BBC America LOVES Scott Hove!

I just wrapped an interview with Our Food host and London Times food critic Giles Coren, who was absolutely gaga over Scott Hove's cakeland installation, My Own Private Apocalypse. The clip, which compares and contrasts the food and culture of East vs. West LA, will air later this year on Giles' new BBC America show, the title of which is yet to be confirmed.

I got Coren to admit that the east side is better (off camera, of course), but it probably didn't hurt that a couple of our patrons recognized him from his correspondent gig on The F Word. Congrats to Scott Hove and much thanks to the BBC America folks and especially Giles Coren for singling us out to represent the cool quotient on the East Side.

Scott Hove's Exhibition comes down tomorrow evening as does Joe Sorren's When the Rain Comes and the Johnette Napolitano pop-up show, Still in Hollywood. The gallery will go dark until Friday when we open the biennial Rogue Taxidermy Show (preview now posted!)

Eastertide

It's hard to believe that it's almost been a week since we completed construction on the New and Improved La Luz de Jesus Gallery, but here we are in the first week of Eastertide. If you haven't seen the Scott Hove "Iced Out" exhibition, you need to drop what you're doing right now and come check it out. This is a show that warrants a "live" perspective.

If you missed the opening reception, you missed an extravagant assortment of delicious desserts from the Nickel Diner. With all those Scott Hove cakes on display, we knew the crowd would be hungry, and they voraciously vacuumed the maple bacon donut holes and potato chip and peanut butter cupcakes. The refreshments, supplied by Nakhon Brewing, were much appreciated and paired well with the savory and sweet snacks.

The best surprise for Scott Hove fans of was the chance to pass through a gallery of Dennis Larkins and Max Grundy paintings before arriving at the cakeland sculptures. Dennis was also on hand Saturday to sign copies of his latest tome of three dimensional relief paintings, "Startling Art," published by Last Gasp and available for sale in the gallery.

Max Grundy was similarly busy this weekend -welcoming a beautiful baby daughter into the world! Congrats to proud new parents Max and Candace! Of course, LA Weekly readers got a preview of Grundy's "Out of Order" show when his title piece accompanied the Easter Sunday spotlight in the Go LA section.

Families flocked to our expanded Los Feliz digs and bought Bruce Eichelberger's etched eggs and other Eastery delights.

The three exhibitions are up all month long, and the work is extraordinary. Just in time for your Tax Refund check!

And speaking of tax, the Rogue Taxidermy Exhibition is coming soon, so be sure to sign up for the online preview by joining our email list.

The icing on the (Monster) cake

The construction is done, and the installation is in process for the inaugural exhibit at the new addition to La Luz de Jesus Gallery for our grand rebirth / reopening on April 2nd. As you read this, Scott Hove and Billy Shire are hard at work assuring that Gallery II will be fully assembled for the opening reception this Friday at 8PM.

When we decided to close BSFA last month, it was part of bigger plan that centered on a redesign and expansion of La Luz de Jesus Gallery. The exhibition schedule for 2010 was built around this planned construction, and the new space allows for multiple exhibitions to cohabit under one roof. The combined infrastructure enables edgier content and a return to the cutting edge exhibitions of our golden age when we launched the lowbrow and pop-surrealism movements of California art. Scott Hove's "Iced Out" exhibition, alongside Max Grundy's "Out of Order" and Dennis Larkins' "Read Between the Lines" were conceptualized with the new space in mind. Scroll down for previews of these first three exhibitions at the new, double-sized La Luz de Jesus Gallery.

Scott Hove's work encompasses a broad variety of media, from sculptural installations to painting. "Iced Out" is a celebration of the artificial, and acknowledges our tendency to embrace illusion in order to feel safe and receive emotional gratification. The fake cake sculptures, with their display of beauty and potential for satisfaction, lure the viewer into a sense of anticipation, but also create a sense of anxiety and fear.
Among the highlights are a seven-piece cake chandelier and a demo of the cake vault, which is an enclosed structure -partly Alice in Wonderland, but entirely Scott Hove. (Click here for a video tour)

We have never exhibited anything like this before!
In keeping with the cake theme on Easter Weekend, The Nickel Diner's master pastry chef is making some extravagant sweets and the All American Softy truck will be parked out front to supply ice-cream and other snacks.

