The Good Earth: Lita Albuquerque, Art’s Cosmic Explorer, Comes Home
THE ARTIST LITA ALBUQUERQUE’S PATH has taken her to the ends of the Earth — from a convent in Tunisia to the pyramids of Egypt; from the salt flats of Bolivia to the polar ice shelf of Antarctica, where she spent over a month in residence at a space station. In these and other far-flung... More
The Secret Growing: On the New Spiritual Art Canon
IN OCTOBER 2022, I received an invitation to celebrate the Scorpio new moon eclipse with a group of creative women. The invitation was illustrated with a 1915 painting by the Swedish artist and mystic Hilma af Klint, The Dove, No. 14—a rainbow sphere with a white center against a black background, astrological glyphs in each corner.... More
Meeting Your Maker, Plus Cake: Facing Death to Embrace Life
An early and pivotal scene in Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” finds a rager underway at the Dreamhouse. Dressed in sequins and spangles, Margot Robbie leads the Barbies in a choreographed routine to Dua Lipa’s “Dance the Night.” After they throw their synchronized hands in the air, certain that tomorrow will be “the best day ever,” Robbie... More
Kitchen Consequential: Serving Rescued Meals With a Side of Rock ‘n’ Roll
A FORMER PAWN SHOP on Vine Street in Los Angeles may still promise guitars, gold and fast cash, but behind the facade is a 3,500-square-foot warehouse filled with thousands of pounds of food in all forms: canned, boxed, frozen, fresh and raw. All of it has been rescued or donated and will go to feed... More
The Casita on Calle Colima: Reflections on a shape-shifting Mexico City
“HERMOSA CASITA EN LA COLONIA ROMA,” read the listing that popped up on Airbnb when I was searching for a rental in Mexico City in the spring of 2022. The main image showed an elegant, periwinkle-blue row house with white trim, beside an identical house painted deep indigo and another, bubblegum pink. Potted plants and... More
The Art of Reparation: Lauren Bon Imagines the L.A. River After Us
Inside the small, ground-floor gallery, the air is moist and fragrant with dirt and hanging bundles of sagebrush, amaranth, yerba mansa and ephedra. One wall is lined with topographic maps; against another, teardrop-shaped beakers steadily drip water solutions into contaminated soil, filtering out lead, arsenic and other toxins through ceramic pipes. Around a corner, a... More
Heads Up: A Q&A with the Mexican American Milliner Gladys Tamez
When Lady Gaga appeared on the cover of her 2016 album, Joanne, unadorned except for a gently tapered pink felt hat, the Mexican American designer Gladys Tamez officially stepped center stage. She launched her line, Gladys Tamez Millinery, in Los Angeles in 2014 and would become one of the first Latina hat designers in the... More
The Floating Sound Collective Tunes In, Outside
It feels a little bit like joining a secret society — that is, if secret societies were open to everyone. “Text a cloud emoji to this number,” instructs the Instagram bio of Floating, an L.A. collective presenting sound experiences in natural settings. Soon your phone is pinging a few times a week with invitations to events... More
Brother Nature: Obi Kauffman and his California Field Atlas Series
“This is a love story.” So begins Obi Kaufmann’s The California Field Atlas (Heyday), an illustrated guide to the natural world of California that sat atop the San Francisco Chronicle’s nonfiction bestseller list for six months in 2017, and then spawned a series —the fourth volume of which The Coasts of California was published... More
Flowers for Didion: A California Transplant Says Goodbye to Her Idol on a Visit to New York
The messages started coming in at noon, Eastern time. “Joan Didion died.” “Joan.” Heartbreak emojis. Instagram posts featuring the glamorous black-and-white portraits I can see with my eyes closed. A link to her obituary. California daughter Joan Didion, whose writings about her home state excavated and formed some of its most indelible myths, had died at her... More
Like A Rainbow: Ariana Papademetropoulos and the Emerald Tablet
Ariana Papademetropoulos. “Origins” (2021). Oil on canvas. 84” x 120”. Courtesy of Ariana Papademetropoulos and Jeffrey Deitch Los Angeles. The artist Ariana Papademetropoulos moves effortlessly between dimensions. With her recent show, The Emerald Tablet, she took us over the rainbow. In this interview for Flaunt, she spoke about how she got there. The paintings of... More
Star 80: Nick Taggart’s LA Stories Encapsulates an Era and a City’s Electric Energy
When the British-born artist Nick Taggart came to Los Angeles in 1977, he planned to stay for three months. Four-plus decades later, he is still here, living on the same Glassell Park street he was told about at a Stranglers show in London. Then twenty-two, Taggart, who studied illustration at Cambridge School of Art, found... More