephant in the room.”

By Krim’s design, Paper Work presents artists with a multidisciplinary platform to express their vision in both tangible and event-/gallery-curated formats. . . .

Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.

Lenny Gerard knows firsthand about disability. He had been volunteering as an art teacher at the Braille Institute for a few years when he had a freak accident that paralyzed him from the neck down. Once he recovered just enough, he had an epiphany to leave the corporate world and devote himself full time to being an artist and educator. This month, 30 of his student artists ages 18 to 82 will show 50 of their artworks in a group exhibition titled “Through My Eyes.”

“I had my accident three years ago, and I had three surgeries,” explained Gerard. “I had to relearn how to walk after each one. But I would go to the Braille Institute on a walker because I love it so much. I went back as soon as I could — the first thing I wanted to do was go back.”

Gerard teaches Abstract Expressionism, a class he developed, and printmaking to the blind and visually impaired. His goal for the exhibition was to highlight their voices rather than their disabilities. He has even pioneered a technique for his students: They put raised objects in the printing press to emboss paper, so students can feel what they’ve done. . . .

Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.

Amy Kaps and Kaye Freeman are both over 60, but — in their opinion — they may not act like conventional older adults. In fact, in one of the accompanying performances to their art show, “Origins of Matter,” which opens Aug. 16 at Matter Studio Gallery, they will be dressed as gods of metal.

“I’m 63, and what a 63-year-old woman looks like or should be doing is still pretty pervasive,” said Freeman, who works out of a shared studio with Kaps at Allied Crafts Building in the Fashion District. “It’s important that if you can stand up and be true to who you are and be the best that you can be at this age, we have a lot to show and share.”

“I’m not into anti-aging,” she added. “Aging is important, and we need to reclaim the value of aging instead of trying to be youthful all the time. Because it’s creepy. We have to step up. Let’s become national treasures. We still have a lot of vitality and a lot to give.” . . .

Read the entire article at The Argonaut.

Adler\Smith Gallery in Santa Monica is considered a cultural hub for surf, skate and music-driven art, thanks to the hard work and stellar reputation of Charles Adler, its co-owner. Adler had been an illustrator for advertising firms, an art director for Quiksilver and a curator for art exhibitions like the South Bay Film, Art and Music Festival when he crossed paths with Mark Smith, Eddie Vedder and Pearl Jam’s manager, and his wife, Laurie — they are the Smith in the gallery’s name.

In the three years since the gallery opened, they have melded visual art with skate and surf history in a string of exhibitions, including “Collaboration: Tom Blake + Outerknown” and Stacy Peralta’s “The Joy of Decay.” Last weekend, “Dogtown: 50 Years of Fun” opened, marking the 50th anniversary of Dogtown Skateboards.

According to the gallery’s Instagram, “It’s a celebration of one of the most influential movements in modern skate culture. Born out of the raw, creative energy of 1970s Venice and Santa Monica, Dogtown redefined what skateboarding could be: fast, aggressive, expressive, and deeply rooted in surf style and street culture.” . . .

Read the entire article at The Argonaut.

Earlier this year, while speaking with teachers at the National Art Education Association conference, Ann Ruhr Pifer learned that today’s students seem hungry for craft activities in a new, different and more intense way.

“One teacher said she had a bunch of art activities in her room, and all the students go for the sewing activity, especially the ninth-grade boys,” shared Pifer. “She didn’t see that coming. We talked about how we feel it’s a reaction against—or perhaps a counterbalance to—the pervasiveness of digital experience in their lives.”

As of January 2026, Pifer, along with Robyn Hollingshead, is the co-executive director of Craft in America, a Los Angeles-based nonprofit arts organization that promotes original handcrafted work through programs in all media. The group is responsible for 35 episodes of the Peabody Award-winning, Emmy-nominated documentary series, “Craft in America,” on PBS, a YouTube channel and multi-disciplinary educator guides. The Craft in America Center in Los Angeles hosts exhibitions, talks by artists and scholars, workshops and K-12 school tours. . . .

Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.

It was a total fluke and an unfortunate and sad coincidence that the Fowler Museum at UCLA debuted its “Fire Kinship” exhibition on Jan. 22, 2025 — 15 days after the tragic LA Palisades and Eaton wildfires erupted.

But as Silvia Forni, Shirley and Ralph Shapiro director at the Fowler, explained, the exhibition was in-the-making for over three years.

“The coincidence was devastating, and we were traumatized when thinking about opening this exhibition, knowing about the pain and destruction that our community was living,” said Forni. “But when we went back to the exhibition text, and we asked ourselves, do we need to rewrite the text, thinking about what is happening in LA now, we did not change a word. The message was not that fire is great. The message is: You have to respect the environment; you have to think of yourself as being in a relationship with the environment. If you think in those terms, then you go about your life and your your relationships in a way that ultimately is more respectful of the land.” . . .

Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.

At any moment, architect and designer Gregg Fleishman is probably thinking about how geometry influences collectible design and inhabitable structures. One look at his work, which is on display at Sky Portal X in DTLA as part of Los Angeles Climate Week, and visitors can view his answers.

ANTIDOTE, his solo exhibition, presents large-scale geometric installations and sculptural furniture. Since 1975, Fleishman has been crafting chairs. Works such as “New Wave” and “Skyrocker” demonstrate his signature interlocking “panel puzzle” system, in which precision-cut plywood components assemble without nails, screws, or glue. The furniture is lightweight and structurally resilient, crafted from Baltic and European birch plywood.

“When I started at my first studio, I was working on structures,” said Fleishman. “I added furniture in 1975 and after four years, I had 11 chair designs. After another five years or so, I had three more chair designs. European birch plywood is very strong, which allows flexibility, and the chairs can be assembled in different ways to reduce the number of different parts. The chairs were the bulk of what I showed publicly in my early efforts. I showed at functional art galleries.” . . .

Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.

On Saturday, April 11, Photographic Arts Council Los Angeles (PAC LA), based in Downtown Los Angeles, invited the LA arts community to hear about its latest initiative, PAC LA Partners, and its inaugural project with the photo department at Pasadena City College (PCC): Second Sight photography festival.

One of speakers at the launch event was a student winner from the first contest in 2023. They told the crowd gathered on the ocean-view terrace of Shutters on the Beach in Santa Monica that the prize money they had won changed their life.

They did not have health insurance, and the money they received enabled them to complete their hormone replacement therapy as a transgender person. In addition, after submitting their winning portfolio to UCLA, they were accepted into the photography program. . . .

Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.

Taylor Wilshire’s mother was a classical master teacher, “a true artist” as Wilshire referred to her, and her father worked for the United Nations. This might explain why Wilshire is both an executive working in global funding for projects with the UN’s Economic and Social Council and an award-winning illustrator and artist.

“I was born into that environment of having art all over the house,” Wilshire shared.

“I was taught technique. Doodling, painting, drawing, it was just this natural thing, and yet I was really self-conscious about it.”

Wilshire never took her painting serious.

She contributes her self-critical nature to being around classically trained artists and growing up in New York where she was exposed to some of the best galleries and museums. Then Wilshire was discovered. . . .

Read the entire article at LA Downtown News.