Artist Michael McCall (center) shows the way at an art opening in Downtown Los Angeles in 1994.

Artists Holly Tempo, William Rabe and Nena Amsler at SITE Gallery at the Brewery Art Colony in Los Angeles in approximately 1996.

Holly Tempo, a well-known Los Angeles artist, was the gallery director at SITE (an acronym for See It Thru Exhibitions). Rabe and Amsler eventually married and run HAUS Gallery in Pasadena and still exhibit their work regularly around town. No idea whose artwork is there on the wall. This location currently houses i-5 Gallery.

Want to make sure you hit the best opening this weekend? Not a whole lot going on, and the big one here is easy to spot: A two person show WE’RE NOT THE JET SET with Exene Cervenka and Wayne White at Western Projects will attract a half million hipsters and is also two very cool artists doing their thing. Exene does collages that takes a George Herms Beatnik composition style and gives it a nod to popular culture’s more acidic tendencies. Wayne White is the Ed Ruscha of thrift store paintings, managing to improve the hokiest mid-century amateur landscapes along the way.

-Mat Gleason

Western Projects is at 3830 Main Street in Culver City. The opening reception for the show is Saturday, JUly 25 at 5 PM thru 8 PM

Artist PATRICK MERRILL (center) guides his wife thru an extensive art exhibit (Downtown Lives) in November, 1994. Merrill is regarded as one of the great print makers in Southern California over the past 40 years. Here is LINK TO ONE of his recent major prints.

West L.A. Art Dealer Niels Kantor (left) and an unidentified art denizen with an Ed Ruscha artwork to their right in approximately 1994. Niels inherited the Kantor name in an era when there were a hundred times more players in the art game.