The seventh annual Culver City Art Walk and Roll festival took over Washington Boulevard from Helms Avenue to La Cienega Avenue on Saturday, October 18. Throughout the 0.3-mile stretch, visitors browsed through the lineup of over 90 vendors with a wide range of mediums, styles, experiences, and food. Families ready for a walk arrived in droves, with their dogs on leashes and kids accompanied by strollers. 

This free event encouraged the exercise, offering a bike valet service run by the Boy Scout Troop 113, and providing a skating experience for families on Cattaraugus Avenue.

Games like mini golf, table tennis, Connect Four, Giant Outdoor Chess, and the arcade basketball games were stationed throughout Washington Boulevard with participants of all ages playing. A zone dedicated to kids was also set up, with schools like Echo Horizon, Linwood Howe, and the Culver City Unified School District’s Academy of Visual and Performing Art (AVPA) contributing inflatable slides, 3D stamp art, and other art-related activities.

Stages for live music were placed at the intersection of Washington Boulevard and Sherbourne Drive and at Washington Boulevard and McManus Avenue. The music lineup featured many local bands like the Culver City High School AVPA Jazz Band, The Front Yard, and The Rusties. Other bands like Double Batch Daddy and Fairfax Station returned to the Art Walk festival to give audiences an exciting show. 

Included in the Art Walk and Roll map were a series of screenings, galleries, and exhibitions, presented by Helms Bakery, farther East of the closed off Washington Boulevard section. With a loose barrier set up at the entrance of the Art Walk, visitors could easily walk between the Sunshine Makers Market at the Helms Design District and the festival just a few feet away. 

With a large collection of Culver City and Los Angeles-based artists, here is a look at some of the artists:

Vintage Menu Art

One of the art vendors, Vintage Menu Art, attracted art collectors and enthusiasts looking for something unique. Barbara McMahon and Eugen Beer collect vintage menus from restaurants, auctions, diners, hotels, and more. Once acquiring them, Vintage Menu Art physically and digitally cleans up and restores the menus. 

“We always work with an original menu, which is damaged in some way,” McMahon said. “It might just be too grubby, or has been folded in half when it was sneaked out of a restaurant 30 years ago, or 14 years ago.”

These collections are a part of American history that grew out of the explosion of diners and restaurants taking advantage of the automotive renaissance in the 1930s. Restaurants with unique menus during this time were eventually overtaken by big chain restaurants.

“These [menus are from] individual bar owners and restaurateurs,” McMahon explained. “They employed great artists to do their menus because it was a marketing instrument.”

Their festival collection included prints from many locations such as Mexico, Hawaii, New Orleans, and more. People browsed through their impressive collection and read through the stories behind each menu on the back of the prints. 

The International Zone

In honor of the upcoming 2028 Olympics, an International Zone was set up with artists from around the world presenting and selling their artwork. 

Alexey Steele, a renowned Soviet painter and the Culver City Arts Foundation (CCAF) Artist Laureate from 2020 to 2022, offered a chance for visitors to add their handprints to his transportable mural, titled “Rings of Love.” This piece is part of the “Love My Neighbor” project and features the Olympic symbol, with the iconic five rings shaped like hearts. 

This mural will be a multi-purpose piece of art, serving as a symbol of community for the city — and potentially as a backdrop at future Culver City events.

The International Zone also featured Los Angeles artist Sandra Zebi, originally from São Paolo, Brazil. Her shop, Zebi Designs, offers colorful, Brazilian art in the form of ceramics, hand-painted tiles, acrylic paintings, digital prints, sculptures and more. Zebi’s inspiration for her art comes from many places: her Brazilian background, Picasso’s unique artstyle, and the multicultural community in Los Angeles.

As part of the International Zone, organized by the CCAF, Zebi felt especially welcomed to Culver City.

“This is my first time here and I love it,” Zebi commented. “I love the people, the community, [and] getting feedback on my work.”

¡Ordena!

In addition to the visual art, were experiences and performances like ¡Ordena!, a food truck which offers dance performances rather than food. Heidi Duckler, the founder of contemporary dance company, Heidi Duckler Dance, came up with this conceptual performance after devastating fires in Portland Mercado in January last year. Portland Mercado is a vibrant Latin American market full of vendors and food trucks slowly rebuilding. 

Duckler, whose dance company had performed there, noticed an empty food truck, which served as an inspiration for “¡Ordena!”. Through their performances with a food truck, they raised funds for food vendors who had been impacted by the fires.

Their performance was so successful, the dance company decided to try performing this in another place with a lot of food trucks: The Culver City Art Walk and Roll Festival. 

Their food truck featured Main “Dishes” like the House Salad with Tango Dressing, or the Skirt Steak with Cold Noodles. The menu included sides, extras, Literary Appetizers, and beverages. 

“It’s interesting to bring dance to people that usually don’t see this,” Duckler said. “We hope to come back.”

To learn more about Culver City’s Art Walk and Roll festival, visit their official website.