Events
Posted Apr 19, 2019
Events
Posted Apr 11, 2019
UPCOMING EVENTS SPRING 2019 !
ARCANA’S UPCOMING EVENTS
JOIN OUR MAILING LIST FOR THE LASTEST!
SATURDAY, APRIL 13th, 5:00 - 9:00 PM
KRAFTWERK: DANCE FOREVER EXHIBITION AND DANCE PARTY
IN COLLABORATION WITH CULTURAL TRAFFIC
FRIDAY, APRIL 12TH, 4:00 - 5:00 PM
THE GREY ORGANISATION: CORK STREET - PUBLISHED BY RICHARDSON
BOOK SIGNING WITH TOBY MOTT AT THE PRINTED MATTER LA ART BOOK FAIR
SATURDAY, APRIL 27th, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
ALEX McWHIRTER: PUBLIC - ISSUE NUMBER TWO
LAUNCH PARTY + SIGNING
SATURDAY, MAY 4th, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
MELODIE McDANIEL: RIDING THROUGH COMPTON
BOOK SIGNING + CONVERSATION WITH AMELIA FLEETWOOD, MAYISHA AKBAR
SATURDAY, MAY 18th, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
ROHINA HOFFMAN: HAIR STORIES
BOOK SIGNING + CONVERSATION WITH ALINE SMITHSON
TUESDAY, MAY 21ST, 6:30 - 8:30 PM
AT THE HELMS DESIGN CENTER (8745 WASHINGTON)
COLORFUL LIFE: GERE KAVANAUGH, DESIGNER
BOOK SIGNING + CONVERSATION WITH LOUISE SANDHAUS
SATURDAY, JUNE 8TH, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
MONA KUHN: SHE DISAPPEARED INTO COMPLETE SILENCE
BOOK SIGNING + CONVERSATION WITH NORMAN KLEIN
DATE TBD
EL CROQUIS 198:JOHNSTON MARKLEE (2005-2019)
MARMOL RADZINER: IN THE LANDSCAPE
Events
Posted Apr 07, 2019
KRAFTWERK: DANCE FOREVER EXHIBITION + DANCE PARTY
Come to Arcana: Books on the Arts at the Helms Bakery this Saturday evening (4/13, 5:00 - 9:00) to experience the West Coast premiere of "Kraftwerk: Dance Forever" – a graphically dazzling exhibition drawn from the Mott Collection of rare and compelling visual material from the German electronic music pioneers and those they influenced. Documenting Kraftwerk's aesthetic output from the early 1970s to the present, on display will be promotional material, sheet music, obsolete recorded media, posters, photos, and musical toys charting Ralf Hutter and Florian Schneider's highly influential machine music aesthetic, which inspired dance music and specifically Detroit Techno. The evening will feature Kraftwerk-themed musical sets by Rose Knows and Sean Horton, Kraftwerk shirts and bags designed by Arcana favorite Alex McWhirter, and Toby Mott signing copies of the limited edition catalogue to the show. If you cannot attend, place your order for a signed copy here!
Events
Posted Apr 07, 2019
2019 LA ART BOOK FAIR
For the sixth time, Arcana: Books the Arts will be exhibiting at the Printed Matter LA Art Book Fair at the Geffen Contemporary at MoCA! This year we are bringing hundreds - yes, hundreds - of artworks, posters, announcements, and other forms of ephemera that have been slumbering in our flat file drawers for the past thirty-five years. We will feature an exciting selection of rarities from the realms of contemporary, Pop, and Conceptual Art, Photography, Design, Architecture, Music, Cinema, and Fashion; including signed works by Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Bruce Nauman, John Baldessari, James Turrell, Mike Kelley, Raymond Pettibon, Edward Gorey, and many, many more. We'll also have a vintage wire spinning rack featuring an amazing selection of Art-related postcards for sale. We will be restocking with fresh merch each day, so come early and often for the best selection!
