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Welcome to Art and Cake!
Art and Cake is an online magazine celebrating contemporary artists and the vibrant Los Angeles art community. Through interviews, essays, photo features, and spotlights, we share stories that amplify diverse voices, spark creativity, and inspire meaningful connection.
Jill Sykes's Icons of Natural Beauty
By Betty Ann Brown "Beauty comes from the balance between two and three dimensions, between abstraction and representation — I seek the equilibrium behind changing appearances."—Henri Matisse Jill sykes by Eric Minh Swenson Jill Sykes creates beautiful paintings of botanical phenomena. Like Matisse, she translates three-dimensional objects into two-dimensional images, occupying the territory between abstraction and representation to achieve balance and equilibrium. From a ve
7 days ago
Crowd-Pleaser: Ken Gonzales-Day Turns the Lens Inward
By Victoria Thomas There's something about a hanging. Whether legal or not, the visual experience seems mythic, supernatural, theatrical, and ritualistic, versus the efficiency of a swift kill. If local authorities greenlight the killing, it's called a hanging. If they don't, the hanging is extrajudicial, and it's called a lynching. Anyone with even the scantiest grasp of American history will know that our country has a sordid romance with lynching — a romance which persists
Jul 20
Rebels with La Causa
By Betty Ann Brown Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, February 22–June 28, 2026 Every moment is an organizing opportunity, every person a potential activist, every minute a chance to change the world.—Dolores Huerta The Royal Chicano Air Force (RCAF, originally the Rebel Chicano Art Front) was an art collective founded in Sacramento in the early 1970s. The visual art members, who focused on printmaking and murals, collaborated with writers, musicians, performers, and teachers. T
Jul 5
Hospital of Emotions
By Melanie Chapman There is much to appreciate about the new pop-up exhibition Hospital of Emotions, currently on view at St. Vincent Medical Center (2131 W. Third Street, Los Angeles) until July 31. But if you want to maximize the benefits of your visit, avoid the bombardment of images now flooding the internet and even consider not reading this review. Like seeing all the best parts of a movie by watching the trailer, it is better to just go, and go soon, with as little adv
Jun 22
The Unbearable Lightness of Yoko
By Victoria Thomas When John Lennon met Yoko Ono in 1966, he had no idea who she was. More remarkably, Yoko was equally unaware of John. This neutral introduction seems impossible for us today, especially for children of the 1960s. But defying mere nostalgia, The Broad meets this challenge with Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind, Ono's first LA museum show, which offers a full season of multi-arts media programming, including the installation of seven digital antiwar billboards acro
Jun 10
Journal of Therolinguistics at Descanso Gardens
By A. Laura Brody What is the language of bat senses and beaver teethmarks? How does water communicate to soil and roots, and how do we translate the paths left by burrowing insects or the markings of trees? These are questions asked by the Journal of Therolinguistics exhibition at Descanso Gardens' Boddy House, on view now until July 5, 2026. Oscar Salguero has curated a fascinating exploration of the expressive worlds of plants and animals brought to life by international a
Jun 5
Lady Praxis: Grace Carter Mercado-Quinn at Antonio Gallery
By Tm Gratkowski With intent and the will to do it her own way, there is a gallery in the most unlikely of places, off the 210 freeway on Lincoln Avenue in Pasadena. Imagine walking into the parking lot of an old lumber yard, stumbling down a paved area past old materials, equipment, and a small cluster of shed-like buildings. Nothing new, no signs, just your average ubiquitous Southern California lot. As you wander in you notice a little welcoming front porch and tucked away
Jun 2
Roomier Than Theatre: A Conversation with Asher Hartman
By Tatou Dede T: How did you end up here, being an artist today? A: I think it depends on how you define the term artist. I was always in theatre since, maybe, kindergarten. When I was a child I used to produce and direct sort of nonsensical plays for my schools, wherever I was, in Oakland, San Francisco, and Berkeley. So every year I produced a very bizarre play that, for some reason, every school had me put on. And then I studied with the Berkeley Rep theater. After that I
May 27
Bruce Weber: Try a Little Tenderness
By Melanie Chapman Timed in conjunction with the Taschen publication "My Education," the first book-form retrospective of photographer Bruce Weber's multi-decade career, the new exhibition now on view at Fahey Klein Gallery, Bruce Weber: Try a Little Tenderness, is worth more than one visit. Likely due to Weber's genre-defining success as a fashion photographer for Calvin Klein, GQ, Vogue, etc., particularly at its height in the 1980s and '90s, the line for the recent gallery
May 25
Zarina Van Ranzow: Let it Bleed and Music for Lovers
By Barbara Patterson Zarina Van Ranzow's debut solo exhibition featuring work from her ongoing series Let it Bleed and Music for Lovers opened on May 8 at STONE/AGE Studios in East Los Angeles. Drawing from archival photographs of the artist's family and portraits of a variety of musicians, the series adapts photographic content into oil and airbrush paintings that pick up where the camera leaves off. Diffusing the harsh, resolute forms that photography's understanding of the
May 24
Monuments That Los Angeles Deserves
By Mary Singh Los Angeles has been in a prolonged conversation about monuments. Co-organized by The Museum of Contemporary Art and The Brick, and co-curated by Hamza Walker, Kara Walker, and Bennett Simpson, earlier this year, "MONUMENTS" brought ten decommissioned Confederate statues into the Geffen Contemporary's vast industrial space, placing them in direct dialogue with contemporary works by nineteen artists. Praised by the Los Angeles Times as "the most significant show
