This year’s Echo Park Artists Festival–which will take place on Saturday, Oct. 10– will expand its offerings to include dance and spoken word performances.

Local writers Steve Abee and Gordon Henderson are working on a line-up of 10 writers to present their work during a two hour, outdoor performance. In addition, entertainment coordinator Sonya Mims is working on adding a flamenco dance group as well as a live theatrical performance that will take place on Lemoyne Street at Sunset Blvd. (more…)

More than two dozen Echo Park residents equipped with cameras and notebooks roamed Sunset Boulevard on a recent Saturday morning to identify the problems and discover the potential of the neighborhood’s downtown. (more…)

Through the tireless lobbying efforts of The Echo Park Historical Society, Lady of the Lake, an art deco sculpture that graced the shores of Echo Park Lake for more than fifty years before it was placed in storage in 1986, has been restored to her lake side home.  (more…)

Come learn about our neighborhood’s heritage on Saturday, Nov. 6! That’s when the EPHS will hold the third Echo Park History Day, an all-day event celebrating our neighborhood’s past with guest speakers, a photographic exhibit, walking tours, oral histories, a raffle, a bake sale and more. (more…)

The Echo Park Historical Society was founded in the Fall of 1995 to promote interest in Echo Park’s heritage, to preserve and protect natural sites and buildings of historic significance within our community, to document and collect materials pertaining to the rich and eclectic history of our neighborhood, and to chronicle the lives of our past and present residents whose deeds and contributions lend pride and substance to our lives here today. (more…)

Echo Park and its lake have always been a touchstone for the community that grew up around it.

Initially, the area we now know as the park was a natural arroyo that filled with water from a spring-fed stream that originated at Baxter Street and flowed down what is now Echo Park Avenue. In 1868 the Los Angeles Canal and Reservoir Co. dammed the arroyo to make a reservoir that aided in powering a woolen mill at what is now 6th and Figueroa (then known as Pearl St.) and was to eventually serve local residents, walnut orchards and vineyards to the south along Alvarado. The immigrants that worked these orchards and vineyards settled here and began to build small homes along Sunset Boulevard, between Echo Park Avenue and Lemoyne Street. (more…)

On Echo Park Avenue is a mural Aaron Donovan painted in homage to a man across the street who has bunnies, chickens and a pony—and at one time, a cow—in his sprawling yard just steps from Sunset Boulevard. Entitled “Chicken Corner,” the huge, colorful mural announces a new presence in the neighborhood: a triple-threat response to the often snobby West Side art world. The opening of three new galleries this year, all dedicated to providing a venue to emerging artist who have been shunned by the more conservative art machine, promise to transform this vibrant working-class community with artistic energy. (more…)

Need a graphic designer to create your business cards? Or a musician to help you complete a composition? Then look for the upcoming “Made in Echo Park: A Directory of Designers & Creative Services.”  (more…)

Fototeka Gallery will present during the month of February “Love Hurts,” a solo exhibit of the recent works of photo-collage artist Carlos Batts.

The artist’s photo-manipulations, lush and brimming with imagery and texture and a wide range of emotion, are hand-produced, using traditional collage-making techniques, mixing painting, photography and film. (more…)

Echo Park based International Metal Supply consists of Paul B. Cutler, who was involved in the early punk and post-punk scenes in Los Angeles, and Jean-Pierre Bedoyan, a former soloist with the Percussions de Strasbourg avant-garde ensemble in France, also composer for the critically acclaimed Diavolo dance company in Los Angeles. Together they reclaim the current supply of metal offered by our post-industrial age - discards found in the junkyards of Los Angeles - and, through collage, welding and random imagination, create original instruments. Against the grain of mass-produced entertainment, they control every aspect of their production - from improvisational composition to design and manufacturing. Their collaboration is playful, entertaining, and generously ironical.