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Del Aire Park Commission – a Public Fruit Park!

Fallen Fruit — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 07:12:07 +0000

Fallen Fruit has received an art commission from the LA County Arts Commission for Del Aire Park. We’ve met with the community group and we’re now in the design stage. We’re working on creating an installation that functions as a public fruit park.

Fallen Fruit Maps

Fallen Fruit — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 17:34:54 +0000

Find our maps here:Fallen Fruit Maps

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Fallen Fruit — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 07:33:38 +0000

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Fallen Fruit of Utah

Fallen Fruit — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 07:14:54 +0000

Fallen Fruit of Utah brings together two types of collections through the common ground of fruit. One is sweeping – museums and historical archives – and the other is personal and intimate. Fruit is both deeply symbolic and simply decorative, both ordinary and special, sometimes at the same time. Eight historic collections and archives and over twenty families agreed to collaborate with Fallen Fruit to assemble works that range from spiritual and symbolic to representational landscapes to the commonplace (or everyday objects). This exhibition draws our attention to the meaning of fruit, a way to investigate symbolism, the aesthetics of deliciousness, and the bounty and goodness of the familiar.

The installation of this exhibition is part of our collaborative art practice. We love mixing serious oil paintings with decorative and everyday objects, and there are even pieces from local thrift stores. What links them all is the way fruit is represented, from the deeply symbolic to the simply decorative or even abstract. A selection of our videos are screened in this show, including one shot with teenagers in Salt Lake City. Several key walls in the exhibition are covered with our new wallpaper. It contains apple blossoms and little budding apples, shot in the spring in Utah and California. It’s an index of the real fruit in the real places it grows – the contrast between the photo-realism of the wall and the crafted quality of the art displayed on top of it creates a dialogue between the “real” and the symbolic.

Among the pieces we love best in the show are the various still lives, especially the number of watermelon pieces we’ve found. There are a great number of fruit trees and Mormon Trees of Life (which bear fruit, but of a more mystical kind, often depicted as points of light, floss, or multi-colored delights). In Utah we were especially captured by the number of fruit bowls or baskets, from wax to stone to beadwork. We like the ones that don’t even try to look like real fruit. We discovered the trove of lucite resin grapes that were part of Mormon Relief Society culture in the 1970s. They’re piled near the end of the exhibition, glowing luminously and unnaturally in the light. They’re an eye-catcher, a kind of bedazzlement that combines plastic with our luminous dreams.

PS, We’d like to thank all the institutions, individuals and families who helped us put this together, and especially Micol Hebron and all of the Salt Lake Art Center. We had a great time!

PUBLIC FRUIT THEATER at LACMA

Fallen Fruit — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 22:54:47 +0000

Public Fruit Theater, Los Angeles
By Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) in collaboration with La Loma Development (Marco Barrantes, Michelle Matthews).
November 7th 2010 June 30th 2011, daylight hours.
Corner of S. Fairfax Avenue and W. 6th Street, Los Angeles CA 90036

Come visit our Public Fruit Theater at LACMA! Sit in the theater and watch the fruit tree perform for you.
Sit long enough and you’ll see a whole cycle of growth, or create your own performance.
Fruit theater can be many things.

The Public Fruit Theater is at LACMA, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and is a collaboration between Fallen Fruit and La Loma Development. A circular amphitheater sunk into a lawn, you’ll find it near the corner of Fairfax and 6th street. It’s constructed of urbanite, reclaimed concrete sidewalks – an echo of the city around us. Much of Los Angeles was a citrus orchard before it became a city, concrete displacing trees with people in place of orange blossoms.

At the center of the amphitheater you’ll find a single orange tree, in memorial to the endless groves erased by time. We think of this as a different kind of theatrical site, one where the slow time of the natural growth cycle meets the fast time of urban life. Come sit with us, watch the tree, and watch ourselves as we gather around a symbol of vitality.

The Public Fruit Theater is a garden which features an amphitheater in the round constructed of reclaimed concrete sidewalks curving around a single citrus tree. Located on the corner of Fairfax Ave and W 6th St on the campus of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the piece comments upon the neighborhood’s history as a one-time site of extensive citrus groves. It is also a meditation on today’s prevalence of concrete and the lack of publically accessible or shared fruit trees. It is a nostalgic monument to the orange trees that covered much of Southern California’s landscape for decades and were an integral part of our economy, agricultural history, and identity.

As the last part of Fallen Fruit’s year-long residency at LACMA, the installation is a collaboration between the artists (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) and La Loma Development (Marco Barrantes, Michelle Matthews). Bringing into focus our precarious and often domineering relationship to nature, the dry-stacked broken concrete is a reminder that the streets and sidewalks of our neighborhoods cover what were once orchards. La Loma Development often designs with broken concrete. Recycled concrete is perhaps the most local, sustainable, renewable resource at our disposal, says Marco Barrantes, though instead it often collects in landfill or piles up at recycling facilities. Instead, La Loma used different forms of recycled concrete for the retaining wall, the base, and for the drainage gravel.

