May 23 — Nico B. Young

Back in LA after a long tour. I caught up with friends and then took a quick trip to the bay to see In Concert- the gallery space where I would be having a solo show. And then another quick trip up to Owens Lake, for a bike ride.

Stella and Aidan's birthday by the LA river

Maya got a space in Dajin's studio.

Maya and her grandparents Bill and Sue at her brother Zev's college graduation.

Zev at home on his graduation night.

I flew to SF, which I'd never done, and was pleased to see these Wayne Thiebaud paintings in the airport.

Gabe and Natalia

Gabe in his studio, which belonged to a harpsichord builder before him.

Gabe assembled ephemera left over from the harpsichord studio into this piece

Gabe drove us to SF to his gallery

This is the space my show would be in.

In Concert's space was shared/hosted by Cushion Works gallery. There were two gallery spaces, one large and one small, which the two different galleries would trade out each show. My show would be in the smaller space.

In Concert had this show up, by Dorian Reid

Cushion Works Gallery was hosted inside Cushion Works, a cushion factory in SF. Their bottom floor had a showroom of all their sample cushions, some of the comfiest I've ever felt.

There was an opening at the Oakland Museum of Art for a show about the different progressive arts studios in the bay area.

Gabe helped work on the show, since he works for NIAD.

I got to meet Dorian Reid, whose show was up at In Concert.

Gabe drove me to SFO

We stopped and got pizza at Arizmendi

Then he stopped to show me Sign Hill in South SF

We took our pizzas up there to eat. Arizmendi gives you a little bonus slice of yesterday pizza.

Then I went back to LA to make my work for the show.

Aidan and Eliot in Elysian park

Eliot in his garage studio with a new shelf and a new painting of washing hands.

Then Maya and I drove up to Owens Lake, for CLUI's new Swansea exhibit.

Hunter organized a bike ride across the lakebed, as part of his Infrastructure group ride series.

Soon after we started the ride across the dry lakebed, a truck pulled off the freeway and stopped to ask what we were up to.

He had come down from Nevada to pan for gold. Supposedly this year's historic snowmelt had stirred the creeks up so much that there was a '2023 gold rush'.