As we face an era of uncertainty, the words of Corita Kent — “Doing and making are acts of hope” — resonate more deeply than ever.
Hope is more than an emotion. It is an ongoing commitment to creating a better future. To honor this spirit, we are pleased to announce that Corita Art Center is relocating to downtown Los Angeles’s vibrant Arts District. The move—which comes with the loving support of the Immaculate Heart Community who gave Corita her first home—ensures that her legacy reaches new generations of creators, thinkers, dreamers, and change-makers.
Opening our doors on March 8th, 2025, this new chapter invites everyone to participate in building a world of justice, creativity, and possibility, where hope is created through collective action.
Let’s celebrate Corita’s living legacy and open these doors together.
With determination and optimism,
Corita Art Center
Board of Directors
Click here for the full news release
We are pleased to announce that Corita Kent will be included in the Holy See Pavilion as part of the 60th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale, which will take place from April 20 to November 24, 2024.
Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça, Commissioner and Prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education of the Vatican, has appointed Chiara Parisi and Bruno Racine as the pavilion curators. The title of the exhibition, With My Eyes, refers to a sonnet by Shakespeare and echoes the Book of Job.
Focusing on the theme of human rights and the diverse experiences of marginalized communities, the pavilion will be presented on Giudecca Island at the Casa di Reclusione Femminile, in collaboration with the Department of Prison Administration of the Ministry of Justice. The pavilion is located on a 12th-century historical site, which was transformed into a women's prison in 1859. In this extraordinary context, the Holy See Pavilion represents a site of artistic dialogue that goes beyond the Venice Biennale’s usual exhibition boundaries, intending to cultivate a culture of encounter, a central theme to Pope Francis’ Magisterium.
Alongside works by Corita Kent, the pavilion will include contributions from internationally renowned artists Maurizio Cattelan, Bintou Dembélé, Simone Fattal, Claire Fontaine, Sonia Gomes, Marco Perego & Zoe Saldana, and Claire Tabouret, with a special contribution from Hans Ulrich Obrist. Bringing together artists and poets alongside the women’s prison inmates and staff, the project aims to create a constellation of unique artistic experiences and practices.
The Holy See Pavilion is one of ninety national presentations taking place at the Giardini, the Arsenale, and throughout the city of Venice. More information about the 60th Venice Biennale here.
An official press conference will take place in early March at the Holy See Press Office, where more details about this exciting project will be unveiled.
Join Corita Art Center at The Preserve on March 7 as we host Ken Lum for a presentation themed around the double lives of artists. This is second talk in CAC’s new lecture, programming, and exhibition series: Catching Sight, which explores the role of photography in Corita's art, ideas, and pedagogy. As the lecture series evolves, it will expand beyond the theme of photography into other intersecting points of inquiry, creating a forum for diverse perspectives and artistic practices.
I think there are a lot of really interesting figures who are outliers to the system of art, who offer all kinds of lessons for the art world.
Ken Lum on Corita Kent
Artist, writer, and curator Ken Lum will deliver a lecture that intersects his own practice with Corita’s, themed around notions of ambivalence, double lives, and the boundaries of art and non-art.
Click here to reserve your free tickets
Brain Powered Arts + Crafts with Ana Dziengel
Thursday, October 5th, 6pm PST
Los Angeles, CA - Lazy Acres Los Feliz
When you exercise the brain with new activities, new connections are created which can help your neuroplasticity! Join us in learning new creative techniques while creating masterpieces. From bread sculptures to herb weaving, these relaxing retro crafts will get your creative juices flowing and keep your brain sharp with artist and educator Ana Dziegel.
Learn more here.
There Should Be New Rules Next Week: Jen Delos Reyes + Nellie Scott
Thursday, October 5th, 4pm EST
Worcester, MA - Holy Cross University
Corita Kent’s art will appear alongside the works of contemporary artists showing her continued influence. Breanne Trammell, Mary Banas, Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo, Roz Crews, Jen Delos Reyes, Christine Sun Kim, Jorge Lucero, Mary Lum, Maria del Carmen Montoya, Aaron Rose, and Lee Walton will all be featured.
Learn more here.
Seed Scenes with Ana Dziengel
Saturday, October 7th, 10am PST
Los Angeles, CA - Lazy Acres Los Feliz
Using small but mighty seeds, beans, and grains, kids will learn how to make unique mosaic masterpieces on a cardboard “canvas”. We will paint the creations to give our mosaics a pop of color. Join us with artist and educator, Ana Dziengel, as we make art and learn about the smallest of foods that fuel us.
Learn more here.
Friday, October 13th, 7pm EST
New York, NY - Anthology Film Archives
To celebrate the release of the new book, Ordinary Things Will Be Signs for Us: Photographs by Corita, published by J&L Books and Magic Hour Press, 2 rarely-seen short films about Corita Kent will be screened. The event will be hosted by the book's editors, Julie Ault, Jason Fulford, and Jordan Weitzman, as well as contributor Olivian Cha, Senior Curator of Corita Art Center, and will be followed by a reception. Books will be available to purchase in-person.
