• In the accompanying photos, the artist Elana Mann leads AVPA art students in gallery discussions at the Museum of Contemporary Art
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In this time where “change” is the word of the year, artist Elana Mann and 30 art students from the Culver City High School’s Academy of Visual and Performing Arts (AVPA) program this weekend will be throwing a “Retirement Bash,” an interactive performance event, in partnership with MOCA, the Museum of Contemporary Art.
The AVPA art students will present, “Retirement Bash,” on Saturday, from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30, at the Culver City Senior Center, 4095 Overland Ave.
The event is free and open to the public.
The Retirement Bash will promote the idea that artists of all ages have a vital role in the community as agents of social change.
During a 10-week workshop with Ms. Mann, the AVPA art students attended field trips to MOCA and Machine Project, an alternative art space in Echo Park.
Saturday evening, the students and Ms. Mann will present a paradigm-shifting event in which outdated sayings, symbols, images and mottos will be performatively “retired.” New ideas and sayings will also be invented and introduced.
The 2 1/2-month program has included several components. Initially, the students focused on how artists have been promoters of social change from the 1940s through the present. They studied examples of artwork from the MOCA exhibitions, A Changing Ratio: Painting and Sculpture from the Collection, and Collecting History: Recent Acquisitions, that have been catalytic cultural instigators.
Placing Emphasis
Ms. Mann also showed artwork to the students with a focus on performative interventions that have activist or political content. Next, the students conducted field research within Culver City to generate material for Retirement Bash.
VPA art students and Ms. Mann have collected mottos and images to be “retired” from their family, friends, teachers, students, librarians, priests, rabbis and politicians. Ms. Mann and the students have generated a series of questions and prompts to help elicit material, questions such as:
“What icon do you hope to never see again?”
“What motto do you think needs retiring?”
The collected materials reflect ideas or histories that are now over, or that the community hopes will soon pass. Through exercises and experimentation in the classroom, students have invented creative and safe ways to performatively retire the material they have amassed.
In addition, the students have been creating costumes, decorations and sets for Retirement Bash.
Finally, the students have learned about producing a performance event, with advice and inspiration from a visit to Machine Project, a space that often creates large-scale performance projects. Mark Allen, the director of Machine Project, discussed the event that he presented at LACMA last year.
“Sony Pictures has been a proud sponsor of MOCA's education initiatives, Contemporary Art Start ( CAS ) and First Visit and Beyond since 1997,” says Janice Pober, Senior Vice President of Corporate Social Responsibility at Sony Pictures Entertainment. “These in-depth programs are a testament to how much Culver City supports the future of the arts.”
AVPA art student Slaveya Minkova said the MOCA experience was “one of the most amazing opportunities I've ever been involved in. Preparing a performance art exhibition this year will be something really fun and really new. Performance art is a new type of art for most of us. The nature of the museum program will allow us new ways of expressing ourselves and new ways of presenting our ideas.”
“What better way to advocate for the arts than to express it with performance and involve our community to participate< says Kristine Hatanaka, AVPA's Co-Executive Director and The Director of the Visual Art Program. “Advocating for the arts has been important this year. Understanding the importance and value of the arts is in critical need. Because of Elana's expertise as an artist, she helped cultivate the ideas of AVPA art students to create original works.”
For information about the Academy, go to http://avpa.org.
