Latest news with #AutryMuseumoftheAmericanWest
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
INDIGENOUS A&E: Horizon costumes, film gathering, desert beauty
Sandra Hale SchulmanSpecial to ICT The latest: Costner costumes on display, Gallup hosts film and media, Coachella Valley seen and heard In a sold-out special event in April, the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angeles hosted actor/filmmaker/director Kevin Costner to talk about the costumes of his ambitious four-part movie 'Horizon.' He brought along lead designer Lisa Lovaas and several of the costume makers who sat in the audience. Several of the outfits were on display, including the vintage buckskin with beading and fringe worn by Owen Crow Shoe, who portrays Pionsenay, a fierce warrior who leads a deadly attack on the settlement of the town of Horizon. He soon splits from his tribe over their disagreements about how to deal with the invading settlers. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Shoe said, "Originally, he's a peaceful warrior, and he doesn't take too well to violence. He wants to keep the violence away as much as he can, and he doesn't want to fight if he doesn't have to. But his perspective starts to change as the settlers start making their way over, and he is starting to notice that the world around him is changing.' Shoe got his start acting as a stunt rider in 'The Revenant,' and grew up watching Costner's Oscar-winning 'Dances With Wolves.' Shoe is from the Piikani Nation and Blood Tribe of the Blackfoot Confederacy, he recalls the great pride of the Lakota Nation surrounding 'Dances with Wolves.' "If Kevin Costner calls, you're going to do it," he said. "I know the homework that he does and puts into making a Native American portrayal as accurate as he can. Because looking at 'Dances with Wolves,' that's a huge thing for the Lakota people. They're really proud of that because they're speaking accurate and fluent Lakota in the film." Shoe notes that they had a historical advisor, Dr. David Bearshield. "Dr. Bearshield worked closely with Kevin on making sure that everything was positive and that there wasn't going to be any bad stereotypes. The diligence that Dr. Bearshield has is if there's something going wrong, he won't take no for an answer. He'll make sure that the representation is spot on."At the Autry talk, Costner said, 'For someone who hates getting dressed up, it's ironic I became a period drama actor who is in charge of dressing up hundreds of other actors. The costumes are majorly important to the story.' The Third Annual Gallup Film & Media Expo is set for next week to bring together filmmakers, industry professionals, and the surrounding community for a free event celebrating the creative talents of Gallup and surrounding areas. Presented by the Gallup Film Committee in partnership with Native Professional Advancement Center, there will be film screenings, panel discussions, a demonstration set, and vendor booths. Gallup is historical, on Route 66, has dozens of murals, and hosts an annual Intertribal Ceremonial Parade, art show, and summer rodeo. This annual expo highlights Gallup's emerging film industry, supporting local and Indigenous filmmakers by providing resources, industry connections, and inspiration for future storytellers. Attendees will gain insight into film careers, learn from professionals, and witness the power of Indigenous storytelling on screen. Date is Wednesday, April 30, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. MST at 825 Outlaw Road, Church Rock, NM 87301. The last two weekends in the Coachella Valley, home to the Cahuilla Tribe, exploded with art, sounds and even beauty products from Indigenous creators. With Desert X on view for another month with art installations from Cannupa Hanska Lugers G.H.O.S.T. Ride and Ronald Rael's robot made Adobe, there was an explosion of new murals in Desert Hot Springs from Known Gallery as part of Revitalize. Bringing in big names in the art world, the curator Casey Zoltan commissioned 13 new murals on the low-slung, one-story buildings that line the dusty streets of the town known mostly for its numerous hot spring resorts and cannabis warehouses. Murals feature everything from jagged abstract mountain views from Jaque Fragua, Jemez Pueblo, to peace themes from global art star Shepard Fairey, who has worked extensively with Indigenous tribes and images. Fairey and Fragua both spun some tunes as guest DJs at the opening party. At the mammoth Coachella festival, Indigenous beauty was represented by N8iv Beauty and brand creator Ruth Ann Thorn, the first such brand to have a booth at the festival. Our stories are worth telling. Our stories are worth sharing. Our stories are worth your support. Contribute $5 or $10 today to help ICT carry out its critical mission. Sign up for ICT's free newsletter.
