Now Festival

In case you were worrying that REDCAT -- with its films from Tajikistan and Tunisia and its concerts dedicated to the likes of Harry Partch -- was going too mainstream, too Hollywood, the little experimental theater tucked inside Disney Hall is offering what it calls a summer laboratory for up-and-coming local artists. "This is an attempt to do more than just rent out space," says Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater executive director Mark Murphy.

A tree grows most surely in Brooklyn. But what's in a ZIP Code? The Los Angeles Philharmonic began its Brooklyn Festival on Tuesday night with a Green Umbrella concert at Walt Disney Concert Hall. The hip New York City borough is not just a destination for visual artists, artisan picklers and other assorted foodies, but also host to a significant new music scene. Meanwhile, Hear Now held its third annual Festival of Contemporary Los Angeles Music in Venice - where foodies (along with artisan picklers)

It's conventional wisdom that old boundaries between different art forms are fraying fast. Globalization and new technology have made dance, theater, film, music and visual design blur together to create interdisciplinary hybrids and collages. So when George Lugg hears people using the "I" word loosely, he reacts with a certain cautiousness. "I often find myself in conversations about interdisciplinarity, and I just want to back up and say, 'Well, what are we talking about?'" said Lugg, associate director of the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater.

The 2013 Hear Now Music Festival is meant to be the sound of Los Angeles. What does that mean? No one really can say, anymore than what it means to be an Angeleno. Over two programs at the First Lutheran Church of Venice on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, a dozen pieces will be played by a dozen composers. They don't all live precisely in Los Angeles -- Altadena (William Kraft), Claremont (Karl Kohn), even Berkeley (John Adams) counts. The age difference is great. They come originally from Austria, Germany, New Hampshire and elsewhere.

The 2013 Hear Now Music Festival is meant to be the sound of Los Angeles. What does that mean? No one really can say, anymore than what it means to be an Angeleno. Over two programs at the First Lutheran Church of Venice on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, a dozen pieces will be played by a dozen composers. They don't all live precisely in Los Angeles -- Altadena (William Kraft), Claremont (Karl Kohn), even Berkeley (John Adams) counts. The age difference is great. They come originally from Austria, Germany, New Hampshire and elsewhere.

Three nonlinear text-driven performance pieces artfully evoked feelings still in flux, not ready to be objectified, on the second program of the multidisciplinary NOW (New Original Works) Festival, Thursday at the REDCAT downtown. Simone Forti's imaginative four-character dance drama "Unbuttoned Sleeves" used a quote from a Japanese Noh master about "words flung down like pine needles," and that phrase would have worked equally well for the pieces by Sara Wookey and Rodney Mason.

Political vaudeville, abstract choreography, dance theater: REDCAT's New Original Works (NOW) Festival had it all Thursday when three women with backgrounds in dance introduced pieces giving women distinctly different archetypal roles. Women as wayward goddesses dominated "Magic War," Marisa Carnesky's clever but very unfinished look at the way people are manipulated into dubious attitudes toward war, torture and other current preoccupations of the body politic.

A greater treat than refreshments awaited the audience after the July 31 performance in the New Original Works (NOW) Festival at REDCAT , a.k.a. the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater in Los Angeles. The evening's artists — having performed hip-hop, contemporary dance and shadow theater in 3-D — joined them to mingle in the lobby. "It's an important part of the experience," said George Lugg, the theater's associate director. According to Lugg, people tend to ask the same general questions at Q&A sessions, starting with "Where do you get your ideas?"

For the 8,000 Jews who celebrated the 50th anniversary of Israel's statehood in Irvine on Sunday, nothing tasted sweeter than freedom--not even the latkes and blintzes they devoured, and which eventually sold out, during the daylong festival. "Wow, these are good," David Levin gushed over the pastries, which he was supposed to be sharing with his 3-year-old daughter, Eva.

A tree grows most surely in Brooklyn. But what's in a ZIP Code? The Los Angeles Philharmonic began its Brooklyn Festival on Tuesday night with a Green Umbrella concert at Walt Disney Concert Hall. The hip New York City borough is not just a destination for visual artists, artisan picklers and other assorted foodies, but also host to a significant new music scene. Meanwhile, Hear Now held its third annual Festival of Contemporary Los Angeles Music in Venice - where foodies (along with artisan picklers)

It's conventional wisdom that old boundaries between different art forms are fraying fast. Globalization and new technology have made dance, theater, film, music and visual design blur together to create interdisciplinary hybrids and collages. So when George Lugg hears people using the "I" word loosely, he reacts with a certain cautiousness. "I often find myself in conversations about interdisciplinarity, and I just want to back up and say, 'Well, what are we talking about?'" said Lugg, associate director of the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater.

A greater treat than refreshments awaited the audience after the July 31 performance in the New Original Works (NOW) Festival at REDCAT , a.k.a. the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater in Los Angeles. The evening's artists — having performed hip-hop, contemporary dance and shadow theater in 3-D — joined them to mingle in the lobby. "It's an important part of the experience," said George Lugg, the theater's associate director. According to Lugg, people tend to ask the same general questions at Q&A sessions, starting with "Where do you get your ideas?"

More a celebration of art and imagination than homage to the change of season, Santa Barbara's Summer Solstice Celebration includes a festival and parade. This year's theme is "splash," and even though the festival technically begins Friday at 4 p.m., the parade won't begin snaking up State Street until noon on Saturday.

Political vaudeville, abstract choreography, dance theater: REDCAT's New Original Works (NOW) Festival had it all Thursday when three women with backgrounds in dance introduced pieces giving women distinctly different archetypal roles. Women as wayward goddesses dominated "Magic War," Marisa Carnesky's clever but very unfinished look at the way people are manipulated into dubious attitudes toward war, torture and other current preoccupations of the body politic.

Three nonlinear text-driven performance pieces artfully evoked feelings still in flux, not ready to be objectified, on the second program of the multidisciplinary NOW (New Original Works) Festival, Thursday at the REDCAT downtown. Simone Forti's imaginative four-character dance drama "Unbuttoned Sleeves" used a quote from a Japanese Noh master about "words flung down like pine needles," and that phrase would have worked equally well for the pieces by Sara Wookey and Rodney Mason.

In case you were worrying that REDCAT -- with its films from Tajikistan and Tunisia and its concerts dedicated to the likes of Harry Partch -- was going too mainstream, too Hollywood, the little experimental theater tucked inside Disney Hall is offering what it calls a summer laboratory for up-and-coming local artists. "This is an attempt to do more than just rent out space," says Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater executive director Mark Murphy.

More a celebration of art and imagination than homage to the change of season, Santa Barbara's Summer Solstice Celebration includes a festival and parade. This year's theme is "splash," and even though the festival technically begins Friday at 4 p.m., the parade won't begin snaking up State Street until noon on Saturday.

REDCAT has named a new gallery director and curator to oversee its visual arts program. Ruth Estevez will take on the job starting November at the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater, located at Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown L.A. Estevez will fill the role formerly held by Clara Kim, who left REDCAT in 2011 to join the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. Since Kim's departure, associate gallery curator Aram Moshayedi has been serving as acting director. REDCAT is a contemporary arts space that is a division of the California Institute of the Arts.

For the 8,000 Jews who celebrated the 50th anniversary of Israel's statehood in Irvine on Sunday, nothing tasted sweeter than freedom--not even the latkes and blintzes they devoured, and which eventually sold out, during the daylong festival. "Wow, these are good," David Levin gushed over the pastries, which he was supposed to be sharing with his 3-year-old daughter, Eva.