Learn more here.
We are excited to announce that CAC is a Creative Recovery LA grantee! The Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture recently announced their historic investment of over $31 million in 750+ arts, cultural, and equity-building organization, made possible by American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA).
This grant helps CAC to keep going. Lifting our continued arts education endeavors and work to make the CAC collection more accessible through digitization. Thank you to the LA County Arts team and the leadership of LA County Arts & Culture director Kristin Sakoda for being a champion for creatives, and 5th District Supervisor Kathryn Barger.
On Saturday, June 24 at 4 p.m., we will gather at the main stage of the LA Design Festival to celebrate the release of a book that is devoted to the Ten Rules. Contributors Juliette Bellocq, Lenore Dowling, Haven Lin-Kirk, and Karina Esperanza Yánez will appear in conversation with Sheharazad Fleming.
When: Saturday, June 24, 4 p.m.
Where: LA Design Festival
ROW DTLA (Main Stage)
777 S Alameda St, Los Angeles, CA 90021
The event is free and no registration is required
Juliette Bellocq is a graphic designer. Through her studio, Handbuilt, she collaborates with space-makers, educators, designers, and artists to provoke civic and cultural experiences.
Lenore N. Dowling, IHM, is a member of the Immaculate Heart Community and a former colleague of Corita Kent's at the Immaculate Heart College Art Department, where she taught film classes.
Sheharazad Fleming is an Iranian-American creative director. She is President of the community design studio WE MUST BE BOLD, and Chief Creative Officer of The Great Discontent, a storytelling platform that amplifies the work of emerging artists in underrepresented communities.
Haven Lin-Kirk is an artist and award-winning designer, as well as dean and faculty member at USC Roski School of Art and Design.
Karina Esperanza Yánez is a visual art and social science educator from South Central Los Angeles with a history of working in arts education and arts management. Her goal is to provide students with the necessary tools to become creative in their own right as young artist and positively engage with their communities.
In the 1960s, artist, educator, and social justice advocate Corita Kent asked her students to collectively reimagine what a learning environment could be. Their contributions comprised the now widely-recognizable Immaculate Heart College Art Department Rules (commonly referred to as “Ten Rules”).
In the ensuing decades, this perennial work has gone on to lovingly hang in classrooms, studios, and homes of individuals and groups as they explore their own creative pursuits. Chronicle Books has invited 20 artists and writers—comprised of former students and contemporaries of Corita, artists, organizers, and thought leaders—to revisit this everlasting list through their own words and work.
The wide-ranging roster of contributors includes Rebeca Anaya, Gail Anderson, Juliette Bellocq, Lisa Congdon, Dan Paley, Eric Dever, Lenore Dowling, Jeffrey Gibson, Vashti Harrison, Jen Hewett, Howsem Huang, Erin Jang, Amos Paul Kennedy, Haven Lin-Kirk, Barbara Loste, MacFadden & Thorpe, Mickey Myers, Carissa Potter, Natacha Ramsay-Levi, Karina Esperanza Yánez.
About LA Design Festival
June 22-25: design for the people.
Social, technological, environmental, political, and economic shifts are changing the way our future will look at lightning speeds.
Design is, at its root, optimistic problem-solving and provides aesthetic and structure to guide change.
As a global design capital, Los Angeles has the opportunity to create a space for collaborative engagement with creatives from all corners of our city and world.
Designing for the people encompasses voices from all walks of life, backgrounds, creative practices, educational experiences, and places of origin including those that are often excluded, dismissed or overlooked.
LA Design Festival provides a place for creatives to explore, collaborate and engage with other members of the design community.
On Saturday, June 17, join Berkeley-based writer and illustrator Bethany Kaylor for the latest installment of our Corita 101 virtual workshop series. This workshop is presented in partnership with Girls Garage, a nonprofit design and construction school for girls and gender-expansive youth ages 9-18.
We hope you will join us for this fun and participatory event, open to people of all ages and backgrounds, where you will learn how use everyday tools and materials to create your very own zine, inspired by Corita’s artworks and creative prompts.
Time: June 17, 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. PST
Register here for this free, virtual event
You will need the following materials:
- 8.5x11" white computer paper
- black pen
- markers
- scissors
- glue or tape
- optional collage materials (like magazines or newsprint)
About Bethany Kaylor:
Bethany Kaylor is a writer and illustrator living in Berkeley, CA. In addition to her work as the communications manager at Girls Garage, she writes longform reported essays and short fiction. Her work can be found on Salon, Sonora Review, Mid-American Review, and elsewhere.
About Girls Garage:
Girls Garage is a nonprofit design and construction school for girls and gender-expansive youth ages 9-18 in the Bay Area. Through classes in carpentry, welding, architecture, and activist art, we support and equip a community of fearless youth who are building the world they want to see. Established 2013.
