We know what you’re thinking, “Been there, done that.” We’re happy to tell you that photo l.a. is an entirely different experience.

We’re bringing the best of the photography world to your doorstep with a collaborative platform that links dealers and collectors with a gamut of galleries from around the globe. Internationally recognized, yet abundantly accessible, photo l.a. cultivates connections between industry elite and up-and-coming talent alike. The longest running international photographic art fair on the West Coast, photo l.a. has been in operation for nearly three decades.

photo l.a. received a new home in the historic Barker Hangar this year. The airplane hangar’s soaring vaulted ceilings, arched steel trusses, and sweeping 35,000 square foot event space will host a roster of 65-75 local and international galleries and dealers, collectives, leading not-for-profits, art schools, and global booksellers.

– for more information on additional images from this event please contact EMS at [email protected] or Instagram at @ericminhswenson

Venice, CA — L.A. Louver is pleased to present an exhibition of prints by Los Angeles artist Alison Saar. For the past 30 years, Saar has maintained a robust printmaking practice, creating more than 90 prints over the course of her career. Addressing issues of race, gender and spirituality, Saar’s lithographs, etchings and woodblock prints are evocations of her sculptures, powerful depictions of figures carved from wood or cast in bronze, that are articulated with found objects – material artifacts enriched with a narrative all their own. As such, a focused selection of sculptures will be installed in dialogue with Saar’s prints, in L.A. Louver’s second floor gallery and open-air Skyroom. As an activity maintained in connection to and in tandem with her sculpture making, Saar undertakes printmaking with the same tangible approach to unconventional materials and methods. Cast-off objects like old chair backs and found ceiling tin become the foundations for etching or lithography plates. Carved panels used for woodblock prints echo the techniques established in her hewn wooden forms. A direct comparison between Saar’s sculptures and prints can be seen in the juxtaposition of White Guise Print (2018-19), a woodblock print of a woman holding an iron dripping with blood, and Sugar (2018), a sculpture of a young girl clasping a machete, her figure carved from wood and surfaced with reclaimed ceiling tin. Both are similarly expressed with the same forward stance, simple dress and cotton branches tethered to their hair. But more than subject matter, they possess a corporeal presence, embodied through an assertive use of materials and a continuity of mark-making across mediums. Saar created these as part of a series inspired by the character of Topsy from Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. However, in Saar’s revisionist account of the story, the slave girl spurns any attempts at pacification and instead takes up arms using her tools of labor. In addition to printing on paper, Saar repurposes worn fabrics that she has collected over time, embracing tears and stains that point to evidence of use. When conceiving these prints, Saar considers the nature of the cloth to inform the content of the imagery. In Redbone Blues (2017), a striking portrait of a young man is printed directly onto a vintage handkerchief, his likeness an imaginary rendering of the handkerchief ’s original owner. Breach (2017) portrays a nude female figure steering a raft through rising waters, burdened by her belongings. Saar applied the imagery onto fabric sourced from linen seed sacks, a material not unlike the sandbags used to fortify the levees during the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927. This subject was initially realized in a large sculpture that Saar created prior to the print. The translation from a three-dimensional to a flat representation affords Saar FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE January 2020 Media Contact: Darius Sabbaghzadeh Email: [email protected] White Guise Print, 2018-19, woodcut, relief, shellac-stained paper, handtainted iron, 55 x 27 1/2 in, (139.7 x 69.9 cm) 29 January – 29 February 2020 Reception for the artist: Wednesday, 29 January, 6-8pm the opportunity to further establish surroundings, atmosphere and environs. Saar states, “Making a 2-D work meant I could introduce all these other things that couldn’t be part of a sculpture… Here, I could dictate that context, create a scene, a tableau, a narrative.” For Saar, printmaking has become an integral part of her artistic practice, where she can experiment and collaborate with master printmakers from Tandem Press, Tamarind Institute, Mullowney Printing and others. Moreover, the process offers Saar the ability to holistically contemplate themes addressed in her sculptures and paintings. “Printmaking allows me to step back from the real physical work of sculpting,” says Saar. “I think of making prints as an intermezzo, a time to go back and reflect, and maybe rework ideas. Carving woodblocks can be tiring, but it’s nothing like the chainsaws. Making prints has become a resting period, like a lave tet, or a cleansing of the mind.”

– for more information on additional images from this event please contact EMS at [email protected] or Instagram at @ericminhswenson

Mining images from mass media, advertising and entertainment since the late 1970s, Richard Prince has redefined the concepts of authorship, ownership, and aura. Applying his understanding of the complex transactions of representation to the making of art, he evolved a unique signature filled with echoes of other signatures yet that is unquestionably his own. An avid collector and perceptive chronicler of American subcultures and vernaculars and their role in the construction of American identity, he has probed the depths of racism, sexism, and psychosis in mainstream humor; the mythical status of cowboys, bikers, customized cars, and celebrities; and most recently, the push–pull allure of pulp fiction and soft porn, producing such unlikely icons as the highly coveted Nurse paintings.

Richard Prince was born in 1949 in the Panama Canal Zone. Prince’s work has been the subject of major solo exhibitions, including the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (1992); San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, California (1993); “Fotos, Schilderijen, Objecten,” Museum Boymans–Van Beuningen, Rotterdam (1993); Haus der Kunst / Süddeutsche Zeitung, Munich (1996); Museum Haus Lange / Museum Haus Esters, Germany (1997); “4×4,” MAK Center for Art and Architecture, Vienna (2000); “Upstate,” MAK Center for Art and Architecture, Schindler House, Los Angeles (2000); Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel (2001, traveled to Kunsthalle Zurich, Switzerland; and Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Germany); “American Dream, Collecting Richard Prince for 27 Years,” Rubell Family Collection, Miami (2004); “Canaries in the Coal Mine,” Astrup Fearnley Museum, Oslo (2006); “The Early Works,” Neuberger Museum of Art, New York (2007); Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2007, traveled to Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; and Serpentine Gallery, London, through 2008); “American Prayer,” Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris (2011); “Prince/Picasso,” Picasso Museum, Spain (2012); and “It’s a Free Concert,” Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria (2014). Prince’s works are in the public collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas; Museum of Fine Arts Collection, Boston; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Prince currently lives and works in New York.