Wallace Berman, Robert Branaman, Joan Brown, Bruce Conner, Jean Conner, Jay DeFeo, Wally Hedrick, George Herms, Alvin Light, Michael McClure, Manuel Neri, and Carlos Villa
The Rat Bastard Protective Association
the Landing
5118 W. Jefferson Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90016
October 1, 2016 – January 7, 2017
Film screening/play reading: December 11, 6 pm

Now on view at the Landing, The Rat Bastard Protective Association is a group exhibition organized by Dr. Anastasia Aukeman, author of Welcome to Painterland: Bruce Conner and the Rat Bastard Protective Association (University of California Press, 2016). The Rat Bastard Protective Association (RBPA) was a community of artists who lived and worked together in the late ’50s and early ’60s in San Francisco’s “Painterland”—the area in and around 2322 Fillmore Street. Upon his arrival to San Francisco in 1957, Bruce Conner established the RBPA, deriving the name from the combination of a local trash collection company—the Scavengers Protective Association—and a slur “picked up at the gym.” The exhibition at the Landing is the first exhibition of work by the RBPA since 1958, when the group led a parade to their exhibition at San Francisco’s Spatsa Gallery.

December 11, the Landing presents screenings of Robert Branaman’s Excerpts from The Fillmore Bus & other films (c.1960), and Paul Beattie’s Scenes from Tap City Circus (1960) featuring George Herms. Robert Branaman will be present at the screening. The evening will also include a live action reading of The Beard (1965), a play by Michael McClure, directed by Russ Tamblyn and starring Liz Nolan as Jean Harlow and Tyler Ritter as Billy the Kid.

Please note that the Landing will be closed November 23 through December 3.

 

Installation view, The Rat Bastard Protective Association at the Landing, Los Angeles, 2016. Courtesy of the Landing.

Installation view, The Rat Bastard Protective Association at the Landing, Los Angeles, 2016. Courtesy of the Landing.


 
Installation view, The Rat Bastard Protective Association at the Landing, Los Angeles, 2016. Courtesy of the Landing.

Installation view, The Rat Bastard Protective Association at the Landing, Los Angeles, 2016. Courtesy of the Landing.


 
Wallace Berman, Collaged mailer, c. 1960's. Collage on cardstock, 6 x 3 inches. Courtesy of the Landing.

Wallace Berman, Collaged mailer, c. 1960’s. Collage on cardstock, 6 x 3 inches. Courtesy of the Landing.


 
Wally Hedrick, Tenzing Zindabad, 1956. Oil on canvas, 40 x 44 inches. Courtesy of the Wally Hedrick Estate, The Box, and the Landing.

Wally Hedrick, Tenzing Zindabad, 1956. Oil on canvas, 40 x 44 inches. Courtesy of the Wally Hedrick Estate, The Box, and the Landing.


 
Installation view (works by Joan Brown), The Rat Bastard Protective Association at the Landing, Los Angeles, 2016. Courtesy of the Landing.

Installation view (works by Joan Brown), The Rat Bastard Protective Association at the Landing, Los Angeles, 2016. Courtesy of the Landing.