Reception: Sunday, August 19, 2012, 6pm (Screening wil commence at 7pm.)
Carmichael Gallery is pleased to announce a special screening of the new documentary short Bumblebeelovesyou, a visual profile of Los Angeles-based artist Bumblebee. Presented by The Downey Arts Coalition, Bumblebeelovesyou was produced by HANDi, a team of Downey-based filmmakers.
There will be a reception and screening at the Epic Lounge in Downey on Sunday, August 19, 2012, followed by a discussion on the documentary and the growing art scene in Downey. A series of new works by Bumblebee will also be on view.
Police are investigating after a vandal defaced an original Pablo Picasso painting at a Texas museum last week and it happened to be captured on video by another museum-goer.
A grainy cellphone video on YouTube shows a man in a suit spray-painting a stencil of a bullfighter killing a bull on the 1929 Picasso painting "Woman in a Red Armchair" at Houston's Menil Collection museum. The man also wrote the Spanish word "Conquista" (meaning to conquer) before he fled.
The person who posted the video online alleges the culprit is a Mexican-American artist. Further to that, the museum-goer who filmed the spray painter told KPRC Channel 2 the vandal identified himself as an artist looking to honour Picasso's work.
Houston police spokeswoman Victor Senties told the Houston Chronicle they are investigating it as a criminal mischief case.
Museum security immediately took the painting to its in-house expert for repair June 13, the newspaper reports.
The value of the painting is unknown, however similar Picasso pieces have sold for tens of millions of dollars, the museum said.
Following examples set in other Arab Spring countries like Tunisia and Egypt, Syrian activists have taken to arming themselves with cans of spray paint and stencils to peacefully protest against embattled President Bashar al-Assad’s regime via a very public and artistic medium – graffiti.
Activists have called for “a week of graffiti for freedom” from April 14 – 21 not only in Syria, but across the Arab world. The campaign invites everyone, tagger or not, to pick up a can of spray paint and peacefully express their feelings in a public place. The project, which was launched on social networking websites by a Syrian activist living in exile and several of his peers still in the country, included an online tutorial and printable stencil models.
