The UCLA Arts Party is back for a second year, featuring the same trio of Westwood art havens. The UCLA Hammer Museum, Fowler Museum of Cultural History and Royce Hall will band together to host three nights of arts and culture offered exclusively to UCLA students.
Today’s events begin on The Hill. The Office of Residential Life will host “Lights, Camera, Technology!,” a workshop on expression through digital media.
On Wednesday, students are invited to the Hammer Museum for dinner at food trucks and live music by KCRW DJ Jeremy Sole. The Hammer Museum will also host interactive workshops inspired by the Hammer Museum’s “All of This and Nothing” exhibit, which is focused on everyday life experiences.
Leah Dieterich, creator of the blog thxthxthx.com, will be among the special guests at the Hammer Museum. She invites students to join her in thank-you note writing to post on the museum walls. She has made a habit of writing a thank-you note each day, since October 2009.
“Writing thank-you notes was something that my mom always instilled in me. … I felt like they were really rare,” Dieterich said.
Hammer Museum attendees can also explore the history of games by finding board games, arcade games, kinetic games and live-action games stationed around the museum or learn to video jockey by taking live footage of the party. These are just a few of the events tied in to the Hammer Museum’s theme.
On the final day, Thursday, festivities will move to the Fowler Museum and will revolve around identity and exploring alter egos. Scheduled events were inspired by two exhibitions currently on display, one which features masks and artifacts from the “Central Nigeria Unmasked” exhibition, and another which features works by contemporary artist Allan deSouza on identity and alter egos.
Bonnie Poon, manager of public programs at the Fowler Museum, said that this year’s events will be more hands-on.
Daring students can sign up in advance to get their torsos transformed into physical art by a body painter or learn to make up their own faces with fairy swirls or realistic gashes. Those less partial to body art can still accessorize their alter egos by making masks or participating in the “BLANK-on-a-stick” workshops where mustaches, glasses ““ anything ““ can go on the stick. Before leaving, students can hop in a flipbook-making photo booth to act out fantasy stories about their new identities.
“I think a lot of times an alter ego can be an inner child, or it can be an aspect of yourself that you don’t feel like you can normally express. That’s what we’re going to try and help students find when they come to the Fowler,” Poon said.
After channeling alter egos, students can listen to a concert at Royce Hall, presented by the Student Committee for the Arts. Dawes, a five-piece folk group that has worked alongside Wilco’s Pat Sansone, will grace the stage.
“We want to bring people to Royce Hall … to see what an amazing venue it is, because you really can’t go four years and not see it,” said Kate Stimac, third-year political science student and marketing director for the committee.
Stimac explained that the main goal of the event is to create an entry point for students in hopes that they frequent arts venues more often.
“The whole idea behind Arts Party … is that we want to try and educate students about all the world-class artists that are at their disposal being here at UCLA,” Stimac said.