During parties, especially ones in designer-conscious downtown Los Angeles lofts, the couch is coveted territory. People have just spent twenty minutes making polite non-committal remarks around the kitchen island, and all anyone wants to do, at this point, is rest on the cushions and maybe squeeze an end pillow. However, the same competitive drive that applies to every other aspect of life in the city is amplified here. The people on the couch are ruthless motherfuckers.

Don’t let its title deceive you, Irish Girl, Tim Johnston’s latest book is a collection of eight short stories that explore life and happenings in small town USA. Hailing from Iowa, Johnston knows a thing or two about the ugly secrets that can often exist buried within the confines of a seemingly sleepy, small town. While the stories within Irish Girl vary in plot and theme, they do share similar small town settings in which such things as murders, love affairs, and lies are uncovered and dispersed from one gossiping townsperson to the next.

The opening reception Saturday night at James Gray Gallery at Bergamot Station Art Center in Santa Monica was where I was introduced to the work of some incredible and incredibly eclectic artists: Morris B. Squire, Susan Rosman, Thom Surman, Marylyn English, David Cook, and Kitty Rocquemore. James Gray Gallery is divided into five separate spaces. Strolling through the gallery, I got my fill of some of my favorite components of art: colors, textures, composition, and fantastically disturbing whimsy.

In the spirit of the obsessive list-making that has become the traditional way to mark the end to calendar years in the first world, here is a guide to the previous 3 years ending in 9 (in no particular order). Happy 2010!

On the cold and rainy evening of December 11, Thinkspace Gallery hosted artist Andy Kehoe’s first ever solo exhibition – The World Unseen and Those In Between. Wood panel canvases and globs of autumnal colors wallpapered the space for gallery goers to get lost in. However, the real intrigue behind the simplistic nature based landscapes lay in the delicate execution of emotion that Mr. Kehoe translated throughout his works.