Dear DnA friends,

I hope you are doing well, despite all the big questions in front of us, like who to vote for in the upcoming elections, or whether AI is a religion (see, Pope’s encyclical, What I’m Digging, below).

If you are feeling overwhelmed, I recommend escaping into the fantasy world of Sheep Detectives (What I’m Digging). Or check out any one of the Design Things to Do, like The Seaweed Sisters lighting up the stage (above), or architects and critics debating the current conundrum of whether or not to like the new David Geffen Galleries at LACMA. Or, take yourselves to the Los Angeles Public Library and check out how some Angelenos are framing the future.

You may know from this newsletter that Friends of Residential Treasures Los Angeles (FORT: LA), in collaboration with several LA nonprofits, including KCRW, launched a competition, Frame The Future, inviting people to submit a poster, slogan, and manifesto offering a persuasive vision for housing. More than 60 people entered, and now all the posters have gone on display at Los Angeles Public Library, in the wide corridor on LL3 in the Tom Bradley Wing.

There you will find bold graphic images and detailed renderings addressing affordability, density, sustainability, displacement, infrastructure, and community. Some entries advocate for vacancy taxes and tearing down the commodification of housing. Others make specific architectural proposals — modular housing above parking lots, shipping-container communities, river-based urbanism – and new forms of collective living inspired by Los Angeles’ bungalow courts. They range from pragmatic policy proposals to speculative visions. Powerful slogans include: “Build A Little. A Lot"...“Fill the Gaps. Vacancy Tax”...“We’ve Got the Solutions. Let’s Build Them”...“Live Alone. Together.”  In their totality the 60 posters represent what one observer has termed a “think tank” of ideas, offering a constructive palliative in this time of push and pull around housing.

My Audlthood Los Angeles.By Joe Yamamura. Image courtesy FORT: LA

But one that stands out for me is the vision for My Adulthood Los Angeles, by child talent Joe Yamamura. Above is his poster, and here is his manifesto:

The Los Angeles I want to live in when I grow up is a place where all the people could live peacefully together. Also on the roof, there are guest rooms for inviting people , parkings for flying cars, and little forests that cool down the place. In addition, on the roads, there are turning parts that help cars make curbs easier and make less traffic and, the stop signs are holograms so they don’t take much space. There are trains that are lifted in the air with pillars that make less railroad crossings. I hope there will be flying cars that take people to destinations faster.

Go, Joe! The exhibition is up until July 27th. Visitors are asked to cast a vote for Audience Favorite. This week is the soft opening. Watch this space for info about an upcoming public gathering there.

Design Things To Do

Top Pick: Let's Dance

How better to resist the merging of human and machine than by dancing in public space! Between June 2nd and 21st, L.A. Dance Project + Paris Dance Project will animate buildings and places with City of Dance, a program of free public performances at public sites including LACMA, Tongva Park, Barnsdall Art Park, and Gloria Molina Grand Park.

Five international choreographers-Dimitri Chamblas, Madeline Hollander, Benjamin Millepied, Jamar Roberts, and Pam Tanowitz-and 14 LA-based dancers have co-created an hour‑long work set to Philip Glass’s remarkable score for the film Koyaanisqatsi (1982). Following the 4:00 PM performance at Barnsdall Art Park, I’ll moderate a conversation with artist Kim Abeles and others, tackling the question: “Can architecture and landscape still offer models for balance” in a city whose systems — ecological, infrastructural, cultural — that are increasingly off balance?

Image courtesy L.A. Dance Project

Then The Seaweed Sisters — the Los Angeles-based, color-coded choreographic trio Megan Lawson (pink), Jillian Meyers (green), and Dana Wilson (blue) — invite you into their frothy "bubble" of dance and physical comedy, on show at LA Theater Center, for nine performances starting on June 5th. The always inventive artist Mimi Haddon has created puppets for the show and tells me that WEED OH NO!, the "Sisters" first feature-length show, presented by The Center for Provocative Thought, will be a visually sumptuous blast for all ages. "Think Blue Man meets PeeWee's Playhouse, but more lighthearted with an all-female cast," says Haddon.

Image courtesy The Seaweed Sisters; photo by Taylor James 

Quick Picks

Johnie’s Coffee Shop, at 6101 Wilshire Boulevard at Fairfax, has been given a new life by artist Gary Baseman. The onetime diner displays menus from various LA eateries covered in Baseman's whimsical drawings. On visiting recently, Baseman was there, outfitted in full-chef mode, and the architect Victor Newlove was present (Newlove became partner in 1963 at Armet and Davis, the “Googie architecture” firm that designed Johnie’s, formerly Romeo’s Times Square). Baseman’s art is on show and for sale, through Sunday, June 14th, Thursday through Sunday, noon–7 PM (Subject to change). Info: Gloria Westcott, info@garybaseman.com/(323) 248-1959.

Victor Newlove and Blackie The Cat at Johnie's. Photo by Frances Anderton

Richard Neutra's radical 1928 Jardinette Apartments modeled hyper-modern living before sinking into disrepair over the decades. They have been brought back to life by developer Cameron Hassid, historical consultant Dr. Barbara Lamprecht, and June Street Architecture. Now the building is up for sale, but before it goes into new hands, you can tour it this Saturday, May 30th. The L.A. Forum for Architecture and Urban Design will host a general tour (12–2:00 PM), and The Neutra Institute for Survival Through Design has some “first-look” tickets for 11 AM–12 PM. Highly recommended.