The Grey Organisation was a London-based artist collective active between 1983 and 1991. Showing in London, New York, San Francisco, and Tokyo, members Toby Mott, Tim Burke, Daniel Saccoccio (nee Clegg), and Paul Spencer worked in the mediums of painting, sculpture, film, and video. Most infamously, in the dead of night on the 21st of May, 1985 The Grey Organisation staged an "art terrorist action" vandalizing the establishment art galleries on Cork Street in central London with buckets of grey paint to protest their lack of support for emerging artists. Limited to one hundred copies only, this Alex McWhirter-designed book presents Andrew Catlin's documentary photographs of the "Cork Street Attack" along with texts by Mott, Neal Brown, and Stewart Home. On Friday at 4:00 PM author and Grey Organisation member Toby Mott will be signing copies of this soon-to-be-rarity at our booth at the Book Fair. If you cannot attend, place your order for a signed copy here!
Events
Posted Mar 07, 2019
Short Films Walk: LA
Join us this Saturday, March 9th, from 11 am to 5 pm at @helmsbakerydistrict for a day of free screenings of over 24 short films showcasing architecture and design. Pop into any of the eight participating showrooms on the walk, including @arcanabooks, Danish Design Store, H.D. Buttercup, Louis Poulsen, Rejuvenation, Room & Board, Scandinavian Designs, and Vitra to experience a unique program of films curated by the Architecture & Design Film Festival. The full program can be found at helmsbakerydistrict.com/sfwla.
The films will be shown on a loop and play throughout the day so guests have an opportunity to see dozens of film shorts as they walk from showroom to showroom. We will screen “In Residence: Noe Duchaufour-Lawrance” Directed by Max Hemmings, “Tides Rising” Directed by Marianne Gerdes, and “Charlotte Perriand: Les Arcs” Directed by Spirit of Space. The SFW:LA will conclude with the screening of a feature length film, Renzo Piano: The Architect of Light, followed by a conversation with Kerry Brougher, the first director of the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, moderated by Edward Lifson. Seating is limited for this portion of the day so please RSVP and find more information at helmsbakerydistrict.com/sfwla.
Events
Posted Feb 04, 2019
Book Launch & Signing at Arcana > Cole Sternberg: The Nature Of Breathing In Salt
"In Western Japan, a bottle of champagne is smashed against the hull of a massive bulk cargo vessel, its path charted along the arch of the northern hemisphere: We follow its gentle glide through the lilac calm of the Japanese outer islands; a waive at the lights of Busan, the South Korean city along its charted path; the frigidity of the Aleutian Islands; a circular motion to avoid a mid-ocean monster; and lastly a cruise into Portland past the forests and factories on the Columbia River. On this maiden voyage across the Pacific, the vessel’s holds sit empty. One is in ballast to strengthen against heavy storms. A crew of twenty, plus four creative wanderers—including artist Cole Sternberg, who wrangled the quartet especially for this journey—anxiously steady themselves for weeks under swaying ground. It is within the context of this floating island that the work comprised of “The Nature of Breathing in Salt” emerges.
We find rainbows confronted by fluorescent hallways, black clouds fighting the setting sun, Sternberg’s paintings dragged in the sea, the glory of the unknown and unwelcoming greeting of the land. The imagery shifts in a bell curve of pleasant anxiety, mirrored by a narrative of Melville, Sternberg’s poetry and the dialogue of the crew. It is an experience that leaves one yearning for and sick of the sea. It is an art object more than just a book.
Sternberg’s practice of using the environment to tell its own story is apparent here. His practice ultimately results in the paintings and photography featured throughout this book. Works from this body of imagery have been exhibited extensively, and are in the permanent collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Pérez Art Museum Miami, and the El Segundo Museum of Art, among others".
"Cole Sternberg was born in Richmond, Virginia. He lives and works in Los Angeles and practices in a range of formats, including painting, installation, video, and writing. Series of his work have focused on a variety of social issues, from current human rights activism and its relationship to the law, to the environment, to the media, and concepts of content overload. The works tend to be subtle or subversive in nature, driven by elegant visual concepts and poetry.
Sternberg has exhibited nationally and internationally, including in exhibitions at the American University Museum (Washington, DC), El Segundo Museum of Art (El Segundo, CA), Los Angeles Nomadic Division (LAND, Los Angeles), Paris Photo (Los Angeles), Zona Maco (Mexico City), LA><ART (Los Angeles), MAMA (Los Angeles & Berlin) and Praz Delavallade (Los Angeles). His works are held by major collections throughout the world, such as the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), the El Segundo Museum of Art (ESMoA), the American University Museum (AUM), Cedars-Sinai, and Deutsche Telekom".
