Front row seating at the Venice Canals Holiday Boat Parade
Venice Canals Holiday Boat Parade
Here are a few scenes from the 2011 Venice Canals Holiday Boat Parade. Tim Tebow almost made us late for this one, but we got there just in time. This year’s parade was later in the day than last year’s and seemed to have a smaller turnout, but all of the lit floats winding their way through the canals still made for a pretty event.
Opening night for Jay Mark Johnson's SPACETIME opening at Animal West in Venice, Calif.
An awesome view of Abbot Kinney from atop Animal West in Venice, California
Last week I photographed the opening of special exhibit of Jay Mark Johnson’s SPACETIME photographs at Animal West, a post production house in a beautiful modern space on Abbot Kinney in Venice. I have been to previous exhibits by Jay and, as always, his panoramics never fail to impress and bend the mind a bit. His unique use of a digital panoramic slit camera is too difficult to explain here, but I’ll just say the results are stunning and unique. Check out more about him and his work on his site. The event was a sneak preview for a special exhibit that was part of the Venice Art Walk, an annual fundraiser for the Venice Family Clinic that features thousands of pieces by local artists and raises big bucks for the clinic, which offers free and reduced cost medical care to families in need. This was also my first time taking part in the Art Walk. I donated (and sold!) a framed print from the Venice Graffiti Walls that I shot two years ago. Glad I could be a part and help raise some money for a worthy cause!
Prisoners
I recently happened to find myself a child’s first birthday party. Thought this was a cute scene. I believe the tykes were eventually let out on good behavior.
Graham Gilmore's photos at Santino's
Jay Brockman paintings at Bondi BBQ
Last night we had a great time at the Venice Art Crawl, the 7th installation of the monthly Venice Beach arts event. As always, there were numerous events throughout Venice, with shows at numerous venues throughout the boardwalk area. Artist’s included everything from first-time exhibiters like photographer Matt Branham, to Venice heavyweights Rip Cronk and William Attaway. We didn’t hit everything, but managed to take in a good majority of the shows. There are a couple more pics after the jump, and a larger gallery posted on my Facebook page. If you’ve never checked out the VAC, be sure to hit it up. It’s every third Thursday. More info at www.veniceartcrawl.com. I didn’t show this month, but plan on doing so next month. Stay tuned!
Venice Art Crawl - December 2010
Video projection by Jesse Nikette on Market Street
Live poetry readings by James Berkowitz
The December Venice Art Crawl appeared to be a success, with solid crowds braving the (relative) cold and darkness (no argument there) to come down to the beach and enjoy some local art. This month had numerous exhibitions, including a cluster of video installations on Market Street, collectively called December Lights. The street was illuminated with numerous video projections lighting up buildings from rooftops across the street, including an interactive projection of the Nintendo classic, Donkey Kong, which participants could play by holding up a cutout of Mario and running his shadow up the wall. Pretty fun! The evening flew by, and we eventually found ourselves at an afterparty before suddenly waking up the next morning with a dull throbbing in our heads. A reminder that a good time was had. Looking forward to next month!
Alberto Burri exhibition opening at the Santa Monica Museum of Art
SMMOA
A couple weeks ago I photographed an art opening at the Santa Monica Museum of Art at Bergamot Station. The featured exhibition was by Italian artist Alberto Burri, who made some really great pieces using a variety of mediums such as fabric, wood and plastic, which lend themselves to a variety of unique textures. These are a few of my favorite candid photos from the event. I always like shooting in museums as the space is usually very starkly decorated in order to draw attention to the artwork. There’s also something interesting about the way people interact with the art pieces that make for great images.
Long exposure; nighttime at Mt. Charleston, Nev.
Stella Artois Draughtmasters Regional Championship, Las Vegas
Last week we made a trip out to Las Vegas for a shoot with Stella Artois, who were holding a regional Draughtmasters Championship at the Wasted Space nightclub in the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. The promotional competition, to see which bartender can complete the most perfect pour, has regional championships around the country followed by a national championship later in the year in Boston. My trip happened to coincide with Erinn’s days off, so she came along and met up with a friend while I got to work. Following my shoot I joined her at the slots, where I downloaded my cards to my laptop while having a few goes at the lever. This, of course, caught the attention of a security guard, who stopped by to see if I might somehow be hacking into the slot machines, which I assured him I was not. After an hour or so I managed to finish up and break even before heading back to the room to transmit a few files for them to release to the press the next day. Having been to Vegas a few times now in the past year, I have to say that the Hard Rock Hotel was my favorite place to stay. The rooms were nice, the pool was amazing and it didn’t have nearly the levels of gaudiness and overabundance of places like Caesars Palace. Plus, it’s off the strip. We had a good mix of work and fun that evening, but the next day decided on a change of scenery and headed 45 minutes west to Mt. Charleston. I hadn’t done any research on the place, but had heard that it was a nearby place where you could get out of the heat a bit. This was imperative, as daytime temps were a tire melting 105 degrees in the desert. Dry heat, schmy heat. It was a great surprise as we ascended the mountain up beyond 8,000 feet, that it was an entirely different climate up there. As we drove up we were greeted by drizzling rain and temperatures dipping down into the 60s. I’d somewhat expected a rockier, desert environment, but it turned out to be densely wooded with towering Ponderosa pines, which, when we hopped out of the car, found to create the most incredibly fresh smell.
