From the Stephen Raul Anaya Collection, a rare and mostly unseen look at the Santa Monica Pleasure Pier and its surrounds from 1917. Images were pulled from a rare ‘Prospectus Book’, created by its then owner, Mr. Looff (who built the first carousel) hoping to sell shares in his Santa Monica “Pleasure Pier.”
This exhibit is a study of Charles I. D. Looff’s ‘1917 Prospectus Book’ and his Santa Monica Pleasure Pier.
Showing at the Santa Monica History Museum: 11/05/19 - 02/22/20
Over one hundred years ago, volunteer firemen sold a book titled, “Santa Monica Fire Department, Souvenir Book of Santa Monica, 1902” door to door. Legend has it that the newly-established fire department promised to fight fires for those who purchased the book, but made no such promise to those who didn’t.
I first discovered the book years ago in the house I grew up in, which was also owned by Santa Monica Mayor Edmond S. Gillette in the 1930’s. The 1902 book contained 110 interior and exterior photographs of houses and businesses in what we know today as western Santa Monica and a few images from other locations around Los Angeles. When I picked it up again, creating a comparison book seemed like a natural idea.
I spent a few months researching and verifying the locations using 1902 and 1909 Sanborn Insurance Maps, Google Maps and the Santa Monica Digital Library. Once I had all of the addresses confirmed, photographer Jens Lucking and I biked or walked to every location, carefully matched the camera angles, and re-shot the historic photographs. Traversing Santa Monica by foot and bike made me appreciate how the people of the day must have experienced the City. The slower pace of transportation (and life) in 1902 may have allowed them to enjoy the city’s character in a more personal way than most people do today–until now.
“Santa Monica: A Look Back to 1902 from Today” is a side-by-side comparison that was more than a century in the making, a juxtaposition of the past and present as seen through lenses focused on one of California’s most vibrant, accessible and diverse beach cities.
-Michael Murphy
VEDEM underground
We are honored be to the creative director for project VEDEMunderground.
It is a great partnership.
The Smithsonian hails Vedem Underground as one of the 10 “Don’t Miss…” new exhibits
Atlanta’s Breman Museum celebrates its second-largest-ever member opening with Vedem Underground
“The exhibition…manages to tell this crucial, eye-opening and timely story incredibly well.” — ArtsATL
VEDEMUunderground is an art exhibit that deconstructs and reinterprets the literary work of the teenage Jewish creators of the longest-running underground magazine in a Nazi camp. Using a combination of pop-art graphics, archival photographs and cartoons, and the prose and poetry of teenage boy prisoners in Czechoslovakia’s Terezin Ghetto, VEDEMUunderground breaks down the 83 weekly issues totaling the 800 pages of Vedem (“In The Lead” in Czech), then reconstructs them in the form of a contemporary magazine.
Through the exhibit, Vedem, which was produced from 1942-44, is recreated as the original ‘Zine (i.e. a handmade magazine), complete with “Masthead,” “Mission,” “Newsroom,” “Printing Press” and “Circulation” sections as well as panels dedicated to subject matter such as “Columns,” “Features,” “Humor” and “News and Editorial” panels. VEDEMUunderground enlarges the intimate scale of the original publication while mixing and matching works of art with poetry and prose to create a collage in which Vedem is reinterpreted as a work of rebellion and social commentary that remains as relevant today as it did more than 70 years ago.
EXHIBIT DATES
Museum of Tolerance, Los Angeles, May – July 2016
Los Angeles Jewish Community Foundation & The BOX Gallery, January 2017
El Paso Holocaust Museum, March – June 2017
University of Texas at Austin, April – May 2017
Brenham Heritage Museum, Texas, June – Sept. 2017
Texas Historical Commission (four locations), 2017 – 2018
California State Capital Museum (every Jan. and May), permanent collection
Holocaust Museum Houston, June – August 2017
Czech Center Museum Houston, August – January 2018
Amarillo Central Library, January – March 2018
Oregon Jewish Museum & Center for Holocaust Education, Feb. – June 2018
Texas A&M University, March – May 2018
Atlanta’s Breman Museum, October 2018 – March 2019
Dallas Love Field Airport, January – May 2019
AMA-CON (Amarillo’s Comicon), August 2019
Illinois Holocaust Museum, TBD
Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust, TBD
Florida Jewish Museum, Miami, TBD
he Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center of Florida, TBD
Naples Holocaust Museum, Florida, TBD
Classrooms Without Borders (4 locations), Pittsburgh, TBD
