LAVA's 12th Sunday Salon February 27, 2011

LAVA's February wild weekend celebrates history and Bukowski in Downtown Los Angeles
WHAT: Esotouric's 5-tour February architecture and urbanism bus tour series, REYNER BANHAM LOVES L.A., concludes with THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN (2/26, 11am-3pm), followed by a free CHARLES BUKOWSKI lecture and downtown walking tour as part of the monthly LAVA Sunday Salon (2/27, 12pm-5:30pm)
WHERE / WHEN: THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN bus departs 11am, 2/26 from Cafe Metropol, 923 E. 3rd. Street, Los Angeles, CA 90013; LAVA'S SUNDAY SALON is noon-2pm, 2/27 at Clifton's Cafeteria, 648 South Broadway, Los Angeles CA 90014 and THE FLÂNEUR & THE CITY: CHARLES BUKOWSKI walking tour departs 2pm, 2/27 from Clifton's Cafeteria, 648 South Broadway, Los Angeles CA 90014
COST: Bus tour is $58/person, LAVA's Sunday Salon and walking tour are free, but reservations are required for the walking tour
INFO: http://www.esotouric.com/lowdown
http://lavatransforms.org/salon211
http://www.lavatransforms.org/flaneur-hank
323-223-2767

LOS ANGELES- Launched one year ago by Richard Schave and Kim Cooper--the founding Director and Curator of the Downtown Art Walk non-profit--the creative consortium LAVA (The Los Angeles Visionaries Association) has established itself as one of the city's most intriguing arts collectives, with a calendar packed with compelling, offbeat urban events and a growing list of notable Visionary contributors.

And during the last weekend in February, the LAVA calendar is packed with three incredible Downtown events (two of them free) reflecting the group's eclectic diversity, with something to delight and inspire anybody looking for a memorable cultural outing. The events play out in this order...

1) Esotouric's Reyner Banham Loves Los Angeles: The Lowdown on Downtown bus tour, Saturday 2/27, 11am-3pm, $58, departs from Cafe Metropol. Info http://www.esotouric.com/lowdown

Join LAVA co-founder Richard Schave, the founding director of the Downtown LA Art Walk non-profit, on a tour that reveals the secret history, and the fascinating future, of this most beguiling LA neighborhood. THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN is a guided social history of the mysterious, complex and rapidly evolving center of L.A., a thriving neighborhood that was intentionally depopulated in the 1950s and is currently experiencing an extraordinary rebirth. Everyone complains L.A. lacks a center -- this tour explains why. Passengers will visit exquisite architectural gems, including some seldom seen by the general public, but they'll also enjoy a sophisticated analysis of the economic and social tools used to rebuild downtown, learn how gentrification sprung up on the city's meanest streets with all the conflicts that go along with a community's socio-economic shift, meet creative residents and explore unique destinations. Featured locations include the intentionally depopulated Bunker Hill and its Angels Flight funicular railway, Grand Central Market, the concrete design disaster Pershing Square (with its tribute to novelist John Fante), European-style dining alley St. Vincent's Court, the lyrical glass-topped Mercantile Arcade Building (an exact replica of a London landmark) and a visit to artist David Hollen's live/work studio. Get on the bus for the real Lowdown on Downtown, as no one but Esotouric's Richard Schave can reveal it.

2) LAVA's monthly Sunday Salon, Sunday 2/27, 12pm-2pm, Free, Clifton's Cafeteria, Downtown. Info http://lavatransforms.org/salon211

On the last Sunday of each month, LAVA welcomes interested individuals to gather on the third floor of the historic Clifton's Cafeteria for a loosely structured conversational Salon featuring short presentations and opportunities to meet and connect with one another. February's Salon includes a presentation from Visionary John Dullaghan, director of the 2003 documentary "Bukowski: Born Into This." John will lead a discussion about writer Charles Bukowski's youthful experiences in Downtown Los Angeles, from rooming house living on Bunker Hill to early employment at the Biltmore and Los Angeles Times, teenage excursions to the burlesque houses of Main Street, curious forays into the world of broken men along Skid Row's Nickel, and to the Central Library, where he found "Ask The Dust" by John Fante and a model for the writer he knew he could become. Additional Salon programming will be added closer to the event.

