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  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
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Los Angeles Art Association Celebrates Opening of Satellite Gallery In the Burgeoning Hermosa Beach Arts District Los Angeles Art Association South: The Michael Napoliello Gallery Opens with "Biannual" Show on June 22, 2006 Distinguished director of MOCA, Jeremy Strick Juries Opening Show
Hermosa Beach (May 2006) — After 80 years of discovering and supporting Southern California's emerging avant-garde talent, the venerable Los Angeles Art Association (LAAA) opens its first satellite gallery to support the burgeoning art community in the South Bay. To fete this new beginning, the Los Angeles Art Association South (LAAA South) will host its inaugural show celebration on Thursday, June 22, 2006 in Hermosa Beach at LAAA South: The Michael Napoliello Gallery. Distinguished curator and director of MOCA, Jeremy Strick, will jury LAAA South's first show, lending weight and credibility to this new chapter in LAAA's legacy. Founded in 1925, LAAA has nurtured the art careers of many celebrated artists, including Man Ray, Hans Burkhardt, Wayne Thiebaud, Carl Benjamin and Lita Albuquerque and helped launch such innovative artists as Helen Lundberg, Lorser Feitelson and June Wayne. Longtime supporters of LAAA include the LA Cultural Affairs Department, LA County Arts Commission and the Robert Gore Rifkind Foundation, to name a few. LAAA has played a central role in the formation of Los Angeles' arts community and has been an unparalleled source for emerging artists on the in California. LAAA executive director, Peter Mays, says, "Eighty years ago, the Los Angeles Art Association changed the conversation about how emerging art could be viewed, appreciated and sustained in Los Angeles. With the expansion of our mission to LAAA South, it's time to change the conversation again. We are very excited to be part of the genesis of Hermosa Beach's fine arts community." The organization's critical role as an incubator for emerging artists enables the public to have access to new talent often before they become the "next big name." LAAA, in essence, has become the place for emerging art on the West Coast. Just as LAAA has played an integral role in the growth of the arts in Los Angeles, LAAA South presents opportunities for artists to reach new constituencies in the wake of the South Bay's recent artistic renaissance. The impact of LAAA South's presence, in conjunction with the overwhelming response to other prominent South Bay galleries, such as Gallery C, further establishes the South Bay as a rapidly growing art destination and lays the groundwork for a future Hermosa Beach Arts District. According to art patron and LAAA South benefactor Michael Napoliello, "Like Culver City and Bergamot Station, Hermosa Beach is now poised to become the next destination for contemporary art lovers." Among the next wave of artists who have found recent success, as a result of the support and exposure that LAAA provides to its members, are multi-media artist Arthur Pembleton and mixed-media artist Carol Es. Pembleton, a former commercial producer, first showed his "Dead Momma Database" installation last year at LAAA to critical acclaim. The installation, a sentimental yet witty homage to his mother's death, includes workstations showing digital videos, audio files, a mural-scaled storyboard and 5,700 photographs. The installation was well reviewed by influential art critic David Pagel (Los Angeles Times) and has since been selected to travel to Utah's Arts Festival in June 2006. Es, a self-taught artist and former garment industry pattern cutter, has shown her intricate work at LAAA throughout the years to a growing patron base. The LACMA Arts Council recently visited her studio and the Getty Museum recently purchased a copy of her multi-medium book, entitled 1-Self, for their library. Representative of her work, the book includes an original watercolor drawing, a hand-carved block print insert, letter pressed pages, and a hand-cut collar pattern, as well as essays by Los Angeles art critics Shana Nys Dambrot and Kristina Newhouse. The book is also featured in UCLA's Special Collections and the Mafa Jaffe Collection at Florida Atlantic University. Es is now represented at the George Billis Gallery. LAAA South's inaugural show opens on Thursday, June 22 and will run through September 2, 2006. The opportunity to submit art was extended to over 200 artists and from this group only 20-25 individual pieces will be selected by Mr. Strick. The South Bay chapter will feature 6-8 exhibitions per year and host a variety of distinguished curators and art professionals. Like LAAA, the South Bay programs will offer its members access to artists forums and peer critiques, education on professional development, as well as exhibition opportunities. This new chapter reinforces the commitment to LAAA's original mission to sustain and support a broad cross section of artists of all mediums, career levels and socio-economic backgrounds. LAAA South: The Mike Napoliello Gallery is located at 936 Hermosa Avenue #105, Hermosa Beach, CA 90254. Admission to the opening show is free to the public from 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. Regular hours will be posted on-line. Please visit www.laaa.org for the latest information about LAAA South activities, participants and events.
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