This project was made possible through the Community Impacts Arts Grant thanks to the Department of Arts and Culture Los Angeles
The City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA) Performing Arts Division(PERF) launched a new initiative to spotlight and celebrate women who have impacted and redefined the human experience and who epitomize empowerment through the arts, activism, and social justice. In 2023, the festival’s inaugural year, DCA will honor the work of: Corita Kent, an American artist, designer, educator, and social justice advocate; and Dolores Huerta, an American labor leader, and civil rights activist, co-founder of the National Farm Workers Association.
The Empowerment: Corita + Dolores celebration will include three days of performing arts, screenings of documentaries, and service through art activities at DCA’s Lankershim Arts Center at 5108 Lankershim Boulevard, North Hollywood, CA 91601. This event is free and open to the public. Due to limited space, reservations are suggested.
A celebration of Corita Kent + Dolores Huerta in spoken word and dance featuring the work of Teresa Barcelo, Jacqueline Rose Bernstein, Marisa Ervin, Mandy Kahn, Vanessa Kruz, Rosalynde LeBlanc, Sadie Yarrington, and Leah Zeiger.
Art Activities from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Button-making and art activities are presented by the Corita Arts Center. Families and all skill levels are encouraged!
Screening and Discussion from 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.
A film screening of Rebel Hearts. The film documents the history of the Immaculate Heart Community as they fought for equality, their livelihoods, and freedom against patriarchal systems. The screening will be followed by an intergenerational conversation, featuring Lenore Dowling, IHM, and Desiree Sanchez, moderated by the Director of the Corita Art Center, Nellie Scott.
Performance at 7:00 p.m.
Empowerment: Corita + Dolores
A celebration of Corita Kent + Dolores Huerta in spoken word and dance featuring the work of Teresa Barcelo, Jacqueline Rose Bernstein, Marisa Ervin, Mandy Kahn, Vanessa Kruz, Rosalynde LeBlanc, Sadie Yarrington, and Leah Zeiger.
Blessing at 8:30 a.m.
The Aztec dance troop, Danza Divina de Los Angeles, will perform a sacred blessing.
Wellness Fair and Art Activities from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
Silk-screening, art kits, and crafts activities presented by Self-Help Graphics & Art, Inc.
Screening and Discussion from 2:00 p.m. to 5 p.m.
A film screening of the documentary Dolores followed by a conversation with the film's Director, Peter Bratt, and Ms. Dolores Huerta (who will appear virtually).
Don't miss our events all over the greater Los Angeles area this April!
April Open House at CAC
Please join us at the Corita Art Center on Friday, April 14, from 4 - 7 p.m. for our monthly open house series at our location in Hollywood.
Save the date for our future open house events:
April 14
May 12
June 9
July 14
All open house events are from 4 - 7 p.m. No RSVP necessary!
Corita Art Center
5515 Franklin Avenue
Los Angeles, 90028
Enter on Western, look for the Corita Art Center sign!
Due to limited parking, we encourage participants to ride share, Metro, bike, or walk.
Image courtesy Even Keel Photography.
Fab Lab Presents: Approaches to Artmaking with the Corita Art Center
CAC curator and collections manager Olivian Cha will give a brief introduction to Corita's life and work, followed by a closer examination of the role that photography played in her artistic and pedagogical practice.
Following the presentation, the Corita Art Center and Altadena Library will co-present a workshop centered on one of Corita's favorite teaching tools: the viewfinder. Attendees will receive custom 3D printed viewfinders created in the Fab Lab—a space for Altadena's community of DIY makers and artists—and will have the opportunity to become members of the Fab Lab.
Saturday, April 8, 2023
10:30 a.am. to 1 p.m.
Altadena Main Library
600 E. Mariposa St.
Altadena, CA, 91001
About The Fab Lab:
Located in the Main Library, the Fab Lab makes a wide array of making, crafting, and creating tools available for free to all kinds of people. At the Fab Lab you can work on your creative exploration with some basic materials provided and make projects in a safe, welcoming, community of fellow explorers and learners.
Image: still from Baylis Glascock's "We Have No Art," 1967, film, 26 min.
SAVE THE DATE: Corita and Dolores at the Lankershim Arts Center
Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA) Performing Arts Division celebrates female ingenuity and creativity through its annual Empowerment event from April 28 to April 30, 2023.
Each year, two women who contributed to the world artistically and passionately will be recognized and acknowledged and their work and impact will be highlighted. To further support this celebration, new works by other artists inspired by these legends will also be presented.
DCA is honoring Corita Kent and Dolores Huerta at its Lankershim Arts Center for the inaugural year of this pilot program. This event, inspired by two courageous women, will include performing arts presentation, screenings of films about their lives, and panel discussions on the topic of female empowerment.
Friday, April 28 to Saturday, April 30, 2023
5108 Lankershim Boulevard
North Hollywood, CA 9101
Stay tuned for more details!
Don't miss our March events taking place all over greater Los Angeles!
Please join us at the Corita Art Center on Friday, March 10, for the first of our monthly open house series at our location in Hollywood! We’ll be open to the public from 4 to 7 p.m. Be sure to save the dates for our upcoming open house events:
March 10
April 14
May 12
June 9
July 14
All events 4 to 7 p.m. No RSVP necessary!
