Culture Articles

Before she was an award-winning artist. Before she was a Senior Art Director at The WB/CW and E! Television. Before any of it — Riea Owens was a seven-year-old in Pasadena dragging visitors into the piano room. Forty-plus years later, she is still dragging people in.

You enter into the work of the elder. You encounter the bridge generation. You arrive at the inheritors — the women who are actively tending the flame right now. By the end of the room, you understand: this was never one woman’s fire. It was always a relay.

There are places in a city that hold memory in their walls — not as nostalgia, but as living evidence of what a community has survived, built, and refused to let go. The Dunbar Hotel on South Central Avenue is one of those places.

Twelve-Time Emmy Award recipient Jimmy Velarde’s journey began where music, street life, and cinematic instinct meet. Whether on 35mm film or digital cameras, his style remains distinct—grainy, emotive, and alive. His images do more than document history; they help...