Cliff Notes
Each week, our regional Cliff Notes columnists Fox Whitney, Alitzah Oros, Melika Sebihi, and Kaya Noteboom pick the most exciting events and exhibitions on the West Coast.
TRYST II + NOMAD III
Del Amo Crossing, Torrance, CA
August 23 to August 25, 2024
As someone who works in an office environment, I spend a lot of time contemplating the cubicle. For decades, contemporary artists have also contemplated the office—its architecture, objects, and liminality—surfacing themes of monotony, isolation, and ambiguity. The vacant hallways, office spaces, and break rooms at Del Amo Crossing are not that different from my workplace, and yet this past weekend, the white, tan, and gray rooms came alive with the works of over 100 artists and collectives from around the world.
Produced by the Torrance Art Museum (TAM), TRYST showcased the work of artist-run spaces and collectives and now, in its second iteration, is the largest international art fair of its kind.
Sprawled across the Crossing’s second floor, paintings, photography, and mixed media works helped this environment shed its sterile nature, creating sites of connection and inquiry across time and geography.
Alongside TRYST, TAM’s contemporary art pop-up, NOMAD III, took up two gutted floors of the commercial office building. Concrete and exposed piping abound, I appreciated the seemingly boundless material explorations of the artists on these floors–zip ties, wigs, a pyramid of gilded bread loaves, stuffed animals, water suspended in space, and wax cast limbs. This is the type of work environment I can get behind.
S/o: ARTSPACEMEXICO (CDMX), PRP Project Space (Dallas, TX), Vorderzimmer (Brooklyn, NY), Quiet Please (L.A.)
Reflection: What if your coworker was an anthropomorphized stuffed animal, a single gyrating hyperrealistic limb, or a rock?
Language Garden Installment No. 5
David Horvitz’s 7th Ave Garden, Los Angeles, CA
Monthly program
Amidst a backdrop of native Southern California salvia plants, corn stocks, opuntia cacti, and plumerias, Alexandro Segade and Fariha Róisín took the stage at Language Garden, a seasonal reading series and convening of artists, poets, and friends at David Horvitz’s 7th Avenue garden in the West Adams neighborhood of L.A.
The garden itself is a work of art—rocks, sea shells, and ceramic tile fragments crunch underfoot. Sculptures and other objects erupt from within overgrown shrubs. Themes of distance, grief, other worlds, terrorism, and care blanketed the garden as Segade and Róisín read from their iPads, books, and phones. The audience was quiet and contemplative. A mezcal bottle was passed around alongside five warm cans of Inca Kola. Next to me, a baby cooed all evening.
Now in its second season, Language Garden is a monthly program organized by the Poetic Research Bureau.
Reflection: How do you share space with others?