So come join us along with our pals from esteemed local publishing concern Hat & Beard on Saturday, February 9th between 4:00 and 6:00 PM to celebrate the launch of Cole Sternberg's striking The Nature Of Breathing In Salt. If you are unable to attend but would like to purchase a signed or deluxe "Collector's Edition" copy, please do so via our website here, or by phone at 310-458-1499.
Events
Posted Dec 14, 2018
Book signing at Arcana > TODD HIDO: BRIGHT BLACK WORLD
PLEASE JOIN US THIS SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15th,
4:00 - 6:00 PM FOR A BOOK SIGNING
TODD HIDO:
BRIGHT BLACK WORLD
"For over two decades, Todd Hido has crafted narratives through loose and mysterious suburban scenes, desolate landscapes, and stylized portraits. He has traversed North America capturing places that feel at once familiar and unknown; welcoming and unsettling. Underscoring the influences of Nordic mythology and specifically the idea of Fimbulwinter, which translates into the ‘endless winter’, Hido’s new monograph, Bright Black World alludes to and provides form for this notion of an apocalyptic, never-ending winter. Exploring the dark terrain of the Northern European landscape and regions as far as the North Sea of Japan enchanted Hido, calling him back on several occasions. This presents the artist’s first significant foray extensively photographing territory outside of the United States, chronicling a decidedly new psychological geography.
Opening with a text by Alexander Nemerov, Bright Black World contains forty-eight plates printed in an oversized format, featuring two vertical gatefolds and a fold-out poster measuring some 25 by 40 inches. This first printing is limited to 3,000 clothbound copies.
Join us this Saturday, December 15th from 4:00 - 6:00 PM to celebrate the publication of our longtime pal Todd's magnificent new book from Nazraeli Press, quaff refreshments, socialize, and engage in some festive last-minute holiday shopping. If you are unable to attend but would like to purchase a copy of Bright Black World - or one of his many earlier titles we'll have on hand - signed by Mr. Hido, please do so on our website here, or by phone at 310-458-1499.
Events
Posted Dec 14, 2018
Peter Fetterman: "Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Collecting Fine Art Photography" This Sunday, December 16th, 4:00 - 6:00 PM at Arcana!
PLEASE JOIN US THIS SUNDAY
DECEMBER 16th, 4:00 - 6:00 PM FOR
EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW
ABOUT COLLECTING FINE ART PHOTOGRAPHY
PETER FETTERMAN REVEALS ALL!
IN CONVERSATION WITH ARCANA'S OWN LEE KAPLAN
This Sunday we welcome our longtime friend Peter Fetterman for a very special afternoon presentation entitled "Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Collecting Fine Art Photography" during which he will take center stage to recount his many eventful years in Los Angeles as a photography collector, then dealer extraordinaire with Arcana proprietor Lee Kaplan. Afterwards we will open up the floor to the audience for all of your arcane questions. For the event, Peter has also curated a lovely show of framed photographic prints for sale by Gallery favorite Pentti Sammallahti.
Born in London, Peter Fetterman has been deeply involved in the medium of photography for over thirty years. Initially a filmmaker and collector, he set up his first gallery over twenty years ago, and was one of the pioneer tenants of Bergamot Station, the Santa Monica Center of the Arts when it first opened in 1994. The gallery has one of the largest inventories of classic 20th Century photography in the country - particularly in humanist imagery - and in-depth holdings of work by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Sebastião Salgado, Steve McCurry, Ansel Adams, Paul Caponigro, Willy Ronis, André Kertesz, Manuel Alvarez Bravo, Lillian Bassman, Pentti Sammallahti, and dozens more.
So stop by to hang with books and friends, quaff refreshments, attend to all of that last-minute Holiday shopping, and hear virtually all of Peter Fetterman's secrets of collecting photography revealed! If you are unable to attend but would like to purchase a copy of the brand new, hot-off-the-press, strictly-limited-English-language edition of Pentti Sammallahti: Birds, please do so on our website here, or by phone at 310-458-1499.
Events
Posted Dec 06, 2018
Musical Performance, Signing and Discussion with Anthony Wilson for "Songs and Photographs" This Sunday, December 9th from 4:00 - 6:00 PM at Arcana!