New York Times
22-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Move Over Lone Ranger, Hopalong,Wyatt and Pals — History is Coming Your Way
Children in 1950s America grew up with a distinct image of the Old West through television heroes like the Lone Ranger, Wild Bill Hickok, Wyatt Earp and Hopalong Cassidy. They all had one thing in common, apart from always prevailing over the bad guys: They were white. Native-American actors had parts but rarely, if ever, did any of these shows include a Black actor as hero, villain or anything in between. That produced what historians have long recognized as a white-centric version of America's westward expansion, especially from Hollywood. The author C.T. Kirk and other historians posit that at least one in four cowboys was Black, many of them former slaves escaping the lingering cruelties of Reconstruction and the Jim Crow years. 'It was the narrative of television to push toward the all-American family as white,' said Kirk, author of the 2020 book, 'How the West Was White-Washed.' 'The idea was to take the importance off of one demographic to focus on another. The Western theology was that it was the white man's burden to settle the West, and everybody else was barbaric.' Black actors had been part of the nation's movie industry from the early years of the 20th century. Their projects, known as 'race films,' many of them westerns, such as 'Harlem on the Prairie' in 1937, featured Black casts playing almost exclusively to Black audiences. Films from the major studios were almost exclusively white, with only the occasional African-American actor before cinema slowly began integrating over the second half of the century, featuring such prominent actors as Woody Strode and Sidney Poitier. More and more these days, museums have taken up the cause of dispelling the perception cultivated by the entertainment industry of a whites-only West. With a variety of exhibitions, they are educating visitors to a more accurate telling of Western history by showcasing the role Black people played in everyday life across territories that would later become states. For nearly a year through early April, the Witte Museum in San Antonio presented a Texas-focused exhibition on the Black cowboys who worked on ranches and cattle drives. Many of the cowboys later became ranch owners, lawmen, rodeo stars, entrepreneurs and entertainers. Major parts of that show are now moving to the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angeles as part of a wider exhibition that follows Black people as they moved westward from Texas cattle ranches through the latter decades of the 19th century. The Autry's 'Black Cowboys: An American Story' opens on June 14, and shows how they helped develop the West. Their presence echoes today through the participation of Black people in rodeos, ranching and acting, and through Western-based themes in the music of recording artists such as Beyoncé, Megan Thee Stallion and Lil Nas X. 'I think we want to remind people that the history, and really the myth of the West and of America, is much more complicated and a great deal more diverse,' said Stephen Aron, the president and chief executive of the Autry, reflecting on the misperceptions of a white-settled West. 'The reality, in fact, is far more reflective of America, then and now.' Curated by Joe Horse Capture, vice president of Native Collections, and the senior curator Carolyn Brucken, the Autry show extends the Witte exhibit well into the 21st century in California. While many Black Westerners worked on the cattle trails, others found jobs on farms or helped build the railroads. It was menial labor for many, but some became ranch owners and entrepreneurs, the forebears of current California and Los Angeles area community groups such as the Compton Cowboys and Urban Saddles, which use horseback riding to promote the contributions of Black people in Western culture. Visitors to the Autry will learn about Bill Pickett, a Texas cowboy who invented rodeo bulldogging in the 1880s and later became one of the country's early African-American performers in Black-cast movies. Allen Allensworth, born a slave in 1842, became a military chaplain after the Civil War, rising to lieutenant colonel, making him the highest-ranking Black person in the U.S. armed forces at the time. Two years after retiring in 1906, he founded a Black settlement in California's San Joaquin Valley known as Allensworth. It remains a dot on the map today, with a population of 457, according to 2024 census figures, although less than five percent were African-American. The exhibition also celebrates women who embody Black roles in cowboy traditions. Bridget 'Biddy' Mason, a midwife and entrepreneur in mid-1800s Los Angeles, became the matriarch of a family that operated a livery stable and cattle-sale business that employed nearly a dozen cowboys. DeBoraha Akin-Townson became the International Professional Rodeo Association western region champion in 1989 and a year later the first Black cowgirl to reach the association finals. Chanel Rhodes's work as a horse trainer and equestrian led her to open a business in 2021 making wigs as decorative manes for horses. As Black people became ensconced in the western expansion, they experienced the same joys and tribulations as whites, a history unknown, even, to many contemporary African Americans, said Alaina E. Roberts, a history professor at the University of Pittsburgh and author of 'I've Been Here All The While,' a study of Black people and Native-Americans in the post-Civil War era. 'African Americans don't know any more about their history than any other group,' she said. 'They're going through the same education system that is not telling them about it.' The Autry Museum was founded in 1988 by Gene Autry, the 'Singing Cowboy' whose radio, film, recording and television career beginning in the 1930s made him one of America's most recognizable entertainers. He also owned professional rodeo companies and the Los Angeles Angels baseball team. The museum opened with his personal art and memorabilia as the foundation for a permanent collection. Today, its 100,000 square feet celebrate all aspects of Western culture through artifacts, photos, drawings and paintings, including a rich focus on Native American culture and essential elements of Western life for all who lived it — horses, firearms, ceramics, jewelry, Hollywood memorabilia and clothing: One exhibit in Black Cowboys will feature costumes worn by Black cast members of the 2021 western, 'The Harder They Fall.' The timing of the Black Cowboys exhibition has an ironic twist that is not lost on museum officials. While more than two years in the planning, the opening comes as American businesses, education institutions and government agencies are eliminating programs that embrace diversity, equity and inclusion in their hiring and operational practices. There are also ongoing debates over the starting point of American history — at the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 or the arrival of the first slave ship in 1619. Only the second acknowledges the role that Africans played in America's beginnings. Exhibitions like Black Cowboys, Aron said, underscore a truer American history, that it was not only whites leading America's Manifest Destiny in the 19th century. 'If we provide some new thinking about the way in which we've remembered or misremembered our history, that would be a valuable contribution as well as a valuable takeaway,' he said. 'I think museums do best when they spark conversation, when they provoke people to think anew and push people to ask questions.'
