Arts Orgs Announce 10-Week Festival for 2010

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES — As mentioned on Wednesday, the LA Opera headed a list of fifty arts and culture organizations set to make a major announcement at a press event this morning. There’s little need to attend the actual event, though, since the organizers gave the Times an extensive preview of what’s to come, a ten-week arts festival to take place around the city in 2010.

In what could be the region’s most ambitious, broadest-based artistic endeavor since the 1984 Olympic Arts Festival, Los Angeles Opera will join forces with more than 50 Southern California arts and educational institutions to stage a 10-week festival in spring 2010 inspired by the opera company’s upcoming production of Richard Wagner’s epic “Ring” cycle.

The launch of Ring Festival L.A., which will include a variety of performances, symposiums, concerts, special exhibitions and film screenings, will be formally announced this morning by L.A. Opera General Director Plácido Domingo. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, county Supervisors Gloria Molina and Zev Yaroslavsky and philanthropist Eli Broad, whose $6-million foundation gift is underwriting the “Ring,” as well as a number of local arts representatives, are expected to attend.

… Several top local arts administrators expressed enthusiasm for the project, which they compared to the Olympic Arts Festival, an extension of the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. The $11-million Olympic festival was held at venues ranging from 99-seat theaters to the Rose Bowl and included public art projects such as the commissioning of murals by Frank Romero and Willie Herron. It has been credited with helping promote L.A. as a cultural destination, bringing internationally renowned artists, such as Pina Bausch, to the city and fostering creative collaborations, some of which endure to this day.

A number of Downtown groups will be participating, including the LA Opera, Center Theatre Group, Colburn School, Latino Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Art. The festival is planned to run April 15 through June 30, 2010.