Now, when camping it’s best to come prepared with such things as a tent and perhaps some food. We had only partial supplies of both. As we were setting up the tent, excited that we practically had the place to ourselves and that the ground looked to be a nice, soft bed of mulch, Erinn asked if I had packed the poles. Um, they’re not in the same bag as the tent? Apparently not. Had it not been threatening to rain some more, we would have considered sleeping beneath the stars, but since it was we were considering throwing in the towel and heading back down the mountain to find a hotel. We hopped in the car to go tell the campground hosts that we weren’t sure if we were staying due to our unfortunate situation and were surprised to find that they were a very nice old couple who offered to lend us their spare tent! Camping crisis averted. We paid them for the stay and went back to set up the tent before heading out for an evening hike to the Mary Jane Falls. The food situation was that we had figured we’d go check out the campground and then go out for groceries. Normally, we come with all of this in tow, but since we were at the hotel the night before, we left out any perishables. However, we hadn’t realized the size of the mountain and by the time we set up the tent we would have had to choose between driving down to get groceries and actually going out and enjoying the mountain. We had with us only a partial loaf of bread, an avocado and a baggie of trail mix, but we decided this was sufficient and opted for the hike.
That night as we were heading for bed the skies finally cleared for a few minutes and the woods were lit up like the day by a nearly full moon, so I stayed up a little longer to take some shots. The affect is exaggerated here by a long exposure, but it was pretty impressive in person as well. After 15 minutes or so the clouds came in and dampened the light, providing me with a excuse to call it a night.
Hanging art on Market St.
Venice Art Crawl After Party at Video Army
The inaugural Venice Art Crawl launched with a bang last night with a solid crowd showing up to check out the numerous local artists who were showing at pop-up galleries mostly located between the Boardwalk and Pacific Ave. I was showing my own work at Nikki’s alongside artist Scott Simon (check out his work here) and was also working the event as a volunteer, so I didn’t have much time to get out to all the venues, but I did manage a quick lap and took a few photos along the way. It was great seeing so many artists participating in the first event. A good sign that the event will continue to grow in the coming months. After the crawl wrapped up we made our way over to the official afterparty at Video Army, a new production company located on Pacific Ave. It was a fun environment with lots of people dancing and great light for shooting. After the party wound down we hit up a nearby taco truck and made our way home. Really a successful night if you ask me. Looking forward to next month!
4th of July fireworks, Marina Del Rey
4th of July fireworks, Marina Del Rey
Just a quick post of a couple shots from the 4th of July. For this year’s 4th Erinn and I, along with my visiting mom and kid sister, hiked a mile or so down Speedway Avenue to join thousands of revelers in taking in the annual fireworks spectacular held in Marina Del Rey. Having shot fireworks numerous times during my newspaper days, I wasn’t that interested in shooting them again, but couldn’t help myself from taking a few once they started booming. I’m a sucker for bright and shiny things I guess. Speaking of bright and shiny things, I tried to at least put a different twist on the photos after noticing the glare of four balding heads staggered perfectly in front of me, tilted upward as their respective owners took in the spectacle. Possibly mean, but kind of funny I thought. From there I noticed that fireworks were as pretty out of focus as they are in focus, so I took a few that way as well. When the show was over we hiked back home, ready to call it a night after a long, active day that included a bike ride to Manhattan Beach and plenty of good food and beer.
A spotlit grunion on Venice Beach
I went out last night to join the Venice Oceanarium‘s Grunion Run Party at the Venice Breakwater. The grunion are apparently abundant in the South Bay and their unique mating ritual brings them up on the beach during full moons on spring and summer nights, allowing them to be easily observed and even picked up. They’re supposed to be good to eat too, though most see it as more trouble than it’s worth to scale so many of them for such little meat. I went out at 11 p.m., when the party was starting and after 20 minutes they started popping up on shore one or two at a time. There they flopped about as they did their thing before being washed back to sea by the next big wave. It was a fun thing to see and the sizable crowd that turned out was very entertained. More can be learned about grunions and the specifics of their spawning practices here.