3) "The Flâneur & The City: Charles Bukowski" walking tour, Sunday, 2/27, 2:00pm-5:30pm, Free, departing from Clifton's Cafeteria and ending at the King Eddy Saloon, Downtown. Info http://www.lavatransforms.org/flaneur-hank

Following the Salon, a limited number of people are invited to join LAVA co-founder (and host of the Esotouric bus adventure "Haunts of a Dirty Old Man: Charles Bukowski's L.A.") Richard Schave and "Bukowski: Born Into This" documentary director John Dullaghan on a free walking tour of writer Charles Bukowski’s downtown. Urban historian Richard Schave's site-specific discussion series "The Flâneur & The City" is an ongoing attempt to explore some of the more important issues revealed by the constantly changing heart of the Metropolis. This installment begins in the historic core at Clifton’s Cafeteria, and makes its way along Broadway and Main, ending at the corner of 5th & Los Angeles Streets at the King Eddy Saloon, the last surviving Skid Row bar. The tour includes discussion of Bukowski's poem “Downtown” (which references Clifton’s and the nearby amusement arcade), and the history of Main Street’s great burlesque houses (favorite haunts for a teenage Bukowski, as described in his short story “Bop, Bop Against that Curtain”). The tour concludes with a discussion of “Skid Row” then and now. What was 5th Street like in the late 1940s? What did Charles Bukowksi see that we don’t? Finally participants will get a well-deserved beer at the King Eddy Saloon, where Arturo Bandini, the hero of Bukowski’s favorite novel, John Fante’s "Ask The Dust," blew his first royalty check on the B-girls. Reservations are required, and space is limited.

Interested Angelenos are encouraged to come out and be part of some or all of these LAVA events celebrating the city and encouraging connections.

ABOUT LAVA: Through participation in LAVA, a select group of creative professionals come together to promote cultural programming that speaks to the urban experience while promoting positive public space. LAVA's creative partners share a love for L.A. and unique ideas for exploring it in their work. Formed by social historians RICHARD SCHAVE and KIM COOPER -- proprietors of Esotouric bus adventures and the 1947project time travel blog series (including On Bunker Hill and In SRO Land) -- LAVA brings together L.A.'s most visionary promoters, artists, writers and thinkers. The first crop of Visionaries in the growing curated community includes cultural chronicler ADRIENNE CREW, artist and Eastside historian AL GUERRERO, Cacophony Society co-founder AL RIDENOUR, avant garde fashion maven A. LAURA BRODY, poet and publisher ALEIDA RODRIGUEZ, back-to-nature pioneer ALICIA BAY LAUREL, filmmaker and festival promoter ALLISON ANDERS, former Metropolitan Museum curator ALLON SCHOENER, designer/mom of Chicken Boy AMY INOUYE, custom tours maven ANNE BLOCK, documentarian and radio producer ANTHEA RAYMOND, pop culture historian BECKY EBENKAMP, ethnomusicologist BETO GONZALEZ, master puppeteer BOB BAKER, producer and promoter CHRISTIAN VOLTAIRE MEOLI, 826LA events manager CHRISTINA GALANTE, comic and singer COUNT SMOKULA, performance artist CRIMEBO THE CLOWN, Libros Schmibros proprietor and former NEA Director of Literature DAVID KIPEN, green sculptor DONALD GIALANELLA, forensic scientist and educator DONALD JOHNSON, author and educator DOROTHY RANDALL GRAY, visual artist ELENA MARY SIFF, documentarian and exploitation film historian ELIJAH DRENNER, conversation curator ERIC VOLLMER, social connector EVONNE HEYNING, musician and performance artist FEATHERBEARD, photographer GARY LEONARD, pop critic and outsider artist GENE SCULATTI, musician and artist GEORGE EARTH, songsmith HARVEY SID FISHER, theater director HOLLY WITHAM, no-longer-Teenage Glutster food blogger JAVIER CABRAL, horror film director JEREMY KASTEN, musician and composer of silent film scores JIMI CABEZA DE VACA, social historian JOAN RENNER, writer and artist JOE OESTERLE, journalist and author JOHN BUNTIN, documentarian JOHN DULLAGHAN, Musso & Frank co-owner JORDAN JONES, performance artist JULES ROCHIELLE, curator and activist JULIE RICO, "Kristin's List" cultural chronicler KRISTIN BEDFORD, songstress and prognosticator MADAME PAMITA, esoteric scholar and lecturer MAJA D'AOUST, author and broadcaster MANNY PACHECO, performer McCRISTOL HARRIS, journalist and internet radio pioneer MICHAEL LINDER, photographic archivist MICHAEL RISNER, President of the new LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes MIGUEL ANGEL CORZO, poet and dancer MONA JEAN CEDAR, , theater director NICHOLAS HOSKING, L.A. Historic Theater Foundation rep NICK MATONAK, music producer and impresario NO'A WINTER LAZERUS, musician OCTAVIUS, peace activist PAUL NUGENT of the Aetherius Society, 3-D photography expert RAY 3D ZONE, historic ghost seeker RICHARD CARRADINE, filmmaker and preservationist ROSS LIPMAN, Boyle Heights ghost hunter SARAH TROOP, social networking mistress SHAWNA DAWSON, painter/gallerist SUSAN DOBAY, Warhol star and writer TERE TEREBA, metal artist TOM WALKER, musical entertainer THE UKULADY, and hat designer and multi-media artist YASMIN DIXON.

Applications from prospective LAVA members are being taken at http://lavatransforms.org/apply

To learn more about LAVA, please visit http://www.lavatransforms.org

Official Website: http://www.lavatransforms.org/salon211