…
5515 Franklin Ave, Los Angeles, CA, 90028 (enter on Western — look for the Corita Art Center sign!)
Due to limited parking, we encourage participants to ride share, Metro, bike, or walk.
The image above by Even Keel Photography.
Join us at the Frederick R. Weisman Museum of Art at Pepperdine University for a Family Art Day full of fun activities for all ages. Held in conjunction with their environmentally-focused exhibition To Bough and To Bend, this day of nature walks, crafts, readings, gallery tours, and kid-friendly food is a collaboration with Third Space, an exciting new space fostering care, connection, and creativity being launched by the Boys & Girls Club of Malibu. Ana Dziengel will present activities inspired by Corita Kent, whose work is featured in the exhibition.
About Ana:Ana Dziengel is an architect and furniture designer turned blogger at Babble Dabble Do. Her 2018 book STEAM Play & Learn and has sold over 10,000 copies to date. She started Camp STEAM in 2017 and Afterschool STEAM in 2018 in the Los Angeles area to bring STEAM projects to her local community
....
Saturday, March 11, 2023
11 a.m. to 3 p.m.Frederick R. Weisman Museum of Art24255 E Pacific Coast Hwy, Malibu, CA 90263
March Workshop at Angel's Gate Cultural Center: Screen Printing with the Corita Art Center and Calimucho
In honor of Women's History Month, we are thrilled to partner with Angel's Gate Cultural Center for their March Family Art Workshop. This free event will be facilitated by Calimucho Screen Printing, who will lead a hands-on activity creating posters with Corita-inspired messages.
...
Saturday, March 18th, 2023
1 to 2:30 p.m.
Angels Gate Cultural Center
3601 South Gaffey Street Los Angeles, CA 90731
The event is in person with limited attendance, so be sure to register early. If the event is sold out, we still encourage you to come in case there are no-shows!
Questions? Email amanda@angelsgateart.org
Para más información consulte amanda@angelsgateart.org
We are thrilled to host our first in-person event in over three years. We have missed you!
This Corita Day is a day in service to our beloved community, and will feature timed tours of the CAC collection, interactive art-making stations, exclusive access to new merchandise and vintage posters, the assembly of 500 Corita-inspired art kits for distribution amongst our partners across Los Angeles, and much more.
Corita Day is also a fundraiser that is essential to our mission of sharing and preserving Corita's legacy. This year, we are raising $150,000 to support the Center's ongoing operations. When you support CAC, you also support incredibly talented artists, educators, makers, doers, and too many wonderful nonprofit partners to name.
On Saturday, November 19th, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m., please join us in Hollywood for a family-friendly celebration including art-making, music, holiday shopping, food, and community engagement to raise funds for the Corita Art Center.
Tickets go live Friday, October 21st at 10 am!
This is a call for helping hands and hearts! We are in the thick of planning a very special Corita Day this year, but cannot do it alone. If you are interested and able, we could really use your help. Our needs are wide ranging and you do not need to be LA-based to give us a much-needed boost. A few ways to be involved:
To help out, please fill out this form or email us directly at info@corita.org
As a recent college graduate in art history, my latest research consisted of the history of Black assemblage artists in Los Angeles working in the 1960s and 1970s. A site that would continuously come up as a part of that history was Sabato (Simon) Rodia’s iconic Watts Towers. To my excitement, during my research at Corita Art Center, I found that Immaculate Heart College’s (IHC) art department was deeply inspired by the Watts Towers and later, in direct dialogue with the Watts Towers arts community. While a broader overview of the socio-political history of the Watts Towers and the Watts arts community's relationship to Corita and Immaculate Heart College will be addressed in a second blog post, I want to begin by introducing the rich mosaic culture of IHC’s art department in the 1950s and early 1960s and elaborate on how this culture informed the art department and Corita's unique approach to artmaking.
To read the full post click here.
On Friday, April 22, please join us from 6 to 8 p.m. for a hands-on art-making event hosted with our friends at Self Help Graphics & Art, with instruction by lead teaching artist Oscar Rodriguez. As the latest installment of our Corita 101 workshop series, this free event will give participants the opportunity to help create and personalize a collection of posters with graphics created by Juliette Bellocq and Sheharazad Fleming that feature some of Corita’s iconic words and phrases. Once completed, the collection of posters will travel to Washington, D.C., where they will be part of a performance at the Kennedy Center.
Register Here for this free event
POW POW POWER UP: Someday is Now is a project made collaboratively by interdisciplinary artist Liss LaFleur, composer Samuel Beebe, and the Corita Art Center, and performed by choral ensemble The Artifice. POW POW POWER UP: Someday is Now is an opera installation inspired by Corita using AI technology and will be full of visual references from historical Mary’s Day processions at Immaculate Heart College.
This performance is the first of 29 mini-operas, each referencing one individual artwork from Corita’s heroes and sheroes series. Each opera will operate as a temporary monument of collective community, combining public art, site-specificity, and audience participation to evoke joy and center conversation around difficult social issues.