May 19
Chasing Rainbows
By Lacey Argus It's easy to miss the bite-sized rainbows orbiting around the travertine surfaces of The Getty Center's Main Entrance. Some people breeze by them, eager to visit the various galleries that lie just beyond them. Others dash through them as they rush into a crowded bathroom line. Some briefly glance upward at the towering glass light prisms suspended from the atrium enclosing the space. But not children. If you spend an afternoon amongst these rainbows, you're su
May 14
Celeste Dupuy-Spencer: Burning in the Eyes of the Maker
By Melanie Chapman Let the Art (and the Artist) Speak for Itself Outside of the art world, painter Celeste Dupuy-Spencer may not yet be as familiar a name as Jean-Michel Basquiat or Vincent Van Gogh, but to those who followed her artistic growth over the past ten years, she was on her way. Perhaps therein lay the problem. For those who knew Celeste personally and/or had the opportunity to work with her professionally, there is still a profound sense of loss permeating most co
May 11
Spatial Memories: "Photography Into Sculpture" at El Nido
By Coral Pereda Serras Among established and other art spaces in Melrose Hill, sits 1028 N. Western Ave., home to Western Avenue Collective artists studios. This 1922 building hosts 22 artist spaces among which is El Nido, an artist-run curatorial and research space by VC Projects. El Nido, borrowing from its Spanish name, is nested in this distinctly LA courtyard and through "Photography Into Sculpture: An Homage and An Update," emerges as a portal into the imagined memories
May 7
Remnants of an Optimistic Era
By Lorraine Heitzman Erik Otsea's show, Clever Animals & Static at Alto Beta is a menagerie of a different sort. His tabletop ceramic sculptures are quirky but solemn hand-built industrial shapes that suggest machine parts found in abandoned factories or as models for obscure patent applications. They conjure Soviet-style brutalist architecture and futuristic inventions, all simple geometric forms that hint at a bygone time when we believed that life could be improved through
May 5
William Camargo takes photography personally
By William Moreno The painter constructs, the photographer discloses. Susan Sontag, “On Photography” William Camargo’s current exhibit of twenty-four plus works, dated 2019 through 2025, reads as a mini survey, with photographic images and installations thematically placed throughout the modest gallery. It’s his largest showing of works to date. Early in his career, the Anaheim native considered fashion and product photography, photojournalism and conflict reportage, findin
May 2
Alec Egan: "Groundskeeper" at Vielmetter Los Angeles
By Nancy Spiller Alec Egan's painting "Dawn House," in his show "Groundskeeper" at Vielmetter Los Angeles, is tender, serene, and calm — a lavender and peach sky sheltering the triangular top of a house flanked by two palm trees and the tip of a cypress. In its companion painting, "Night House," the sky takes a sinister turn with layers of dark blue, sunset orange, and a roiling strip indicative of flames mixed with what might be smoke. It hints at something of what Egan, his
Apr 28
Gustavo Rimada’s Show “Rhythmic Sequence” Centers His Mexican Heritage and California Life
By Jorge Rodriguez-Jimenez Gustavo Rimada is showing his third solo show and largest to date at Thinkspace Projects. The show, titled “Rhythmic Sequence,” brings together his masterfully vivid acrylic paintings and his newly found love for ceramics. Offering mugs with faces that both haunt and delight, Rimada, who was born in Mexico and raised in California, is blending his Mexican heritage and his California lifestyle to create bold and culturally stunning works of art. Rima
Apr 22
Something Is Happening in Melrose Hill
By Katherine Kesey In the last few years, Los Angeles's Melrose Hill neighborhood has quickly become one of the city's most walkable arts districts. This past Saturday night, there were nearly ten coordinated openings, and I attended almost all of them. Taken individually, the shows were equally captivating. Together, they were a warm and exciting medley of passionate color, lighthearted mystery, and wry humor. Hannah Tishkoff, Beyond Love There is No Belief. 2026. Acrylic, o
Apr 17
Lost in Space: Alicia Piller's Material Cosmology at Track 16
By Kristine Schomaker The work hits immediately. Not one piece — all of it, simultaneously. Large sculptural assemblages covering the walls, a freestanding sculpture in the middle of the room, a piece suspended from the ceiling. The whole gallery feeling like its own solar system, each work a satellite orbiting something enormous and unspoken. Last night, four humans splashed down in the Pacific Ocean after flying around the Moon for the first time in more than fifty years. A
Apr 11
No Dust to Settle: Amir Zaki at Diane Rosenstein Gallery
San Juan Capistrano Library #1 Amir Zaki No Dust to Settle Diane Rosenstein Gallery April 4 - May 9, 2026 by Jody Zellen The saying "waiting for the dust to settle" might refer to when things will calm down and return to normal. It could be said that "the dust never settles" and there is no state of definitive calmness because everything is in flux, both in life and in art. This might be taking the personal into account by reading too much into the title of Amir Zaki's curren
Apr 9
Borrowing a Studio
Studio Loan wants to connect LA artists with the space they need — for free By Kristine Schomaker 60% of artists in Los Angeles don't have a studio outside their home. Or one at all. I think about that number a lot. Because space — or the lack of it — shapes everything. What you can make. How you can show it. Whether you can even invite someone in to see the work. Studio visits matter. Not in some abstract networking way, but in the real, tangible way where someone comes to y
Mar 25
Genie Davis Just Opened a Gallery. Of Course She Did.
