DRAFT BY SHERI MOBLEY 11/16/11
Public Art Project Aims to End Rape in Los Angeles
Recreation of Seminal 1977 Performance Three Weeks in May Artist Suzanne Lacy and LACE Present New Work in January 2012, Part of Pacific Standard Time
LOS ANGELES -December 1, 2011 - Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE) presents Three Weeks In January, a new work of public art by artist Suzanne Lacy in partnership with Los Angeles student and arts groups, political organizations and civic institutions including the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). Re-creating key aspects of an original 1977 artwork titled Three Weeks in May, the new event focuses on where Los Angeles is now - thirty years into the anti-rape movement - and how violence against women can end. Three Weeks in January is part of the Gettys Pacific Standard Time Performance and Public Art Festival (January 19-29, 2012) organized by LA><ART and The Getty Research Institute. A hallmark of the Three Weeks in January art project is the Los Angeles Rape Map, installed at the LAPD in downtown Los Angeles, on which young women and men mark, each day for three weeks, the prior days police reports. Surrounding this activity there will also be a press conference featuring Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, and Critical Conversations, multi-vocal events with partnering organizations that take place in January at the site of the map and elsewhere in the L.A. region. As in the original work, art is the platform to organize a series of consciousness-raising sessions, and other productions and presentations that collectively bring renewed focus on the effort to end rape. The initial Three Weeks in May project had a forceful political imperative: to bring hidden experiences of gender-based violence to public attention. The 1977 project engaged the city and its politicians and media in an examination of how rape impacted Los Angeles women. In its time, it played a radical role in public exposure. Lacys epic civic event Three Weeks in May stood at the forefront of a movement changing the way society viewed sexual violence, wrote journalist Cara Baldwin in the prestigious art publication, Art in America. Now, over thirty years later, we can no longer say that rape is unspoken, nor that services and policies do not exist, says artist Suzanne Lacy. Yet violence against women remains, locally and globally, with implications more pronounced than ever. This project will mobilize young women, men, and an intergenerational coalition across the region to consider next steps in an ever-increasingly necessary and prominent agenda against violence. As part of the form and structure of Three Weeks in January, the work includes activism, education, media, city politics and art, and participants from all of these areas. A schedule of 30+ events, organized across the Los Angeles metropolitan region, will begin on January 12 and continue through February 1. [Link] Other featured events include: the mobilization of students at high schools, college campuses, and community organizations to host consciousness-raising conversations and to attend a
candlelight ceremony on January 27 at the site of the map. Storying Violences a performance of policy deliberation by experts in rape prevention and education, legislative advocacy, criminal justice, the media, and direct service delivery.
The Three Weeks in January advisory board includes Gail Abarbanel, Founder and Director, The Rape Treatment Center; Chief Charles Beck, Los Angeles Police Department; Deputy Mayor Eileen Decker; Jodie Evans, Co-Founder, CODEPINK; Olga Garay-English, Executive Director, Department of Cultural Affairs, Los Angeles; Patti Giggans, Executive Director, Peace over Violence; Wendy Greuel, Los Angeles City Controller; Cora Mirakitani, President and CEO of the Center for Cultural Innovation; Councilwoman Jan Perry; Ruth Slaughter, former Vice President of Community Outreach Prevention and Education Programs at PROTOTYPES; Amy Elaine Wakeland, Board Member, Just Detention International; Lisa Watson, Executive Director, Downtown Womens Center. Additional information and the complete event schedule for Three Weeks in January is available at [Link]. ###
ABOUT LACE LACE champions and challenges the art of our time by fostering artists who innovate, explore, and risk. We move within and beyond our four walls to provide opportunities for diverse publics to engage deeply with contemporary art. In doing so, we further dialogue and participation between and among artists and those audiences. [Link]. LACE (Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions) 6522 Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles CA 90028 Gallery Hours: Wed - Sun 12 - 6pm, and Thu 12 - 9 pm Suggested donation $3, Members free SUPPORT Support for LACE and its programs are provided by the Getty Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, James Irvine Foundation, Jerry and Terri Kohl Family Foundation, Los Angeles County Arts Commission, The Mohn Family Foundation, Morris Family Foundation, the Audrey & Sydney Irmas Charitable Foundation, the Visual Artists Network, a program of the National Performance Network, Stone Brewing Co., and the members of LACE. ABOUT PACIFIC STANDARD TIME Three Weeks In January is part of Pacific Standard Time, an unprecedented collaboration of more than sixty cultural institutions across Southern California, coming together to tell the story of the birth of the L.A. art scene. Initiated through grants from the Getty Foundation, Pacific Standard Time will take place through March 2012.