I noticed something interesting since the anniversary of the fire. Every fire-related email last year had been about the immediate physical recovery: distributions, remediation, soil testing, insurance, mental health, etc. Last year was a reminder of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs in real-time as we focused on survival, security, and community. This year has struck a different tone and I think we’re collectively climbing to Maslow’s summit of self-actualization. The majority of fire-related emails I have received this year have been about art: art exhibits, art therapy, documentaries, performance art, community murals, and more.
We are living the Eaton Renaissance.
We spent last year plunged into undoing as So Cal Edison’s negligence unmade our world. This year, we are the makers: this is the age of creation. This is the time artists were born for.
The Eaton fire burn area was home to two significant historic art enclaves, from the avant-garde Black artists who formed the lifeblood of Altadena to the counter-cultural bohemian artists who enlivened the Sierra Madre canyon. The convergence of Black and bohemian art defined the cultural heritage of this area: vibrant, rooted, and communal. Last year felt oppressively dim but there’s color again as many makers are finally in a place to think beyond immediate survival needs.
The Eaton Renaissance is shaped by four elements of art: art as an expression of healing; a depiction of truth; a form of connection; and an act of control. All four combine in a gasp of sublimity that gives hope and forward focus once again. It is beautiful and powerful, and I hope that today’s fire babies will sit in a college lecture hall one day learning about the Eaton Renaissance that unfolded during their nascence. In the meantime, I asked some local moms to share their contributions to the Eaton Renaissance.
Art as healing
Many organizations have been holding art therapy workshops for children and adults as part of their fire recovery programming. My daughters have participated in Maple Counseling’s children’s art therapy sessions, which have been hosted by Remainders Creative Reuse and the Pasadena Public Library, and my eldest found it to be very helpful.
For Altadena Candle Company owner Marike Anderson, art has been a very personal form of catharsis and closure through tragedy. After the passing of her husband, Edwin, in 2021, a friend encouraged her to paint through her grief. “I said, “What am I going to paint? Myself in the fetal position?” He replied, “Yes. Paint that.” So I did.”
So Marike painted her way through that great sorrow. “The paintings became a way of communicating with myself when I felt dissociated,” Marike said. “I could see the stages I was moving through — obliteration, anger, longing, even hope — reflected back to me.” Marike connected with a grief art therapist, who counseled her that art helps restore flow in the limbic system, where emotion can become stuck during trauma. “Keep creating,” Marike’s art therapist urged her. “After about fifteen paintings, I felt grounded again — not beyond grief, but back in my body.”
After the Eaton Fire, Marike did not find herself drawn to paint. Mothering through disaster and rebuilding her economic livelihood were all-consuming. However, on the one year anniversary of the fire, Marike completed a self-portrait in front of her burned home and felt an immediate release. “A powerful wave of grief surfaced,” she said. “The painting had held what I couldn’t yet feel.”
“Though it represents loss, it’s beautiful to me now,” Marike added. “It reflects the alchemy of turning devastation into something human and beautiful— an artifact of survival and healing.”
Art as truth
Many fire survivors have embraced the catharsis of storytelling in art as they have navigated their recoveries. “In the beginning, creative writing really helped,” said Hani Shafran, a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and artist. “It was very therapeutic. Now I can come back to my art pursuit and follow beauty and not just the pain.” Hani is a featured artist in the Eaton Fire Collaborative’s exhibit that is on display through March 31.
Ursy Lala’s husband, Marcus Ubungen, is a commercial director and photographer who has spent the last year capturing 8x10 (real film!) portraits across Altadena. Ursy said their work started “as a way to keep our stories alive” and “it’s been both healing to connect with folks and also heart wrenching at the same time.”
Several of Marcus’ portraits are on exhibit at Cafe De Leche in Highland Park. “They are hauntingly beautiful to see in print,” said Ursy.
Art as connection: community art
The Eaton Fire Collaborative and Soul Force Project’s “Culture of Black Excellence in Art” exhibit is a community art celebration running through March 31. Featured artist Jasimen Phillips believes that this exhibit represents the promise of the Eaton Renaissance. “Creation is not just recovery,” she said; “It’s expansion. Art doesn’t require perfect conditions. It allows people and communities to design possibilities in real time. To move from reacting to envisioning.”
“As an Afrofuturist expressionist painter, my work is inherently future-forward,” Jasimen stated. The Eaton Fire recovery itself is an act of Afrofuturism. “Afrofuturism is about imagining possibility, about writing new and empowered narratives. It asks, What comes next? What can we build? Who do we become?”
Jasimen, a traveling artist who works with children, has noticed a shift over the course of our recovery. “What feels different this year is a return to imagination,” she said. “There is space again to create not only from what was lost, but toward what can be.” Children have been quicker to “play, imagine, and build new worlds” since the fire, but she believes that community art can help adults to return to the freedom of creation. “When adults engage with art, they give themselves permission to be imaginative and empowered again,” she stressed.
Art as control: rebuilding
“I’ve started doing ceramics to create my own dishes after losing everything,” said Susan Littenberg. “It’s become a healthy obsession for me.” Susan is taking classes at Green & Bisque Clayhouse, one of two pottery studios in the Eaton Fire community. Sierra Madre’s Creative Arts Group is another studio where members and students have been busily engaged in making and remaking homewares to replace items lost in the fire (and they offer partial scholarships).
The act of rebuilding itself is an exercise in art as control. The artistic flourishes of rebuilding are the parts many have been embracing— a chance to make one’s unique mark. With two thirds of houses in the Eaton Fire community constructed more than 75 years ago, few people have ever had their chance to be part of their home design. “I’m taking the opportunity to design my dream kitchen,” enthused a friend.
For Sidecca owner Adriana Molina, planning a mural was an act of commitment. “I was working on this mural since last July when I decided that I was coming back,” said Adriana. “To me, it was a dedicated piece that Sidecca was back to stay in Altadena. It was something I just felt naturally in my heart to do.” She commissioned artist Annie Bolding of Disco Day Designs to help create a vibrant, retro-inspired homage to Altadena. Through Adriana’s own recovery challenges (after our holiday gift guide was published, Sidecca suffered damage from the heavy rains in December and has still not reopened), the mural has allowed her to “switch my energy to just focus on rebuilding this community, and I am here to stay.”
These are just a few stories of the Eaton Renaissance at work, but between award-winning documentaries, monumental art, and reimaginings of community fixtures, there is so much more to take in— and more on the way. This is the richest time of creation in our community’s history, and we are living art history.
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