Long time Grateful Dead artist Dennis Larkins returns to La Luz de Jesus on the same evening with a new batch of three dimensional relief paintings that provoke, disturb and amuse. Dennis is longtime La Luz alumni, and his freshest batch of textured oil and acrylic works will dominate a display that includes classic and rarely seen work as well. He's fresh from an exhibition at the New York Historical Society, and just in time for the premiere of his new graphic volume Startling Art: the Revealing Art of Dennis Larkins, which he'll also be signing on Saturday, April 3rd from 6-9 PM.

He'll be in attendance with Scott Hove and Max Grundy, who is unleashing his sophomore show here at La Luz de Jesus which includes neon sign in addition to his enamel works on aluminum and steel. Max's work conveys a concept of the future from the perspective of the past. He infuses each image with rebelliousness, industry, freedom, conflict and impending disaster. By paralleling the Atomic Era and today's times of terror, social and political pressures, Grundy gives his work a narrative that is both familiar and unprecedented. Created with enamel on aluminum panel, "Out of Order," Grundy's new body of work, portrays the tension created between man and technology and the impending apocalypse.

We've got cake.
We've got ice cream.
We've got the best damn art gallery opening you're going to see this month!

Kitsch 'N Sync Coverage

Congrats to La Luz de Jesus' own JAW Cooper, who has three great paintings in the Kitsch 'N Sync show, the same week that her art graces the cover of the LA Weekly! Cooper's got a featured exhibition here in June, too, so be sure to sign up for her preview list on our constant contact sign up box. She's been dropping hints about what we can expect, and I'm feverishly anticipating another faux-fur rug, because I know some hard-wood floors that need a stylish companion.

We expected a great turn-out on Friday, but we could never have expected over 2000 people!

The folks from SinoTequila were working overtime to blend enough margaritas for the ravenous crowd, and several artists had complete sellouts of multiple pieces. Brandon Steen, Frijol Boy, Jasmine Worth, Tennessee Loveless and Walt Hall all sold three or more paintings each, and many of our newbies experienced the very first gallery sales of their artwork. That list is far too extensive to list, but you can check out what's sold and what's available by clicking on the Current Exhibition link.

The following evening, we said goodbye to Billy Shire Fine Arts.

The live, musical performance by Unextraordinary Gentlemen was off the chain, and we were able to give away some mementos from the past five years' exhibitions. The aesthetic that was established at BSFA will be incorporated into the new La Luz de Jesus, which will soon have a second enclosed space behind the current main gallery. Take a look at the upcoming shows and you'll see what I mean.

Next month, Scott Hove will be taking over the new, second gallery space at La Luz de Jesus with his installation of surreal, anthropomorphized cakes. The exhibition, called Iced Out has already received coverage from Hi-Fructose, Boing Boing, Planet Oddity and The Food Network. Ace of Cakes -eat your heart out, as the centerpiece of this show is a gigantic cake chandelier that will hang suspended from the center of the ceiling in gallery II. We'll be coordinating some other special events around this opening on April 2nd, which will likely involve some edible sweets to accompany visual ones, so check back for updates.

The front gallery will host Dennis Larkins and Max Grundy.

Dennis' work is 3D relief sculpted paintings in acrylic on canvas and paper. He was just covered by the New York Times as part of the New York Historical Society Grateful Dead Exhibition, which coincides with the release of his book, Startling Art: Revealing the Art of Dennis Larkins, which he'll be signing at La Luz de Jesus on Saturday, April 3rd from 6-9PM. Max Grundy's paranoid propaganda paintings of enamel on metal are a hellacious futurama meets constructivism. Larkins & Grundy are La Luz veterans, and their work will juxtapose nicely with Scott Hove. You've never seen anything quite like this, I promise you!