The Brick

Thursday, June 27, 2024 6:30 PM Join us for the LA launch of the new journal WAYBILL The Brick 518 N Western Ave Waybill is a new small-press publication tracing, if not fully explaining the global paths and nodes of global shipping. As globalization has stretched production and distribution across borders and continents, modern logistics offers a tangible way to grasp an economic logic that appears so large and diffuse as to be beyond representation. Via critical essays, photography, poetry, fiction, industry insights, and other artwork, Waybill attempts to mimic the intermodal, interdisciplinary structure of modern logistics towards a greater understanding of this industry and its social, political, and aesthetic implications. Join the editors at The Brick on Thursday, June 27th at 6:30pm for an evening of lectures, readings, and screenings on how the logic of logistics can be identified, extended, and critiqued.

THIS SUNDAY: Sekula / Stein Garage Sale Opening Sunday, June 23, 2-6pm Open Tuesday - Saturday, June 25 - 29, 12-5pm each day 518 N Western Avenue, Los Angeles Cash and cards accepted. All proceeds benefit The Brick. Light refreshments will be served courtesy of The O’Reilly Company. For its housewarming, The Brick is holding the Sekula / Stein Garage Sale. Sally Stein, widow of the late, great artist Allan Sekula (d. 2013) is moving to New York. She has generously donated to The Brick their home library along with all manner of charming bric-a-brac that was the stuff of their lives- mementos from travels, Hasselblad slide projectors and lots and lots of Sekuliana. In their respective roles as art historian and artist, Sally and Allan were recognized internationally for their critical engagement with the field of documentary photography. They enjoyed the same standing in their hometown of Los Angeles where their practices served as a paragon of integrity and rigor. Their interests in struggles of all stripes was hopelessly global. That combined with their knowledge of photography makes this collection of over 3,000 books notable at one and the same time for its breadth and specificity. Come sit, sift, peruse and haggle, all the while checking out our new digs.

IN CONCERT: Roscoe Mitchell with Special Guests (Two Night Performance) Roscoe Mitchell/Tom Buckner/Sandy Ewen Sunday, June 16th, 4pm (Doors at 3pm) Roscoe Mitchell/Moor Mother Monday, June 17th, 7pm (Doors at 6pm) The Brick - 518 N Western Ave. Los Angeles CA Our inaugural public program at our new location at 518 and as The Brick, we are thrilled to welcome legendary saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell with special guests Tom Buckner, Sandy Ewen, and Moor Mother! Our events are free and open to the public. Limited seating is available on a first-come first-served basis.

NEWS: LAXART is now THE BRICK. New building opening this June at 518 N Western Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90004. Founded in 2005, LAXART has been rechristened as The Brick in a new home at 518 N. Western Avenue. The name was derived from the building’s most prominent feature, its exposed red brick. Dedicated to understanding key issues of our time through contemporary art, the mission remains the same. Free and open to the public, The Brick is an alternative arts space engaging the local, national, and international community. The mix of exhibitions, concerts, and performances will resume this Summer in the new 5,000 square foot facility. The Brick’s Grand Opening is over two evenings: Sunday, June 16 and Monday, June 17. Both evenings will feature legendary saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell in two different settings. These concerts will be followed by a community party on Sunday, June 23 to coincide with the Sekula/Stein Garage Sale, a week-long sale of artist Allan Sekula and art historian Sally Stein’s home library sprinkled with personal effects. All events are free and open to the public. The Brick’s inaugural exhibition will be a solo show of new work by artist/writer/activist Gregg Bordowitz opening in July, followed in September by the group show Life on Earth: Art & Ecofeminism, organized by deputy director and curator Catherine Taft as part of PST ART: Art & Science Collide. The Brick opens with an exterior facade that will feature a mural memorializing the late artist Pope.L by LA-based muralists 3B collective. Alongside this new location, The Brick also unveils a new logo and visual identity designed by Perron-Roettinger. The new logo prominently features elegant, fluid script lettering with contemporary typographic features. Legible across both small and large scales, the new branding speaks to The Brick’s mission to be distinctive, while indicating an ethos that’s forward-thinking, embraces connection, and synthesizes different points of view.