Public Fruit Theater- looking toward 6th and Fairfax:

Rather than looking at fruit trees as simply a source of food, Public Fruit Theater highlights the tree as a durational performance. Viewers complete the story through observation, witnessing the tree’s leafing out, blooming, and ripening of its fruit. Fruit trees that exist in public space present us with a question of ownership. Whose fruit is this, and who is the public? People usually think of fruit and trees as static, but to the artists they are a kind of durational performance, one that unfolds over time according to the logic of the seasons: growth, dormancy, fruiting and ripening. The collaborators wanted to give the public a way to relate to this cycle over time.

photos of ‘Public Fruit Theater’ by Fallen Fruit, 2011
EATLACMA.org
LACMA.org
lalomadevelopment.com

FALLEN FRUIT OF UTAH- OPEN CALL: LEND US YOUR FRUIT OBJECTS!

Fallen Fruit — Sat, 16 Apr 2011 18:59:52 +0000

OPEN CALL:
LEND US YOUR FRUIT OBJECTS!

FALLEN FRUIT OF UTAH
June 11 â€“ September 1, 2011
Salt Lake Art Center
www.slartcenter.org
Objects must be submitted by May 9 at noon and received by May 15, 2011

As part of our upcoming exhibition on the history of fruit in Utah, we are looking to include objects of art and everyday objects that represent fruit in some way. This may include aprons, or family pictures of picking fruit or jars of home-made jam from last summer. We are interested in creating a collection of objects that tell the story of fruit in Utah families – both current and throughout history. The pieces we assemble will be shown at Salt Lake Art Center from June 11th, 2011 to September 01, 2011. Please consider your family as a valuable representative of Utah and the spirit of the pioneers!

The materials loaned for this exhibition will be compiled and displayed by the three artists known as Fallen Fruit: David Burns, Matias Viegener and Austin Young. Fallen Fruit has collaborated on fruit and art-related projects around the world for more than 7 years. This is their first exhibition in Utah.

Things we are interested in finding

We are interested in everyday objects, drawings, paintings, photographs or mementos that tell a story about your family and it must relate to fruit in one way or another (regardless of how abstract). Maybe your grandfather has a collection of fruit trees? Are there special dishes that have fruit painted on them? Or heirloom furniture with carved fruit ornamentation? Or earrings, or jewelry? Waxed fruit, paintings- old or new, personal or collected art, handwritten or typed recipes from your great aunt. Was canning or jamming central to your family? Maybe there is an orchard close by? Maybe your aunt or uncle photographed landscapes and some of those pictures are of fruit trees? We are interested in all kinds of fruit-related objects for this exhibition!

How to get involved

Please submit jpg photographs of your family fruit relics by email to fallenfruit@SLartcenter.org with a brief description of the object and its meaning. The submission materials may be recent or historic however, they must be able to be hand-delivered or sent by USPS or UPS to Salt Lake City by May 15th 2011. Please include your contact name, email, and preferred phone number. There is no limit to the jpg’s you may submit, and all pieces included in the exhibition will be insured by the Salt Lake Art Center, and returned to you at the conclusion of the exhibition.

Fallen Fruit of Utah

Fruit trees were planted across the plains of the western United States as a means of sustenance and survival. In 1847, Brigham Young traveled west to Salt Lake City bringing with the pioneers not only personal and familiar artifacts and tools, but fruit trees for planting. We’re interested in what these trees symbolize “the desire for self-sufficiency, not depending on others or outsiders, but also the desire for an earthly paradise” blooming in this case in the desert.

We are excited about the possibility of reorganizing the “Fruit of Utah” into one large exhibition for the summer of 2011 at the Salt Lake Art Center. The Fallen Fruit of Utah draws from the permanent collections of the LDS museum, the Daughters of the Utah Pioneer Museum and The Fairview Museum to name a few. The concept behind this project is bring a selection of historic depictions of fruit in the state of Utah into one place in Salt Lake City. Whether in form of handicrafts, everyday objects or fine art, we hope these objects will speak for themselves to some degree, creating a dialogue on the meaning of fruit to the pioneers and to those who followed.

The objects will evoke the symbolic and practical significance of fruit. Some will be handmade and familiar, others are masterfully painted or sketched. The exhibition creates a different kind of history of the pioneer and the expansion westwards across North America. We’re interested in ideas of place (“this is the place”) and of destiny, making what seems empty full. Our ancestors not only brought hope, but also aspirations, objects of art, family history and of course fruit!

fallen fruit of Utah!

Public Fruit Theater- almost ready for public view!