This inaugural performance, inspired by the artwork titled green fingers, will gather a community to center on environmental justice. Free and open to the public in the DC area, the event invites participants to join the performance in a celebratory procession on May 1, 2022, at 7:00 pm. outside the REACH at the Kennedy Center.
We hope that you will be able to join us both in-person and in-spirit for this incredible collaboration that brings together two coasts for a breath of fresh air.
On the occasion of Women’s History Month, we invite you to join us for a hands-on, virtual event centered around digital literacy and activism, taking place on Saturday, March 26.
There is a significant gender gap on Wikipedia. These well-documented gender inequities are most apparent in the under-representation of women and non-binary artists on the website. They also contribute to a bias in content and language, and the erasure of knowledge and history. Let's help change that!
Corita Art Center is pleased to host this presentation and workshop led by Amber Berson, an advisor at Art+Feminism, a project that works for a more equitable Wikipedia. The event will begin with a 45-minute presentation on the importance of not just how to edit but how to read Wikipedia, and the ways activism is helping to address the platform’s systemic biases. Next, Berson will lead a 45-minute workshop on how to edit the tenth most visited website in the world!
We hope that you will join us for this fun and low-key participatory event, open to people of all gender identities and expressions. No experience is necessary: simply join the Zoom meeting with your personal computer or tablet (*we are unable to accommodate mobile phones for the workshop component).
Time: March 26, 11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Pacific Time
Register Here for this free virtual event
Amber Berson is a writer, curator, and art historian interested in digital advocacy and alternative governance models in the arts.
She most recently curated Souper Spaghetti (2021, with Manon Tourigny), Utopia as Method (2018); World Cup! (2018); The Let Down Reflex (2016-2018, with Juliana Driever); TrailMix (2014, with Eliane Ellbogen); *~._.:*JENNIFER X JENNIFER*:.~ (2013, with Eliane Ellbogen); The Annual Art Administrator’s Relay Race (2013, with Nicole Burisch); The Wild Bush Residency (2012–14); and was the 2016 curator-in-residence as part of the France-Quebec Cross-Residencies at Astérides in Marseille, France. She is an advisor at Art+Feminism, a project that works for a more equitable Wikipedia, and was the 2019-2020 Wikipedian in Residence at Concordia University. She is also the Executive Director at The Visual Arts Centre in Montreal, Quebec.
About Art+Feminism
Art+Feminism builds a community of activists that is committed to closing information gaps related to gender, feminism, and the arts, beginning with Wikipedia.
When cis and trans women, non-binary people, Black, Indigenous, and people of color communities are not represented in the writing and editing on the tenth-most-visited site in the world, information about people like us gets skewed and misrepresented. The stories get mistold. We lose out on real history. That’s why we’re here: to change it.
Since 2014, over 20,000 people at more than 1,500 events around the world have participated in our edit-a-thons, resulting in the creation and improvement of more than 100,000 articles on Wikipedia and its sister projects.
From coffee shops and community centers to the largest museums and universities in the world, Art+Feminism leads a do-it-yourself and do-it-with-others campaign that teaches people of all gender identities and expressions to edit Wikipedia.
This project was made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services
A collaborative poem for Corita Day, with words contributed by participants and assembled by writer and educator, Matthew Burgess.
Inspired by Aracelis Girmay.
You are who I love,
checking the air on my tires
You, lost in thought
You being perfect just the way you are
Dancing in the yard with such joy
You are who I love, jumping
from sofa to chair to ground as you battle
imaginary foes
You who knows no stranger
You who tend the earth
You learning to surf at age eight,
sitting underwater, calling yourself an ancient
Egyptian name
You who noticed the beaver in the park
You smiling at me with paint on your hands, in your hair
You keeping your nose warm
You crying in the bedroom, impatient, tired, hungry
You are who I love
Wondering about a mystery cross on a white wall
You are who I love,
You as a victim, quiet and observing —
You, still my friend.
You my difficult ones who make me grow
You who hold me up when I feel down
You who laugh at my jokes
You, alone in stony echoes
You, sharing friendship and love
Growing whole boats of plants from single stems
You try and try and try and you succeed
You, who helps me navigate the healthcare system
for my 95 year-old father
You are who I love
Trying every day with every ounce to believe
Letting me sit extra close and nuzzle into the fur in your collar
Always with a furrowed brow, the weight of the world
on your beautiful young face
You are who I love
You who are my person
You working hard
You the light of my heart
You laughing with me
You who brings the candle lit to my table
You sick, you well
You are there
You who smells of freshly cut alliums lingering on my fingers,
You who sit on a swing, making my Saturdays delightful,
You love so that we can be generous always
You whose heart is always full of love and willing to forgive
You playing a tune like a clear bell on a simple gourd instrument
on the street outside the park
You, building toward an unknown future, insulating
old thin walls for warmer times
There once was a girl who knew love with no bounds
You, who knew me
I love the person you are becoming
You, old tree, who lets your gold fall at at once after a hard frost
You speaking to me through the acts of kindness of others
You sitting quietly
You are who I love
You who row your boat in the dark
You who sings like an angel
You in your bunny boxer shorts, not caring who sees you
going to the mailbox
You are who I love
The one who notices beauty everywhere you go,
smiling at me each time we pass
You, bringing an old friendship forward to the present,
laden with the history and loss we each bear
You writing words of love to me
even if it was hard, confusing, ended–
I still believe you did.
