Fish & Chips: Using High-Tech Tools to Learn More About Fish
"#3 x 6' Four Fold" by Robert Irwin. Photo by Philip Sholtz Ritterman / Courtesy: Quint Contemporary Art.
Art
Robert the great: To sum up Robert Irwin’s career and impact on art in one paragraph would almost certainly be an exercise in futility. The San Diego artist changed installation, light and space and public art forever, so it’s quite the coup that La Jolla’s Quint Contemporary Art (7739 Drury Lane) has landed the first gallery exhibition of Irwin’s work in 30 years. The show, Works in Progress, will feature new installation pieces that, true to the name, will change every two weeks after the opening reception—from 6 to 8 p.m. Friday, March 19—up to its final day on May 1. If you can’t make it to the reception, stop by the gallery during regular business hours (11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday) to get the full impact of a master at work. www.quintgallery.com.
Hung Loose: Timothy Williams shoots surfboards with shotguns. He takes torches to acoustic guitars. He knows a brunette who will pose nude for black and white photographs. He combines the results and calls it art. We call it “dude art” because it’s so specific to coastal Southern California that it deserves its own Wikipedia entry. Does Williams’ craft legitimize surf culture, or is he just producing collectibles for corporate executives who hang 10 one weekend a month? Ask him at his new show, Relics from the Now, which runs through April 22 at the Eric Phleger Gallery, 828 North Coast Hwy. in Encinitas. Williams will be there in the dude flesh—muscles, long hair and a metal goatee—for the opening reception, 6 to 9 p.m. Thursday, March 18. The show runs through April 22. www.ericphlegergallery.com
Special events
Nature calls: We’re nuts for Blind Lady Ale House’s specialty pizzas and craft beer, and we’re equally nuts for High Tech High Media Arts, the Point Loma school that emphasizes a strong liberal arts, design and sciences foundation for teens. So consider us smitten for Raw Nature, an art show and benefit that’ll go down from 11:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday, March 21, at Blind Lady (3416 Adams Ave. in Normal Heights), where 20 percent of food sales will be donated to Media Arts. Work from HTH students will be on display, and the event will also serve as the soft launch for Holiday Matinee’s new “Artist Series” T-shirts, which will feature big San Diego names like Joshua Krause (this week’s cover artist), Mike Maxwell and Jason Sherry. www.blindladyalehouse.com.
Beer good, books good: Wait, you mean we can help promote reading by drinking beer? Sign us up. Right now. From 5:30 to 9:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 23, Toronado (4026 30th St. in North Park) will host Beer for Books, where $1 from every tasty brew purchased will go toward buying books for children. Behind B4B is the San Diego chapter of Room to Read, a nonprofit whose mission is to make sure children living in developing countries are literate and receiving quality education, no matter their gender. So there you have it: Buy a beer and you buy a kid a book. It’s win / win. www.roomtoread.org.
Music
Gather ’round: Admit it. You’re getting a little older, and there’s been a little voice in your head saying, “Less alcohol, more culture. Feed me.” You have one more opportunity to chow at the trough that is Art of Élan’s “Fantasia” series of hour-long chamber-music concerts at the San Diego Museum of Art. The fourth and last of the series, called Storytelling—7 p.m. Tuesday, March 23, in the museum’s Hibben Gallery—is inspired by William Bouguereau’s painting “The Young Shepherdess” and features “Snapshot-circa 1909” by John Corigliano, and “Folksongs” for mezzo-soprano and chamber ensemble, arranged by Luciano Berio. The awesome thing about the series is that you get great art as well as great music—a veritable smorgasbord of culture for your starved mind and soul. $25. www.artofelan.org, www.sdmart.org.
Politics
Know you rights: If you give a damn about civil rights, you might consider devoting part of your Saturday (March 20) to the local chapter of the ACLU’s Action Summit: Change Begins in San Diego at the Jacobs Center for Neighborhood Innovation (404 Euclid Ave.). The program starts at noon with information on what the ACLU is up to on the legal and policy fronts and a keynote speech from Susan Herman, ACLU national board president, followed at 1 p.m. by presentations from recent clients of the ACLU and an open discussion on free-speech issues. At 2:30 p.m., after a “gourmet” lunch, the ACLU’s Andrea Guerrero and CityBeat editor David Rolland will co-moderate a forum in which candidates for the District 4 and District 8 San Diego City Council seats will answer questions about civil rights. Free for students and low-income attendees, $5 for everyone else, lunch included. www.aclusandiego.org.
Film
Watch your water: Early on in the short animated film The Cycle of Insanity: The Real Story of Water, the film’s message is splayed boldly on the screen: “Our Water Cycle is Broken,” it reads. And it’s true: Increased population, urban development, water imports, wetland destruction and other human-induced problems have drastically affected water’s natural cycle. The film, made by a group of volunteers at The Surfrider Foundation and narrated by actor Zuleikha Robinson (Ilana from Lost), bluntly illustrates what our water cycle looks like these days and shows that, though it’s not in the best shape, there are things we can do to fix it. It screens at 6 and 7:30 p.m. Monday, March 22 (which is World Water Day), at The Loft on the UCSD campus (in the Price Center). RSVP to water@surfridersd.org. To watch the trailer, visit www.vimeo.com/9760124.
Dance
Skin on skin: Warning: Sushi Performance and Visual Art’s The Symmetry Project contains nudity. Yes, people, Jess Curtis and Maria Francesca Scaroni perform their experimental-dance piece about two perfectly balanced bodies au naturel. And when the NEA awarded the duo a grant last year to continue their work—whoo-whee!—were some folks hoppin’ mad. That makes us want to recommend this show even more. Seriously, if you’re into provocative, sophisticated performance art of the sort that doesn’t make it to San Diego too often, head to 390 11th Ave. in East Village at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, March 19 and 20, or 6 p.m. Sunday, March 21. $20. www.sushiart.org