Kristine Schomaker and Genie Davis at the Getty By Kristine Schomaker I've known Genie Davis for years. She shows up. That's the first thing you notice about her — and also the thing you never stop noticing, because she just keeps doing it. She's at openings, she's writing reviews, she's telling anyone who will listen about artists she believes in. For over a decade, her blog Diversions LA has been quietly, consistently documenting the Southern California art scene because sh
Mar 15
Liberal Jane Makes Freedom Shareable
By Kristine Schomaker I keep seeing Liberal Jane's work pop up across different platforms - Instagram, obviously, but also sliding through Facebook, saved in Pinterest boards, shared in group chats. This immersion matters more than I think we acknowledge. These aren't gallery pieces waiting for the right audience to find them. They're already embedded in the actual digital infrastructure where people are trying to survive right now. Caitlin Blunnie has been making this work f
Mar 10
50 Over 50: The Best Is Now - Suzanne Gibson's Destination Art Travel
Suzanne Gibson is creating new pieces with new energy and focus. At 50+, their work is more self-dedicated—not about what others expect from them. Me painting in Utah, 2024, photo by event photographer, used by permission for personal use and promotion What's actually hard about being an artist at this point? Being available for themselves. Someone just turned 50 and wants to start making art—what do they tell them? Let's do this. Let's play!!! Do they try to keep up with wh
Jan 28
50 Over 50: You Don't Need Permission - Laurie Freitag's Lost Years
Laurie Freitag is working on finally creating The Lost Years book that she's self-publishing. At 50+, after many years of photographing childhood and memory through the children she cared for as a nanny, it feels like a natural gathering of everything she's been working toward. In the Garden at Chislehurst #7130, Photography, 10”x12”, 2020, self-portrait 50 Over 50: You Don't Need Permission - Laurie Freitag's Lost Years Laurie Freitag is working on finally creating The Lost
Jan 23
Artist Spotlight: Adrienne Kinsella - The Jello Holds Everything
Adrienne Kinsella starts her studio days with movement. Pilates or a hike in Griffith Park before the real work begins, because she's learned—after years of trying to muscle through—that her body needs to move before her art can. Coffee. Something to eat so her brain functions. Then the painting becomes "restorative, strangely restful." It's a practice built around listening to what works, which feels fitting for an artist whose work examines the slippery space between interi
Jan 21
50 Over 50: The Long Way Home - Miguel Ripoll's Post-Digital Practice
What Miguel Ripoll does is highly unusual. At 57, he's been developing for over 25 years a practice based on technology and traditional materials and techniques. He's working with AI-generated fragments from public domain archives, transforming them through hand-crafted digital collage, and then spending hours hand-drawing with ink and pencil on them. The friction between machine logic and human gesture never gets old. It's not about age for him, but about patience. In 1999,
Jan 18
After Zero: Leonie Weber's Cardboard Ruins
By Kristine Schomaker Standing in front of Leonie Weber's cardboard relief at Wönzimer and my brain's trying to sort through everything it's reminding me of—Abstract Expressionism, Nevelson, Bontecou, constructivism, Malevich's Black Square. All these art history touchstones showing up in what's essentially crushed Amazon boxes painted black and mounted on a wall. From a distance it reads as pure gesture—black forms exploding across the surface. But get closer and you see the
Jan 12
In The Middle of Conscious Giving This Holiday Season
By Marina Claire The Middle Becomes Eclectic II is an LA-made small works salon – a large-scale exhibition within an intimate space – of forty Los Angeles area artists. The show’s title is a play on the iconic KCRW alternative radio program that began in LA in 1977. The small works in this exhibit span a wide range of media and styles, all made during the past year, by diverse artists at all career levels, guest curated by Camilla Taylor. The show is on view at The Middle Roo
Jan 2
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