Los Angeles Times - 06.08.2019

CALENDAR

TUESDAY, AUGUST 6, 2019:: LATIMES.COM/CALENDAR

E

On a recent Friday morn-

ing, before the veterans of

the Oakland Raiders were

expected to arrive for their

first day of training camp,

the sun rose over scenic

Napa, Calif. The crew of

“Hard Knocks” was up, film-

ing it. They filmed the team

breakfast. They filmed

weight training and the

early-morning coaches’

meetings. They filmed as the

practice field was mowed

and the morning dew re-

moved. They filmed as star

wide receiver Antonio

Brown arrived at camp (or

at least near it) in a hot-air

balloon, one-upping his ar-

rival at the Pittsburgh Steel-

ers’ camp in a helicopter last

year.

‘Hard Knocks’ at Raiders’ door

OAKLAND COACHJon Gruden advises Raiders quarterback Derek Carr at

training camp in Napa, where the HBO docudrama “Hard Knocks” is filming.

Oakland Raiders

By Eric Ducker

[See‘Knocks,’ E4]

Allegations

shake up ABC

President says inquiry

ongoing into claims by

“The Rookie’s” Afton

Williamson. E2

Expansion plans

for N.Y. festival

James Murdoch takes

a majority stake in

Tribeca, co-founded

by Robert De Niro. E2

What’s on TV..........E5

Comics...................E6-7

My children don’t remember 9/11. My youngest hadn’t yet been born; her siblings

were 3 years old and 17 months old. They know what that date signifies, have

seen the footage and visited the site, but they don’t know what it means — not

really. They cannot fathom the devastating cultural dislocation that occurred in

those moments when the World Trade Center collapsed, the Pentagon burned

and the seemingly impossible became real.

My children do not believe in the seemingly impossible. In a country where

mass shootings have become routine, nothing seems impossible.

For them, the symbol of terror and terrorism is not Osama bin Laden, or even ISIS. For

them, the symbol of terror and terrorism is a fellow American — almost always a man, almost

always white — shooting a bunch of people he does not know. In a theater, a school, an office. At

a mall, a concert, a restaurant, a festival, a Walmart.

These events do not shock them or wrench their belief about American culture from its

socket. Mass shootings are part of what they know to beAmerican culture. And the fact that

no one seems to care enough to do anything to prevent them.

Yes, many protest and march and write outraged think pieces like this one. But since the

ban on assault weapons expired in 2004, any attempt to prevent mass shootings, or even

curtail their increasing frequency and deadliness, has been largely a matter of rhetoric.

If you can call statements on Twitter rhetoric.

MARY McNAMARA

MELODYStout, left, Hannah Payan, Aaliyah Alba, Sherie Gramlich and Laura Barrios at a vigil for victims of Saturday’s mass shooting at a Walmart in El Paso.

John LocherAssociated Press

Do not accept

this way of life

Kids have come to expect mass shootings. We must

change our culture. Let’s start with assault weapons.

[SeeGuns,E3]

Where there is light, there
is shadow.
In an odd way, shadows
are essential to the best
“white light paintings” by
Mary Corse. She began the
series in 1968, determined to
find a way to physically em-
body light within a painting
rather than merely repre-
sent it with oils or acrylics.
Her work since then has
been a variation on the
theme.
The first full example
comes midway through
“Mary Corse: A Survey in
Light,” itself a rather odd
traveling exhibition newly
opened at the Los Angeles
County Museum of Art. It’s
peculiar because the L.A.-
based artist’s 50-year career
is surveyed in just 25 works,
with two-thirds of those
made between 1964 and 1969.
Subsequent decades zoom
by — faster, one is tempted
to say, than the speed of
light.
The pivotal work is “Unti-
tled (First White Light Se-
ries),” a 6½-foot square can-
vas painted pristine white,
its acrylic surface embedded
with thousands of glass
microspheres. Those tiny
beads are the material that
gives highway caution signs

ART REVIEW

‘Light’

dimly

shines

CHRISTOPHER KNIGHT
ART CRITIC

[SeeLight paintings,E3]

The Mary Corse

paintings exhibition

at LACMA leaves

a lot to be desired.

There will be no red car-

pet, no television cameras,

no gold statuettes. But far

from the spotlight, the mo-

tion picture academy will

soon decide a contest as con-

sequential in its own way as

an Oscars race.

On Tuesday evening, the

academy’s 54-member

board of governors — includ-

ing such boldfaced names as

Steven Spielberg, Laura

Dern and Whoopi Goldberg

— will meet at the organiza-

tion’s Beverly Hills head-

quarters to choose a new

president from among its

ranks to succeed cinemato-

grapher John Bailey, who

has led the 91-year-old insti-

tution through two years of

further transformation and

occasional tumult.

For decades, the job of

academy president — which

has been held by prominent

actors and filmmakers like

Douglas Fairbanks, Bette

Davis, Frank Capra and

Gregory Peck as well as less

well-known behind-the-

scenes industry power play-

ers — was considered essen-

tially honorific, a kind of cer-

emonial figurehead for Hol-

lywood’s most prestigious

institution. But whoever

steps in to replace Bailey,

who is stepping down due to

term limits, will inherit a se-

ries of challenges facing the

tradition-bound institution

as it continues to diversify its

historically white-male-

dominated membership,

prepares to open an ambi-

tious and costly museum

and tries to boost flagging

public interest in its all im-

portant Oscars telecast.

Those efforts have not al-

ways proceeded smoothly,

to put it mildly. During Bai-

ley’s presidency — which fol-

lowed a similarly turbulent

tenure under his prede-

cessor, Cheryl Boone Isaacs,

as the academy weathered

New

leaders

for film

group

Academy’s board will

elect a president as it

readies for its museum

director’s departure.

By Josh Rottenberg

[SeeOscars, E2]