Compton's Cafeteria, 24 hour diner in S.F.'s Tenderloin was a hang out spot for trans women, drag queens, and sex workers. It was a place for the community to meet up for an expensive meal, a place to chit chat, and let each other know they made it through the night alive. They were often harassed by police and arrested for female impersonation. Finally one night in August the Compton's costumers weren't going to take it anymore.
Creative Time, Social Practice Archive: In 2000 Heavy Trash, an anonymous arts organization of designers, architects, and urban planners, implemented its Aqua Line project throughout various parts of Los Angeles. The project involved the installation of false "Future Station Location" signs in the downtown area, notifying passersby of the impending construction of a subway that would connect the downtown to the Westside.
Visible Distance / Second Sight is an art installation by Jennifer Bolande for DesertX. The temporary artwork can be found along the Gene Autry Trail near Vista Chino (33°50’41.70”N 116°30’21.02”W), where a series of consecutive billboards have been replaced by perfectly aligned photos of the landscapes they are blocking.
From the DesertX project page:
The Immigrant Yarn Project (IYP), organized and created by Cindy Weil was a massive work of public and democratic (crowd-sourced), yarn-based art honoring our immigrant heritage and promoting tolerance, difference, and community. Weil reached out across the state and beyond to collect yarn-based creations by immigrants and their descendants.
Cinema is a popular medium for people to escape the real world. It provides comedy, drama, and endless entertainment. But Kalpna Singh-Chitnis saw an even greater potential for film. She believed that this art form could be utilized as a means to highlight social causes, so she created the Silent River Film Festival.
Grammys 2015: Abuse survivor Brooke Axtell talks Katy Perry, advocacy
by Nardine Saad
Domestic abuse survivor and advocate Brooke Axtell captivated audiences watching the Grammy Awards on Sunday with a stirring spoken-word piece before Katy Perry's performance of her ballad "By the Grace of God" at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
Creative Time, Social Practice Archive: Brinco is an art project, product, and intervention created by the Argentinean artist Judith Werthein for the 2005 inSITE Biennial held on the border of Tijuana and San Diego. Brinco—Spanish for "jump"—is a specially designed shoe the artist created for illegal migrant workers and immigrants who navigate the border region at night.
In May of 1977, artist Suzanne Lacy mapped every reported rape in LA for a period of three weeks. This project, aptly named "Three Weeks in May", was part of an extended performance which Lacy utilized as a means to expose LA's problem of violence against women. As a centerpiece for this project, Lacy used a large map where she recorded every reported rape in the area with the word RAPE.
DEL AIRE, Calif. — Fruit looms large in the California psyche. Since the 1800s, dewy images of oranges, lemons and other fruits have been a lure for seekers of the state’s postcard essence, symbols of fertile land, felicitous climate and the possibilities of pleasure.
This shop is more interested in people than it is in profits. If you've got some mad dance skills, or even just some mediocre ones, you can purchase a variety of goods at The Merit Shop in San Francisco.
Vince Staples mentioned Long Beach's Ramona Park approximately 80 times on his debut album Summertime '06 and even allotted the park two of its own tracks: "Ramona Park Legend Pt. 1" and "Ramona Park Legend Pt. 2." "The sun come down and guns come out, you know Ramona Park."
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
San Francisco, California
Corrected Billboard Defends Transparency at Guantanamo Bay
The California Department of Corrections (CDC) has unveiled a new billboard campaign to assist the U.S. Navy with transparency at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility.
Founded by Bobby Gordon and Nayeli Adorador Knudsen, The Melrose Poetry Bureau is a public intervention involving a whole lot of typewriters, a public space, and the chaos that ensues. Once a location is picked for an intervention, Bobby and Nayeli pack up their collection of old and new, sleek and saggy typewriters and transport them to that place. They set up tables, distribute the typewriters, and invite people to come write poetry.
LOS ANGELES — At the Grammy Awards on Sunday night, pop’s megastars will compete for the music industry’s most prestigious trophy, and put on flashy performances that are sure to ricochet through social media.
(Honoring our Origins, Ourselves and our Dreams) is an all-womyn and womyn-identified crew from the northeast San Fernando Valley dedicated to creating awareness through public art.
Julie Dillon is a critically acclaimed illustrator, having been nominated and won multiple awards, including two Hugos and a Chesley. Her work often deals with science fiction and fantasy stories, and her work in the field has made her aware of the lack of diversity in this optimistic speculative fiction.
The humorously critical project offered people an opportunity to compare themselves to the supermodel silhouette: face to face in the imaginary impression of a mirror, or at real physical scale.
The idea was born out of a serious concern with the publicized woman's body - our social obsession with thin ideals - that falls nowhere close to average or, for the majority of the population, healthy.
Forest activist and environmentalist Julia Butterfly Hill spent two years (Dec. 10, 1997-Dec. 18, 1999) living 180 feet high, on two six-by-six-foot platforms, in the canopy of a thousand-year-old redwood tree named Luna to help make the world aware of the plight of the redwood forest.
Beyoncé delivered an intensely, unapologetic celebration of Black and HBCU culture at the Coachella Festival 2 weekends in a row. Not only were her performances some of the best live performances to date but they sent a pretty significant message to the world.
Here are some assessments of this beautiful demonstration of Blackness and Black Girl Magic:
From BBC News:
For 35 years, the Billboard Liberation Front have been altering public advertisements in San Francisco under the cover of night, strategically changing words or phrases to invert the intended message of corporate sponsors. Considering their guerrilla reclamation of public space an "improvement of outdoor advertising," the BLF regards the advertisers whose billboards they improve as clients, for whom they are performing a vital service.