And One, Two, Cha-Cha-Cha

Back in the late ‘70s, three local artists took over a former Arthur Murray Dance Studio in downtown Pomona to live and work in.

According to gallery director Darlene De Angelo, the artists’ friends would drop by to discuss art in progress and eventually started bringing along their own works.

Artists Chris Toovey, John Hanor and Bruce Gothard had “only been there for a couple of years and everybody kept showing up,” De Angelo said.

Because it was a former dance studio, the walls were covered with mirrors. Friends convinced the artists in residence to take down the mirrors to display more art, and DA Gallery was born. The name comes from the building’s exterior dance school sign, which had fallen into disrepair to read: “DA------ STUDIOS.”

In 1988, the gallery became a nonprofit organization, providing space for artists to display their works.

This weekend, about 88 area artists are supporting DA by opening their studios for the gallery’s second Fringe Valley Artists’ Studio Tour to support the gallery’s Fringe of the Fringe Festival scheduled for fall, 1993.

“We’re calling it Fringe Valley because we are on the fringe of Los Angeles,” De Angelo said.

For $10, tour participants will receive a map and a book of admission tickets to 22 studios that will be open in Pomona, Claremont, Montclair and Upland, between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m., Saturday and Sunday. There are also coupons for a free cup of coffee at the Haven in Pomona and Nick’s Caffe Trevi in Claremont.

“We did that primarily because we thought that people would like to sit down and talk about what they saw,” De Angelo said.

Tickets are available at DA Gallery, 244 1/2 S. Garey Ave.