Fallen Fruit — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 22:20:35 +0000

We are happy to announce that Public Fruit Theater is almost ready for public view!
Situated on the northwest corner of LACMA’s new park grounds, Public Fruit Theater
is near where old citrus groves once formed the Los Angeles landscape.
Public Fruit Theater is a piece we conceived of years ago, and we are so excited that it’s going
to be one of the cornerstones of LACMA’s new landscape.

In this incarnation of Public Fruit Theater, Marco Barrantes and Michelle Matthews of La Loma Development Company, pioneers in green building and the use of “Urbanite,” designed, engineered and constructed the amphitheater which surrounds one orange tree.
Find more info about La Loma on their website:
www.lalomadevelopment.com
Find out more about ‘Urbanite’: Sustainablog:The Recycled, Post-Industrial Green Building Material: Urbanite

The new area of the LACMA grounds behind ‘LACMA WEST,’ are being planted now and will be a beautiful park open to the public – we think an opening party will be in order soon!

Public Fruit Theater, Los Angeles, 2010
By Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) in collaboration with La Loma Development (Marco Barrantes, Michelle Mathews).

This garden is a nostalgic monument to the orange trees that covered much of Southern California’s landscape for decades and were an integral part of our economy, agricultural history, and identity. It also brings into focus our precarious and often domineering relationship to nature. The dry-stacked broken concrete is a reminder that the streets and sidewalks of our neighborhoods cover what were once orchards.

Rather than looking at fruit trees as simply a source of food, Public Fruit Theater upholds the tree as a durational performance. Viewers complete the story through observation, witnessing the tree’s leafing out, blooming, and ripening of its fruit. Fruit trees that exist in public space present us with a question of ownership. Whose fruit is this, and who is the public? If the tree offers us fruit, what do we offer it? Where does the theater begin and the performance end?

Orange and Fairfax at LACMA. just near the site of Public Fruit Theater.

EATLACMA.org
LACMA.org
www.lalomadevelopment.com

EATLACMA was organized by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and made possible by a Museum and Community Connections Grant from MetLife Foundation.
Additional support was provided by the Ralph M. Parsons Fund and Paramount Citrus.

Let Them Eat LACMA! November 7th at LACMA

Fallen Fruit — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 17:03:34 +0000

FIFTY ARTISTS EXPLORE ART, FOOD, CULTURE AND POLITICS IN “LET THEM EAT LACMA”

Fallen Fruit in collaboration with The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), presents Let Them Eat LACMA, a day-long event that explores art, food, culture, and politics on Sunday, November 7th, from noon to 8 pm. LACMA will teem with spectacular and subtle performances and installations that intervene in and activate the museum with surprising explorations into art and food. Let Them Eat LACMA is the culmination of the museum’s collaborative project with Fallen Fruit, EATLACMA, which investigates the social role of art and food and the rituals of eating. Since its launch in February, EATLACMA has included a series of interactive programming along with an exhibition and curated set of gardens on LACMA’s campus that will be on view at the event.

‘Let Them Eat LACMA’ Fallen Fruit, 2010

A tomato fight, a song and story cycle on the mystery of the knife, fork and spoon, an electronic melon drumming circle, Salome seducing her lover through the language of food, and a large Mandala of dinner plates ritually assembled and then dismantled by the public who take home each plate. a selection of food served to prisoners in California jails, chewing carolers, a watermelon eating contest, and belly listening sessions in which we hear digestion at its pinnacle. Jonathan Gold will read a text on Spam to accompany Ed Ruscha’s Actual Size, his painting of a can of Spam. Three Los Angeles muses (Karen Black, Ronee Blakley, and Phranc) will sing for their suppers.

‘Tomato Fight’, Jean Dunning

‘Old-Fashioned’ Jennifer Rubell

Artists and collectives participating in Let Them Eat LACMA include Machine Project, Gina Badger, Karen Black, Ronee Blakley, Lauren Bon, Michelle Carr, Robert Crouch, Cloud Eye Control, DidierHess, Harry Dodge, Jeanne Dunning, Fallen Fruit, Finishing School, Liz Glynn, Jonathan Gold, Veronica Gonzalez, Sean Griffin, Dana Gingras, Liz Hansen, Micol Hebron, Anna Homler, The Infamous Boom Boom!, Dawn Kasper, Emily Katrincik, Killsonic, John Knuth, Kadet Kuhne, Ann Magnuson, My Barbarian, National Bitter Melon Council, Katie Newcom, Gina Osterlogh, Adam Overton, Sun-Yun Park, Phranc, Eva Posey, Miss Barbie-Q., Marco Rios, Roots of Compromise, Jennifer Rubell, Susan Simpson, Slanguage, Asa Sonjasddotter, Squeaky Blonde, Kim Stringfellow, Lisa Teasley, Stephen van Dyck, We Are The World, Michiko Yao, and Bari Ziperstein.

