Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival To Celebrate L.A.'s Vibrant Arts Community

Grand Park will celebrate L.A. artists from April 27-29 at the first annual Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival, a public arts exhibition that will gather diverse and powerful talent from around Los Angeles County and showcase the region's artistic excellence. A tent-pole event that will spotlight Grand Park's ongoing commitment to L.A.'s creative communities, Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival will be a free "best of L.A." performing and visual arts event representing the County's many voices and perspectives. The weekend-long celebration will feature outdoor theatrical and dance performances, storytelling, youth performances, live art and a public marketplace with nearly 30 artists creating and/or selling their work on-site.

With family-friendly programming, Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival will create an opportunity for Angelenos to experience the diverse richness of the County's arts community. Highlights from the festival line-up include The Fountain Theatre's production of Citizen, a provocative meditation on race that fuses prose, poetry, movement, music and visual images; Antics Dance Theatre's Sneaker Suites, featuring dancers, live spoken word poetry and short films; Grand Park's PROUD Stories, a series of spoken word and storytelling performances from the LGBTQ community ; and the Jardin deLArte 2018, a public marketplace showcasing L.A.-based visual artists and crafts people in partnership with Self Help Graphics and DTLA Proud; and two stages featuring DJs and local artists including Garth Trinidad, DJ Tendaji Lathan and Shiva.

"Los Angeles is home to a powerful, diverse arts scene with boundless creativity," said Rachel Moore, president and CEO of The Music Center. "Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival will create a home for these artists and provide a beautiful setting for them to perform and display their work while connecting with new audiences," Moore continued.

"Throughout Grand Park's five-year history, we have been committed to supporting L.A.'s arts community and have helped develop many emerging talented artists," said Julia Diamond, interim director, Grand Park. "By creating, nurturing and sharing art, Grand Park has become a home for artists and a place where art lovers can find common ground and uncover the themes that unite us as Angelenos. We are proud to provide the stage for creativity and expression with Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival and look forward to this festival becoming an annual Grand Park tradition."

With the inaugural theme of "What does it mean to be a citizen?", Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival line-up will probe issues of belonging and alienation as well cultural equity and inclusion. The Fountain Theatre's production of Citizen by Claudia Rankine and adapted by Stephen Sachs will focus on acts of everyday racism through a lyric poem, snapshots and vignettes. Antics' Dance Theatre's Sneaker Suites, a collaboration with story architect Mark Gonzales, will use the virtuosity and hyper-physicality of street dance vocabulary to delve into the diverse and personal relationships that many people have with sneakers, an emblem of street culture and one of the most highly-purchased fashion items and means of self-expression in the world. Grand Park's PROUD Stories will continue its tradition of presenting narratives about how Los Angeles connects people no matter who they are or whom they love. The festival's Jardin deLArte will offer a gathering spot for artists to create and sell paintings, prints, jewelry and other works. In addition, the festival will include youth performances by the Pomona Youth Orchestra, Little Kids Rock, and Jose Hernandez Mariachi Heritage Society, pop-up performances and many other opportunities to experience the arts throughout the park.

A partner with the Department of Cultural Affairs' the Big Read, Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival dovetails with this year's literacy program book selection -- Claudia Rankine's "Citizen: An American Lyric."

For more information about Grand Park's Our L.A. Voices: Spring Arts Festival, and updates about additional performances, visit grandparkla.org/event/ourlavoices2018

About Grand Park

A vibrant outdoor gathering place, Grand Park is a beautiful public park for the entire community in Los Angeles County. With expansive green space for gatherings large and small, Grand Park celebrates the county's cultural vitality and is host to community events, cultural experiences, holiday celebrations, and many other activities that engage and attract visitors from all communities. The 12-acre Grand Park stretches from The Music Center on the west to City Hall on the east and is easily accessible by Metro via the Red/Purple line to the Civic Center/Grand Park station. The park was named one of American Planning Association's 10 "Great Public Spaces" in the U.S. for 2013. Working closely with the county, The Music Center is responsible for all operations and programming for the park. For more information, visit grandparkla.org Follow Grand Park on Facebook (@GrandParkLosAngeles), as well as Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat (@GrandPark_LA).

About The Music Center

The Music Center is Los Angeles' home to the world's greatest artistic programs and events with four iconic theatres and an outdoor plaza. In addition to its four-renowned resident companies - Center Theatre Group, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, LA Opera and LA Phil - The Music Center presents an international dance series, free and low-cost public programming and special events and activities for all ages. From its early days, The Music Center has been a pioneer in arts education and offers a multi-faceted program from K-12. With The Music Center On Location, the non-profit performing arts organization brings programming to locations outside of its Downtown Los Angeles campus. The Music Center also programs and manages Grand Park, a 12-acre adjacent greenspace, with year-round free programming. For more information, visit musicenter.org Follow The Music Center on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat (@MusicCenterLA).

Photo: Antics Dance Theatre, photo courtesy of Javier Guillen for Grand Park/The Music Center

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