San Diego Unseen: An Urban Portrait
A shot from "First Kiss Fight" - Photo by Manuel Rotenberg
Here's a little roundup of San Diego art and culture news—some old, some new and some that's happening later in 2011.
Looking forward: Roman de Salvo's always-interesting sculptural art will grace Ruocco Park, a new park funded by the Port of San Diego and the Lloyd and Ilse Ruocco Fund. The park, which will be located at the corner of West Harbor Drive and Pacific Highway, will be designed by landscape architect Dennis Otsuji, who included Salvo's art in his proposal. Construction on Ruocco Park will begin in spring of 2011.
Looking back: The photo to the left is a shot of choreographer Anthony Rodriguez's "First Kiss Fight," the winning dance piece in the Dec. 19 San Diego Young Choreographers Prize, the first-of-its-kind dance competition created by Jean Isaacs San Diego Dance Theater for emerging San Diego choreographers.
Rodriguez, who says his first love of movement came by listening to hip hop, took home the $2,500 prize. He says he thinks his piece, which had a sensual gay kiss choreographed in it, won because, "It was very honest and relevant to the time now. It had a lot to do with equality, anger and protest." He says he'll use the prize money to "pay myself and my dancers—I also saved some for future costumes or ideas I may have for my next project." Read more about Rodriguez here.
Looking forward: I keep running into artists who are working on their Art Meets Fashion projects. So far, there have been several Fringe Events promoted by the program, which was created by the San Diego Visual Arts Network and FOCUS, but the big to-do is happening on April 28, 2011. Get this event on your radar because it promises to be pretty cool.
Looking back: CityBeat staff writer Dave Maass has a new e-book out. It's called Kuro Crow and it's a collection of three short stories that KPBS Culture Lust author Angela Carone calls "humorous, irreverent, slightly cynical, and clever."
Looking forward: In other Port of San Diego public-art news, the statue "Unconditional Surrender" may be calling San Diego its permanent home. A spokesperson for the Port says they are currently working on finding the statue (which some people love and others, like me, hate) a site where it can stay indefinitely. While I'm not a big fan of the somewhat cheesy statue, I have come to appreciate the Port's "Urban Trees." A new crop of trees, Urban Trees 7, went up in October of last year and is currently on view, so cruise by, check them out and let me know which are your favorite.
Looking back: This guy named himself "Poet Laureate of Facebook" earlier this year. Unfortunately, neither I, nor any local media to my knowledge, picked up on the press release he sent out. But the release did make me giggle, so I started following the guy on Facebook and I enjoy his attempts at adding poetry to the online experience.