Los Angeles Times
14-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
SoCal Museums Free-for-All and lots of opera: L.A. arts and culture this weekend
Sunday is this year's SoCal Museums Free-for-All, an annual tradition in which more than 30 museums and cultural institutions across the region offer free admission for the day to their art, film, natural history and other cultural offerings. It's not a question of if you go, but which one(s) you'll visit: among the many options are the Autry Museum of the American West's exhibition on romanticism in Western art, the Skirball Cultural Center's retrospective of fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg, the Bowers Museum's exploration of Aka Chen's titanium creations and LACMA's shows on digital image manipulation and 21st-century Black artists, to name a few. Check SoCal Museums online for more information such as exhibition exceptions, reservation details, parking prices and TAP card discounts to museum stores. Can't make it to a museum on Sunday? Several are always free — including the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Broad, the Getty Center and Villa, California African American Museum and the Hammer Museum — and L.A. County residents with a public library card in good standing can access passes to many others for free or at minimal cost. Also, bookmark this calendar of free days around town. I'm Ashley Lee, here with my fellow Times staff writer Jessica Gelt with more arts and culture must-sees and must-reads: L.A. OperaIt's a full weekend of L.A. Opera offerings: first, it's 'The Three Women of Jerusalem (Las tres mujeres de Jerusalén),' this year's commissioned community production from composer-librettist Carla Lucer that imagines the lives of the unnamed women who wept for Jesus just before the crucifixion, as depicted in the Eighth Station of the Cross. Both performances on Friday night and Saturday afternoon, sung in Spanish with English supertitles, are free to attend with online reservations. Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, 555 W. Temple Street, Downtown. Saturday night is all about 'Coming Home: Angel Blue in Concert,' in which the acclaimed soprano performs with jazz singer Sacha Boutros, sopranos Kathleen O'Mara and Gabrielle Turgeon, and the Los Angeles County High School of the Arts Gospel Choir. And Sunday brings another performance of 'Così fan tutte,' which runs through March 30. Times classical music critic Mark Swed gave the production a mixed review, praising its 'fine singers' of a composition 'flooded with Mozartian beauty that offers the depth of thought and feeling of the first modern opera.' Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave., Downtown. 'Hamlet (Solus)'Independent Shakespeare Co. consistently presents L.A. with 'the right take by a savvy interpreter who knows how to reinvigorate a 400-plus-year-old text for contemporary audiences,' as Times contributor F. Kathleen Foley wrote in 2019. The theater's latest show: a solo performance of the Bard's classic tragedy, conceived and performed by the company's managing director David Melville. The 90-minute production, directed by Cary Reynolds, incorporates instrumentation into the world-premiere staging. Performances run Thursdays through Sundays until April 13; free tickets are available to anyone displaced by the L.A. fires. Independent Shakespeare Co. Studio, 3191 Casitas Ave, Suite 130, Atwater Crossing. American Contemporary BalletThis month, the dance company is putting on two of its most popular presentations: 'ACB Jazz,' which blends ballet with the signature styles of the 1920s and '30s, and all to the sounds of Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton and Johnny Dodds (through March 21); and 'Homecoming,' featuring drill and yell squad choreography — on pointe! — and set to a live marching band (through March 28). Bank of America Plaza, 333 S Hope St, Suite C-150, Downtown. — Ashley Lee FRIDAY 3/14Ain't Too Proud – The Life And Times Of The Temptations The Broadway jukebox musical features the Motown vocal group's biggest hits including 'My Girl,' 'Just My Imagination,' 'Get Ready' and 'Papa Was a Rolling Stone.'7:30 p.m. Friday; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday; 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sunday, Bank of America Performing Arts Center, Fred Kavli Theatre, 2100 E. Thousand Oaks Blvd., Thousand Oaks. Ballet Folklórico de México de Amalia Hernández The troupe's performances feature music, dance and costumes spanning pre-Columbian civilizations to today.8 p.m. Friday; 1 p.m. Saturday. The Soraya, Cal State Northridge, 18111 Nordhoff St., Northridge. 