The newest Clarion Series publication from @52walkerstreet for the exhibition “Gordon Matta-Clark & Pope.L: Impossible Failures” features a conversation between LAXART Director Hamza Walker, Director and Curator Ebony L. Haynes @ebotron , and the late Pope.L. This catalogue is held close to our hearts, we hope you will enjoy it as we have. Order now from 52 Walker Street Gallery. A joining of two artists, exploring their shared fixation on the problematics of architecture, language, institutions, scale, and value “[The exhibition is] powerful and unhinged and overbuilt—a monument to the entropy of the postindustrial city, and the tenuous dance of its inhabitants.” —The New York Times Gordon Matta-Clark and Pope.L are esteemed for their respective interdisciplinary practices that examine the value and paradoxes of urban life as well as the risk inherent in art making. Utilizing performance, film, drawing, and various multimedia projects, the two artists often open up interstitial spaces by realizing sweeping gestures that take into account shifting, decentralized zones. Grounded in the concept of failure, the sixth exhibition at 52 Walker and its accompanying catalogue reconsider societal, artistic, and structural failure—and its related expressions of hope. With an introduction by the curator and director of 52 Walker, Ebony L. Haynes, this publication also includes a conversation between Haynes, Pope.L, and the director of LAXART, Hamza Walker, where they discuss the visual, material, and conceptual similarities between Pope.L’s and Matta-Clark’s work and what it means to treat the possibilities of failure as an artistic medium. Writings by Matta-Clark related to works in the exhibition highlight his interest in working with the void as material.

The Mike Kelley Foundation for the Arts (MKFA) announced yesterday the recipients of its fourth year of Organizational Support Grants, an unrestricted grant program the Foundation established during the pandemic to address the immediate needs of Los Angeles County arts organizations. While the grants continue to support organizations’ operating costs, 2024 grantees also provided an upcoming project for consideration, and a required minimum of the awarded amount must go to artists involved. The Organizational Support Grants, like the Foundation, support arts organizations that reflect Mike Kelley’s passion for critical thinking and provocation in the arts. This year’s grantees are the Armory Center for the Arts, Automata Arts, CalArts REDCAT, Clockshop, Coaxial Arts Foundation, Echo Park Film Center, Fulcrum Arts, Future Roots/Lookout FM, Human Resources, JOAN, LAXART, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE), Los Angeles Poverty Department, Museum of Jurassic Technology, and Self-Help Graphics & Art.

LAXART Director Hamza Walker spoke with Harper's Bazaar's Editor at Large Stephen Mooallem about "The Collective Power of the L.A. Art World" for their December/January issue. On newsstands now or read the article online, link in bio. @harpersbazaarus Photograph: Andy Jackson Styling: Yashua Simmons

This Giving Tuesday we hope you will consider donating or becoming a member of LAXART! Every contribution counts towards bringing free exhibitions and programming to our Los Angeles community. We look forward to welcoming you to our new space this spring! Link to our donation page in bio.

Please join us this Sunday at @gattopardo.la for the closing reception of Wrong Number by artists @fimkisher and @tubeflo , who will be in conversation with @cat.taft.cat . See you there!

Please join us next Saturday for a talk between Hamza Walker and prolific writer and curator @hmolesworth on occasion of her new collection of art writing, published by @phaidonpress . Free RSVP link in our bio!

We are delighted to announce a very special lecture by @cat.taft.cat at @theicala on occasion of Barbara T. Smith's exhibition: Proof on November 8th at 7pm. The lecture explores how Barbara T. Smith’s performances and visual artworks are tied to themes of ecofeminism: the idea that environmental and gender exploitation are systemically linked under patriarchy and capitalism. Link to RSVP in our story and bio! Wednesday November 8 at 7pm 1717 E 7th St, Los Angeles Photo credit: Barbara T. Smith, Proof, 1965–66. Xerox and drawing, 14 x 19 inches. Image courtesy the artist and The Box, Los Angeles.

Join @pacegallery and Hamza Walker with artist Fred Wilson and Pace Gallery Chief Curator Oliver Shultz next Saturday November 4th at 2pm for a discussion on Wilson’s solo exhibition Dramatis Personae, on view at Pace’s Los Angeles space from November 4 to December 22. Link to register in our bio and story! Saturday, November 4th 2:00PM Doors open at 1:30PM Pace Gallery 1201 La Brea Ave. Los Angeles, CA