The ribbon windows at Jardinette. Photo by Frances Anderton

Design for Dignity, the annual AIA/LA conference about housing those most in need, is back for an 11th outing, this time with the theme From Crisis to Construction — Building a "City of Yes". Speakers will address how to integrate the "policy, capital, and design that have operated in isolation for too long," from the building site to the City Charter. It takes place on two Friday mornings, this coming May 29th and next Friday, June 5th. At the second session, I’ll moderate a panel about Single Stair Access.

Two related shows open this weekend at Craft Contemporary. Outside is Earthen Comforts: Airing Earth, a courtyard installation by (Office e.g./ (Im)material Matters Lab) that “stages mass and fiber as shared infrastructures for collective comfort” through passive cooling, which was the norm in hot countries before AC. Inside is tierra, the museum’s 4th Clay Biennial, in which 14 artists use clay, masa, rock, sand, and dirt to craft artworks that “ask what it means to truly know a place.” There is an opening party for Earthen Comforts on Saturday, May 30th, 7:00–9:00PM. Both shows open to the public on Sunday, May 31st.

Heat resilience and material experimentation will be modeled at Earthen Comforts. Image courtesy Craft Contempoary

The coastal city of Santa Monica was once home to a thriving Black community that was displaced by the construction of the 10 Freeway. Now the Coastal Coastal Crossroads Tour, a self-guided tour of 20 sites by the sea, brings alive this history at four of the sites, including A Resurrection in Four Stanzas, artist April Bank’s installation (below), depicting the historic traces of the former Belmar neighborhood. The tour launches Sunday, June 7th from 1:00–4:00 PM. Historian Alison Rose Jefferson, Banks, and a team of storytellers will docent at the four sites. The tour launches on the same weekend as the 14th Annual Nick Gabaldón Day — honoring the pioneering Black surfer — on Saturday, June 6th, and in time for Juneteenth.

A Resurrection in Four Stanzas," by April Banks. Photo by Frances Anderton

Still trying to figure out your feelings about the perplexing (IMHO) new David Geffen Galleries at LACMA? Come hear some architects and critics debate “the most polarizing work of architecture to appear in Los Angeles in the twenty-first century.” It’s on Sunday, June 7th, 4:00 PM–5:30 PM, Barnsdall Gallery Theatre. Hosted by Punch List, NYRA, and L.A. Material, and featuring Antonia Cereijido, Frederick Fisher, Christopher Hawthorne, Jimenez Lai, Samuel Medina, and KCRW's Art Insider, Carolina A. Miranda. Also on show: New photographs of the David Geffen Galleries by Janna Ireland.

The belly of the beast; underneath the Geffen Galleries. Photo by Frances Anderton

Every June since 2008, UCLA Architecture and Urban Design (UCLA AUD) has hosted Rumble, a showcase of student and faculty ideas. This year, the event, taking place on June 8th and 9th, also honors the institution’s six-decade history of “shaping architectural advances… bringing together hundreds of architects, designers, and civic and cultural leaders to celebrate AUD’s legacy and see what the future of architecture and urban design may hold.”

What I'm Digging

Baaah-ing... Call me a Babe-y for liking talking-animal movies (“Hollywood’s worst genre”), but Sheep Detective is totally adorbs. In this riff on “cosy” English murder mysteries, Lily (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), Mopple (Chris O'Dowd), the "black sheep" Sebastian (Bryan Cranston), and the rest of the flock help a village of hapless human beings solve a crime. Witty scriptwriting, amazing animation, and genuinely moving animal characters make this a perfect escape, even though Jill Lepore at The New Yorker says the film is clueless about actual sheep.

Still from Sheep Detectives, courtesy Working Title

Intrigued… at the Pope's 42,300-word encyclical on the threat to “Magnifica Humanitas,” or “Magnificent Humanity,” presented at the Vatican alongside Christopher Olah, co-founder of Anthropic, the AI developer of Claude that claims to "put safety at the frontier." Of course, some AI capabilities are extraordinary, not to mention humanity can sometimes be very anti-humane, as can the Catholic Church or at least its leaders (see, France and Code Noir). But someone had to start a global conversation about the inexorable march of a deeply disruptive technology that, per Pope Leo, most people are powerless to effect, and are "merely hoping for the best."

Al models like Claude talk in words but think in numbers. Image courtesy Anthropic
 

What I'm NOT Digging

Ear-splitting Eateries

LA restaurants need our business, and yes, there are plenty of big challenges facing the industry. Still, they might get more love if they could turn down the volume. I thought my objection to pounding music meant I was a fuddy-duddy, but then learned that journalists at L.A. Material are also wondering Why Are L.A. Restaurants So Damn Loud?. The reasons are many, ranging from vibe-setting to drowning out service clatter. Years ago, I was given a more venal explainer: the higher the volume, the faster the customers leave, freeing up tables more quickly. Be careful what you ask for. Those deafened customers might never come back. And what about the aural well-being of the staff?

Image courtesy L.A. Material/(Photo byKady Jeaurond / Unsplash)

Well, that's it for this week's newsletter. Please send your design news, questions, and comments to francesanderton@gmail.com. Get back issues here. And remind your friends to sign up for the newsletter here.

Yours with very best wishes,

Frances