3 and 7 p.m. Sunday. The Luckman, Cal State L.A., 5151 State University Dr. Sound and Science: From Signal to Noise Sonic artists Celia Hollander and Jenna Caravello, Ivana Damaa, Iman Person and Paige Emery explore 'eco-acoustics' as a post-object art form in this unique concert.8 p.m. UCLA Nimoy Theater, 1262 Westwood Blvd. Tchaikovsky & Schubert German conductor Joana Mallwitz makes her long-awaited L.A. Phil debut with Grammy-winning violinist Augustin Hadelich.11 a.m. Friday. 8 p.m. Saturday. 2 p.m. Sunday. Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. SATURDAYBourgeoisie: Mozart + Haydn + Handel Pianist Awadagin Pratt joins the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra for a classic Mozart overture and the composer's 23rd piano concerto; Jeannette Sorrell returns to conduct Haydn's Symphony No. 8 in G major, 'Le soir,' and selections from Handel's 'Water Music.'7:30 p.m. Alex Theatre, 216 N. Brand Blvd., Glendale. RENT In Concert Hear Jonathan Larson's long-running Broadway musical in a new way with this symphonic experience.7:30 p.m. Segerstrom Center for the Arts, Segerstrom Hall, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. Rolling Loud California The self-proclaimed 'World's Largest Hip-Hop Festival' expands its horizons with its first non-hip-hop headliner, Peso Pluma, joining ASAP Rocky, Playboi Carti and more than 75 other acts. SUNDAYCarmina Burana The Los Angeles Master Chorale performs Carl Orff's epic cantata, plus the world premiere of a new work by Reena Esmail.7 p.m. Walt Disney Concert Hall, 111 S. Grand Ave., downtown L.A. Look What SHE Did! Short Film Festival Six female filmmakers screen and discuss their work.3 p.m. UCLA Nimoy Theater, 1262 Westwood Blvd. My Fellow Americans Artist Tod Lippy exhibits 50 portraits that address the nation's political 24 hours, until 6 p.m. Thursday. 626 N. La Cienega Blvd. Starring Gene Hackman The American Cinematheque continues its tribute series to the late actor with Arthur Penn's 1975 neo-noir 'Night Moves' in Theatre, 6712 Hollywood Blvd. 'Little symbolizes L.A. resilience like the Mahlerthon. Five hundred young musicians can't be wrong,' writes Times classical music critic Mark Swed in his review of Gustavo Dudamel's 'Mahler Grooves' festival with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and, yes, 500 talented members of local student orchestras. The Corita Art Center — dedicated to the life and work of Sister Mary Corita — opened in downtown L.A.'s Arts District, and Scarlet Cheng has the scoop for The Times. The new facility has offices and exhibition space, and also stores more than 30,000 pieces of art and ephemera. Three artists — Mariana Castillo Deball, Sarah Rosalena and Shio Kusaka — have been commissioned by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to create pieces for the new David Geffen Galleries. These monumental works will join Chris Burden's 'Urban Light' installation of city streetlamps and Michael Heizer's 'Levitated Mass,' as civic landmarks and Instagram favorites. LACMA also announced that it will open portions of its new campus to the public this summer, including and the new location of Ray's + Stark Bar and the LACMA store, both slated to open later this year. And jazz saxophonist Kamasi Washington will play shows in the galleries in late June. Athol Fugard, one of South Africa's most acclaimed playwrights, has died. He was 92. Fugard took an unflinching look at the effects of apartheid in works including 'The Blood Knot' and ' 'Master Harold' … and the Boys.' In an appreciation, Times theater critic Charles McNulty writes, 'For all the political freight of Fugard's works, he was a deeply personal writer. It wasn't so much ideas or arguments that inspired his plays but human beings in all their messy complications.' The Getty has acquired the archive of American artist Raymond Pettibon, best known for his punk aesthetic and documentation of the rock 'n' roll scene in Southern California in the 1980s. The collection includes drawings, posters and concert fliers that became synonymous with Pettibon's iconoclastic persona. The Trump administration fired the bulk of workers in the General Services Administration's fine arts and preservation units, which are responsible for preserving and maintaining more than 26,000 pieces owned by the U.S. government, including Alexander Calder's 1974 'Flamingo' at the John C. Kluczynski Federal Building in Chicago and Michael Lantz's 1942 'Man Controlling Trade' outside the Federal Trade Commission building in D.C. — Jessica Gelt Rashid Johnson, esteemed artist and … model?
