Best Things to Do in SoCal and LA This Week: February 23-March 1
A cinematic tribute to Horace Tapscott
Getty Center presents a screening of "Horace Tapscott: Musical Griot" by L.A. Rebellion filmmaker Barbara McCullough, a four-decades-in-the-making tribute to legendary jazz composer Horace Tapscott. Screened in conjunction with the exhibition Photography and the Black Arts Movement, 1955–85, the film is an intimate portrait of Tapscott’s indelible imprint on Black Los Angeles and musical history. After the screening, McCullough joins Getty Research Institute senior research specialist Kristin Juarez for an onstage conversation, offering deeper insight into the moving image as an historical record. To learn more about the L.A. Rebellion, watch the Artbound documentary, L.A. Rebellion: A Cinematic Movement.
1200 Getty Center Dr
Come for the jazz, stay for the community
Jazz Fest: A Black History Celebration brings community spirit together for a family-friendly tribute to the enduring legacy of jazz and its profound impact on Black history. Hosted by Fontana Arts, this free annual festival features live jazz and dance performances, educational workshops, hands-on art activities, and a colorful lineup of local food and art vendors. More than a concert, it’s an immersive cultural gathering to celebrate the creativity and contributions of Black artists whose influence continues to shape America’s cultural soundtrack.
17002 Arrow Blvd
Experience an archive through moving images and materials
UCLA Film & Television Archive presents a screening of Hollywood Television Theatre: Wakako Yamauchi’s “And the Soul Shall Dance” at the Hammer Museum as part of their Archive Television Treasures screening series. Originally staged by the East West Players and adapted for KCET, the teleplay is a haunting drama of Japanese American families navigating the Great Depression in California’s Imperial Valley. Told through the eyes of young Masako, the story captures the quiet resilience and broken dreams of the Issei and Nisei experience. The evening continues with archival materials on view from UCLA Library Special Collections and an in-person Q&A featuring actor Denice Kumagai-Hoy, Densho’s Brian Niiya, East West Players artistic director Lily Tung Crystal, and moderator Karen Umemoto. To learn more about the East West Players, watch the Artbound documentary, East West Players: A Home on Stage.
10899 Wilshire Blvd
Preserving our past and present to safeguard our future
Co-presented by Zócalo Public Square, Japanese American National Museum, and Museum of Contemporary Art, “How Do Museums Resist Censorship?” is a timely and urgent conversation in an era of cultural erasure and political pressure. This panel brings together American Alliance of Museums board chair and museum director Devon Akmon, JANM president and CEO Ann Burroughs, and The Brick director and MONUMENTS co-curator Hamza Walker to explore how museums resist erasure, safeguard truth, and document our shared past, present, and future.
1111 S Broadway
Artist David Salle gets fluid
Sprüth Magers presents “My Frankenstein,” an exhibition of new paintings by David Salle in his first solo show in Los Angeles since 1997. Widely regarded as one of the leading postmodern painters of the past four decades, Salle is known for his “presentational mode,” layering and juxtaposing disparate images into arrangements that feel at once cerebral and emotionally resonant. Like musical chords struck in precise intervals, his artworks orchestrate contrasting visual languages into dynamic compositions that bring the “simultaneity of film montage, into painting.”
5900 Wilshire Boulevard