PLEASE JOIN US THIS SUNDAY
DECEMBER 9th FROM 4:00 - 6:00 PM
FOR A PERFORMANCE, DISCUSSION, AND SIGNING
ANTHONY WILSON: SONGS AND PHOTOGRAPHS
In the new album and photobook Songs and Photographs - beautifully produced in collaboration with German artbook publisher Little Steidl - Anthony Wilson brings together a collection of his songs and 35mm photographs that opens a new chapter in his broadening quest for personal and musical authenticity.
"Most mornings I wake up and go out wandering with my camera, sometimes in my hometown of Los Angeles, often in places around the world where I am traveling on tour. I look, watch, and take in the space around me. I’m conscious of my attentive state, totally absorbed in noticing things. My path determines itself, each picture leads me to the next. It’s a meandering journey through a landscape or cityscape, but also through my own personal experience. Often the smallest things are what stop me in my tracks and compel me to point the camera and snap the shutter.
In Songs and Photographs, the visual and musical paths of my process converge into a single work in which the songs and the photographs speak back and forth to each other."
Born in Los Angeles in 1968, guitarist and composer Anthony Wilson is known for a body of work that moves fluidly across genres. The son of legendary jazz trumpeter and bandleader Gerald Wilson, his musical lineage has deeply influenced his creative trajectory, compositional choices, instrumental groupings, and the wide-ranging twelve album discography that blooms out of them.
An inventive soloist and sensitive accompanist, Over the past two decades Wilson has joined a diverse roster of jazz masters on their recordings and performances, including Ron Carter, Mose Allison, Bobby Hutcherson, Madeleine Peyroux, Joe Sample, Al Jarreau, Harold Land and Diana Krall. And while his footing is firmly rooted in the jazz idiom, Wilson pivots with ease into other genres, having contributed his instrumental texture and improvisational authority to albums by pop music legends Paul McCartney, Willie Nelson, Leon Russell, Aaron Neville, and Barbra Streisand.
Join us this Saturday between 4:00 and 6:00 PM as Anthony Wilson will be performing an intimate set from Songs and Photographs with Jay Bellerose, Patrick Warren, and Garret Lang followed by a discussion with producer Joe Harley and publisher Nina Holland of Little Steidl.
If you are unable to attend but would like to purchase a signed copy of the exquisite book and 12" vinyl LP that comprise Songs and Photographs, please order from our website here, or by phone at 310-458-1499.
Events
Posted Nov 30, 2018
Book Signing at Arcana! > MONA KUHN: BUSHES & SUCCULENTS
MONA KUHN: BUSHES & SUCCULENTS
PLEASE JOIN US
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 8th, 4:00 - 6:00 PM FOR A
BOOK SIGNING AND DISCUSSION WITH
MONA KUHN AND DEANNA TEMPLETON
PRESENTED IN COLLABORATION WITH
PHOTOGRAPHIC ARTS COUNCIL - LOS ANGELES
Born in Brazil, photographer Mona Kuhn currently resides in Los Angeles. Through intimacy with her subjects, knowledge of traditional iconography, and technical mastery, Kuhn portrays the complexities of human nature, both tempting and provoking our imagination. Newly published by Stanley / Barker in the UK, Bushes & Succulents is Mona Kuhn’s celebration of the female essence - confident, raw and elegant, yet confrontational and unapologetic.
Reminiscent of Georgia O'Keeffe's floral paintings, your eyes wander around the graceful lines, not knowing exactly what you are looking at. Kuhn's use of the solarization process reveals human imperfections in the metallic brilliance of the skin, and brings to the surface a woman’s struggles, strengths, and power. The photographer states “The frame reminded me of early childhood, at age eight or so, when I would jump in the shower with my mother. It resonates an adoration and child-like curiosity for what it is to be a woman. My intention is not to objectify the body, but to celebrate the female body and its essence.”
Join us Saturday, December 8th from 4:00 - 6:00 PM for a conversation between photographic powerhouses Mona Kuhn and Deanna Templeton, refreshments, and some festive Holiday shopping. If you are unable to attend but would like to purchase a copy of Bushes and Succulents signed by Ms. Kuhn, or Swimming Pools signed by Ms. Templeton, please order from our website here, or by phone at 310-458-1499.