Taking a Club to Your Oil Painting

Donning costumes designed by the ghost of Freddie Mercury, the L.A.-based artist collective My Barbarian seems about as far from a group of art school hipsters as one can get. How many tortured MFA grads do you know who have the gall to get onstage wearing a rhinoceros horn dance belt or a giant crown shaped like a Canadian maple leaf?

There’s a reason why My Barbarian was included in Artforum magazine’s infamous Top Ten list in 2008. Their strange combination of ’70s-era fantasia and biting cultural satire stands in stark contrast to all of those ironic neon signs, though their combination song-and-dance routines are definitely something that might fly right over the heads of the mainstream. Here’s some advice if you’re into art: Resist watching videos of their performances online and just show up to the Museum of Contemporary Art for this Saturday’s 7:30 p.m. show, the first big event in the four-month-long “Convention” exhibition. Sometimes it’s better to be initiated on the spot.
Sat., May 30, 7:30 p.m., 2009