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Huell Howser died last night and there's never been a night I wished more I was in California.

For me, growing up in Los Angeles in the '90s, Huell Howser was the most consistently watchable entertainer on TV. I was more of a radio geek as a teenager, but Huell I watched whenever I got the chance. A lot of us did. And if you missed something, friends would swap stories of California's Gold and Visiting and his other shows on KCET, always lapsing into impressions of his awe-struck exclamations: "This is amazing!"

His voice is so familiar to me and so closely tied to his love of the state that it might as well be the voice of California itself in my mind. So when I got into sketch comedy I felt compelled to do an impression of Huell because he was such an innocent and joyful character to mimic, and it was fun to get to play him for a few minutes on stage.

Like a lot of us, I heard and re-told stories of real-life Huell Howser encounters. Friends had spotted Huell all over Southern California: at the Hollywood farmer's market, at Whittier Narrows, at a historic hotel in Palm Springs. Huell eyewitnesses always re-tell their particular tale with a gleam in their eye, as an encounter with a mythological character. It seemed you had a 1 in 10 chance to meet Huell Howser if you grew up in California, but I never did. So I made up my own Huell stories and told them in-character on the Comedy Bang! Bang! podcast.

And then he called me on the phone.

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Anna Jones

Honoring Michael Asher

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*5 Artsy Things to Do in L.A. This Week

The mood was one of respect and reflection last Friday, Dec. 7, as hundreds of friends, colleagues, student and teachers gathered in the Main Gallery at the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia to celebrate and remember the life of long-time beloved faculty member and widely regarded conceptual artist Michael Asher.

Asher, who passed away after a long illness on Oct. 15 at the age of 69, is often hailed as one of the most influential figures in the contemporary art world, particularly noted for his work in a genre known as institutional critique, involving artistic takes on the structures of the art world itself, such as museums and galleries.

But he was perhaps even more widely known for the exhaustive attention and critical consideration he gave to his students' work. Within the framework of his famous Post-Studio Critique class, Asher would spend hours and hours discussing a single artwork, deconstructing and examining it from every possible angle. The class meetings, starting at 1:00 pm on Friday afternoons, were known to stretch past midnight (or even later) on a regular basis.

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Photo by Gregory Bojorquez

Justin Van Hoy

On Nov. 14, Los Angeles' art community lost Justin Van Hoy, 31, to a long bout with cancer. Van Hoy was an artist, designer, curator, a husband and most recently, published author. He was nicknamed the "Dutch Giant" because he towered over most people at a height of 6'5, punctuated by a shock of crazy ginger hair.

Justin loved art, basketball, good food and orange cats. He designed grafitti books for Roger Gastman, Swindle Magazine illustrations for Shepard Fairey, logos for RVCA, Vans and the Oinkster, answered the phone for Mark the Cobrasnake and even helped us out here at LA Weekly when we asked nice.

Most recently he co-founded THIS gallery in Highland Park, staging shows like the series of monumental group exhibits called "These Friends," which included hundreds of works of art that hung from floor to ceiling, and got himself the job curating the bathrooms at Gagosian in Beverly Hills (currently displaying installations by Sage Vaughn).

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Courtesy Mor Lovehours

Mike Kelley memorial on Tipton Way, photographed Wednesday afternoon

Mike Kelley was "arguably" the most important L.A. artist of his generation, "arguably" the one who changed the world's perception of Los Angeles, even "arguably" the most important contemporary artist according to obituaries and remembrances published yesterday, after news of the 57-year-old artist's death, reportedly by suicide.

A subdued version of that argument -- over how much exactly Kelley mattered and why -- was playing out last night near 11 p.m. at the top of Tipton Way. There, in an abandoned driveway blocks from Kelley's home in Highland Park, artists had begun to construct an unofficial, makeshift memorial.

"He was one of the main reasons I moved to L.A.," said painter Greta Svalberg. "He was a rebel, and he was famous."

"For me too," said artist Dani Tull, who lives nearby and knew Kelley well. "After graduate school, it was either New York or L.A." Tull, who finished school in the early 1990s, had written down names of all the artists working here that interested him: Mike Kelley, Jim Shaw, Raymond Pettibon, Paul McCarthy. "This list of mavericks and freaks had an allure that seemed exotic," compared to New York.

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Carol Cheh

Early works by Kelley at MOCA's "Under the Big Black Sun" exhibit

Los Angeles is now one brilliant mind short, as legendary artist Mike Kelley has been found dead, his gallery confirmed.

Born in 1954 in a suburb of Detroit, Kelley received his MFA from CalArts in 1978, made his work and home primarily in L.A. and grew to become an internationally renowned artist.

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Gil Ortiz

Gilbert "Magú" Luján used to laugh when described as a Chicano art icon, but he is more than deserving of the title. His irreverent, playful work across a broad spectrum of media that included cardboard, metal, ceramic tile and organic material, among others, fused a distinct visual vocabulary with his perennial curiosity and a soft-spoken, often sweetly paternal bearing.

A founding member of "Los Four," an early Chicano art collective that brought LA Chicano art to a wider audience with an exhibit at LACMA in 1974, he died of complications from prostate cancer on Sunday.

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