You my favorite person, who I love,
You are why I’m me.
You are who I love, finding the beauty in small things,
balancing me out, being grumpy when I am not
You, moving closer to Heaven
Hiding under the dining room chair, writing messages
You are who I love
You, mending hearts with kind words,
peeling the persimmons to prepare a purée for the pan bread
You walking away
You who tell me everyday you will pray for me
You making family reunions into Celebrations with music and art
You who wonders who are creating while I do
You are who I love
Bravely sharing your whites and reds so swiftly,
playing the piano, one of mom and dad’s favorite tunes
You smiling at anyone’s presence, opening
your eyes and letting me in
You with a freckled face and vocal stims and disconnect with the world
You are who I love!
Steaming the beets, caring for us and others,
Telling a story, you are who I love
You trying to live by your own rules
You, alone
You in the chair that moves with your feet
You say everything is an experiment
You are sweet fruit, jellybeans and chocolate
You who are part of the IHM community,
who gave me the grace to become who I am today
I see a cascade of love and history and care
and creativity when we meet
You are who I love, who I miss so dearly
You struggling and loving the best that you can
You who cry
You are who I love
You who saves ‘til messy rooms demand attention
You gardening with love
You who breathe and blink
You doing your best
You helping me to get myself and others to places
because I can’t keep track of my own time and many promises to others
You setting the groundwork for who I become
You who know love has no bounds
You are who I love, packing our kale and bread
and eggs into our canvas bag with care, a smile, a story
and a “take care” every time
You sitting watching tv, you driving very carefully,
You cooking dinner with way too much food,
you whether cheerful or in a sad mood
You who worry about dying stars and boiling planets
You smiling at me and I know you are proud
You with your boat, your sure hand at the rudder
You are needed for our world is broken
You are who I love
You are me when you walk among the trees,
wandering through the colors, the pathways
and the rhythms that summon the marigolds
You always napping in the sunny spot
You who loves popcorn
You, who–at 97—bring so much joy to all who encounter you
You, bursting with life, an incendiary force,
vibrating wildly
You are who we love.
–November 21, 2021
You're invited to an evening of togetherness online with friends new and old (and some special guests!) in celebration of Corita Day on Saturday, November 20, 2021, registration is free, and all are welcome!
Funds raised during the festivities will support the Corita Art Center's ongoing mission to preserve and promote Corita's art and legacy through digitization initiatives and art educational programming.
Time: November 20, 2021 5:00pm to 6:00pm Pacific Time
On Saturday, September 25th, join Los Angeles-based artist, educator, and researcher Álvaro D. Márquez in the latest installment of our Corita 101 virtual workshop series. As part of an ongoing partnership between Corita Art Center and Casa Esperanza, the workshop will center the youth of Panorama City.
Drawing inspiration from Corita’s pedagogy, this workshop will teach you about the expressive potential of line and color. Under Álvaro’s guidance, you will learn to make an abstract drawing and turn it into an accordion book, while exploring the ways that color and line can communicate feelings and emotional states.
This program was made possible through the Community Impacts Art Grant thanks to the Department of Arts And Culture Los Angeles.
Time: September 25, 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time (US and Canada)
Register Here for this free virtual event
Click here to download worksheets
You will need the following materials:
- 1 sheet of 8.5” x 11” paper
- Cardboard or foamboard
- Washable markers
- Scissors
- Pencil
- Glue stick
- Ruler
About Álvaro D. Márquez:
Álvaro D. Márquez is a multidisciplinary artist working with printmaking, fiber art, sculpture, and installation. Their work explores issues around social, racial, and gender inequality and engages questions about the self, history, and one’s place in it. Based in Los Angeles, they hail from the working class immigrant community of East Salinas, CA.
About Casa Esperanza:
At Casa Esperanza, we empower and provide our clients — the families of Blythe Street and the greater Panorama City area — with the resources to be successful and to create a positive impact in their community. More than a resources center or a safe place to go after school, we are an integral part of the fabric of our community. It is our mission to ensure that youth and parents alike have the tools they need to create their best possible future. Learn more at casaesperanzaihm.org
This program was made possible through the Community Impacts Art Grant thanks to the Department of Arts And Culture Los Angeles.
In celebration of the forthcoming book release, please join us for a virtual art-making session led by Matthew Burgess and Kara Kramer, author and illustrator of Make Meatballs Sing: The Life & Art of Corita Kent.
In the spirit of Corita, plorkshop is a hands-on experience that combines work and play. The event is free and all ages. are welcome. Participants are encouraged to have basic supplies on-hand, such as scissors, glue stick, markers, drawing paper, and colored/patterned paper for collage making.