Dana Gingras, ‘What’s Mine Is Yours’

Nov 7th will also be the groundbreaking for “Public Fruit Theater,” Fallen Fruit’s garden at LACMA. It is a theater in the round constructed of reclaimed concrete sidewalks curving around a single citrus tree. The “theater” is the durational performance of the fruit tree in its seasonal cycles, as well as the spectators watching each other watch the tree grow. It comments upon the neighborhood’s history as a one-time site of extensive citrus groves as well as a meditation on today’s prevalence of concrete and lack of publicly accessible or shared fruit trees. The amphitheater for this project was designed in collaboration with Marco Barrantes and Michelle Matthews and constructed by La Loma Development Company. lalomadevelopment.com

EATLACMA
EATLACMA plays the richness of the museum’s permanent collection against the natural growth cycle of gardens to create a year of programming in three acts. EATLACMA has unfolded seasonally to include a curated set of gardens on the museum’s campus; an exhibition curated by Fallen Fruit drawings from LACMA’s collection; and Let Them Eat LACMA, a one-day final event with more than fifty artists and collectives to activate, intervene, and re-imagine the entire museum’s campus and galleries.

EATLACMA exhibitions
Pursuing their ongoing obsession with fruit, Fallen Fruit has curated The Fruit of LACMA, assembling works from the museum’s permanent collection in several forms of media, including painting, photography, and decorative arts. The exhibition will also feature new work by Fallen Fruit, including a picnic table installation, LACMA Event Score – a text piece,Fruit Machine, a series of video portraits of people eating fruit, and Public Fruit Wallpaper, a decorative wallpaper pattern assembled from fruit publicly available, found in Silver Lake, Los Angeles, over the course of one day. Concurrently The Gardens of LACMA will be on view, showcasing artist-designed gardens installed throughout the LACMA grounds. Each artist’s garden examines public space, the actualities and symbols of food, and the people who give these things meaning.
EATLACMA is curated by Fallen Fruit – David Burns, Matias Viegener, and Austin Young – with LACMA curators Michele Urton and José Luis Blondet. For information online, visit eatlacma.org.

General Information: LACMA is located at 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA, 90036. lacma.org.
Museum Hours and Admission: 11 to 8 pm: Adults $12; students 18+ with ID and senior citizens 62+ $8; After 5 pm, every day the museum is open, LACMA’s _Pay What You Wish_ program encourages visitors to support the museum with an admission fee of their choosing.

Art in the Field – EATLACMA Artists on their Gardens & Beyond -

Fallen Fruit — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 03:06:01 +0000

Thursday, October 28 Â· 7:00pm – 9:30pm
Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE)

Six artists or collectives discussing their current gardens, all in the exhibition “The Gardens of LACMA” (June 30 – Nov 7) at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Curated by Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) the exhibition examines the garden in an expanded field. It asks whether a garden can do more than be decorative or be productive – can a garden in fact express an idea, or serve as a container for a set of questions and concepts?

The artists will briefly present their very different gardens, and then follow by asking each other questions about the projects. Questions will then be opened to the audience. Our goal is to have a conversation on the expanded potential of the garden, social practice, and what lies in, on and beyond the garden.

With Lauren Bon and the Metabolic Studio (Jules Rochielle Sievert), Didier Hess (Jenna Didier & Oliver Hess), Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young), National Bitter Melon Council (Hiroko Kikuchi, Jeremy Liu), Roots of Compromise (Karen Atkinson, John Burtle, Ari Kletzky, and Owen Driggs), and Asa Sonjasdotter.

Location Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE)
6522 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA

facebook invite page: www.facebook.com

EATLACMA – Join Lauren Bon and The Metabolic Studio on The Twain.

Fallen Fruit — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 17:31:46 +0000

After more than a year Strawberry Flag by Lauren Bon and the Metabolic Studio is leaving the VA campus in Westwood and, with EATLACMA nearing its end too, this seems an ideal opportunity to share ideas and thoughts, visit the artwork that Lauren’s garden/sculpture at EATLACMA indexes and, in some cases, meet for the first time.

For the next 3 Fridays (Sept 17, 24 + Oct. 1) 1-3pm , the Twain will run from LACMA to the VA and back again, with guest conversationalists narrating the route and exploring issues raised by the artworks at either end. It’s a curated afternoon and would be made ever so much more meaningful with your participation. We’d love you to join us for any of the three remaining Fridays; but next week, Friday September 24, Matias Viegener will be riding with us (along with George Herms, Al Nodal, Ken Brecher, and Matt Coolidge) and it’d be great to see and hear you then.
RSVP: Info@metabolicstudio.org
There are more details at www.strawberryflag.org
find out more about EATLACMA gardens at www.eatlacma.org