When: July 25, 1 p.m. PST / 4 p.m. EST
Co-hosted by Enchanted Lion Books
On Saturday, May 22nd, join Ana Dziengel, founder of Babble Dabble Do, in the next installment of Corita 101 workshops. As part of an ongoing partnership between Corita Art Center and Casa Esperanza, the workshop will center the youth of Panorama City.
Spend an incredible afternoon with Ana creating “Collage Cubes” with 3D Collage. Collage Cubes are based on Corita Kent’s explorations with found graphics, collage, and the juxtaposition of images and type. In this project, you will make four cubes, each collaged with found images and type from magazines, newspapers, old artwork, comics, junk mail, and whatever you can find!
Time:
May 22, 2021 01:00 PM Pacific Time (US and Canada)
Register Here
Download supplies and worksheets
About Ana Dziengel:
Ana is an architect and furniture designer turned blogger at Babble Dabble Do. Her 2018 book STEAM Play & Learn and has sold over 10,000 copies to date. She started Camp STEAM in 2017 and Afterschool STEAM in 2018 in the Los Angeles area to bring STEAM projects to her local community. Learn more at babbledabbledo.com
About Casa Esperanza:
At Casa Esperanza, we empower and provide our clients — the families of Blythe Street and the greater Panorama City area — with the resources to be successful and to create a positive impact in their community. More than a resources center or a safe place to go after school, we are an integral part of the fabric of our community. It is our mission to ensure that youth and parents alike have the tools they need to create their best possible future. Learn more at casaesperanzaihm.org
This program was made possible through the Community Impacts Art Grant thanks to the Department of Arts And Culture Los Angeles.
On Saturday, April 10th at 10amPST/1pmEST, join Dieter Roelstraete, curator at the Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society at the University of Chicago, and Olivian Cha, curator of the Corita Art Center.
The exhibition presents a retrospective view, featuring serigraphs and watercolors spanning across her career, from the 1950s through the 1980s. In this webinar, Roelstraete and Cha will discuss Kent's practice at the intersection of art, language, and politics.
Please note: the talk will take place via Zoom in English and will be recorded. Participants will be sent a login link upon registration.
We're thrilled to welcome you to our redesigned site! We will be posting news about programming, events, and exhibitions here, but as we transition to this new format, you can still access our archived Tumblr.
Join the Corita Art Center and Greetings from South Central LA to celebrate the importance of art education as we collaborate on some fun Corita-inspired programming in the coming weeks! Swipe for more info about upcoming pop-ups, the virtual workshop, and learn how you can #GetWithTheAction!
Stop by on 11/14 Hanks Mini Market and 11/21 Cruzitas Deli and Cafe to pick up a Corita 101 art box including the new heroes & sheroes zine worksheet, created by art educator Karina Esperanza Yánez and designed by the Design Lab at Otis College and printed in LA by Typecraft.
11/14/2020
11:30AM - 2:30 PM
3301 West Florence Avenue
Los Angeles, CA
11/21/2020
9:30AM - 12:30 PM
7121 State Street
Huntington Park, CA
1:30 - 3:00 PM
Virtual Workshop with art educator Karina Esperanza Yánez, Founder of Greetings from South LA.
Join us on Zoom. All ages, all skill levels welcome, but we encourage you to pick up a Corita 101 art kit or download materials in advance!
Be sure to register: bitly.ws/ax4q
Celebrate virtually with the Corita Art Center on Corita’s birthday this November 20th, at 6pm.
We would like to tip our party hats to you dear friends, and share (with the help of some special guests) the hard work we were able to accomplish through your support. Help us continue to preserve Corita’s legacy and build a stronger collective community. Reserve your spot for the Corita Day virtual celebration and receive a complimentary gift box to help you enjoy the evening. Boxes will include special Corita merchandise, party supplies, and a sweet treat.
Visit our store to purchase tickets and reserve your box today!
Corita Art Center is a project of the Immaculate Heart Community. Read the Immaculate Heart Community’s 2019 Annual Report, inspired by the “irregular bulletin.”
Published intermittently by the Immaculate Heart College art department from 1956 - 1963, the “irregular bulletin” was a newsletter edited by the inimitable Sister Magdalen Mary, announcing the various activities and accomplishments of the students and faculty, including Corita, who succeeded Sister Magdalen Mary as head of the art department. So what was it, you ask? The “irregular bulletin” was initially comprised of a few pages of printed paper announcing departmental news, but it then quickly evolved into a longer and broader publication, with a distinct graphic style that in many ways presaged the formation of contemporary zines.
In this video, we hear from Juliette Bellocq and Hermine Lees, two women who collect the “irregular bulletin” and appreciate the unique creativity and ideas of Sister Magdalen Mary. Juliette Bellocq is a graphic designer who runs Handbuilt Studio, a practice dedicated to design for education, culture and activism. She designed the Immaculate Heart Community’s “irregular bulletin”-inspired 2019 Annual Report. Hermine Lees is a member of the Immaculate Heart Community. When asked to describe her relationship to Sister Magdalen Mary, she wrote, “a devoted student, sincere friend and caring helper in all her wild and wonderful endeavors.”
Thanks to a grant from California Revealed, all issues of the “irregular bulletin” will soon be digitized. Stay tuned for details.
Corita Art Center is a project of the Immaculate Heart Community. Read their 2019 Annual Report, inspired by the “irregular bulletin,” here.
We’ve launched a new video series inspired by Corita Kent and Jan Steward’s seminal text, Learning by Heart: Teachings to Free the Creative Spirit. This video introduces the main concepts in Learning by Heart – looking, sources, structure, connect + create, work + play, and celebrations. Over the next few months, we will be posting videos by artists around the world, who will share how they engage with these ideas in their own creative practice. If you want to brush up on a specific topic, they are all posted as individual videos as well. We hope you enjoy the series!
Friends, We hope you are all staying safe, and finding moments of peace and hope during these uncertain times. To support community health and well-being, Corita Art Center is temporarily closed. We will update you with reopening information as soon as it is available. While we will miss seeing you at the Center, we are actively exploring ways to adapt Corita’s teachings so that we can all remain creatively connected in our homes and online. Stay tuned for updates. As ever, we take comfort in Corita’s art and words, and hope you do the same.
❤️,
Corita Art Center
In 1985, the US Post Office released the Love Stamp designed by Corita Kent. This is the lesser-known story behind Corita’s most well-known work.
Now streaming, the inaugural event of The Great Humans Series, featuring Roxane Gay and Abbi Jacobson in conversation at Second Home Hollywood. The event is a reboot of the “Great Men Series,” a lecture series organized by Corita and the Immaculate Heart College Art Department in the 1960s. Lisa Congdon kicked off the event and set the stage for the unmoderated evening. What followed was a generous and engaging conversation between two creative women on topics ranging from the elusive work/life balance and the challenges of social media, to morning routines and the educators, friends, and family members who have encouraged their journey. We hope you enjoy watching these inspiring women, and stay tuned for an announcement about the next event in the series, coming this April!
We had a hard time not highlighting every word in this clipping from “We Need Decembers,” an article by Corita in the December 1969 issue of Ladies Home Journal. Read the full article here.
We are thrilled to announce that Wednesday, November 20th has been named #CoritaDayinLA. The honor falls on what would have been Corita Kent’s 101st birthday. Throughout Corita’s 100th year, we have ramped up our efforts to grow Corita’s legacy and introduce her to a new generation, both in Los Angeles and around the world. In that spirit, we want to honor her on Corita Day with an online celebration—or in 1960s terms, “a happening”—that will share her art and message of hope, love, and justice with an even wider audience.
If you aren’t yet familiar with Corita, we hope you celebrate Corita Day by getting to know this inspiring artist and educator: read her bio, follow us on Instagram or Facebook, or sign up for our newsletter!
If you are already well acquainted, we hope you will join our online “happening” and share Corita’s artwork, story, or teachings via social media on November 20th. We invite you to create your own artwork if you desire, but we also have a few sample posts here. Thank you for being a part of Corita’s legacy!
Corita Art Center and CHIRLA, the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, partnered to build an altar titled Corita Art Center x CHIRLA: amar la justicia for this year’s Dia de los Muertos celebration at Hollywood Forever cemetery. The altar honored members of the extended CHIRLA family lost in the struggle for immigrant rights.
Corita used bold and graphic serigraphs to expose injustice around the world while delivering a message of love, hope, and justice. In this spirit, the altar was constructed out of one of Corita’s favorite everyday items, the cardboard box, and featured an enlarged version of love justice, a serigraph she first created in 1966 which boldly depicts the Camus quote, “I should like to be able to love my country and still love justice,” in red, white, and blue.
For the anniversary of the Watts Rebellion, we take an in depth look at Corita’s “my people,” from 1965.
For Corita, celebration was an art form. All celebrations contained variations on the same ingredients: special colors, words, clothes, processions, etc. Corita analyzed celebrations in this way in order to update and revitalize traditions. In August 2019, the Corita Art Center went to CicLAvia: Meet the Hollywoods to identify some of the ingredients of a celebration.
We found this great clipping from an interview with Corita in The New Yorker from 1966. May we all be blessed with Corita’s prolific productivity in the coming month. Don’t forget Rule # 7: The only rule is work!
Introducing our “From the Archives” series, where we take a peek inside the archives at the Corita Art Center to share a lesser-known piece by Corita Kent.
This first installment features Olivian Cha, our Curator and Collections Manager, uncovering a poster commissioned by the Poor People’s Campaign in 1968 for their March on Washington. Olivian notes Corita’s frequent use of newspaper clippings in her work, and how it illustrates her understanding of the media’s growing impact on society.
Save the date!
🗓 #Corita100 Celebration❗️🎈🎉💜
Saturday November 10, 2018
Blessed Sacrament School Auditorium
6441 Sunset Blvd
Hollywood
#coritakent